Political Abuse

Hardesty rushed up to the second level to find most of the bedrooms deserted, except for one, where a wide-eyed Jay, who had been resting on a bed, gave Hardesty a wild look. Hardesty waved his hand, yelled, "Take cover," and Jay sank to the floor on the other side of the bed. There was no way the young man was going to raise an alarm, Hardesty knew.

"Where's Toby Drake? Do you know Toby?" Hardesty asked in a stage whisper. "I'm looking for him. The police are on their way. Stay here and you should be safe."

"I haven't seen Toby. I've just been in a bedroom downstairs with one man and then up here, upstairs, with another," the young Senate page and rent-boy whispered back.

Where would they stash Toby if not here, Hardesty wondered--if Toby still was alive. He shuddered at the possibilities. Someone could be buried in the forest downslope from the house or across the road in the wildlife preserve and never be found again. Maybe the guys taking target practice had been using other guys as targets?

If Toby was still alive and not bound in one of the bedrooms, then maybe they had a sex playground somewhere with heavy equipment. Most likely in the basement. He stumbled down the stairs to the first floor and found the door to the basement stairs. As he descended, he heard the sirens from police cars and ambulances coming up Fire Trail Road. Anyone here at the lodge was stuck here with the police cars coming in from the main road. Fire Trail ended in a dead end. Anyone with a car out front would be traceable even if they fled into the woods on foot.

But in the next few seconds, all hell would be breaking out here, with Colver's and Hughes's high-powered guests trying not to be caught up in the net. And they had rifles. Who knew if they'd try to make a stand here? If so, they had completely misjudged the firepower of the authorities. Hardesty could hear a helicopter overhead too--maybe more than one.

In the basement, he immediately saw Toby hanging on the X-frame, but looking not so great. He was alive and aware, though. Hardesty rushed to him, laid his pistol and the one he'd taken off of Quillen on the floor, and started working on the restraints binding Toby to the X-frame.

"God, it's good to see you," Toby said. "But Adrian first. I hope he isn't dead. He's over there. Take care of him first."

"You!" The exclamation came from the doorway to the room. "What in the hell?" Ted Colver had his rifle raised and pointed at Hardesty. "Leave him!" he commanded.

Hardesty looked at Colver and then down at the pistols he'd put on the floor. Getting to them would be hopeless. He moved to stand between Toby and Colver's rifle. He watched Colver's finger stroke the trigger of his rifle, heard the explosion of a gun, and watched Colver crumple and fall on the floor at the door.

Hardesty's eyes narrowed as he saw Carrie Evans come through the door, her service revolver smoking.

"What's happening? You're standing in my way," Toby called out.

"You followed me," Hardesty said, accusingly to his partner.

"Sure I did," Carrie said. "You thanked me for coming back from Florida. You're only polite to me when you need help. That meant I had to follow up to see that you didn't hurt yourself."

A half hour later, Crane had pulled them off to the side. "This is a mess for others to clean up and cover over now," the lieutenant said after medics had put an unconscious, but still alive, Adrian Mills in an ambulance and Hardesty and Carrie had given their versions of Quillen being shot, Colver being dead, and Hughes having been tracked down in the forest, stories that corroborated each other and would keep both out of trouble. Toby and Jay had been quickly dressed and were sitting in the back of Crane's cruiser in that parking area in the wildlife reserve where Hardesty had parked it. Crane had had Carrie take them there down the Appalachian Trail as soon as he'd shown up.

Two helicopters had settled down in the backyard of the hunting lodge and men--Colver's and Hughes's guests--were being loaded into them. The cars of the guests were being driven by cops from various jurisdictions farther up Fire Trail--not out toward the main road.

"Carting them off to jail," Carrie commented, "but why are the cops moving their cars away from the scene?"

"Really? You don't know?" Hardesty said, with a laugh.

"We didn't see any of this just like the other cops here haven't seen Toby or the other young guy," Crane said. "Those on the helicopter are being whisked away so they were never here. Their cars are a problem, because the press is already settled at the entrance to Fire Trail. So, the cars have to sit on ice until they can be spirited away. The press could trace the license plate numbers."

"So, this is being covered up?" Carrie asked.

"It's being quietly handled," Crane said. "The main problem would have been Ted Colver, and you took care of that problem yourself."

"So, how about dinner tonight?" Carrie asked Hardesty when Crane walked off to continue containing his own unit's involvement in all of this. "I'm starved. You can pick up the tab, seein' as how I came back from a nice Florida vacation just to save your ass."

"How about tomorrow, Carrie?" Hardesty asked. "I need to get Toby home and into bed."

"After what he's been through, I wouldn't mess around with him tonight," Carrie said. The partners didn't mince words with each other. "And you should make another pass at tellin' him his idea of a job is too much a danger to his health."

Hardesty gave a laugh, but it was a dry one. "I tell him that almost daily, Carrie, but you should know from your own relationship with Sophie that telling him what to do or trying to fence him in would be the quickest way to not having him anymore."

"But I know you," she said. "This has put you in a rush. I know what you need now."

"As a matter of fact, I already have that in mind. After I've tucked Toby away, I have a little training mission to go on."

"Training. Yeah, right," Carrie said.

But it was a continuation of training he'd been interrupted in giving that Hardesty had in mind. He was thinking of that new, deliciously small and blond, rent-boy, Curtis, at Justine's he had in the plow belt earlier.