Booked for Kidnapping (Vigilante Magical Librarians Book 2)

by R. J. Blain

  “I’m pretty happy over that myself,” Bradley stated, and he smiled at me. “You can leash me if you’d like until you’re more comfortable. I’m not going anywhere, at least intentionally.”

  “Let me see if I understand this. Because of the illusionist, my testimony is so questionable they’re not even bothering?” Having been completely eliminated as an information source shocked me even more than the realization everything I’d lived for almost nine months had been a carefully constructed lie. “But why?”

  “That’s what we wish we could find out.” Bradley’s father drove us back to the beach, found a spot, and parked. “We’re missing something. Why take you? If the goal was to kill Senator Westonhaus, a second bullet would have done the job rather than a complicated kidnapping. It was immaculately timed. You stayed and helped catch the goats, and the kidnappers waited until the streets started clearing out to make their hit. They made certain to have a viable escape route, likely using illusions to prevent anyone from using the street. I think you were the goal. Senator Westonhaus was just a bonus, and one they gave up at the first sign of trouble from the FBI.” Mr. Hampton grunted, killed the engine, and got out of the vehicle. “It seems I have taken us to a beach, so you’re just going to have to get out and play outside for a while before I take you to a jewelry store.”

  I removed my seatbelt, got out of the vehicle, and snagged my purse. Bradley tucked the metal box containing his gun under an arm. “You can put that in the trunk,” I said.

  “While I could, I am going to hit someone with it if they look at you wrong,” my fiancé informed me. “Lenard keeps trying to make me learn alternative self-defense methods. This is my latest alternative method. If I can’t readily access my firearm, I will just beat off any close-range assailants with it. The gun’ll be perfectly safe in its case, even if I fling it at someone.”

  “How far can you fling your gun case?”

  “A surprising distance, and if I do it right, I can make it spin on the way to my target. The corners are fairly sharp.”

  Ouch. “You have my approval. Do whatever is necessary to make it hurt more if you need to use your case as a weapon.”

  Bradley laughed, and he joined me, wrapping his free arm around me. “If we pretend we don’t have a babysitter here, we can take a romantic stroll along the beach.”

  “I’d rather find out why your dad brought us here, although I do like the water and the idea of a nice walk.”

  “That’s why I brought you here, in part,” Bradley’s father said. “I want to see the trail, where you came out at, and how easy it would have been for you to emerge relatively unnoticed, although I suspect the illusionist obscured your presence here. At that talent level, frankly, they can change reality for just about anyone using their talent.”

  “Including tricking us into believing someone shot in the head hadn’t been shot at all.”

  “Precisely.”

  I pointed at where I’d emerged from the forest, wondering how much of my adventure escaping had been an adventure at all, rather than something meticulously planned so I could resume my life. “I came out over there somewhere.”

  “Then let us go walk over there to see what there is to see.”

  Bradley stared at me with a raised brow.

  “What’s that look for?”

  “I’m just waiting to see if I have to maintain my current rudeness, or if you will cooperate without a fight.”

  “Your current rudeness should be counted as ruthless, cruel, and unusual.” While I hated losing, we’d both win later if I cooperated, so I headed for where I thought I had emerged near the beach. Sure enough, a well-beaten trail curved through the trees in the direction of the manor I’d been held at—or had believed I’d been held at.

  I hated not knowing.

  Bradley’s father chuckled. “Reward programs work better on your mother, just for your information.”

  Hugging me close to his side, my fiancé grinned at his father. “I’m saving the rewards for when I’m absolutely certain she will otherwise fully resist my suggestions.”

  “That is not necessarily a bad idea, but I’m warning you it’s a horrible idea doomed to backfire on you. The last time I tried that on your mother, it landed me on the couch for a week. She wouldn’t talk to me for days.”

  I could see his mother doing that. “That must have been quite the sin.”

