Red: When Cherylann posted the snippet about "John Daley's brother" in Fire and Ice, my response was WHOSE brother?? And I had to go hunting through the story for "John Daley" to figure out who he was. We can share the dunce cap!

Thanks to everyone for the great reviews and support. Your anticipation made me work at completing this chapter. It is the last one, with an epilogue to follow.

Disclaimer: I'm just using the character for this last chapter and one more epilogue, thank you.

The saga didn't end at the Hardy household with cups of hot chocolate, comfortable chairs and familiar surroundings. Instead, it ended at Bayport hospital.

Most of the hospital staff knew Frank and Joe Hardy by sight. By the time Frank was 18 and Joe was 17, they had been admitted to the emergency room more than most people are admitted to any hospital department throughout their lifetime. At 20 and 19, Frank and Joe were at the hospital again; but this time as concerned visitors instead of patients.

Fenton and Laura had been admitted at 2 AM for observation. Their oxygen levels were still low as a result of the carbon monoxide poisoning. Fenton had also been treated for the various injuries he had received. Frank and Joe had been examined by the doctors who ultimately decided not to admit them, but had given them strict instructions to drink lots of fluids, get a lot of rest, and report back if they had the slightest headache or felt dizzy. But the warning proved unnecessary as neither Frank nor Joe had any intention of leaving.

As the sun was beginning to rise, Frank and Joe stretched out on uncomfortable couches in the waiting room and waited. Callie and Vanessa had told them what little they knew about their mother and all the events of the past few days before they had fallen asleep in padded chairs. Once in a while a night nurse passed by, but except for that, the entire hospital wing was completely quiet. The nurse had told them that they could see their parents when they were ready for them, but that had been a half an hour ago.

Even though their girlfriends had filled in some of the blanks, Frank and Joe had too many unanswered questions to sleep peacefully. All they could do was wait together, wait until the two people who had the complete answers were available. And there was no one they would rather be waiting with than a brother.

"Your Dad's sleeping," Laura's soft voice came from behind them. Sitting up, they turned to look at her. She looked extremely tired, but otherwise looked as she always had, except for the can of oxygen she was dragging behind her.

"How bad was it?" Frank asked, looking both anguished and frustrated. "I-"

"Concussion, bruised ribs, and some torn tendons," Laura answered. "Thankfully, he will make a full recovery. It was not your fault," she continued and put up a hand to forestall Frank's next comment. "The fault lies with Thomas alone. There is nothing you or I could have done."

Looking at his mother, Frank saw that she faulted herself just as much if not more than he blamed himself for his father's suffering. That thought was strangely comforting. If she knew exactly how he felt, but still maintained that neither of them could have changed anything, then strangely enough, he could believe her. Just as he was about to move on to the next topic on his mind, Joe got there first.

"Why didn't you tell us?" he asked. "Maybe not when we were kids, but at least before we went to college. All those years, you just…"

At the sound of his voice, both Callie and Vanessa woke up. Yawning, they turned their faces toward Laura to see what she would say.

"Guilt," Laura said simply. "And fear of rejection. I didn't want you to think any less of me than you did before you knew."

"But you were pardoned," Frank said logically. "You helped the police catch a lot of people. And, all of your crimes were forgiven. Why would we think any less of you?"

"Forgiven?" Laura said. "Regardless of any official pardon, that is what I did. Yes, I changed, but I'm not going to pretend I didn't do what I did."

"How could you think we would have rejected you?" Joe asked. "You're our mother, no matter what you did before we were born."

"You are also detectives with the black and white view of the world that the job requires," Laura said, glancing at Frank. "Now you're old enough to understand that the world isn't always like that, but would you have understood that when you were younger?"

"That's not the real reason," Joe said standing up and looking at her directly. "There's more."

Except for the distant drone of a television, the room fell silent as four blue eyes fought a silent staring battle before the older pair yielded to the younger.

