A/N: My muse is back from holiday. He has arrived in form of CSI: Miami episodes in which I get ideas from this story. Good thing there are heaps of episodes for me to watch. I didn't plan for the ending to turn out that way, but you know how it is with writing. I'll stop babbling now.
Disclaimer: I own twenty one Hardy Boys books, but not the Hardy Boys *Cue sad face*
Chapter Eleven
Joe felt as if he was rooted to the spot. His throat was incredibly dry and there were a million and one thoughts racing through his mind as he gripped the phone tightly.
"Who is she?" Joe managed to ask after a few moments of silence. He forced himself to calm down and focus. As horrifying as the case was, he had to keep a clear mind in order to get anything done.
"Her name is Ali Richards and she's from Millerstown. I'm going to email you and Frank all the information I have gained from talking to her parents," Fenton told his son. After being called by Ali's parents, he had spent the morning with them learning all about their daughter and how she had disappeared.
"How similar is this disappearance to the other two?" The younger Hardy asked. As the words came out of his mouth, Frank glanced at Joe in horror. He hadn't been paying too much attention to the call as he was so engrossed in his thoughts about the other two girls.
In his mind, he had already formulated a plan. They were going to Klicksville to visit Milly's family to see the package and gather more information about it. Frank was hoping that it was going to lead them to possible suspects, but you could never be too sure with cases like this, so he wasn't going to keep his hopes up. Having another girl to also read case notes about was going to change his plans and he wasn't too keen on the thought. Frank was the type of person who hated having his agenda changed, although that had seemed to be what was happening more often than he would like.
When the elder Hardy heard Joe ask their father if the new missing girl might possibly be linked to the two other disappearances, all thoughts of his plans had disappeared and was replaced with a rush of fear. He hated cases like this and had dealt with very few of them. All Frank wanted to do was catch whoever was doing this to these poor girls and imprison them for life.
"I think you should read the case notes," Fenton murmured in a low tone before hanging up. Joe sighed, dropping the phone from his ear. From the tone of his father's voice, he already knew the answer to his question. Without a word, he made his way to his bedroom, Frank quick to follow his younger brother's heels.
Joe sat in front of his laptop, his brother standing behind him with a hand placed on the younger Hardy's desk, leaning over his brother slightly. They both said nothing as Joe booted up his laptop and waited to check his emails. Both of the boys were too engrossed in their own thoughts that they didn't bother to even make eye contact.
A few minutes passed and Joe had downloaded the folder that his father had sent him. Before he opened the file, the blonde haired boy twisted around on his computer chair to face his older brother.
"We're going to have to do this methodically," Joe said, looking Frank straight in the eye. For a split second, the elder Hardy was slightly taken aback. Everyone who knew the Hardy brothers knew that Frank was the more logical, organized and analytical of the pair, whereas Joe was the impulsive one who always acted on his gut. Hearing his brother talk about 'doing things methodically' was something Frank rarely heard and it always surprised him. The brunette knew, however, that his younger brother was right and they were going to have to search through the case files in a way that would get them all the information they wanted. Frank's mind raced as he tried to think of the most logical way to go through the information.
"What we're going to do is go through the word document that dad sent, finding words that have linked Milly and Yolanda together. Hopefully we'll find enough to link all three of the girls together. We'll see how she got kidnapped and check if there are any eyewitnesses. And then we'll look through the photos and find all the similarities between the three girls," Frank said after a moment's thought. The younger Hardy said nothing, but nodded in agreement.
"How about you get your laptop and look through the photos while I go through the documents?" Joe suggested. The fact that Milly Severson's had gotten a package with a finger in it hadn't left the younger Hardy's mind and he still wanted to go to Klicksville and investigate the package and see if that left them with any clues. With Frank looking at the photos and he at the documents, they were hopefully going to go twice as fast, so they could leave earlier and arrive at Klicksville quicker. Joe knew that his brother had the analytical eye and would be able to catch things in the photos that the younger Hardy might miss.
As if Frank read the blonde haired boy's mind, he quickly walked out of Joe's room to go to his own bedroom in order to grab their own case notes and his laptop. On his way back to his brother's room, he bumped into his sister. Literally.
Papers, photographs and scrap pieces of paper flew all over the hallway as the siblings collided, but Frank was glad that he managed to hold on to his laptop. He managed to stay standing up, but Faith, who was a good foot shorter and at least twenty pounds lighter, was lying on the floor in the mess of paper. He quickly bent down to help her sit up, immediately apologizing as he did so.