  “I suggested we dress Bradley up and put him where he might be photographed before we signed the contract for you. I may have suggested we could get grandchildren in a hurry if we got him onto one of the eligible bachelor lists.”

  Bradley sighed. “He really did, too. And Mom really did put him on the couch for that. Apparently, she assumed my father wanted to sell me into sexual slavery.”

  “I’d buy you,” I announced. I blinked, realized what I’d blurted out, and sighed. “Of course, at the time, I was fairly willing to sell my body if it meant my parents could have a comfortable retirement.”

  “Technically, you did. I am grateful Dad suggested I be put up like a stud on auction, though. It made me consider the contracts. It didn’t take me long to figure out you were the one I wanted.”

  “I raised him to actually use his intellect. I didn’t pay for all that damned schooling for it to go to waste.” Bradley’s father angled for the path, and we followed him.

  Once to where I’d emerged and spotted the beach, I took a long and slow look around. Everything seemed as I remembered, with one exception. People made use of the trail, but when I’d gone on it, I’d been alone. “Nobody was using the trail when I came out.” Somehow, I kept my voice steady. “I don’t understand why. Why take so much of my life?” At a loss of how or why everything had happened, I gestured to my foot. “Why do all of this?”

  “I have an educated guess,” Bradley’s father announced, and he tapped at his phone’s screen before turning the display towards me. “Do you remember this person?”

  I narrowed my eye at the young businessman in a perfect suit, and I went cold at the memories. “Yeah. His bodyguard was the one driving the other car.”

  It amazed me my voice didn’t betray me. I turned the phone enough Bradley could view the picture, too.

  “Yeah, that’s the guy.” Unlike me, Bradley’s tone took on a dark edge, filled with anger.

  His father turned his phone back around and tapped at the screen before, showing us the picture of an older woman. “Do you know who she is?”

  I shook my head, as did Bradley.

  “This is Eulalia Castor, his uncle’s wife. She was born in Spain before moving to the United States to marry his uncle. When his uncle died, she returned to Europe, where she has been living ever since. However, she owns a holiday home here.” After a moment of fussing with his phone, he showed me a picture of the house with the patio and rose garden skirting the trail leading to the ocean. “Eulalia remarried, which is why she is now a Castor, but her second husband also died. He got drunk and killed a car filled with kids in Germany. She has made it her life’s mission to treat victims of severe accidents, where they were not in the wrong. Like you. She, however, typically lives in Europe, skipping between Spain, Germany, and Italy. However, she has been on leave for a period of a year due to adopting a child with her third husband, who opted to take her name rather than give her his. Familial problems, according to the internet.”

  “Okay. We’ve been gone from that house for less than twenty minutes. How did you find all of this out?” I demanded.

  “Eulalia Castor is one of twenty people globally who is capable of performing the operation on your foot, and we researched all of the known talents. She’s specialized in severe bone trauma repair in addition to organ trauma recovery. Honestly, if the two of you were to join forces, I doubt you’d ever lose a patient on the table, at least a patient who had any real chance of being saved. The only thing she can’t do is blood and lungs. There’s something about it that escapes her abilities. You can do everyt
hing she cannot.”

  I blinked, and I took the phone from Bradley’s father, tapping at the screen until the older woman’s face reappeared, her dark hair touched with streaks of gray and lines marring her face. Her brown eyes held secrets, as shadowed as the haunting ghost of her smile. “You think this woman is the one who did the work? On my foot? But why?”

  “When her husband killed those kids, she wanted to make a difference. Perhaps she felt you were much like her, wanting to make a difference. More details than I like about the accident were revealed after you were kidnapped, as were details of your efforts in the hospital. A lot of people you saved appealed through the media to bring you home safe and sound. They wanted to save you much as you had saved them.”

  “But I disappeared before that happened, right? I mean, nobody was making appeals before my disappearance.”

