Sorry it's taken me so long to post another chapter – I've been out of town for the past week and unable to get to a computer. Again, I don't own the Hardys.
It was eight o'clock before Fenton and Joe returned. "It's all been decided," Fenton announced. "You'll fly home tomorrow, Lach."
"No, I won't."
Fenton simply stared.
"There's nobody at home," explained Lach. "Nothing for me to do there. Here, on the other hand, is where things need to happen. There's hope, still, for Michael and Patrick. They need to get rescued. I'm not going home alone, so then one of you'd have to come. Which would make the investigation twice as slow, and that isn't going to happen. Those boys need finding."
Fenton still stared, first at Lach and then at his older son. He had difficulty believing that Lach had had enough coherent thoughts since the telephone call to dream up this plan on her own.
Frank looked steadily back at his father, expressionless.
"You've heard this before," said Fenton. The answer was in Frank's silence. "And you didn't try to talk her out of it." Again, Frank denied nothing. "You're crazy, you know," said Fenton, dead serious. He turned to Lach. "The funeral can't be postponed indefinitely," he said, appealing to her logic.
"True."
"So, when will you go back?"
"When the boys are found."
"That's not necessarily going to be tomorrow, you know."
"I know. They can be buried without me. My parents won't – wouldn't – mind. They'd want what's best for me. And what's best for me is what's best Michael and Patrick. So I'll miss the funeral. But the boys will be found." Lach held Fenton's gaze for a long moment. "I'm going to have a bath and then go to bed. It's been a long day."
As to be expected, Lachlan slept badly that night. They all had gone to bed just after nine, but Lach lay awake until eleven-thirty. She dozed until almost two, when her tossing and turning woke Joe.
"D'you want to go for a walk, get some tea or something?" he asked in a whisper.
Lach nodded. They pulled sweatshirts over their pajamas and prowled the deserted corridors of the Holiday Inn.
Finally, Lach spoke. "Why did they kill my parents? We hadn't exactly made a whole lot of progress. I don't think we were jeopardizing their operation."
"Apparently, they thought so, so maybe we're closer than we think. Dad said something about getting the agency to set up a twenty-four-hour-a-day surveillance on the warehouse and Marriott rooms. And they're sending some agents to Vancouver to work with the police there. Something's bound to happen."
"Something did happen," said Lachlan quietly.
Joe slid an arm around her shoulder. "I can't wait until we catch these guys."
"I can't wait until we find the Jameses." There was a long pause. "D'you suppose that, well, maybe they're in the warehouse? I mean, that's the only place we've been, and they reacted a little strongly."
Joe considered. "Anything's possible." They were in the lobby. The night clerk appeared to be asleep. "Excuse me? Do you know a place where we could get coffee now?"
The receptionist blinked. "Um, no, well, there's coffeemakers in the rooms. Do you need more coffeebeans?"
"No, see, we didn't want to wake up the other people in our room. Thanks anyways. Lach? You want to go look for a place that's open?"
"Can we just go back to bed?" asked Lach.
"Sure. You gonna sleep?"
A wan smile. "We'll see."
The morning passed dreadfully slowly. Fenton left at eight, leaving a note saying to meet him for lunch at noon. Lach and Frank awoke half an hour later and, at Lach's request, went swimming in the hotel pool. "It'll take my mind off things. It's better than just sitting around," said Lach, and Frank agreed.
Lach swam laps. Frank could tell that she wasn't a great swimmer, but she was splashing quickly back and forth, back and forth, fuelled by pent-up emotion. Frank swam at a more leisurely pace before retiring to the hot tub. Finally, gasping for air, Lach joined him. She slid into the tub and sighed. She looked to Frank. "I wonder if Joe's up. Maybe we should go back now."
"Whatever you want."
Without warning, Lachlan began to cry and buried her face in her hands. "I just realized, the last time I was in a hot tub was at Christmas with my parents…" she mumbled through her tears. When Frank tried to comfort her, she pulled away and stumbled out of the water. "Let's go get ready for lunch with your dad. I was talking with Joe last night…"
They wore disguises this time, as they traveled to the warehouse. Frank and Joe were dressed as dockworkers in dirty coveralls and baseball caps pulled low over their faces. Fenton was pretending to be a wino, and the teenagers had a hard time not laughing when they looked at him. Lachlan was in tourist getup, wearing summery clothes and a big sunhat and a camera and carrying maps and exclaiming to herself in loud French.
An hour ahead of time, Fenton took his place on the street half a block down from warehouse. He would provide any distraction necessary.