"What's got you so inattentive?" Faith couldn't help but ask as she helped her eldest brother pick up all the paper he had dropped. Ever since her two brothers had a conversation in the hallway without her, they had both been acting strangely. Seeing Frank in such a frazzled state started to worry the youngest Hardy. It was extremely rare that Frank was ever in this mindset and it could only mean one thing. The case was starting to eat at him. It had only happened once or twice, whenever someone he cared about was in danger. From what Faith knew, Frank knew none of the girls previous to the case, so she couldn't help but wonder what was going on with him.
"Sorry," Frank apologized once more as Faith handed him a small stack of papers she had gathered. He took them gratefully and placed them on top of his laptop, silently reminding himself to sort through the papers and photographs as soon as he got to Joe's room. "Just the case," he tried to answer his sister's question as nonchalantly as possible, but Faith wasn't buying it. She raised an eyebrow at her oldest brother, but didn't bother to question him further.
"Well, I'm downstairs if you need me. I'll bring up sandwiches and coffee in about half an hour," she told him instead, turning around and heading towards the stairs. Frank made his way to his younger brother's room, breathing a sigh of relief. He hated lying to his sister and leaving her in the dark, but he knew that it was the best for her.
Within the next five minutes, the eldest Hardy busied himself with organizing the jumbled case notes. He laid all the notes into four piles: the photographs, notes about Milly, notes about Yolanda and notes that made both of the cases similar. Frank handed Joe the fourth pile, giving him the information he needed to find in Ali Richard's case notes.
"What do you have so far?" Frank asked his younger brother as he waited for his laptop to start up. They were seated on opposite sides of the small room, Joe at his desk, Frank sitting on the floor leaning on the bed. The pair both had notes scattered around them, with highlighters to mark all the similarities. They also had a notepad and pen ready to take any new notes. Joe had said nothing for a moment, glancing down at his messy scrawl in his notepad to see what he could tell his brother that would be useful information.
"She's eighteen, a senior at Millerstown High. Only child, middle-class family. Last seen two days ago near the local library. There was one eyewitness, I'm reading the account now," the younger Hardy murmured as he continued to read the file in front of him.
"Right, keep me posted," Frank replied. He downloaded the folder and clicked 'open' on the first Jpeg file. What he saw absolutely shocked him and he struggled to keep his composure. The elder Hardy stared at the picture in a mixture of shock, horror and fear.
Joe noticed that his brother went silent and turned to face him. Seeing Frank deathly pale as he stared at the screen scared the younger Hardy and he was quick to make his way over to his brother to see what the matter was. When he caught sight of the picture, he gasped.
All three of the girls looked so similar.
Long blonde hair that reached mid-back and naturally wavy.
Bright blue, almond shaped eyes with thick blonde, long lashes.
Pale skin.
A petite, lithe frame.
"They're being targeted," Joe let out a hoarse whisper. He blinked a few times to try and focus before completely shutting his eyes. The mere thought that innocent teenage girls being targeted and kidnapped because they all looked the same made him feel sick right to the pit of his gut.
Frank was freaking out for another matter entirely. Although he was also trying to stomach the fact that young girls were being taken by some mad person, he could only think of Callie. She fit the description that all three of the kidnapped girls did. All three of the kidnappings were in small towns near Bayport and Frank couldn't help but think that his girlfriend might be next. The thought made the elder Hardy want to go and punch a wall.
The pair didn't know how long they sat there in silence, but it seemed like forever. Both boys were completely engrossed in dissecting the case notes of Ali Richards to see what all three girls had in common. As it turns out, they could've been carbon copies of one another. All three girls were cheerleaders, on the track team, on the honor roll and all had one younger brother and a steady boyfriend.
"Why the hell are these girls getting targeted?" Joe spat out angrily after reading the eyewitness account for the third time. There wasn't much to work on, the eyewitness had barely been paying attention. All the blonde haired boy could get out of the account was that it was a tall man dressed in all black who had approached Ali and they had walked away together. Since the eyewitness was far away, they didn't know whether words were exchanged or anything like that. That meant that Ali either knew whoever had taken her, or she had been threatened. It really wasn't much to work on, but it was something.
