Chapter 1

Joe Hardy needed to get the damn handcuff off his wrist and get it off quick. He was not looking forward to being cooked alive by the arsonist he had been stalking, not one iota!

He had just woken up on the floor of a woman's restroom smelling acrid smoke and listening to the sound of distant crackling flames, his manacled arm resting over his head. Then floated the sound of distant fire trucks, nicely illustrating the bind he was in.

Rolling to look, he found the cuff was linked to the iron leg of a sink unit, so he got up onto his haunches, wrapped his free hand around the link chain and began to yank and pull, using his legs and weight as leverage – the intention to break the cuffs or separate the sink leg from the floor.

The only problem: nothing was budging, loosening or breaking, no matter how much he strained, jerked and fought. He was starting to panic, to reach his own flashpoint. "C'mon!" he shouted. "This isn't working…why is this not working?" He grunted, hit himself upside the head and shouted: "THINK!" and then forced himself to slow down, to stop acting so 'Joe-like' and consider things rationally. At the moment, all he was achieving was a chaffed wrist.

Closing his eyes momentarily, he abandoned the fight to inspect the handcuffs more closely. What he found was a mass-produced pair, the type used to shackle hapless grooms to streetlamps for fun. It was little wonder they were not covered in a pink faux fur. Although unbreakable enough as to keep him a prisoner, it did not mean the manufacture was not cheap and shoddy. A plan hatched.

Glancing about, his gaze settled on the bin in the corner that was out of arm's reach, but not necessarily for his feet. So he stretched out on his side and strained until his was so taut that the cuff razor-bladed into his skin again. Delving about with the toe of his boot, he hooked onto the bin and inched it along until he was able to upturn and dump the contents out over himself. Then began the sickening and revolting task of mooching through the sticky wet contents. Remarkably he came across the very thing he was hoping he would find – a bobby pin!

"Thank heavens for little girls!" he muttered with a bitter grin before prising the plastic nodules off the ends of the wire with his teeth and the spitting them out. He straightened the metal, and then bent the straight edge into a tiny hook against the floor.

He stopped to place a palm flat against the tiles, noting the unnatural warmth, a sign the fire had progressed as far as the level below. The sands of time were fast running out. Fire was an unforgiving, fast mover and it would only be a matter of time before it climbed to seek him out. He did not even want to think about how he was going to get off the top floor if the stairs were engulfed.

"I'll make Dad pay for making me handle this case alone…where's Frank when I need him? Oh yeah…getting rained on in Seattle! Serves him right—" Joe pushed the end of the bobby pin into the cuff's keyhole and pushed the hook against the ratchets until it gave against the teeth and then carefully twisted his wrist as the bracelet opened, emitting a soft clicking sound. "Three months…three whole months. Surely Frank's sorted by now?"

A splintering sound, and the room jolted as something crashed under the floor level. "Mind you—" he said, continuing his complaining monologue as he freed himself and stood up, "a bit of that Seattle rain would do some good right now," he strode to the door, "douse out the fire." He experimentally put his fingers against the door handle, yanking them back with a hiss – it was red hot, and thick choking smoke was beginning to infiltrate the room under the door.

He swore, shrugged off his jacket and jammed it to the gap, stopping most of the black mist coming through.

Stepping back, he looked around again. "No windows…no way out the door…no ventilation chutes," he stared about the floor, "and no comedy trap doors. I am so screwed."

Then his attention fell on something he had not noticed before – a door down the other side of the room in a dark corner, beside to the last sink. Going straight for it, he cautiously tested the doorknob and found it was cool to the touch. No fire on the other side. Finally, he had caught a break.

He turned the knob but his hand slipped, leaving behind a smear of blood from the cuts to his wrist. Swapping hands he tried again, but the door still would not budge, solidly locked. Not messing around, he withdrew a few paces and began power kicking around the lock plate. On the third kick there was a splintering sound, on the fourth it caved in entirely and the door clattered open, swinging hard and hitting something with a loud clang.

Stepping though, he found himself in a large cleaning closet, not the escape route he was hoping for. What the door had collided with had been iron shelving, and although he was disappointed he was not going to be able to get out that way, there was something he could make use of. On the central shelf was a roll of white and blue edged towelling, the type that in bygone days had been used in a dispensing machine, but which had gone out of use to be replaced with cheaper, hygienic paper towels and electric hand driers. This particularly roll was clearly being recycled by a fore-thinking cleaner. Quite a lot of the length had been cut away over time for use as ragging, but there was plenty left – and as a bonus, a large pair of dressmaker's scissors was lying on top.

