I scanned through the financial report, feeling angrier by the minute. Arthur Stench played dirty pool, for sure. Large payments from Petrol International, an oil company. I wouldn’t doubt those payments helped set up this compound and it was meant to be a retreat for people searching for alternate energy resources. But if it was a safe haven why was Stench forcing them to do crazy things? Suddenly it hit me. “Of course.”

“You know I really hate it when you do that,” came Joe’s voice. After digging through the drawers, he’d decided to dig in the cabinets in the kitchen. His voice sounded muffled, so I turned to look. His head was in the freezer. He came out with a half-gallon of ice cream. “It’s my lucky day.”

I arched an eyebrow. “Don’t tell me. He likes cookie dough ice cream too?”

“There’s nothing wrong with cookie dough.”

I wasn’t going to get into that argument with him again. I got up and headed to the kitchen. “We need to get out of here, not eat him out of house and home.”

“I’m hungry and this saves you having to buy mine.” Joe searched through drawers until he found a spoon. He’d already located a bowl.

“Joe, you can’t fill that bowl up with ice cream. You’ll be sick. It’ll be like eating half the carton.”

“That means I’ll only be eating a fourth.” Joe flashed me a grin and dug a spoonful of ice cream out of the carton. He gestured with the spoon. “What?”

“I think I know what he’s up to.”

“Well, it’s about time. What took you so long?”

I resisted the temptation to dump the carton of ice cream on his head. “Stench is trying to make these people look crazy, dangerous to society, isolate them from everyone else.”

“So people will think their ideas of alternate energy are as kooky as they are?”

I nodded. My brother isn’t quite the jock he sometimes appears to be. “Yes.”

Joe scooped up some more ice cream and dumped it into the bowl. “Want to share?”

I didn’t much care for cookie dough ice cream. “Leave me the ice cream and you can have all the bits of cookie dough.”

“That’s not a fair trade.” Joe grabbed another spoon and handed it to me. “And I’m not dirtying anything else. He’d probably make me wash it.”

“And dry,” I added, smirking. I took a deep breath. “We have to get out of here.”

“Wonderful idea. Do you see any windows?” He gestured to the door with his spoon. “And dear me, is there a lock on the door?”

I glared at him. “Now you’re doing the sarcasm thing again.”

“I’m just pointing out the obvious. Can’t see how you could have missed it.”

I rolled my eyes. “Joe—” I broke off, hearing an odd sound coming from the door.

Joe eyed the bowl of ice cream. “Did I hear him say make yourselves at home or did I imagine it?”

The door creaked open just enough to let in a sliver of daylight. I ran to the door, and grabbed it before it could close again. No one was there. Cautiously, I pushed the door open a bit wider. There was no one in sight.

Joe came over to the door, still holding his spoon. The bowl of ice cream was in his hands. “I’m not leaving it.”

I shook my head. “You can’t take it with you.”

Joe set it just inside the door and stepped around it. “Fine.”

I saw his grin as he stepped back, behind me. “Perfect.”

I took a cautious step forward and then was out of the building. No one was anywhere near us. With Joe right behind me, I ran around the windowless building. Once we were out of sight, I nudged him. “You’re bad.”

“Not my fault. Remember I have an older brother,” said Joe, grinning.

I rolled my eyes again. “Shh.”

The compound was eerily empty. “I think it’s siesta time,” Joe whispered in my ear. I nodded. That meant we’d been in the ‘sanctuary’ longer than I had thought. But the real question was who had let us out?

Joe tapped my shoulder. “Tent,” he whispered. “Hide.”

I saw he was pointing at the dining hall. I shook my head. “Probably someone there.”

“No, not there. Come on.”

Keeping low and hoping no one would look in our direction, we crept along the wall until we reached a row of tents. We zigzagged between tents until we got to the dining hall. Then Joe led the way to a small empty tent. Once inside we lowered the flap just enough to keep prying eyes out. Joe sighed. “This is where I woke up yesterday morning.”

I took a deep breath. We’d munched on junk food, drank water and had ice cream but the sudden realization that we were without our backpacks and had no way to get water without getting in trouble made me worried. “We have to get some water and our stuff.”

“You’re suggesting we leave? Walk back to Landers?” Joe shook his head. “I never want to see sand again.”

“Not even at the beach?”

“Don’t distract me.” Joe sat down on the cot. “No. There as to be another way.”

“All right. Tell me.”

“You said yourself we can’t let him go into town without us. Who knows what he’s up to.”

“Yeah, but he’s got the mob behind him. How can we stop everyone?”

“Not everyone.”

I jumped and saw Petal slipping into the tent. “You.”

She eyed me almost angrily. “You know it took me awhile to figure it out. I don’t know what I was expecting, really.”

Joe frowned. “Took you awhile? To figure out what?”

“Who you were. The plan was to bring in the cavalry. Unless you can multiply yourself, you two don’t look much like the cavalry.”

“So you’ve been faking it all this time, waiting for someone to rescue you? And going along with whatever Stench wanted seemed the way to go.” I strode over to her, stared her down.

“Don’t take that tone with me. I didn’t know what would happen when I walked into this.” She tossed her auburn hair back over one shoulder.

“And what about principles?” I asked, feeling the anger stir back up. “You’re—”

Joe got to his feet. “Hey, you two can bicker later. We need to come up with a plan.” He nodded to Petal. “Thanks for letting us out.”

Petal gave him an odd look and then glanced at me. “Let you out?”

She shook her head. “I didn’t let you out. What, you think I carry a lock pick set around with me?”

Joe snorted. “Works for us.”

I studied her for a long moment and felt that uneasy sensation in the pit of my stomach. “If you didn’t let us out, who did?”

“I did,” came a voice from the doorway. I looked and my heart sank.

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Disclaimer

The Hardy Boys belong to Simon and Schuster and the Stratemeyer Foundation. The authors have just borrowed them for an adventure or two. The authors promise to put the boys back when they are done with them. The authors do claim copyright to the original characters in this story. Please do not borrow original characters without express permission of the authors.