"Now, now, boys, don't look so down," Lewis told them, grinning. "We're going to have some fun before Joe dies." He looked down into Joe's eyes. "This is all your fault, you know?" he asked. "If you hadn't been rescued, I wouldn't have your sweet brother to take your place after you're gone."

He leaned down close to Joe's ear. "And I want to be nice to you today, so I'll even show you a sample of the fun I am going to have with your brother." He stood up and walked behind Frank. "This was planned for you, Joey, but well, I think I'll have more fun watching you watch your brother," he said, coming to stand behind Frank.

If Joe had been free he would have killed Lewis right then, but as it was, he could only glare at Lewis with a mixture of hatred and terror. "You know the great part about this kind of room?" Lewis asked them. "It's sound proof!" he shouted and ripped the tape off of Frank's mouth.

"Let us go," Frank begged.

"But the fun's just beginning," Lewis protested. He pulled a cotton ball out of his pocket and grabbed some alcohol off a tray near Frank's head. "Can't have you getting an infection," he said. "I have to have something to play with after Joe dies."

He wiped the wet cotton onto Frank's arm. "What are you going to give me?" Frank asked, his eyes watching Lewis as he removed the protector from the syringe.

"Why, Frank, I'm just going to give you a little air," Lewis replied innocently.

"What?" Frank asked, confused as he watched Lewis pull the needleup halfway.

"You know, air is a funny substance. A lot can kill you. But a little will just make you wish you were dead." He inserted the needle half filled with nothing, into Frank's arm. Almost immediately Frank began screaming in agony as he twisted and struggled in his bonds. Frank's screams grew louder and his movements more erractic.

Joe had watched Lewis inject his brother with the air and saw Frank start writhing in pain. He closed his eyes to the scene he could do nothing about but couldn't block out the screams. Joe's eyes filled with tears and they streamed down his cheeks as he was forced to listen to his brother's suffering.

Several minutes later, Frank was still, his breathing heavy and deep. His face was wet from the tears he had shed. "Ain't it wonderful to be free and have so much air?" Lewis asked them, laughing.

"Two nurses saw Lewis near the green garage exit," Chief Collig told Fenton and Laura as they stood in the hallway outside of the room where Frank and Joe should have been. "But no one has seen Frank or Joe."

"Was he coming or going?" Laura asked.

"He was on his way out of the building," was the reply.

"Alone?" Fenton asked. "Why would he be leaving alone?"

"You think maybe he hid the boys somewhere in the bulding?" Collig asked. "But if he left them, then that means..." his voice trailed off, as he looked at the Hardys, their faces white as ghosts.

"It means he killed them," Laura sobbed, bursting into tears and hiding her face in her husband's arms.

"I'll have my men search every place where the boys could be," Collig said, walking away to leave the couple to their grieving. Collig ordered his men to search every place where the boys' bodies might be hidden then returned to the Hardys. "Why don't you two go home and get some rest," he suggested. "There isn't anything you can do here and if Lewis did get them out of the hospital, he may try and contact you."

Fenton nodded and led his wife out of the hospital. Once they had gotten home, Laura went upstairs to her room and sat down on the bed. She had cried all the way home and was now in too much shock to cry any more. It had been bad enough when she had thought she would lose one son, but both of them.

She heard her husband pacing the floor a few rooms away in the bedroom he had converted into an office. She got up from the bed and looked out the window, staring at the tree they had planted on Arbor Day almost ten years previously. Joe had been so excited. He had wanted to help with the digging and ran to get another shovel from the storage building but had tripped and fallen on a rake.

They had taken him to the hospital because the wound had pierced the skin and gone deep. He had lost a lot of blood before they reached the hospital. Laura shuddered as she remembered having to wait while the blood needed for Joe's transfusion had to be signed for and brought from another floor because he had a rare blood type. "Wait!' she thought, rushing out of the room and into Fenton's office.

"Fenton!" she shouted as she entered. "Didn't you say you saw empty blood packets under one of the beds in the boys' hospital room?" she demanded.

Fenton nodded. "Why?" he asked.

"Because the bags of blood have to be signed for," she told him. "If Lewis stole some blood, he wouldn't have signed for it," she pointed out.