J.M.J.

Author's note: Thank you for reading! Thank you especially to Candylou, MargaretA66, ErinJordan, caseykam, and max2013 for your reviews! I would say enjoy this chapter, but you're probably all going to hate me by the end, so…Anyway, God bless!

Chapter XXVI

Frank couldn't believe it that they had actually escaped from the room in which they were imprisoned—through a series of events so unlikely that he couldn't even process them now—only to be recaptured by Angelo and led along the same dark tunnel to the room where the so-called Great One had held his "court." He and Joe had the same number of escorts this time. Angelo was walking behind them, prodding them along with a gun, while Alyssa was leading the way with a torch. Alyssa was walking much too fast and the light from the torch was too far forward for them to see what was in front of their feet. Frank stumbled on a stone on the floor, which drew a moan of protest when it jolted his already-aching muscles after that leap from the window.

"Quiet!" Angelo hissed. "Do you want them to hear?"

"Who?" Joe asked as he helped Frank get his footing again. This time, at least, they weren't handcuffed and neither was gagged.

"Eva and her henchmen, genius," Angelo replied. "Don't pretend you don't know that she's the one who came to wipe us all out."

"Eva Moretti?" Frank asked in confusion.

"How many other Evas do you know who are crazy killers?" Angelo retorted.

"What's she doing here?" Joe asked.

"What do you think? Trick-or-treating? She's here to finish us all off."

"I feel like there are a few parts of this story that we're missing," Frank said. "I thought she worked with you people."

"That's what she wanted us to think," Angelo replied. "She infiltrated our ranks so she could find the Faceless One or whatever the heck his name is and kill him, and now she's decided she's going to wipe us all out."

"Her too?" Joe shook his head. "Is there anyone in Black Rose who wasn't just trying to kill the leader?"

"Alyssa and I were never trying to kill him. We've always been loyal. Like we told you, we just fed you dummies that line. At least, I'm loyal." He dropped his voice. "I wouldn't make any promises when it comes to Alyssa."

"When you were trying to get that picture of your leader," Joe replied. "What were you trying to do? It sort of made a little bit of sense when you were claiming you wanted to kill him. Why did he want that picture? It's not like you were destroying the only copy or anything."

"That was just another excuse. I had to come up with something at the spur of the moment. If you Hardys could get over yourselves for a few minutes, maybe you'd have figured out what my mission was."

They continued down the tunnel a few paces without speaking.

"Why did kill Tony?" Frank asked finally. "You didn't have to."

Angelo snorted in bemusement. "Like I said, you Hardys need to get over yourselves."

It took a few minutes for the import of Angelo's statement to sink in. Then both Hardys realized at the same moment. They stopped walking and turned to look at Angelo.

"Are you saying that was your mission?" Frank asked.

"Tony was your target all along?" Joe added.

"But why?" Frank continued. "What did Tony ever do to you?"

By this time, Alyssa had reached the door at the end of the hallway. She had unlocked it and was frantically gesturing for them to hurry.

"Alyssa has a point, even though it kills me to admit it," Angelo said. He gestured with the gun. "Get moving. If there's time, I'll tell you the whole story."

"But isn't this room a dead end?" Joe protested as he and Frank were herded toward it. "Isn't it the worst place to go if there's someone hunting you all down?"

They were inside the room now and Alyssa was putting a heavy bar across the door.

"Get some decent light in here," Angelo told her.

"Do it yourself," Alyssa snapped. "We're home free now. Let's kill the Hardys and get out of here. I've had enough of this crap."

"Tough. You should have thought of that before you signed up with Black Rose." Angelo looked at Frank and Joe again and frowned. "For all we know, we might be all that's left the whole organization. We could each use one of them as a hostage when we get out of here. I don't care what you do with yours, as long as I never have to see you again."

"What do we need hostages for?" Alyssa asked.

"You honestly think Eva didn't call the cops about us? Or I bet she called Fenton Hardy to lure him in so she could trap him, too. Either way, I want some insurance."