Joe grabbed the scissors, put them between his teeth and lifted the heavy roll of linen. He carried it out, kept hold of the loose end and dropped and kicked the rest of the spindle out in front of him. It unfurled across the floor like a huge roll of toilet tissue and he chased after it, gathering up cloth until he had enough, and then cut away the piece and moved to heave it into one of the basins before setting the faucet running.

Fate was on his side as water ran freely, the fire having yet to take out the plumbing. Boy, he was glad he was not going to have to soak the towelling in the toilets, which would have been his only option otherwise! He went back to the roll and cut off another, smaller piece, which he also soaked and used to wet himself down, especially saturating his jeans.

Finally, he lifted out the larger section of cloth and wrapped it around his chest, ensuring that although he was swathed down to his knees, that he could still move freely. Then he used the smaller piece to create a protective hood which cascaded over his head and past his shoulders.

His jacket was no longer effectively blocking the smoke, which was now infesting the room again and coating the back of his throat to make him cough. So he pushed some of the loose cloth to his mouth to use as a filter realising that if the flames did not get him in the end, smoke inhalation would.

Not wanting to waste any more time, he went to the exit, kicked the jacket aside and opened the door with a covered hand. Immediately, he ducked, covered and used the door as a barricade from what he knew was going to come next.

A solid wall of fire shot roaring into the room. A golden, swirling and vivid living entity, gobbling up oxygen and turning his prison into an oven. Joe's lungs physically tightened as the air was torn screeching from the atmosphere and he closed his eyes against the glare. After a few shocking seconds, the howling receded to a hissing whomp and the fire retreated leaving the walls, floor and ceiling singed and smouldering.

Joe rose out of his crouch and stepped into the doorway to greet the fire. What he saw confirmed for sure that the stairs were now inaccessible, which left only one single exit...and if he dallied for too long he would lose his nerve to use it.

He gripped his hood shut, ensured his hands and arms were covered, took a gulp of fetid air, leaped and sprinted into the flaming corridor. With his head down, he kept moving until the inferno was at his back and pounded down the hall. There was method in his madness, he was not headlessly running, he was aiming for something, something he could not yet see through the dense black smog. Then he heard the one thing he had never wanted to hear again, and felt that telltale rush as the oxygen was again sucked from the atmosphere, a sign of the pursuing horror that was to come.

The building turned into a funhouse, the floor moving under him as an explosion began to build slewing him madly for a moment before he caught himself against the wall and pushed himself on target again. He squinted though streaming eyes to finally spot the window he had been aiming for, still seemingly miles away and barely visible through the fog. Daring a glance back, his eardrums began to ring as the intensity of the blast built to ear busting proportions from deep in the bowels of the building.

Hounding him was a ball of fire, a firestorm that was rolling far quicker than he was running – even though Joe had picked up speed and was eating up the ground like a pro-sprinter. The inferno was starting to envelop, devour and choke him. The fire wanted him, tendril hot fingers reaching and groping – but it was too late for the monster to take him as Joe was already diving for the window, airborne, the force of the explosion helping to propel him onward and the towelling cosseting him from being burned to a crisp.

He was spun by the blast to face the blaze before his back hit the glass and he was physically hurled screaming out through the window, the casement and glass splintering to give way. Joe's body sailed free and kicked out into empty air, arced and froze for a millisecond before dropping like a lead weight.

Joe prayed he was correct in his theory that this particular window overlooked the water, or the four-storey fall would kill him. He was glad all he could see was sky; he did not relish watching the hard floor rushing up to assault him, much preferring ignorance if he was going to end up in a million pieces. He was rewarded for his belief in his own sense of direction though when he hit water and went under, shards of wood, glass and other burning debris raining down about him.

The towelling-cum-fire blanket that had been his collaborator now became a turncoat, betraying and helping to drag him down, binding him as securely as any straightjacket. Trying to keep a clear head, Joe struggled against his self-imposed bondage and kicked to get himself to the surface. What with having run a three minute mile and the shock of being flung through the window, and then the long fall before hitting surprisingly cold water…well…he was just about suffocating.

But no matter how he fought, he could not free himself. In fact, he was getting more and more knotted up – although he did manage to get to the surface for a second, enough time to gulp in some air hungrily before going down again.

Then he was getting tangled in something else, probably weeds, and they were pulling at him, dragging him down further, yanking him about, frightening him, causing him to kick out…then he was unaccountably breaking the surface and taking in air, coughing hoarsely. Still struggling, he was too panicked to consider why he was at the surface again and no longer sinking.

"Take it easy, kiddo, you'll drown us both!" snapped a voice.

At the sound of the forceful, commanding instruction, Joe was shocked out of his fear and quit thrashing. He twisted to find Con Riley bobbing and supporting him as he coughed. An instant later his dad burst through the murky water several feet away with his back to them.