  Bradley’s father nodded. “But in the medical field, they knew. Doctors talk with each other, especially about challenging cases. I am of the opinion Dr. Avers disliked you because you could do what he could not. You’re a miracle in the operating room. He doesn’t approve of exsanguinators working in a hospital setting, mainly because he’s one of those idiots who thinks you drink blood in addition to manipulating it.”

  “What a fucking moron,” I muttered, shaking my head. “So, this is her house?”

  “That is her house, and she would have access to the top specialists. It would be trivial for her to put together the type of team needed to do your operation—and the kind of people she could put together would be happy to do it and erase the evidence while doing so. Dr. Mansfield thinks it would have taken them two months to prep you for such a procedure, including removal of as much infection as possible, and then four to six months of recovery afterwards.”

  “Which would put us to now, if I recovered on the slow end.”

  “Which puts us to now,” he agreed. “Dr. Castor is scheduled to do a convention talk in a few days in Spain.”

  I narrowed my eyes, staring at Bradley’s father, wondering how he’d found out—and just how closely he’d been following the doctor. When I said nothing, Bradley asked, “What is she talking about?”

  “Treatment options for patients with trauma-induced chronic injuries with a focus on critical bone recovery, repair, and rehabilitation.”

  “That sounds eerily familiar,” I murmured.

  “The rumors have it she is going to propose a new controversial treatment method for particularly severe injuries.”

  I held my foot out, glared at it, and pointed at my shoe. “You’re trouble. Look what you’ve done. You’ve gotten us into trouble. This is all your fault.”

  “You’re struggling to cope with this, aren’t you?” Bradley’s father asked.

  I shrugged. “It seems pretty far-fetched some random woman from Spain would get a bunch of her doctor friends together, kidnap me, and do a ridiculously expensive and controversial treatment on my foot. It’s ludicrous. And expensive. They could have taken you for a financial ride your bank account would never forget.”

  “But it stands high odds of being true.”

  “Why do you think it might be true?” I blurted.

  “Dr. Yvon is one of her friends and associates,” he informed me.

  My mouth dropped open, and I spluttered. “Wait. Didn’t he say something about a treatment plan?”

  “That he’d been working on one for a long time, yes.”

  I snapped my teeth together, but after a moment, I blinked. “Did he literally admit his involvement to our faces?”

  Bradley covered his mouth, and after a moment, my fiancé giggled. “He must have been pretty pleased with the work because it was partially his work, and Dr. Mansfield has no idea he was involved. He was like a proud peacock over your foot. And he ended up coming here because he’s friends with Dr. Mansfield. Hell, for all I know, maybe he became friends with her because you’re her patient.”

  “Why are you laughing?” I demanded.

  “It’s hilarious. For months, we’ve been worried the killers got a hold of you, but no. Vigilante magical physicians booked a vigilante magical librarian for a kidnapping and an operation. And they covered their work using a senator believed to be a target, copycatting the actual serial killers to pull it off, because everyone thinks the killers did it.”

  “But why shoot me?” I asked, pointing at the scar on my arm. “Wouldn’t doctors not want to do that?”

  Bradley’s giggles grew into full laughter. “Someone had to get shot for it to work, and how better to paint you in a good light? The videos had you shoving the senator out of the way, and then you were shot after you hit him. That implies the shooter waited until you could be grazed. You hitting your head probably hadn’t been part of the plan, but with a bunch of doctors behind the kidnapping? The only thing they were likely worried about was killing you outright. That they completely erased that you were shot at all comes across to me that they wanted to minimize how much you suffered while in their care.”

  “But why the senator, then? Why grab him at all?”

  Bradley shrugged. “That’s easy. The illusionist would have painted an alternate reality, and since they’re obviously strong enough to do that, they’d just create the reality that best fit their dialogue before dumping him somewhere, making it appear the FBI had performed a daring rescue—in reality, it was probably just a calm drop off where the FBI agents all believed it was more of a daring rescue rather than them dumping an unwanted victim.” At the rate Bradley grinned, I worried he’d lost his mind. “This actually makes sense.”