"Well I don't. You're just as paranoid as the rest of them."

"Okay, then I'm going ahead with this, just in case Eva didn't get the Great One," Angelo declared.

He began lighting torches in brackets around the small, round room. Frank and Joe looked around them in surprise now that they could see the place clearly. The walls were stone and there were pillars supporting the ceiling, giving the impression of some kind of castle or dungeon. At a ninety degree angle from the door that they had just come in was another door made of heavy oak. Tapestries decorated with a black rose were hanging on the wall, each ninety degrees from the next. In between each were hung various medieval weapons: swords, pikes, spears, longbows, battleaxes, morning stars, and others that the Hardys weren't familiar with. Directly opposite the door that they had come in was a huge throne, where the "Great One" had sat earlier. The middle of the room, of course, had a pit with the red light in middle. In the light of the torches, Frank and Joe could see that it was a typical red electric light, such as had once been used in a dark room, but large enough to cast at least a little light throughout most of the room.

There was something sinister in all of it, which even Frank could sense. Joe knew it at once. It was the same sense of evil that had been in Ziyou and in the car with Alyssa and Angelo. It almost seemed stronger now, with fewer people there.

"What about Tony?" Joe asked after he had taken a moment to look around and to steady himself.

Angelo checked his watch. "We have a little time yet. I might as well tell you everything. The only trouble is where to begin. We don't have all night, after all."

"Do we have to?" Alyssa whined. "The last thing I need is for you to get carried away, bragging about your cleverness."

"Be quiet! Let's see." Angelo frowned thoughtfully for a few seconds. "All right. We'll just begin at the beginning and give a brief overview. You two already know that my dad was working for Gregorio Moretti, and that Gregorio had him and my mom killed because my dad was going to double cross him. It was then that we all got involved in this whole thing. Really, Gregorio's the person who brought all the rest of us together. My siblings and me got involved because of our parents working for him. Black Rose rented Gregorio out some talent, so that's where they came in. Gregorio, of course, was Eva's father, so naturally she was involved. And then you two and your little circle got pulled in because your dad was investigating the whole affair. So was Alyssa's aunt, you remember, who worked for the FBI, until Gregorio killed her. So it was right there in New York City that all our lives got tangled up together forever.

"You also know that my siblings and I had to go live with our old stuffy uncle, who was—and is—a bachelor and a religious freak. No business raising kids whatsoever. He taught Mario and Belle to be just like him: to let anyone who wants to walk all over them and to be satisfied having nothing because maybe after you die, things will be better. I was old enough, I could see right through it. I split as soon as I could make it on my own. Black Rose sought me out. That's how Black Rose works, you know. Of course you do. You saw Rudger's letter. He explained as much as he knew in there.

"In my case, they didn't come for me because they saw me personally as being of any use to them. It took me a long time to figure it out, but I did eventually. Actually, they came after Alyssa and me for the same reasons. See, my dad had some dirt on Shun. Shun's been with Black Rose from the beginning, you know. It was good stuff, this dirt he had on him. A recording that showed Shun knocking another guy off. Clearly first degree murder. Easily would have convicted him. My dad put it on a floppy disk—don't forget this was the '90s—and was going to turn it over to the cops. Only he never got the chance. Black Rose figured that disk must be somewhere in my dad's personal belongings. They thought I could get it for them, if they could just pull me in. I couldn't, though; when I left home I left behind all chance of getting anything out of there.

"As I said, they recruited Alyssa for the same reasons. She had access to some evidence her aunt had left behind in a compromised place due to her unexpected death. She actually was able to provide it to them, which always made her rather a favorite. She hasn't done them much good since."

"You're getting our roles in this story confused," Alyssa snapped.