Frank sighed, running a hand through his dark hair as he glanced at the photos again. There was nothing to suggest that the girl had any enemies, which really didn't help the case at all. The elder Hardy glanced at his watch, sighing once more.
"Joe, it's nearly noon. I think we should head over to Klicksville and check out that package," Frank murmured as he set his laptop on his brother's bed and stretched. Joe nodded in agreement, grateful that he was going to get out of the house. The blue eyed boy hated staying inside for a long period of time and desperately wanted to get up and do something active. As he saved the new case notes and logged off his laptop and got up out of his computer chair when a thought hit him.
"Sounds like a good plan bro, but what are we going to do about Faith?" The younger Hardy asked as he grabbed his black Nikes from underneath his desk. Frank glanced at him, wondering what he meant for a second. He had been so engrossed in his thoughts that he had even forgotten his sister was in the house.
"I don't think we should bring her along…" Frank trailed off, thinking of the case. There was no way he wanted his sister to be involved in something that could be potentially dangerous, not to mention quite gruesome. When he saw the look on his younger brother's face, he knew that they had no clue.
"I know it's not the best idea, but we can't just leave her home. You know that, I know that and our parents know that. The Pritos are out of town this weekend and there is no way in heck I am going to leave Faith at Levi's place," Joe replied as he slipped on his shoes. He knew for a fact that he and Frank had disappointed their sister many times in the past few weeks and he wasn't about to do it again.
"Yeah, I know," Frank muttered, seeming rather reluctant as he stood up from Joe's bed. He left the room to go grab his shoes before going downstairs to see his sister. Faith was seated at the kitchen table, looking like she was working hard on a school project.
"Faith, Joe and I are going to Klicksville for the new case," the elder Hardy began quietly as he entered the kitchen.
The youngest Hardy was surprised to see that her brother had left Joe's room. He had seen them working hard on the case as she had passed by her blonde haired brother's room. They had left the door open and as she slipped past the room, Faith had glanced in and saw both of her brothers glued to their computer screens.
"Oh," Was all she said, unsure of how to react. She was hoping for a day spent with her brothers and just hanging out with them. It had been a long time since they had done anything together, just the three of them. Since this new case has started, it seemed to be all they planned on doing in their spare time. Either that or spending time with their friends.
"Do you want to come with us?" Frank asked, sounding rather meek as he grabbed the car keys off the kitchen counter. He had secretly hoped that she was going to say no, but they both knew what the answer was going to be.
"Sure," she said with a smile as she packed up her things. She was quick to put her things back into her room and grab her shoes before making her way to the car. Faith wondered what was going to happen in Klicksville, but she wasn't completely sure she wasn't going to like.
The siblings were on their way to Klicksville in the matter of minutes. The small town of about nine thousand people was about an hour and a half north of Bayport, the drive not particularly interesting but rather windy. The two Hardy boys were itching to talk about the case, but with Faith sitting in the back seat, they didn't want to say anything in front of her. Especially anything to do with the package. They simply sat in the car with a local radio station turned out and music pumping through the speakers.
Faith was blissfully unaware of any of the dark side of the case. All she knew was that there were now three missing girls that all looked the same, but that was about it. She knew that her brothers and father were not going to let her know any information and she was glad. Although she had the tendency to be a curious person, she never liked to hear about the cases. She was just pleased that she got to spend time with her brothers.
The ride was quiet for the first thirty minutes of the journey, all three of the Hardy siblings absorbed in their own thoughts. Frank and Joe in particular were thinking about the case, but both of them in different aspects. Joe was thinking about the missing girls and about the eyewitness case he had read so many times. He was hoping that they were going to find a few decent leads in Klicksville and that they would find the girls safe and sound, but for some reason, his gut was telling him that it was going to be a different story.
Frank, on the other hand was thinking about Callie. He was that he was being incredibly selfish since three girls lives were in danger, but he couldn't shake off the feeling that his girlfriend was going to be a part of the case, whether he liked it or not. The elder Hardy didn't have a particularly good feeling about the case in general and thought that it was going to get much worse, as much as he didn't want it to.
The youngest Hardy was thinking about something entirely different. She was thinking about the two teenage boys who were sitting in front of her. They both looked so different from behind, one with short dark hair that was impeccably neat and a straight back, the other with tousled longer blonde hair that flicked slightly at the ends who was slouched against the car seat. Yet, they were so familiar in many ways, but so different in other ways. She wondered what had happened between the three of them.