Lach loitered on a side street. When she saw Frank and Joe walk by, ostentatiously on their way home from work, she would mosey on over to the warehouse.
Shortly after five-thirty, the Hardy boys turned a corner a few blocks away. They were aware of Lachlan following them at a distance. There was traffic on the road, but no other pedestrians. A bit before the warehouse door, Frank knelt down to tie his shoe. Joe leaned against the building, and casually reached over to try the knob. Unlocked. He opened it a crack, and then he and Frank entered in. Joe listened at the door marked Bay 1 and, hearing nothing, he slowly opened it. It was pitch dark, and both boys crept into the bay. Lach was a few steps behind them.
Slowly and silently, they explored Bay 1 after their eyes adjusted to the dark. It appeared to be empty except for a large stack of wooden crates in one corner. Lach found a door, probably leading to another bay, but she didn't try it because Frank motioned her over to the crates. "Do you hear something?" he whispered.
Straining her ears, she nodded. Joe joined them, and they began moving the apparently empty crates around, trying to find the noise. "Mmmgh." All three stopped dead, then, cheered by the sound, they quickened their pace.
"Hey," said Lach. "This crate is nailed shut and the others weren't." Exchanging significant glances, and hardly daring to breathe, they poured their efforts into prying open the crate with a hammer that Frank had carried partly for his disguise, but also as a defensive measure. The murmurs increased. The going was slow; every time the wood creaked, they stopped and listened intently.
Finally, the lid was free, and Joe lifted it off. Shocked, he saw two little boys crouched together in the far corner of the eight-foot-square wooden prison. "Michael! Patrick!" gasped Lachlan, reaching in to them.
The James boys were equally shocked, but wasted no time in leaping to their feet. The crate walls were five feet high, and Frank finally climbed into it and lifted the boys out to Lach's waiting arms. "We're not done yet," whispered Frank. "We still have to get out of here. Remember, be quiet," he added for the Jameses' benefit.
Leaving the warehouse turned out to be easier than entering it had been. Lach left first, with the boys, then Frank and Joe left, walking the opposite way down the street. Unbelieving, Fenton stumbled after Lach, Michael and Patrick.
They soon rendezvoused in their room at the Holiday Inn. "We'll drive to the agency," Fenton announced, "and they'll find us a place to stay." He broke into a broad smile and hugged Michael and Patrick. "I'm so glad that we got you back safely." He turned to Lach. "Thank you for suggesting we check the warehouse. And, Joe, Frank, thanks for convincing me it was worthwhile."
Lachlan was exceedingly glad that the agency headquarters were located in New York, and not Washington, D.C., which would be logical. The drive was half as far, though the three-and-a-half-hour drive was still three hours too long for Patrick. Michael slept; he'd forced himself to stay awake as much as possible during his imprisonment, to protect Patrick if necessary.
Pat, on the other hand, was a bundle of energy at the best of times. Having been cooped up in a packing crate for days, plus the pent-up stress and fear, combined to wire him sufficiently to orbit the earth. He not only wouldn't sit still, but he was cranky and whined and cried at the slightest reproach, and Lach had only so much patience.
An eternity later, the Hardys and the Jameses and Lach got out of the overcrowded car and entered the agency building. The boys were to be whisked away for medical examinations, but Michael, in tears, wouldn't leave Lach's side, and she had to accompany them.
It was late in the evening before debriefing occurred. Patrick was patently useless, but Michael was a veritable fount of information. Their captors had been lax in front of them, obviously believing that the boys would be killed rather than returned to their home and family.
They sat in a conference room, in fairly comfortable chairs around a long table. Patrick dozed, and the others longed to. Around two in the morning, the meeting broke up, and sleeping arrangements were made. Since the night was half over anyways, and the boys were already asleep, it was decided that they would simply bunk on the floor of a large room, and in the morning, they would move to a proper safe house residence.
Lach lay on her back on the floor, covered in a wool blanket. Paddy was curled up on one side of her, and Mike was on the other. She had an arm around each of them, and she could hear their breathing. At their feet slept the Hardys. Lach was the only one awake. These people, well, Mike and Pat, were her only real family left. Her parents were gone, and she had no other kin. Lach's mind wandered to the friends she had left behind in Vancouver. She was hit, for the first time in her life, with homesickness, but in reverse. When in Canada, she would miss the Hardys and Jameses terribly. I will have to go home and deal with things, she thought to herself. I can't escape that reality. Mr. and Mrs. James will come home, but I can come back here for the rest of the summer, Fenton and Laura will let me stay with them, but in September, I have to go home, well, to my hometown, for good. Lach cried herself to sleep.