Chapter 21 | Rescue

Katherine's POV

The taxi pulled into the parking lot of the apartment complex. It seemed like just yesterday I was stopping through in a U-Haul bringing with me terrible news, and also bidding my farewells to the rest of the group. This time, however, the air was heavier and the tension was greater. Our biggest fear was unfolding in front of us, mine especially.

Callie was now behind bars for murders she didn't act out, she was alone and scared.

Chad paced the apartment unsteadily, one hand fixed on his forehead from an apparent tension headache. The wrinkles on his forehead were protruding terribly, his eyes swollen and puffy from crying. His other hand clung his cellphone to his chest, a sign of him awaiting for a call from Callie.

I rolled my luggage into the apartment, setting it beside the door before closing it behind me. "Any news?"

I knew the answer by the way he was acting. Surely he wouldn't have calmed down after her first phone call, but he wouldn't be pacing the living room similar to a stalking hyena if she had called.

He paused from his pacing and shook his head in defeat, "They took her last night, surely they would have booked her by now. She should have been able to call, right? What if she called someone else, what if she called her family?"

I approached him cautiously due to his emotional state, and wrapped him in a tight embrace. I squeezed hard enough to show that he wasn't alone, that despite everything falling to pieces he was safe.

"She wouldn't do that, she would call you. She will call you," I whispered into his ear, slightly stroking his hair.

The trembling of his back signified he was crying, and I slowly began to feel my shoulder becoming damp with tears. I didn't mind, however, because I knew he needed someone.

Chad had never depended on a female in all of his years of living, I wasn't used to seeing him falling apart over one. She was special to him, as he was to her. He depended on her more than he had come to realize, and with her gone he was slowly beginning to deteriorate into nothing.

After he had calmed down, I marched over to the kitchen to start up some coffee.

The tension in the room was at an all time high, "Where are the others?"

Chad seated himself on the sofa staring at the blackness of the switched off television, "Jeremy is out, he says the normal him would have nothing to do with us. Melanie is gone."

Coffee grounds spilled over the counter as I mentally sank in the words escaping from his mouth, "What do you mean 'Melanie is gone', what is going on here?"

The silence was spine bending, the tension only grew by the minute. Nothing was making sense. I had fully underestimated the situation. From the beginning it had seemed everyone was going to stick together.

Everyone, however, seemed to have their own manmade agendas.

The aroma of the Columbian brew filled the apartment, somewhat easing the tension that had been growing.

Chad took a big whiff of the air breathing out in relief as he exhaled, "Melanie has lost it. I went to see her yesterday, to tell her we should all meet here and gather our heads together. Her apartment is trashed, Callie has been going over there at least every other day to tidy it up. Melanie was always in her bedroom according to her, but I thought the situation was exaggerated. If only you could see her Katherine, she looks terrible. It's almost as if she's not there, like she's dead or something."

"Melanie was always the sensitive one of the group," I exclaimed from the kitchen, "She seemed tough, but I always knew if anyone was going to crack up it was going to be Melanie. She's seen too much, it's a lot for anyone to take in. Everyone deals with these things differently."

Chad shot up from the couch like a bat out of Hell, "Everybody copes with death differently, nobody copes with murdering someone. It eats at you, every single day. I would know, and you should too if you had any slight remorse for what you've done."

"I saved Callie from a lifetime of hurt," I began marching towards him, "Of all people, you should be thanking me for what I've done. You know as well as I do, you wanted him dead just as much as anyone. For the law firm, for the glory, for the girl. Face it, if he was alive Callie and him would've had a bond you couldn't have given her. You aren't that child's biological father, you remember that."

My words of the cold, bitter truth stung him violently as the tears began welling in the ducts of his eyes. He knew I was right, he cowardly couldn't admit the truth of the harsh reality.

Chad stumbled back to the sofa, cradling himself like a young child who had just lost their favorite toy. He sobbed weakly and began hyperventilating for air. The empathetic side of me finally kicked into full swing, and before I knew it I was rubbing his back comfortingly.

I found myself kneeling down in order to whisper into his ear through the episode, "I shouldn't have said the things that I did, truth or not you don't deserve that. She loves you, and you love her. You both need one another right now. You can't sit here and fall apart on me, she needs you to be strong. I don't know how but I'm going to get to the bottom of this, I will find out who's talking to the police."

Chad attempted to control his breathing, sliding out a couple of slight nods ensuring he knew and understood the words I was saying.

Breaking us away from the empathetic embrace, Chad's phone began vibrating on the coffee table in front of us. The number of the county jail illuminated from the screen, sending Chad jolting upward and answering it in a frantic.

"I'll accept the charges," he spoke speedily into the receiver.

He bounced uncontrollably on the couch, and I tried cueing in to eavesdrop on the conversation. All I heard was static. Chad didn't interrupt Callie as she spoke, but I could tell by his facial features that the things she was saying was unpleasant.

Chad's face would spread into an unsettling grin, and tears filled his ducts. His face became flushed and his breathing became uneasy again, signaling the near beginning of another episode. The looks on his face gave off the depiction of pure heartbreak.

After only ten minutes at most, Chad and Callie exchanged their farewells before he placed the cellphone back onto it's resting place on the coffee table.

The scene, then, became one that was uncomfortably familiar. His face stayed drooped to the floor, depending on his hands to keep it stable. His knees bounced up and down in a frantic, and I watched as I silently heard him counting out the breaths he was taking.

My hand rested on his shoulder, "What did she say? What's going on?"

Following my words, he returned my glance sympathetically, "They told her they found Stefan's body on the abandoned property. They have her roomed with a murderer in an unit filled with other murderers. Massey is going to pin both murders on Callie unless we do something."

I felt a lump in my throat, like a theatrical pill I was being forced to swallow. Our biggest fears were truly unfolding, in a way none of us would've imagined.

I paced the room as Chad had been doing when I first walked in, my hand also fixated on my chin as I began plotting ways to get Callie out of jail.

I was about to do the unthinkable, the one thing everyone doubted of me. I was about to confess to the murder of my husband and his chauffeur. I was about to make a semi-false claim of murdering my husband in cold blood after he had left me scorned for a pregnant mistress, and how his chauffeur had gotten in the way. I was about to save my husband's mistress from the consequences of her own twisted revenge.