Disclaimer: These characters are not mine and I make no profit from them.

Rated: K+

Author's Note: It comes after McCormick, McCormick, McCormick and Hardcastle, in which Mark and Matt spent an interesting afternoon with a bank robber named Kenny DeSalle.

Thanks as always to Owl and Cheri--and to everyone who puts up with Matt.

Monsters

By L. M. Lewis

On Monday, Hardcastle was the first one to the office, even beating Joyce, the secretary, by a half-hour. She found him there, just inside, staring fixedly at something. She stepped in as the judge opened the door for her.

"I heard about it on the news," she said anxiously, "and I tried to call him at home, to see if everything was all right."

"Oh, they're both fine; Kathy, too. They spent yesterday at the estate."

She nodded, her brow still furrowed, and he realized she was giving him a puzzled look.

He gestured to the front door, which he'd been contemplating. "I was just wondering if we ought to get some sort of security system here." Then he shook his head. "Though I don't know how much good it would do if he's just gonna go and open the door to anyone who walks up to it."

"He couldn't possibly have expected that," Joyce protested. "I mean, what would be the odds, a man robs a bank and comes straight here?"

Hardcastle had shifted his gaze to her and there it rested for a moment.

"All right," his secretary finally conceded, "Maybe a security system would be a good idea."

Hardcastle smiled grimly.

00000

An hour later McCormick still hadn't shown up. There'd been a phone call from Frank, asking when Mark planned on stopping by and giving a statement about Saturday's events. It wasn't absolutely essential, not yet anyway, but Harper seemed slightly suspicious.

"I know he had a rough weekend, but—"

"But you think maybe he's going to bat for this guy?" Hardcastle interrupted. "Like maybe you're gonna have an uncooperative witness?"

"Yeah, maybe. I think he's a little too close to this one, Milt."

"Well, you can't get much closer than being the victim," the judge replied dryly.

"Just as long as we don't have a case of Stockholm Syndrome here. I know Mark. When he gets that empathy thing going, he kinda loses perspective. And what am I supposed to think, anyway? While he was still being held hostage, he was already arranging to get you to be the guy's lawyer. What kinda sense does that make?"

"It makes sense that he was trying to get the guy to turn himself in without him hurting anyone."

Hardcastle paused. He took a deep breath. It surprised him how much anger he still felt. He shook free of it. He was part of the arrangement, and he'd just have to deal with it. It was mostly negotiations, anyway. He had strongly counseled his client to plead his way down to the lightest sentence possible and not risk a trial. He'd never wind up defending the man in court, not if DeSalle had one iota of sense.

He was suddenly aware of the silence from Frank's end and recognized it for what it was—Harper was trying to maintain his professional perspective, too.

"Okay," the lieutenant finally muttered. "Will ya tell him to get his butt down here by tomorrow? Just him. I don't want you along, okay? This is weird enough, having you being that guy's defense attorney; I don't want Mark worrying about what he has or hasn't already told you when he talks to me."

Hardcastle harrumphed, which was easier than admitting that so far McCormick had told him practically nothing, just the bare bones of what he'd half-promised to DeSalle in terms of potential charges and sentences. They said their curt good-byes and the judge hung up.

Nearly ten a.m. and still no McCormick.

He supposed he ought to call, but if something had been wrong, surely they would have let him know—Kathy would, at any rate. The judge checked his watch one last time and decided he'd swing by the courthouse. There was the ten-thirty hearing before Judge Gleason that McCormick had been doing the prep for on Saturday.

Hardcastle had offered to deal with it, but Mark had insisted that it would be no problem. Chances were, he'd just decided to sleep in this morning, and head straight over there.

Ten thirty-seven, and there didn't appear to be much going on in Gleason's courtroom, though almost as soon as he stepped into the back Hardcastle was summoned forward. Gleason had an angry scowl and started in on him as soon as he'd approached the bench.

"You tell that associate of yours he's lucky to have gotten off without a citation for contempt. Disrespectful pups these days—"

"Ah . . . " Hardcastle lowered his voice to just above a whisper. "Wally, you didn't see the paper or anything like that yesterday?"

"Hell, no, I was up at the cabin all weekend," Gleason grumbled. "I do that so I won't have to look at the news."

Hardcastle nodded once in what was supposed to be deep sympathy, then he launched into a brief recital of Saturday's events.

"So why the hell didn't he just come in and ask for a continuance?"

