Frank lay perfectly still, eyes closed, attempting to focus on his breathing to try and block the pain from his mind. Stefan was more than angry, much more. Frank felt his eyes fill with tears as Stefan’s words echoed in his head. Maybe Stefan was right, maybe he did deserve this.  

“It was all your fault that Mama died! If you’d never been born she’d still be here!”  

“You deserve everything that is going to happen to you. You took my mama from me and now you will pay for it.”  

He heard the door open and close and the lock clicked. Opening his eyes he saw Stefan was gone and his hands were free. His wrists were bruised and scraped, but he knew that was nothing compared to what his back must look like. Stefan had taken his belt off, determined to make Frank beg. And it had worked.  

Frank curled up on his right side and once again closed his eyes, trying desperately to block out Stefan’s words. But just as it had been when he was little, the words refused to stop bouncing around. The accusations and threats from the last few hours intertwined with the ones from childhood and continued to play in his exhausted mind until he passed out.  

***  

Callie Shaw stepped off the plane and smiled. It felt good to be home! Spotting her father, she ran to him for a hug.  

“Welcome home, honey!” Mr. Shaw said.  

“It feels so good to be home.” She linked arms with her father and together they walked to the baggage claim area to get her luggage. Neither said much, which Callie found rather disappointing. Things had been strained between them since a fight at Christmas. His relative silence on the way home only confirmed that he still thought talking to Frank was a bad idea.  

Patrick and Regina Shaw had encouraged their daughter to go off to college, to see what there was outside of Bayport. And they thought she needed to put some distance between herself and Frank Hardy.  

Frank had thought it a good idea too since Callie couldn’t get exactly what she wanted at Bayport University .  She had chosen to spend the previous summer working at an architecture firm in Phoenix , a spot she had gotten through one of her professors at Southern Cal . Now she regretted that choice because Frank had moved to the back burner. Knowing he had been hurt by her choice the previous summer, she had chosen to spend this one at home.  

There were literally dozens of young men on campus who would have given their right arm to call Callie Shaw their girl. She had even gone so far as to casually date a few of them. But none of them were Frank. No one else made her heart flutter like Frank, left her speechless, and no one kissed like Franklin Simon Hardy.  

Over Christmas break, she and Frank had had dinner together one night, and that meal had started her to thinking and made her realize just how much she missed his companionship. She’d gone home for spring break hoping to spend some more time with him, but he and Joe had been out of town on a case for their father the whole week. With a smile, she thought about the entire summer stretched out before her, endless days to spend with Frank Hardy.  

If he would have her that is. While they did talk, things were still strained. Callie knew it was because of the way she had reacted when he told her he was adopted.  

“Just so you know, Dad,” Callie said as they pulled into the driveway. “I intend to call Frank.”  

Mr. Shaw simply nodded, he had no desire to start the summer off with an argument.  

***  

Joe woke slower than usual the next morning, Sunday, and found himself with a chloroform hangover. Sitting up very slowly, he cradled his aching head in his hands. I hope Frank feels better than I do! With a sigh, he realized that wasn’t very probable.  

“How’s your head?” Laura asked as she sat down on the edge of the bed.  

“Not so good.” Joe took the two Excedrin she offered him and downed them with a glass of water. “Where’s Dad?”  

“At the embassy. The press secretary is an old friend of his.”  

Joe smiled. “You mean the Moscow chief of station is an old friend of his.”  

Laura shook her head in mock exasperation. “Go take another shower, it’ll help your head.”  

“’Kay.” He slid out of the bed, gathered up a clean change of clothes and proceeded to take the hottest shower he could manage. It did help the headache and when he was done, he knew exactly what he would do next.  

“Mom, I’m going back to the cemetery.”  

Laura eyed her youngest son critically. “Well, I’m going with you.”  

Her tone gave no room for argument on Joe’s part, so after a quick breakfast in the hotel restaurant, the two hailed a cab for the cemetery. The driver skillfully navigated the congested morning traffic and deposited his passengers at Vagankov in record time.  

“It’s over this way,” Joe said as he led Laura to the spot. He had brought Frank’s tiny digital camera, but could tell immediately he wouldn’t be using it at the grave. Stefan had been incredibly careful and the only thing out of place were a few spots of trampled grass. Which in a cemetery would not be deemed suspicious by anyone.  

Joe jogged over to the shed, leaving Laura pulling some stray weeds from Sophia’s grave. He pulled the door open and could tell that no one had been inside since he and Fenton the night before. He took the camera from his pocket and took several pictures of the ropes and the inside of the building, then stepped back out and closed the door.  

“You were here yesterday.”  

A voice behind him made Joe whirl around. A middle-aged man was standing there, leaning on a hoe. His English was very good. “Yes, I was. With my brother. He was kidnapped.”  

The man sighed. “I was afraid that might happen when I saw the car. Mr. Gregov is very particular about his mother’s grave.”  

“What do you mean?” Joe asked, his voice sounding puzzled.  

“I have worked here for many years now. Hers was the strangest funeral I have ever seen. No one came. Then two years later a boy showed up. He said the woman was his mother. So I showed her to him. He’s a very angry man now, a man you don’t cross no matter what.”  

Joe felt this man might be able to tell him something useful, so he took a chance and told him what exactly had transpired the previous afternoon. “The person he kidnapped used to be his little brother. My parents adopted him when I was five. Stefan Gregov blames his little brother for what happened to their mother. She was murdered, Frank saw it.”  

The man shook his head. “So sad. Mr. Gregov only comes here twice a year, yesterday and September 7^th.”  

“Do you know anything about him, anything at all?”  

“I’m sorry,” he replied with another shake of his head. “Men like that keep their lives very hidden.” The man then walked off, swinging his hoe and whistling.  

“Who was that?” Laura asked.  

Joe jumped a little as he didn’t know she had come up behind him, then shrugged. “Not a clue. He did say Stefan only comes here twice a year and won’t be back till September.”  

Mother and son began walking back towards the gates. “That doesn’t help us find Frank,” she said softly.  

Joe took her hand and squeezed, hoping that little gesture might make her feel a little bit better.  

***

 

Fenton closed the file and sighed heavily. This was not good, not good at all.  

Ray Wahlburg wanted to offer some sort of comfort to his old friend, but he had none to give. The file spoke for itself and what it said was pretty damning. “He’s been on our radar for about three years now, really since his old man disappeared.”  

“Do you know what happened to him? And I’ve heard all the theories, so just tell me what you think happened.”  

Ray nodded and then did just that. “I figure Stefan wormed his way in, found out Yuri killed Sophia and then bumped him off.”  

That was Fenton’s feeling as well, and he said so. “But that still doesn’t explain why he would take Frank. Surely it wasn’t out of sheer jealousy.”  

“Unfortunately, no one knows enough about Stefan to figure that out. At best, the man is unstable. At worst, he’s just plain out of his mind. I lean more towards the plain out of his mind.”  

“Either way he’s dangerous,” Fenton said softly. “I’ve never heard Frank that scared before.”  

Again, Ray wanted to say something to comfort the man, but there was nothing to say. “Any clues besides the phone call?”  

Fenton shook his head. “Not a one.”  

“Well, it does give me a compass direction to start poking in, which is more than I had yesterday,” Ray pointed out.  

“Is there anything concrete about these slavery ring allegations?”  

“At this point, no.” Ray leaned forward slightly. “Everything we know about him so far though leads me to believe he won’t sell Frank.”  

“I hope you’re right, Ray.”

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.