Chapter Eight

At the kitchen table of the large farmhouse sat Lucas, Noah, Alexis, and Patrick. Each held a handful of cards and on the table lay potato chips instead of poker chips. The sound of screaming children barely reached their ears as Lulu and Spinelli supervised the camp-out much to his delight and her terror.

"Look out, boys. It looks like you're all about to be beaten by a girl!" Alexis laughed lightly raking up the Doritos as the men groaned. Being married to Sonny Corinthos had taught the attorney a thing or two about gambling.

"You have to be cheating." Patrick grumbled, hating to lose at anything. Much like Alexis herself.

"Get over it, Dr. Drake. You just got your ass handed to you." Alexis said with a smug grin that the egotistical doctor hated desperately.

"As much fun as playing Texas Hold 'em with Doritos is, I would like to know where Luke and Lucky have gone. I'd also like to know what the plan is." Lucas cut in, looking at Alexis for a straight answer that no one else seemed interested in giving him.

"There is no plan. Luke is flying by the seat of his pants like he always does." Noah snorted, the disdain for his brother-in-law clear to the others in the room.

"There's always a strategy in dealing with my step-mother, Noah. What Luke's is…he didn't tell me and I have no idea what he could be thinking, but I trust him to make the right calls. I have three daughters, grandchildren, and my nephew's family to worry about. He made the right call. We made the right call."

"Well, what could Helena want from us?" Patrick said.

"I don't know. Luke's head mounted on the dining room wall at Wyndemere is probably a good place to start guessing." Alexis joked.

"I know he's not afraid of her. He's afraid for the kids and Laura and the rest of us." Lucas said, still young enough to think of his quirky uncle as somewhat of a superhero.

"Maybe so." Alexis replied, not knowing the true answer herself. Lucas nodded before getting up and walking off. Noah followed behind his step-son, and Alexis herself stood up. She looked at the youngest Dr. Drake as he pensively sat with his arms crossed, engrossed in inward thought. She sighed and ruffled his hair before stepping outside to check on her two youngest children, turning off the light in the kitchen to leave him to his thoughts.

How did he end up here? A few years ago, he had no one. All he wanted was a fantastic career and an endless string of no-name sex with beautiful women who never called. When had that stopped being enough?

Here he was. The world famous womanizer with no family to speak of was in a house full of people that mattered to him including the son who thought he hung the moon and the wife that owned his soul.

He had hurt her though in a way he had never thought he could. It was a mistake. Liz and he both had been drinking. She was a friend to both of them. It hadn't been at all awkward to be alone in the house with her. He still didn't understand how he could have gone there.

It had all started at work when he and Elizabeth had scrubbed in on a craniotomy, and the five-year-old had died on the table. Both were so shaken up because of their own little boys at home. They just wanted to take the edge off, so Patrick opened up a bottle of vodka. The rest, they say, is history.

All he remembered was laughing hysterically with Liz, and the next thing he knew his wife was looking at him … like he was Clark Kent. She used to look at him like he was Superman.

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Johnny's deep eyes widened at the man before him. When the hell had Morgan come back to town?

"Well, now that we're all here…" Frisco's voice trailed off as he looked to Robert to take over the explanation. No way would these Mob boys be able to hack the spies usual need-to-know only way of handing out information.

"We wait." Robert said, calmly.

Sonny's eyebrows rose. What did that old man mean by wait? Sonny wasn't waiting anymore. When he thought there was nothing to be done about his wife and ex-wife disappearing with his kids, he was calm. Now that he knew he had resources… well, it was an entirely different ballgame.

Jason, on the other hand, was as cool as ever. He knew that Robert hadn't come for no reason. He would reveal himself in time, as would Frisco.

Johnny stood up straighter, anger overcoming his rational side. How dare these people come into his home, practically take him hostage, and then tell him to wait to find Nadine?

It just wasn't happening.

"Screw waiting." Johnny said with a dark note to his voice. Pulling his gun, he aimed it at Robert. "I want answers now, Scorpio."

"Cool your jets, man. All will be revealed in due time," Robert said, hands up to try and reason with the boy.

"No, I've had a fucking rough year, and I'm tired of waiting around for things to happen. It's time I made them happen." Johnny took a shaky breath. "Now…why the hell are we here? Or better yet…why are you here?"

Before Johnny even knew what was going on, he was on the ground with his gun across the warehouse floor at the feet of Jason Morgan. On his back, however, stood one Frisco Jones.

"He said, 'We wait.' So we wait. You calm now?"

"I told you we should have killed him three years ago," Sonny said under his breathe to Jason.

Johnny stood slowly as Frisco smiled easily with his own gun pointed at the unarmed hothead.

"We know you're worried, boy, and you're young, so listen up." Robert said. "The only way to find Luke when he's gone into hiding is to let him come to you."

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"Hey, Baby girl." Bobbie said as she walked into Caroline Leigh's room to find her daughter looking at an old picture, crying silently. She didn't have to ask who it was of because Bobbie already knew. It was the same damn man Carly had always cried over.

Jason Morgan.

"Mama, I miss him so much." Carly began to sob, and Bobbie ran over and scooped her grown baby into her arms, holding her close.

"I know you do. What brought this on?"

"Michael looks so much like him when we were younger. He even acts like him sometimes, and MJ - she's his own baby, and he doesn't know. Hell, no one does except for my brothers, Noah, you, and the girls."

"Ah, the diamonds." Bobbie smiled at the nickname for the five best friends. "Want me to go get one of them?"

"No, they don't understand." Carly said. "Loving Jason is apart of me I wish I could let go of, Mama. I just don't know how not to love him."

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"Hello, Noble Nurse Nadine. How is the sweet expecting one this evening?" Spinelli asked as he came up to the piano Nadine sat on the bench of, staring at the ivory keys.

"I'm fine, Spinelli. The baby's kicking. Wanna feel?"

"NO!" He jumped back about two feet with the color draining from his face. "No, thanks, but the Jackal wouldn't like to feel feet coming from the Noble Nurse's abdomen. Maybe next time!"

He yelled the last part out as he ran out of the door, sending Nadine into tremendous giggles. Lucas came in with a glass of milk for his best friend.

"What are you laughing about?"

"Nothing. Sit with me. I'll tell you a story." She said, pressing keys like children do: one at a time.

"You're thinking about Johnny?"

"Shut up! You'll ruin my story, Lucas." She told him, smiling. "There once was a girl who had a beautiful, but lonely life. She had a gorgeous hunk-of-a-best friend and four women who had become her family. She worked with children all day, helping them get well from different diseases. All in all, she was content. But she still felt like something was missing, and then one day…there was a man."

"Let me guess…he rode in on a white horse?"

"No, a black Roadster."

"And they fell madly in love?"

"Yes, they did."

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