Page 59 of Booked for Kidnapping

He chuckled. “Do you think Mickey will help us in the appropriate rearing of a librarian son? Most inflicted with librarianism seem to be women.”

“We could just have a lot of girls and secure future librarians that way,” I countered. “That’s on you, by the way.”

“I feel I should request a great deal of practice. It could matter.”

I eyed the rather obscene collection of condoms. “I think your father supports the idea of us getting in a lot of practice.”

“My father is aware of the realities of my magic. I’m more patient than he is, although not by much. My patience has worn thin.”

I got up, went to the door, grabbed the do not disturb sign, hung it on the knob, and made certain the deadbolt was in the locked position. “My doctor told me I’ll need a lot of physical therapy to put back on some pounds and get back into shape. I’m ready for my exhaustive first treatment.”

“I’m not sure that’s what she meant, but okay.”

“If she’d meant something else, she should have given us better directions.”

“I like the way you think.”

FOURTEEN

I will make you pay for this.

While I had expected pleasure, the peace and comfort took me by surprise. Thanks to his abilities, my fiancé clued into my state of mind, and he went out of his way to pursue my peace and comfort even more than our pleasure. At some point, the significance of having lost so much time hit me hard.

I tried to avoid crying in front of anyone, but once the first tears appeared, I proved unable to fight them off. Bradley held me until I ran out of tears, and then he worked to replace my anguish with better things.

My new and improved physical therapy plan exhausted me, and when we weren’t indulging, I bathed with Bradley while reading books, ate, or slept. After describing what I remembered of the house, Bradley began his search using a map app to attempt to find the place. He figured, in my condition, it couldn’t have been more than two to five miles from the beach, as he doubted I would have made it farther than that without collapsing.

Considering how I struggled to stay awake, I agreed with him. Rather than go on a trip to Hawaii, Bradley issued a single threat, one that made it clear I was a goner: I could either go on a drive to see the houses he found or else. The else involved not needing any condoms because he’d be too busy arguing with me over visiting the houses to indulge.

Bradley’s father, who’d been sacrificed to go out and buy me some clothes and everything else I needed to survive away from home, snickered every time we saw him, although he was kind enough not to say a word about my new state of supremely frustrated.

“I will make you pay for this,” I swore, ridding my purse of all things sexual save a single strip of condoms, which I hid in the inner zipper pocket.

“Will you be naked when you’re making me pay?”

His new favorite retort, considering he kept his promise to abstain until I agreed to go on a drive to look for the house, would drive me insane. “I won’t be if you keep making up these stupid rules!”

“I’m not going to make you go into the house, but it would be really nice if we could identify the place so we can start putting together a case. There are a few properties we want to check, and none of the road view pictures show the right windows, so we need to go prowl around and have a look. Unless your kidnappers are in league with one of us, all they know is that you escaped. We haven’t made a formal announcement that you have been found. The last thing they’ll expect is you to return to where you were kept. It’ll be fine.”

“But it might not be.”

“Janette.”

“You’re going to make me do this, aren’t you?”

“It’s a good idea. If you can get over this, the next thing you know, you’ll be taking that new foot of yours on a test drive.”

That got my attention. “Test drive?”

“My future wife obviously needs a car, one that is hers and hers alone. But until she’s able to face difficult things she does not like, it’s probably not safe to set her loose in a dealership to meet her next new car love.”

Bradley Hampton did not pull his punches. “You fiend.”

“Dad will be with us, so it’s not like we’ll be alone. We’re just going to drive by them unless we need to go crawl through some bushes for some reason.” Bradley smirked at me. “And I have a very extensive list of things I plan to do to my future wife upon our return from said trip.”

“I feel like the therapists have gotten to you. I haven’t even met the therapists, but I feel they are ruthlessly using you as part of some treatment plan. But you have the goods, and you’re not afraid to bar me from enjoying the goods.”

“We’ll both be armed, so it’s fine. We have our licenses, and we have approval to carry in California. The cell licensing comes with a fancy badge we get to show the cops. It tells them we’re allowed to carry our guns around. You can even carry your gun in your purse.”