  “Don’t mind him, Janette. This is the first scenario we’ve come up with that actually fits all of the pieces we have. A copycat to get you out of the way so they could do a severe act of kindness is excessive—and it fits. And it would protect you for months. The real killers wouldn’t want to get you out of the way because the real killers are probably having a field day because somebody copycatted them to get rid of you. The real killers probably think they have a copycat group of supporters, and they panicked because they missed the senator. Why you were taken just didn’t fit any of the puzzle pieces we had. This actually all fits. The senator wasn’t the goal at all. You were. And there are connections that would make it easy enough for them to plan your kidnapping.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked. “I don’t understand.”

  “I do,” Bradley stated, clearing his throat. “The New York Public Library has a lot of specialists, right? Mickey talks to the paper pushers all of the time. He’s become quite close with one of the acquisitions experts for the main branch. That acquisitions expert? She’s a former doctor.”

  “What kind of doctor?”

  “Trauma recovery. The grind got to be too much, so she retired and became a librarian instead. She still wanted to help the public. She’s worked with Dr. Castor; you don’t get two specialized doctors like that who handle severe cases without overlap, and Opal was the best in her field for rehab. Mickey found out when trying to get more information on what would be needed to help your foot heal. It’s been one of our coping mechanisms,” my fiancé admitted. “The therapists approved, too. If we were looking into ways to help your foot, we would always maintain the mindset you still lived out there somewhere. Dr. Mansfield suggested the therapists on the recommendation of a friend.”

  “Yvon, by any chance?” I asked in a wry tone.

  “Entirely possible, especially since Mickey was researching alternative treatment methods to see if we could do anything to help you heal.”

  I showed off my foot. “I’m confused. Do I send chocolate, cards, or flowers? Do I have to thank them while informing them their methods might have scarred me for life?”

  “No,” both men stated.

  I could understand Bradley’s father refusing, but I didn’t understand why my fiancé rejected my idea to show some gratitude. “Why not? If you’re right, they were doing a really good deed in a somewhat traumatic fashion. Except beyo
nd being really lonely, it wasn’t really traumatic. Excluding the part that was so traumatic I seem to have completely blocked it out.”

  “That part is the reason why,” Bradley’s father replied. “That could have killed you.”

  “But it didn’t.”

  “You were gone for almost nine months,” Bradley added. “I definitely didn’t appreciate that at all.”

  “Well, I can’t say I liked it.” I pointed at my foot again. “But I appreciate this.”

  “She makes a good point, Dad. I mean, I’m forced to appreciate it, too. She’s not hurting every time she takes a step. It’ll hurt when the weather changes, and it’ll hurt and get sore because it was so extensively injured, but she’s not going to hurt all the time anymore.” Bradley sighed. “And even if we could prove it, why would we? I still don’t understand the motive. The expense for this would be huge. That many specialists on that complicated of an operation? Who paid for it? Why?”

  Mr. Hampton shrugged. “It’s not that expensive, outside of the machines, when all of the specialists are doing the work because they want to. You’re assuming they paid for anything. Dr. Castor is a researcher. She surely owns her own lab equipment. Other specialists of that tier are wealthy enough to own their equipment. All they’d need is a matching blood type for transfusions as needed, and an illusionist could easily just steal some from a blood bank without anyone being the wiser for it. Blood gets tossed with unfortunate regularity. All an illusionist would have to do was flag the blood they needed for her as tainted or spoiled when it wasn’t.”

  Turning, I wiggled out of Bradley’s hold, threw my hands up, and marched towards the beach. “I am going to steal a seashell from state property. There, a crime you can actually solve.”

  “I don’t have any handcuffs. I don’t like this game,” Bradley complained.

  Bradley’s father snickered. “You might not, but I do.”

  I halted, spun around, and gaped at Bradley’s father. “Take that back!”