Page 44 of Booked for Kidnapping

Bradley’s father laughed. “I legally changed my name from Bradley and gave it to my son so he wouldn’t have any weird numbers attached. I thought I was being considerate. Call me Paul. That’s my original middle name, before I got rid of it because it annoyed me. That way, you’ll be happy because you’re aware you’re inevitably making me twitch because I can’t escape my birth name. The only thing I left unchanged was Hampton, as I didn’t want my mother to cry. I changed my name to what she would have named me if my father hadn’t been stubborn.”

Things had truly become strange since I’d been kidnapped.

“You’re in a good mood. All right, Paul. What can I do for you this morning?”

“The lead was a hit, and your little girl is passed out in my hotel room, not quite fit as a fiddle, but close enough. I’m going to call in Dr. Mansfield to handle her checkup and pull some strings for access to a private clinic rather than take her to a hospital. She would have talked to you directly, but she passed out fairly hard the instant she got near a bed, and I didn’t want to try to wake her, tired as she is. We fed her, and she’s underweight. She was taken care of, but I suspect solitude led to some depression and a lack of interest in eating. She was kept in confinement alone and restrained from my understanding of the situation. The whole time we’ve had her, she’s been firmly attached to either myself or my boy. She must have lost enough weight she was able to slip the cuff and escape. She went to a library and emailed Bradley, and Bradley did as we’d asked, dragging me along for the ride.”

“She’s really okay?”

“She’s really okay, and there wasn’t anything she could have done to come home sooner as far as I can tell. She hadn’t been aware she’d been shot, so they must have had her under full sedation for at least a month at the start of her kidnapping, maybe longer. I’ll ask Tawnlen about the specifics to get a timeline. I suspect longer, because they did some significant work to her foot.”

“What did they do to her foot? Is she okay? Who do I need to kill?”

“Goodness, Tanya. How did you go from asking about her foot to wanting to know who you need to kill?”

Bradley snickered.

“I haven’t had coffee yet,” my mother admitted. “But if they did something to her foot, they’ll make her cry, and then I feel I should be justified in a little murder. And don’t you laugh at me, Bradley Hampton!”

“They did a great deal of restorative work on her foot. She’s walking again in regular shoes. No cast, no boot. Judging from the feel of it, they’ve installed a bunch of pins, maybe a rod or two, and otherwise reconstructed it. She had no idea the procedure even happened, so they must have kept her down and out through the entire recovery process.” Bradley’s father chuckled. “Honestly, after seeing how much she struggled after her procedures, I find myself unfortunately indebted to them for saving her from so much pain and anguish. However, I’m really upset with how badly her disappearance hurt my boy. Janette seemed quite excited about the goats, so I expect she’ll be visiting soon enough with her fluffy goddess in tow. Bradley made mention of escaping to somewhere quiet for two weeks with Janette, so I expect we’ll stay out here until she’s had a chance to catch up and he settles down. You can wrangle the other kids and prepare them for her return. We’ll want to make sure somebody is always available to keep Janette company, especially for the first while, until we see if there’s any trauma.”

“I can wrangle the kids, and I’ll make sure none of them make a fuss. If she needs two weeks to settle down with Bradley, then that’s what she needs. Knowing she’s all right will be good enough until she comes home. So, she doesn’t need to go pick a switch?”

“She rescued herself as soon as she could, so I feel she doesn’t need to pick a switch. That said, if she’s picking one to herd my boy off, we’ll let her pick several if she expects to break the first few smacking him to get a move on.”

Bradley laughed, and the sound relaxed me as nothing else had been able to. I snuggled into the warmth of the blankets and pillows, fighting sleep to listen to them. His father’s warnings had worried me, but the conversation reminded me reality rarely matched my fears.

My mother could be upset with me and still love me and want me to come home. Even when I scared her to the point she questioned if I still lived.

“I’ll bring her home as soon as she’s ready,” Bradley promised. “I think she’d convinced herself we’d hate her because she hadn’t rescued herself sooner. But we’d expected everything except complete solitude, and I have no idea what that has done to her emotionally. My current plan is to stay in the room so she can find me easily until she’s ready for some independence, and I’ll make sure Dad’s around if I’m in the bathroom.”

“Don’t you go luring my daughter into any bathrooms,” my mother warned.

The fastest way to convince me to go chasing after Bradley into some bathroom involved my mother telling me I couldn’t, and I filed that away as something to explore in the near future, assuming we could evict his father from the room long enough to take advantage of the situation.

A bath large enough for two would make a bathroom adventure interesting.

“What about if she lures me into a bathroom?” Bradley asked, his tone curious.

“She can do whatever she wants to you if she’s the one doing the luring. You Hamptons are pushy, and you won’t be pushing my little girl right now, you mark my words. Ruthlessly use those damned goats to bring her home in a timely fashion. I will send pictures. I’ll even go find another little girl for the herd if you promise within three weeks.”

“You like the goats,” Bradley accused.

“We might be expanding the enclosure to get a herd of our own,” my mother confessed. “They’re adorable little devils. And it seems I am going to be owning two horses, because someone in my house went to an animal auction this morning, saw these two sad horses, and is refusing to leave unless he can bring them home. I don’t have any damned idea where we’re going to put two horses!”

Mr. Hampton snickered. “I’ll call work and talk to Jerome. His wife owns a construction company, and I’m sure she can fit you in for a barn raising and a quick fence job. The stalls you got aren’t big enough for the horses?”

Since when did my parents have stalls?

“That’s the goat barn.”

“I’m sure your goat barn can fit two horses until you can get a horse barn up. What kind of horses are you getting?”

“They’re thoroughbreds from that bankrupt farm down in Maryland. There are six of the poor things about to go to the butcher since nobody else wants them. The cream of the crop were already taken, although nobody wanted the foals. They were only down to three broodmares when they went under. The buyers wanted the yearlings who could be trained to race right away or the trained horses. We’re getting a filly to go with our mare. The foal’s still nursing. He says they’ve got the papers for them, too, so they’re pedigree thoroughbreds. He wanted to take the whole lot of them, but I don’t think we can realistically get it set up. They have to come home today.”

“I can talk to Jerome if you want the whole lot of them. We know people with horse farms if you need temporary lodgings for the other mares and foals. Have you checked their race history?”

“The broodmares never raced, so they’re unproven. They’re bred from winning racers, but they weren’t racers. We can break them to saddle and ride them since they weren’t broken early, too. They’re between five and six years old. I asked, and they should be ready to be ridden within a year.” The excitement in my mother’s voice startled me, as I’d never taken her to be the kind to be interested in riding horses. “I read online some horses can race until they’re eight. We could try the mares on the track after their foals are weaned.”