"Then there was Eva," Angelo went on, ignoring her. "Black Rose never wanted her. She sought them out and ingratiated herself with them. She was too good and in it too much for herself to be trusted, but she knew too much to be turned away. She even had some fail-safes in place so that if she was killed, everything she knew would be turned over to law enforcement in every country with a Black Rose presence. She claimed at first that she just wanted Black Rose's help in avenging herself on the people she blamed for her blindness—Fenton Hardy, Sam Radley, Mitchell Johnson, and my brother. Turns out, she also wanted to get to our leader and kill him, because she also blames him for the whole thing. But then you Hardys sent her to jail and she had to sit the game out a few years.

"So meanwhile, Black Rose was still going strong then. We had that whole country of Ziyou under our thumbs, we were getting lots of recruits, everything was great. Then we made a fatal mistake: trusting Rudger. He'd been with Black Rose since he was a kid, but he was getting tired of it, I guess. He started purposely recruiting people he knew would be trouble. That's how we got stuck with that idiot, Darcy, for instance. Oh, she wasn't naturally trouble, but Rudger managed to plant enough doubt in her that he ultimately ruined her. Then he sent her on a bogus mission to ingratiate herself with you two, through one of your friends. Classic Rudger-style. He'd hoped that you were good enough detectives that you'd be able to get to Black Rose through her. But he was wrong. Fortunately.

"Another of his recruits was Lisa Prito. He really wanted to get one of your close friends, but you had too good a circle of friends. It's much easier to trap someone who's already lonely, and Lisa fit that bill. He figured she was close enough you'd still get to Black Rose. Wrong again, but that was Rudger for you.

"When our leader found out what Rudger was up to, he was furious. He ordered Rudger to be killed on sight and the recruits all had to take a pledge of loyalty to our leader or face the same punishment. Some did. Darcy was among them, of course. You'll be surprised to learn that your sweet, little Lisa was, too. Oh, we never trusted her to have her do anything, but we kept her in reserve, just in case.

"Then we did find a use for her a few months ago. We've been having a hard time ever since we lost Ziyou. Our leader changed strategies and stopped the recruitments. A lot of people left—or rather, tried to leave. Most of them didn't get very far. We were beginning to be seriously short-handed. Then we found out that my brother still had that floppy disk with the recording of Shun. Shun wanted it. Because Lisa had some mutual friends with Mario—namely, you two—she seemed our best chance to get it without raising his suspicions. She refused. She then had to be taught a lesson.

"The Great One still wanted her, if possible, so he cooked up this scheme to kidnap her brother and use him as a hostage to get her to cooperate. He was the one away from home and family, so he should have been the easiest one to get at. I was assigned the task of actually getting my hands on him. Of course, I had to get him away from Joe here and your buddy, Phil, but I knew exactly the person who could shake you two up. That's why I brought in Darcy. I didn't tell her what it was all about, because I didn't trust her as far as I could throw her. Instead I let on like I was interested in her and was helping her. It was easy to arrange for her to bump into you guys at the beach.

"Then I thought I had my chance that night in the parking lot. I waited by Tony's car, but then you had to go and come up to it first, Joe. I hit you with the pepper spray before I realized it was you and not Tony, so I had to come up with something so no one would suspect what was really up. By the time I finally managed to get hold of Tony, everything was such a mess that I didn't want to take the chance on contacting Lisa. Alyssa was working with me, trying to throw all of you off the scent. She finally agreed we should abandon mission, but what we didn't agree on was what to do with Tony. I wanted to let him go. I figured then you might take the whole thing as a learning experience and leave us alone. Alyssa wanted him dead to get to Lisa."

"That's not how it was," Alyssa said. "You were scared. A coward like you…"

"Shut up!" Angelo flared at her. "I knew what I was doing."

"Why didn't you just let him go?" Joe asked. "If that's what you wanted to do and Alyssa was on the other side of the country…"

"I almost did let him go," Angelo said. "When Frank showed up in that mine shaft, I thought maybe I'd kill Frank and let Tony go to tell the story. But then Tony bumped me so I missed. He saved your life that time, Frank. Too bad he didn't die for someone who would get a little more mileage out of it. Anyway, we're running out of time, so I'd better wrap this up.