Sure, both Frank and Joe were still the best of friends, but nothing was ever going to change that. What she was wondering was what had separated her from her brothers. They had all been so close growing up, but in the past two years, it was like she barely existed. Of course, they did everything possible to get her back alive when she had been kidnapped and was by her side every step of the way during her physical recovery, but with the small things, they were busy with their own lives. She highly doubted that they had ever been to any of her soccer games, just like her father.
There were times that she didn't feel part of the family. By blood, she knew that they were all related and she even looked like all four of her family members, but sometimes she felt like she didn't belong. Unlike her brothers and father, she hated being in dangers and she wasn't an outdoor person, but all her family members were. Faith had been to countless track meets, football games, softball matches, swimming competitions that her brothers were involved in, but she couldn't remember one time her family had all been to one of her musical performances or her soccer games. Heck, her mother was the only person who came to her middle school graduation. Faith sighed, twisting her long hair around her pinky finger.
"You guys don't want me here, do you?" She murmured quietly from the back seat. Both of the boys were slightly surprised that she had spoken up, considering she had been silent throughout the journey.
"Of course we do," Joe replied, but she couldn't help but miss his slight hesitation. The blonde haired Hardy instantly felt guilty for what was going on. He loved his sister so much more than he'd ever admit, but he hated seeing her in danger. What had happened during her kidnapping and the aftermath had torn him to shreds and he had promised to himself that something like that would never happen to her again. Joe had never thought in a million years that his efforts of trying to protect her were slowly pushing her away in the process.
"No you don't," Faith insisted with a small hiss. "The only reason I'm here is because mom and dad made you take me. You know if you really didn't want me around, you could've dropped me off at the Hadlows."
Silence filled the Hardy's van as both of the boys tried to figure out a way to reassure their sister that they cared. Hearing a small sniffle from the back seat made Frank's heart tear into two. He hated seeing anyone he cared about crying, especially when it was his baby sister and especially when it was partially his fault. The eldest Hardy pulled over as soon as he could and cut the engine to turn and face his sister.
Joe was two steps ahead of his brother and opened the car door as soon as he heard the engine turn off. He was quick to unbuckle his seatbelt and climb out of the van and rushed to the back passenger's door and pulled it open before climbing in and sitting next to his sister. Nobody said anything as Joe put his arms around his sister and wrapped her in a tight embrace as she sniffled against his shoulder.
"It's okay Faith, it's okay," Joe murmured in her ear as Frank unbuckled his seatbelt and rushed to join his siblings in the back seat of their van. He put his arm around her shoulders and squeezed it tightly.
"Faith, we're trying to protect you," the elder Hardy tried to reassure her. Frank didn't know what else to say. He just wanted everything to be okay again, to be the way it was before the kidnapping. Faith lifted her head off Joe's shoulder and quickly wiped away any remaining tears on her face.
"By pushing me away?" She cried, trying to hold back more tears. Usually, she wasn't such an emotional person, keeping her feelings to herself like her brothers did, but she couldn't help it. Faith was tired of her brothers not being around anymore and had decided it was time they knew what she was feeling. It wasn't exactly the way she wanted to tell them, but nothing could be done now.
"No, no," Joe soothed, rubbing circles on her back to try and calm her down. He never enjoyed seeing anyone in distress, it was why he loved being an amateur detective so much, to try and help people get out of their problems, but he couldn't stand to see his sister cry. "All we've been trying to do is protect you. Seeing you in that hospital bed after we found you almost killed me Faith, I can't see that again," He murmured the last part, his voice only a mere whisper as he tried to hold back his emotion.
"Sorry for pushing you away Faith, we never meant to," Frank added in the most sincere tone he could muster. "We won't do it again," he promised as he leant in to press his lips against her forehead.
"I guess she should probably head to Klicksville," she suggested a few minutes as she lifted her head off Frank's shoulder where she had been resting. They had sat there in a contented silence, all equally grateful that their relationships with one another had been restored. Both of the boys nodded, glancing at each other before giving her a quick squeeze. They both got up from their places beside her and made their way back to the front of the van.
Within minutes, they were on the road again. Faith had never felt so safe with her two brothers' arms around her and never wanted to leave the position, but she knew that they had work to do. They were her heroes, but it was time they were heroes for the missing girls and their families too.
What do you think? Next chapter will include more information about the package :3
