I do love writing this story and am glad people also seem to be enjoying it. I can't seem to stop writing it. Thanks once again for the wonderful reviews. Here is chapter 7, I hope you like it.

Chapter 7

Sandy was fuming.

He'd just come out from a meeting with the police and he swore he could almost see red, he was so angry.

"Sandy?" he felt Kirsten's soft hand on his back. As was the normal lately, tears were falling freely down her face.

"Just go home, Kirsten. I'll look after Ryan today." he forced himself to keep calm, not wanting to cause a scene but needing her to go home. He couldn't face her right now. Not after what her father had done.

"Sandy… I didn't know." she whispered but he didn't pay her any attention and merely shrugged her off, hurrying off to be with his son.

He couldn't believe this.

All that time they'd been looking for Ryan, all the worries and terrors they had had to deal with, only to find out the man who had planned the whole thing, had been right under their noses.

All he knew was that the next time he saw Caleb Nichol; he was going to give him more than a broken nose.

All of the pain and fear that his son had been forced to undergo was to do with that man.

He breathed in deeply, there was no way he could face Ryan this way. The kid could barely bear being spoken to these days. He'd curl up into a ball if anyone came too close.

Sandy was treating it like he always did. He stayed with Ryan and spoke softly to him. Kirsten and Seth usually sat in the corner. Sometimes, Seth would take up the steady commentary when he sensed Sandy's voice getting too tired but Kirsten never said anything.

He just needed some time with Ryan to himself. Ryan had begun to respond a little, he would no longer go into a panic attack if anyone touched him. He would no longer whimper whenever anyone got too close. He'd generally just watch whoever was talking with wary eyes.

There was still a long way to go, but Sandy was determined to get through to him and let him know that they were there for him.

He pushed open the door and watched as Ryan snapped his head up to see who had entered.

Sandy was pleased when he merely watched as he entered. He didn't smile or show any emotion in his face, he just watched Sandy passively.

Sandy resumed his usual position, not too close but not too far away from Ryan. He could feel Ryan watching his every movement.

Ryan wasn't sleeping well, or so the doctors said. They had to give him a sleeping pill every night or else he'd just stay up, all night. A psychotherapist had been to see him a few times, but he had yet to speak to the poor man. He also suffered terrible nightmares and he'd had to be restrained more than once.

He was always in a right state in the mornings and all it took was a look at the frazzled nurse on duty to know what had been going on.

As a result, Ryan's wrists were red and bruised. But he didn't seem to notice the additional pain.

Sandy was beginning to get more and more worried as the days went by.

He'd almost shouted at the police officer that morning. The bearded officer had told them that a Mr Caleb Nichol had been arrested on suspicion of the planning of Ryan's kidnap. As a lawyer, Sandy knew that he wouldn't go to prison as long as the people that had actually kidnapped Ryan and that thought angered him even more.

That man had been paying people to capture his son and hurt him. He felt a ball of anger rise in him again.

Only one of the men that had been hurting Ryan had been captured and he had only given Caleb's name. He hadn't given any information on the other kidnappers. Sandy had seen the picture of the man in a newspaper and had been shocked by how rough and terrifying he looked.

He didn't want to imagine Ryan in the hands of that man.

He noticed that Ryan was still watching him and he began to speak softly to him.

He tried to keep up a happy front, not wanting to further frighten Ryan into his shell. He tried to swallow his anger. He assumed Kirsten had followed his order and had gone home as there was no sign of her when he glanced out through the glass door.

He tried not to wince at the sight of Ryan's bruises as he spoke. He was still wickedly pale and it deeply accentuated the bruises. He was still showing signs of dehydration and his lips looked sore and cracked.

The doctors had spoken to him about all the evidence that had arisen about what Ryan had been through. There were deep cuts on his stomach where there were signs that Ryan had been teased with by a knife. There were marks and rope burns on his ankles from where the kid had obviously been tied up. The more Sandy was learning about what had happened, the more anger he felt for his father in law.

There was no reason for Caleb to hate Ryan so much. The kid hadn't done anything to him besides provide a new son for his daughter and save his daughter's relationship with her family.

They'd been told that when the psyche consult had cleared Ryan, they could take him home. That thought kept Sandy going. He longed to have Ryan back where they could have him in the same building. Where they weren't given a time between certain hours when they were actually allowed to see him.

His only worry was how Ryan would react to going back home. Sandy knew that Kirsten still drank when she felt especially lonely and judging by the way he had spoken to her, Sandy was certain that she was probably drinking at that precise moment in time. He was worried how Ryan would take that.

Seth had been unusually quiet recently. Instead of his usual banter he would lie on his bed, when he wasn't at the hospital, and mope, with Captain Oats locked in his hands.

The future was uncertain and Sandy could only hope and pray that one day they could help Ryan get back to his old self and become once again the family that they used to be…

To be continued…

Thanks for reading and a special congratulations to ChrisUSA who actually managed to guess that Caleb was the man who arranged the kidnapping. Either this story is incredibly predictable or ChrisUSA is psychic.