"Must've just been a little mix-up." Hardcastle hesitated and then added, "I must've said I was going to do it, and it slipped my mind." He swallowed hard. "Happens sometimes."

Gleason was giving him a hard stare, full of doubt. They'd known each other for quite a few years.

"All right," the man at the bench finally said sternly, "I've rescheduled it for Thursday morning. Ten-thirty sharp."

"He'll be here. No problem."

"And tell him I'm glad it turned out okay." Walter Gleason smiled. It was a little thin, but even this was an astonishing effort.

"I will," Hardcastle nodded, already over his shoulder as he high-tailed it for the door.

Ten forty-five. He'd made three quick phone calls, each dialed with increasing worry. No one answered at the McCormick residence, and Mark hadn't shown up at Frank's or back at the law clinic yet. For the fourth choice he'd wavered between calling Kathy at her office, or contacting the preschool where Matt was enrolled.

It was cowardice, he supposed, not to want to alarm Kathy yet, but he was almost certain there had to be a rational explanation for Mark's absence. He called the school first.

Matt was there, and by all reports fine, according to the staff. He'd been dropped off by his father, perhaps a few minutes later than usual but at least two hours ago.

Hardcastle thanked them and hung up, baffled. He made one last stab at working the phone; it still wasn't a call to Kathy. He dialed the gatehouse—many rings and no answer. Of course not. It would've made no sense, but then, no other possibility did either.

He gathered himself together and tried to decide what to do next. Uncertainty was not one of his usual vices. Maybe he hadn't been too far off when he'd claimed mental slippage as an excuse to Gleason.

The school, he suddenly realized, was where he wanted to start. It had nothing to do with a vague need to actually see the Matt with his own eyes, to confirm that he really was all right. No, it was just a logical starting-out place, the last one where he knew McCormick had been for certain.

He drove, and the whole while he was behind the wheel a series of increasingly improbable and disastrous possibilities presented themselves, but most of them not half as improbable, nor nearly as disastrous, as things that had actually happened to McCormick in the past. If this was radar, the pings were coming way too fast to mean anything good.

He pulled up in front of his destination—small, brick, and sinisterly peaceful. The kids were out in the side yard and he walked around that way. Matt's teacher recognized him—last Christmas's Santa and a visitor on Grandparents Day as well. She waved and headed over.

"Just checking?" she asked. "We heard what happened. I'm amazed. He's really doing quite fine."

Hardcastle nodded. He'd caught sight of him, next one up on the small slide. He'd been spotted, too, and Matt forfeited his turn with a whoop of glee as he charged over to the fence.

"Hi, kiddo." He reached over to ruffle the boy's hair lightly. He really did look okay and the last thing Hardcastle wanted to do was cast a shadow across that.

"You wanna play? We've got cars you can sit in." Matt half-turned and pointed out one of the vehicles in question which, truth be told, would have been an even tighter fit than the Coyote.

Hardcastle smiled distractedly and said, "Just a quick hello. I've got some stuff I have to do."

Matt stuck his lip out, but it was all pretense and gone a second later—back to a flash of smile and another whoop, and he was off.

Hardcastle watched him go, letting his own smile drift down into a more worried expression. The teacher caught his eye and said, "See? He's fine."

"Yeah," the judge forced his smile back, then turned his head to look at her. "His dad, he seemed okay?"

"Ah . . ." Her hesitation spoke for itself. "A little tense, maybe," she finally admitted. "Not that I can blame him."

Hardcastle risked raising the alarm. "Did he say where he was going?"

"Um, I thought he said something about needing to go to the courthouse." She pondered a moment. "Yeah, that was it. He didn't take off right away. He hung around for a few minutes. I finally kinda shooed him out. It's not real good for the kids sometimes."

"What isn't?"

"Oh, they pick up on that stuff, you know, when the parents are upset. Worried."

Hardcastle nodded again.

"When you see him," she said, "tell him Matt's doing fine."

He gave this one final nod and a smile, then ducked his chin and headed back to the car. He next stop would be Kathy's office, and, if that was a washout, a call to Frank for official assistance.

He was back at the corner, turning toward his own vehicle when he spotted it, across the street and a few car lengths down. The Volvo. Of course he hadn't been looking for it, but how he'd missed it the first time he wasn't sure. He ducked out between two parked cars and dodged traffic to get to the other side, breathing a little fast.

