Page 36 of Booked for Kidnapping

I never would have been able to escape with a booted foot; I would have fallen, probably to my death, attempting the climb down. However much I disliked how long I’d waited, I would convince myself of its necessity. Once I had a better idea of what was going on, what the news had to say about my kidnapping—if it had anything to say about it—and took better stock of my situation, I would make a plan. With a little luck, my plan would involve reporting to a police station to announce I’d been kidnapped and would really like to contact my family and friends.

Time would tell.

NINE

A sign directed residents to the local library.

My plan on locating and making use of a public library hinged on being close enough to civilization where libraries existed. Deep in the country, the nearest library could be an hour or farther away—by car. The presence of woods surrounding the home I’d been held captive in could pose a problem, if the woods weren’t the specially planted tracks of nature owned by the wealthy trying to preserve their privacy.

It could go either way.

Once confident I hadn’t drawn attention leaving, I shuffled from tree to tree, keeping out of sight of the property as much as possible.

My luck held. I walked far enough my right foot complained over the unaccustomed exercise when the faint blare of a car’s horn promised something was ahead. I followed the sound, and the gradual noise of busy streets welcomed me to somewhere far from home.

Home lacked cacti, palm trees, and redwoods, and whomever owned the woods near the house had cultivated a lie, one reminiscent of the east coast. After a brief walk along a trail, I discovered the cars came from a road skirting the ocean, and judging from the surfers, the long stretches of sand, and mixed lot of license plates, most of them from California, I’d been dumped in paradise, not far from where I’d spent months recovering from the accident.

My heart skipped several beats before settling into a galloping pace in my chest, and I forced myself to focus on my breathing and stare at my right foot, which had survived its second visit to California. Wiggling my toes and showing off my foot, in a proper shoe rather than a boot or a cast, helped to convince my struggling brain and rogue emotions I hadn’t been grabbed by a vengeful doctor pissed off I’d surpassed expectations.

According to Dr. Geran Avers, I had been a complete waste of time and money, and he had zero reason to hold me hostage in some nice house near the coast and fix my foot free of charge. While I’d lost more than a few of my memories, the one of Bradley advocating for my on-going survival and recovery remained.

Vengeful doctors would not help my foot.

When I could take deep breaths without feeling like my heart would burst out of my chest, I decided to join the beach goers enjoying the sun, the sand, and the waves. To remove one of my more distinctive features, I took off my glasses and pretended I could see without them, stuffing them into my shirt with only one of the arms sticking out.

I suspected I would need new glasses anyway, a reality that freaked me out almost as badly as the idea I’d once again lost months of my life to something outside of my control.

To keep my anxiety from making a reappearance, I focused my thoughts on those around me, listening to the murmur of conversation, the squeals of children playing in the surf, and laughter of family and friends enjoying their time together.

Most wore jeans to combat the slight chill in the air, only the brave few went into the water to attempt to surf, and most lounged on the sand on towels and blankets to soak up the sun.

The waves suitable for surfing came few and far between, although the patient were rewarded for their wait.

Rather than soak up the sun, I prowled the area in search of direction, hoping I’d stumbled across one of the many state beaches littering California. The state beaches might have a map of the local area. A map would offer me a better clue than California license plates. Upon closer investigation, I learned I had found a public beach, which offered bathrooms, showers, and general facilities to beachgoers. I had no idea who paid for it, as parking was free in the main lot.

Then, because I could have good fortune, a sign directed residents to the local library, which was a hop, skip, and a jump from the ocean. According to the sign, I would have to go around a single block to reach it, using the local post office as a landmark.

As I had no idea what time a small library near a beach might close at, I headed there first to get a better feel for how much trouble I’d landed in. Luck once again favored me, as the library was closed three days of the week, but it was open. I stepped inside, where the librarian, who wasn’t at her desk but prowling around the small place, greeted me with a smile and asked if I needed anything. I shook my head, mumbled a thanks, and wandered around to get a feel for the place, spotting several public computers scattered around the main room, most of them available for use. I picked one with a window view of the street, delighting in the presence of people going about their business.

Fortunately for me, I could use a computer without my glasses on, although I needed to bump the font size up to account for the damage to my vision. I began with checking the date, to discover I had been held captive for almost nine months. The shock of the passage of time froze me in place, my gaze locked on the innocent enough month.

Late January in California reminded me more of spring in New York, before the heat and humidity sank in its brutal claws. I hadn’t put much thought into what people in California did during the winter. Had I not checked the calendar two extra times to make certain I wasn’t hallucinating, I would have believed it to be March, maybe early April.

Losing time in the hospital had been one thing, easy enough to accept and adapt to when I could focus on proving my doctors wrong and refusing to quit on my foot or myself. I’d quit on Bradley, something creeping its way to becoming a major regret in my life.

Losing almost nine months, trapped in a room with nothing but books for company, would haunt me. What could I have done in nine months? How much had I missed?

What the hell had happened?

I began my search on the internet, and as my life had been put on hold at the point some devilishly cute goats had gotten loose, I started investigating New York goats. To my dismay, the goats and my subsequent kidnapping had made the headlines due to a murder attempt I couldn’t remember. Somehow, Senator Westonhaus had emerged unscathed, and I had been the reason why.

While the library was a small branch, they’d gotten digital news subscriptions for most major newspapers, and the first article gave me a rundown of what had happened.

It had begun with a bunch of goats, and it had ended with a street bombing, a failed shooting, some gas-based sedative, and a small radius hand grenade, the kind meant to deter crowds rather than kill. The grenade had mildly injured five people and three goats with no loss of life. In the resulting chaos, I’d disappeared along with Senator Westonhaus.

I couldn’t figure out why the would-be killer hadn’t taken a second shot to kill Senator Westonhaus, but someone had captured my act of heroism on video. Despite having a crippled foot, I’d seen something, something that had sent me barreling into the senator. According to the video, I’d been shot again, although in the arm. When I checked the spot, somewhere I didn’t usually look at, sure enough, I found a thin, pale line marking where I’d taken a round.

The senator, unlike me, had been rescued by the FBI some eight hours later.