Page 99 of An Unexpected Home

“You’re gonna find him, son. I’m sure of it.” He took a sip of coffee. “Now do you have time to have breakfast?”

“I do,” Brandon said.

They placed their orders and it was then that Brandon remembered that he had news. “I have something kinda important to tell you.”

Charlie waved him off. “If you don’t think that your mom already found out about Leah moving in with you then you don’t know this town very well.”

He shook his head. “I figured and I feel bad about not telling you first. But really, it just kinda happened.”

“Are you happy?”

He smiled. “Happy is not even the right word for what I feel with Leah. She makes me smile and I think I maybe forgot how to do that for a while. Now, thinking of her not being in my life, makes me panic.”

His dad nodded a huge smile on his face. “I like her. A lot. She has backbone, that’s important. Your mom had that. Hell, she still does.”

They both laughed.

“Now if we could just settle Logan down,” Charlie said.

“That might be closer than you think.”

“Oh boy, seems as if you know something I don’t?”

“It’s nothing...yet. But I’m keeping my eye on the situation.”

“If I really wanted to know who it was, I could just ask your mom, you know that right?”

Brandon laughed. “Probably true.”

Their breakfast arrived and they ate while keeping up their conversation. When his food was gone, Brandon hugged his dad and headed for home.

He almost went by Leah’s, but at the last minute decided to let her sleep and have a regular day. It would only be a little while longer until he was sleeping with her every night. He could make due.

He parked his car outside and went around to the porch facing the lake. He loved the lake this time of the day; the sun rising, lake calm. After enjoying the view for many minutes he unlocked the door and went inside. Wanting out of his work clothes he headed for his bedroom.

A strange feeling washed over him. A feeling that he was being watched. When he turned to check, everything went black.

––––––––

When he regained consciousness, he had no idea how long he had been out, but he was now tied tightly to a chair.

His head was pounding and he felt dried blood above his right eye. There was no one in the room with him as far as he could tell.

He was in his kitchen and he could tell from the sky outside the windows that it was still morning but close to noon. He would have called out or yelled but his mouth was gagged and then taped.

This had to be Will but Brandon had no idea how he could have gotten into his house. More so, how had he gotten the jump on him, a trained cop?

And that’s when a thought occurred to him and he looked down.

Sure enough his gun was gone.

He was helpless and now there was a crazy person out there trying to hurt Leah, and he had a gun.

He screamed even though it was futile. His head was pounding and his arms hurt from being tied behind his back but none of that mattered when all he could think about was Leah and finding a way to protect her.

He needed to come up with something and he needed to do it fast.

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