"I was hiding from myself as well. Trying to pretend that part of me never existed, and I could live my life as if it never happened. When Frank was born, it was a new start, and I did everything I could to keep it that way. And part of that was never talking about it, never starting down the path that could lead me back to Laura Basden, Camrazzi operative."

"The last few days have been hard," she continued in an uncharacteristic understatement. "I've gone back and forth between Laura Hardy and Laura Basden. There were times when I felt like I had completely turned back to my old ways, and times when I could think of nothing except rescuing you and feeling guilty about having involved Callie and Vanessa into this whole mess."

"Collig was right, you would never have joined him," Joe said firmly.

"He was right, but I wasn't sure. I needed to know that myself, and I found that out earlier tonight."

"What we do doesn't bother you?" Joe asked, needing to make sure. "After all, we're tracking down people who uh…"

"Some are how I used to be, others are far worse. And Fenton asked me the same thing when you two started solving your own cases," Laura told them. "Nothing made me more proud than seeing you two work together to bring criminals to justice. Nothing. If you two had chosen a different life, I would have been happy with that, too. But when I see what you two are doing, I almost think you're making up for what I did before."

"You've never said anything," Joe said wonderingly. "Not once."

"I wanted to. But I always held myself back. If I had told Joe how to open a locked door in about thirty seconds flat and taught Frank how to hack into the DMV database, wouldn't you two have been curious about how a librarian picked up those skills?"

"You can hack into the DMV mainframe?" Frank asked, raising his eyebrow. "It took Phil months to figure out how."

"You and Joe are what Fenton and I could have been," Laura said. "A team. And nothing will ever change that."

"What you could have been," Frank repeated. "But why did you give up your life for Dad and become a librarian? I would never ask Callie to do that for me."

"I'd kill you if you tried," Callie interjected.

"A different era," she said. "There were not as many opportunities for women back then as there are now. But I didn't give it up just for him. I gave it up for myself, and for you. Like I said earlier, I didn't trust myself enough to work undercover permanently."

"What about now?" Frank asked. "What will you do now?"

"Fenton and I talked a little bit, and he mentioned he could use some help with some of his cases. We'll see…"

"Did it really take you six days to write those computer science notes?" Frank couldn't remember ever feeling this nervous in her presence before; including the time he had knocked over a candle and set the living room rug on fire when he was seven. But his mother had been honest with him; he owed it to her to be honest in return.

"Yes," she said and laughed. "Technology has advanced and changed. I had to look up some of the specifics on the internet. But I do remember how hard that stuff was when I first started learning it, so I did what I could."

"Mom, when I found out, I was angry," he admitted. "I called you and Dad hypocrites. Even when he tried to explain the whole situation to me, I still didn't quite believe him… And then you almost died..." his voice trailed away.

"I'm sorry," he said and frantically tried to get his thoughts in order. But when it came down to it, there were only two things he needed to say "I was a jerk and… I love you!"

"You were hurt, Frank," Laura answered. "You weren't being a jerk. And I love you, too!"

Laura reached across the table for a piece of paper and began to draw quietly. Her brow furrowed in concentration, she was able to produce a remarkable likeness of Joe, Vanessa, Frank and Callie. "I haven't drawn in at least 20 years. I was afraid that it would cause me to revert back to who I was. But, nothing can do that now."

"So," Frank said after casting an approving eye at the picture. "The professor mentioned this complex problem in class the other day…"

Joe decided to escape before they started comparing computer programming strategies. As Callie and Vanessa left to call their parents, he wandered down the hall and took a seat in the only available chair located in his father's hospital room. Fenton's breathing was slow and steady and the monitor showed a strong pulse. The eyes that had recently regained their spark were now closed.

Looking at Fenton, Joe was reminded of how many times he had woken up in the hospital to see his father's concerned face peering down at him. Now that their positions were reversed, Joe could only marvel how his parents could have gone through this so many times, never asking him to stop what he was doing. If he ever had a kid himself, he would steer his son or daughter toward a less dangerous occupation. Something like bungee jumping, skydiving, or being a racecar driver.