"Alyssa was sent back to Bayport get to Lisa. She really shone there, didn't she?" he added sarcastically. "Then we got Eva out of jail for a distraction. The whole point was to try to get that floppy disk away from Mario. We could frame Eva for killing him, considering she's tried to do that before."

"Mario survived, you know," Frank told him.

Some unidentifiable emotion crossed Angelo's face. "I know. Too bad. He must have identified me."

"He's your brother," Joe reminded him, aghast.

Angelo shrugged. "What difference does that make? He's just like my uncle, and I'd just as soon be rid of the both of them. Anyway, that's about the end of everything I know. She showed up here at the same time we have you two here. I think that's a coincidence, but who knows? Maybe she didn't like being framed." He looked at his watch. "Three minutes to midnight. Tie Joe's hands, Alyssa."

Alyssa rolled her eyes. "This is stupid, Angelo."

Frank and Joe met each other's eyes. This was their last chance. All in all, it probably wasn't much worse odds than their original plan of jumping Alyssa and the other guard had been. It was still the two of them, unarmed, against two armed murderers.

"Here goes," Joe muttered under his breath just before he pounced at Angelo.

Amazingly, Angelo didn't fire his gun. Instead, he let Joe knock him off his feet and began grappling with him. Frank grabbed at Alyssa and managed to get hold of her gun hand and forced her to drop it. For a moment, the Hardys thought that they were going to win in spite of the odds.

Then Angelo managed to get on top of Joe and smacked him on the forehead with the gun. For an instant, Joe could only see stars and he forgot all about trying to fight, giving Angelo a chance to help Alyssa. He pulled Frank away from Alyssa, who backed off. Frank had nearly succeeded in getting Angelo in a headlock when he felt something sharp jab into his back. He jumped and turned his head to see that Alyssa had taken one of the swords off the wall and had poked him with the tip. With Frank distracted, Angelo got in a hard blow to his midsection, which knocked the wind out of him. Before Frank could recover himself, Angelo had him backed up against one of the pillars supporting the roof and was binding his hands behind it.

Joe was recovering and attempted to stagger to his feet. Quick as thought, Angelo jumped toward the wall and ripped another sword down. He had it pointing at Joe's throat before Joe had even managed to completely stand.

"Tie his hands, Alyssa," Angelo ordered angrily.

Instead, Alyssa made a leap for her gun. Angelo still had his, and he fired it. Alyssa staggered and fell, while Frank and Joe stared with open mouths. Instantly, Angelo turned on Joe again.

"On your face. Now!"

Joe didn't obey, and Angelo kicked him in the stomach, forcing him to double over. While Joe was still stunned, Angelo took another length of rope from his pocket. He pulled Joe's hands behind his back and then began wrapping the rope around them.

Once Joe was secure, Angelo turned his attention back to Frank. He took a third length of rope and bound it around Frank's chest so that his back was forced against the pillar. Frank winced as the cut from Alyssa's sword smarted.

"I've got to hurry now, after I fired that shot," Angelo muttered, taking a step back and surveying his handiwork. "Eva must have heard. It'll take her some time to figure out where it came from. I won't give her another shot to listen to." He looked back at the wall full of weapons.

"You can't do this!" Joe shouted, trying to rip his hands from the bonds holding them.

Angelo kicked him in the shin. "I told you to shut up."

As Joe ignored him and continued to shout, Angelo strode to the wall and took down a slender spear like some kind of harpoon. He examined the tip as if he was trying to gauge how sharp it was. Then he looked at Frank. "Any last words, Hardy?"

"Don't you dare!" Joe shouted.

Tied though his hands were, he got to his feet and ran forward as if he was going to ram Angelo with his head. Angelo easily stepped out of the way and tripped him so that he sprawled on the floor.

"If you had any last words, your brother just used them for you."

Without further ceremony, Angelo thrust the spear into Frank's side.