Even from twenty feet back, he could see there was someone in the driver's seat, leaning a little toward the door, alarmingly still, but . . . yeah, breathing.

He was breathing again, too, and reached forward to knock on the glass. Mark yanked his head up abruptly and opened his eyes, looking around dazedly. It seemed to take him a half-second to connect with his surroundings. He turned his head toward the window and blinked, then shaded his eyes, then frowned.

He was scrabbling for the door handle. Hardcastle had it open from the outside first.

"You okay?" he asked doubtfully.

"Ah, yeah, what the hell are you doing here?" And then, a second later, "Oh, God, what time is it?" He was scrambling upright and trying to focus on his watch.

"Don't worry. Thursday, ten-thirty, I got you a continuance. I called damn-near everywhere looking for you."

Mark paled. "Not Kathy."

"No, she was gonna be next."

Mark really was looking at his watch now. "Eleven-twenty?" he muttered. "How the hell did that happen?"

"I dunno. You fell asleep."

Mark scrubbed his face with his hands and looked around owlishly again. "Honest. I wasn't planning on it. I was, um . . ."

"Sitting here?" Hardcastle offered helpfully.

"Ah, yeah, I guess," McCormick said sheepishly.

"For how long? I mean, before you conked out."

"Ahh . . . not too long. A while."

"How come?"

"Because—" He paused. He seemed to be thinking about it a bit. He finally said, "Because I didn't want to leave. Is that weird?"

"No," Hardcastle said, "Saturday was weird. This is normal."

Mark was looking out past him, at the school. "Matt's doing okay?"

"Yeah, running around. He seems fine." Hardcastle managed a grin. "You knew I checked, huh?"

"That's . . . good." He didn't spell out exactly which part he meant, but he seemed to be a tad doubtful.

The judge risked a guess. "How was he last night?"

Mark flinched just slightly. "Oh, not too bad. Woke up a couple times. I might not have even heard him—"

"Except you were already awake yourself?"

"Might've been," Mark admitted with apparent reluctance. "We had a bad attack of monsters. Under the bed, in the closet. The laundry hamper even."

"Those are the worst."

Mark nodded slowly, then let out a long sigh. "Well, at least he finally fell back asleep."

"He looks pretty good now." Hardcastle looked at his watch again. "Hey, I'll take you to lunch." Then he frowned. "You okay to drive?"

"Yeah," Mark nodded, "I had a nap."

"Okay, and after that you'll go see Frank. He thinks I'm holding you incommunicado or something, so my client will walk." The judge shook his head. "He has no idea. I dunno—I'm not sure I can handle this, kiddo. My heart's not in it."

McCormick looked up at him. There was more understanding there than the judge would have expected. "I know," he said simply. "But Kenny's not a monster. Really." It almost sounded like he was trying to convince himself. "Just talk to him some more."

"And you don't duck Frank. He needs your statement. You can't shield this guy from everything."

Mark looked puzzled. "That's what you think?" he finally asked. "God, no. That's your job. I . . ."

"Hate him?"

"No," McCormick shook his head. "No, he's not a monster . . . but, my God, he had a gun, and Matt was there." He put his fingers to the bridge of his nose. "If it had been just me—"

"The hell with that," Hardcastle grumbled.

"I mean," Mark pulled back, "kids make everything different."

The judge gave that a long, considering nod.

"And if something had happened to him . . ." Mark paused on this and flushed. "Sorry," he mumbled, after an awkward pause.

Hardcastle took a deep breath and plunged in. "It's a risk, a gamble, a crap-shoot. You pray like hell and you keep a flashlight close to the bed. Nail the hamper shut if you have to. Won't necessarily do any good, but you keep on trying."

"But what if you lose?" Mark was looking up at him, doubt and hope.

The judge said nothing for a long minute, not sure if any of the right answers were really true.

"No platitudes," he finally said. "If you lose it hurts like hell."

The hope faded and the doubt seemed to harden. "I dunno," Mark finally said, very quietly, "I'm not sure I can handle it."

"Too late now. You're in."

One nod, still worried. "Yeah," he exhaled.

Hardcastle let out a long sigh of his own. Then drew in another breath and said, practically, "I'm thinkin' maybe we need a security system down at the office."

Mark raised an eyebrow.

"Just a thought." The judge shrugged.

McCormick smiled wryly. "Maybe if you nail the front door shut."