"Joe," a familiar voice interrupted his thoughts. "Joe!" it repeated insistently.

"Dad," he said sitting upright in his chair and looking at Fenton's open eyes. "How are you feeling?"

"Fine," Fenton lied, even though his ribs ached. "His eyes wandered to the empty bed next to his.

"Where's-"

"Having a talk with Frank," Joe answered. "I left when it started to get technical."

Fenton grinned and his face filled with color. "How's Frank taking it?" he asked.

"He's come around," Joe answered. "Seeing as how Callie did her best to set him straight earlier, and you both almost died, he's come around. He's now thrilled to be able to talk techie with someone in the family."

"Good," Fenton said. "Maybe she'll stop badgering me to transfer my files to the computer."

Joe got up and filled a plastic cup with water from the sink. He walked over to the bed and helped Fenton sit up and take a sip from the glass of water. Sighing in relief, Fenton laid his head back on the pillow.

"Joe, I'm sorry," he said so softly that Joe almost didn't hear him.

"Sorry!" exclaimed Joe, looking astonished and setting the water down on the nearest flat surface. "Whatever for?"

"If I had told you two earlier, if I had insisted that she tell you, if I hadn't gotten so distracted and let him rattle me, if-"

"If we had never gone to the mall, Iola would still be alive," Joe said harshly, but with sympathy in his eyes. Fenton was so shocked that he stopped speaking.

"We blame ourselves when things happen to people we love," said Joe. "It just shows how much we love them, not that we could have or should have done anything differently."

Hearing Joe say that warmed his heart. It had taken Joe a long time to return to any semblance of his own self after Iola Morton's murder, and that event would remain with him for the rest of his life. It had taken the combined efforts of Frank and Vanessa to give him a reason to keep living, and by that remark, it sounded as if he had finally started to realize that he bore no blame whatsoever for that incident. But their situations were not the same.

"It is my job as your father, as a person, to look after my children in every possible way," said Fenton through clenched teeth. "And if I had not gotten too caught up in what happened 27 years ago and kept my head, we could have found a way to escape earlier."

"The situation affects you differently when it's personal," Joe said "And when the decision is made, you go with what feels right, what is the best thing to do at the time. There is absolutely no way you could have told us earlier, Dad. She was the one who had to tell us."

"I would have lied for both Vanessa and Iola," Joe continued with conviction. "Even if it meant going to jail"

"But you never would have doubted either of them," Fenton countered.

"Who knows? Perhaps I would have," Joe said. You didn't doubt her at the end, Dad. And I don't think your earlier reaction was really because of doubt, I think it was because you were worried for her, frustrated that you couldn't be there. And even when Frank and I doubted it, you knew that mom would make the right decision and come and find us."

"That's right," Frank said from the door. "And you made me believe it, too." He and Laura had agreed to put their discussion off until later. They were both way too sleepy.

"We had agreed that someday we would work together," Laura said getting back into bed. "And it turns out that today was the day."

"We didn't quite think it would happen like this though," Fenton said smiling at his wife.

"No," she agreed. "But, it would have happened in some way, even if Thomas never answered the picture. Later today, it will be time for us to go-,"

"Home!" Joe finished.

"And when we get home," Laura said sternly, "Your Dad and I will go over his current and past unsolved cases while you will be grounded for the entire weekend."

"Me? What did I do? My life hasn't been hard enough already, and now I'm grounded?" Joe protested.

"I heard about your drinking," Laura said glaring at him and refusing to be diverted. "Even though I strongly suspect you won't do that again, I thought we had raised you to know better!"

"You told her," Joe said looking accusingly at his father who threw up his arms in mock surrender and refused to interfere. Joe was on his own.

"Now mom," said Joe turning back to Laura with characteristic puppy dog eyes and the trademark Hardy charm, "you really aren't going to judge me based on what I did when I was young, are you?"