"JOE?" Fenton bellowed and prepared to dive again.

"Over here, Flash," Con called. "I've got him."

Fenton flayed about until he could see his son, deep relief etching his handsome features. "You okay?" he asked, doggy-paddling closer. He patted Con on the shoulder and they began working around Joe to untether him.

Joe could see a knot of people at the side of the lake, pointing and talking amongst themselves and uniformed officers directing a fire truck down the embankment. He must have put on quite a show for them. "Yeah, thanks," he said switching his attention back to his detective father, Fenton Hardy, and his burley ex-police lieutenant partner, Con Riley.

Finally, Joe was free and able to swim unaided so they struck out for the shore, an unverbalised agreement made not to say anything else until they were away from the building which was now freely burning out of control. Clearly there was little the fire fighters were going to be able to do to save the structure, and it would not have done the swimmers any good if they had stayed, only for an external wall to collapse onto them.

Which was exactly what happened as soon as they were wading out to be met by Office Bach and Officer James Anderson, the long-lost nephew Con had recently become reunited with, and who had found himself there after being called out while on duty.

James opened his mouth to say something, but a low rumble interrupted him. Everyone turned and several people in the small crowd gave off screams as the outer wall crumbled and came down, crashing into the lake and sending a shockwave of water surging, turning the ground into an mini earthquake. Some people ducked, others ran up the bank worried they would be struck by debris, many just simply stood and gawked.

Fenton was one of the latter people, standing knee deep in water, his mouth open and gaze fixated.

"Whoa!" Joe exclaimed and instinctively reaching for his father as Fenton was closest out of everyone to the tumbling masonry. Grasping his upper arm, Joe tugged to break Fenton from his trance and backed them into a retreat up the slope towards the awed crowd.

Seconds later, everyone was squealing as the dust cloud descended. The sudden surprise at being covered in soot making everyone laugh and breaking the tension.

"Aw man!" Joe groaned, palms out and staring down at himself in disgust. As if being muddy and wet in a t-shirt with a burned hole in the shoulder was not bad enough, he was now grey with dust too!

"Burned hair," Fenton said, smirking, his teeth unnaturally white against his grimy skin.

Mortified, Joe's hand went to his blond head and he started feeling about. "Where?" Fenton touched just above Joe's ear and his errant hand went there next. "No way! Not my hair! Can this get any worse? I just paid a fortune to have it cut – have I got any left?!"

"Kiddo, you should thank your lucky stars it's just the head decoration that's crispy," Con said, appearing at his shoulder with James. "You were a fireball when you fell from that window."

"No I wasn't…was I?"

"Yeah you were. Or at least that material you were wrapped in was – good call with covering yourself in it."

"What can I say? I am the ideas guru of the team!"

Fenton snorted.

"What happened?" James asked, putting his cap on to signify he was acting in an official capacity.

"Actually, James, do you mind if we go and get ourselves cleaned up first?" Joe asked, still prodding at his head and feeling uncomfortable at being stared at by an understandably curious crowd. He even spotted a couple of people using their cell phone cameras and realised with a groan that he would probably be up on Youtube within the hour. "I promise I'll call down to the precinct after. I can confirm it was the guy I told you about who's our arsonist, I've got proof, but I need to report back to my client first. You know how these things work, yeah?"

"Okay, we'll pick him up in the meantime." James sighed, but then lowered his voice and leaned in. "When you come by the station house, ask to speak to me will you? I need all the brownie points I can get."

"Why?"

"Ask not."

*****

Joe entered the marina complex and jogged along the wharf, down the side of his houseboat and used the grab handle to pull himself up onto the deck. Not wishing to track dirt inside, he urgently started removing his sodden sneakers whilst hunkering low in front of his front door, not wanting anyone to see him in his filthy condition.

Realisation had hit once he was back at his motorcycle that when he had abandoned his jacket in the burning building, he had left his keys in the pocket so he had to accept a lift from his dad and borrow his spare houseboat keys. But Joe was doubly pissed when he realised his wallet had been in his back pocket with over a hundred dollars folded up inside, although he hoped some of the notes could be saved if he could pry them apart untorn and then leave them out to dry.

Luckily he had another key to his motorcycle at home, so he planned on getting himself cleaned up before updating his client on the case, and then jumping in a cab to collect his ride. Lastly he would head across town to the precinct to see James Anderson as prearranged.

Joe did not give it a second thought when he found his front door unlocked. It was nothing out of the ordinary as several people had a key and would often visit and be waiting for him when he got home. He simply opened up and jumped down into the seating area. Once there, he indeed found that he had company...but not at all who he was expecting.

It wasn't one of his social friends.