Standard disclaimers apply.
Second Chance
After all, of the police had left. Kaitlyn and Gary remained in the kitchen. Gary pulled the paper from his back pocket. The article had not changed. Kaitlyn got up and began to pace. She was going through a series of emotions. She was upset before, distraught, now she was angry.
"He wanted nothing to do with her for four years. Why would he do this? Why now?" She said looking at Gary. Gary stood up and stopped her.
"Listen to me." He said in as calm of a voice as he knew. "We're gonna find him. When we find him, we'll find her. I promise you."
"What if he hurts her. Gary, what if he…." She started to sob. Gary grabbed her and pulled her body as close to him as he could. He started to run his hand over her hair. This was his fault, he thought. If he had only looked at the paper, he could have stopped this. He knew then that he had to tell her. Tell her about the secret that he had been keeping, praying that she would understand.
"I just wanna go home." She looked at Gary. "Please, take me home." She cried onto his shoulder.
Gary and Kaitlyn walked the short distance to her house in silence. Megan had come to their mother's house hours earlier and taken Jessica home with her. Kaitlyn didn't want to let her leave. She didn't want to let her out of her sight, but she reluctantly agreed after Megan explained that it might be better for Jessica. Ben could keep her distracted, give her some sort of normalcy.
When they got to Kaitlyn's Gary told her that he was going to give his parents a call and give them an update. Kaitlyn told him she was going to go upstairs and lie down. Gary knew that she was emotionally exhausted. He kissed her forehead and she headed upstairs. Gary went into the kitchen to call his mother.
"Hello." He heard his mother's voice.
"Hi, Mom. It's me." Gary said.
"Oh, Gary. Is there any news." Lois asked.
"It was her ex-husband, Mom. He took her." Gary said meekly.
"What?" Lois asked in disbelief. "Do they know where he is?"
"No." Gary said.
"Gary what about the paper. Has it given you any information?" Lois asked.
"No. The paper hasn't given me anything to go on. The article is the same as it was this morning." He sighed. "I don't know what I'm gonna do Mom. I have to find her. This is all my fault." Lois could hear the remorse in her son's voice.
"Gary, honey, you can't blame yourself for this." Lois pleaded tears in her eyes.
"I can't! Like hell, I can't! I've spent the last six years stopping things like this from happening everyday, helping complete strangers. The one time, the one time I need to help someone that I love…" He hesitated. "I failed. This was the biggest test of all and I failed." Lois was speechless. "I gotta go Mom. Kaitlyn went upstairs and I want to check on her."
"Gary, please call us if you hear anything. You're father and I are here if you need us." Lois said.
"Thanks. Bye." Gary said as he hung up the telephone.
He started up the stairs to check on Kaitlyn when he heard her sobbing. It was coming from the girls' room. He walked to the door and he found her curled up on Casey's bed holding the stuffed monkey that she had gotten at the zoo. He walked in and sat down beside her. He caressed her cheek. She sat up and held him as tightly as she could.
"Thank you." She sobbed. "Thank you for being here. I trust you more than anyone." She cried.
The words from her mouth went through his heart like a dagger. He knew. Now was the time for him to tell her the truth.
"Kaitlyn look at me." He said as he pulled her away from him. "I have to tell you something, something important." He got up and started to pace.
"What?" She asked.
"I haven't been completely truthful with you these last few months. I know this is probably the wrong time to bring this up, but…" He hesitated. "After what has happened today, I just hope you can forgive me when I tell you…" He stopped.
"Gary, you can tell me anything." Kaitlyn whispered scared at what he was going to say next.
"Six years ago, ah, after my marriage broke up, a strange thing started to happen to me. I started to get this newspaper every morning. The cat he would bring it. I found out it's not your average newspaper. You, see, I get tomorrow's newspaper, today." He hesitated. "It lets me know when things are going to happen and I go out and I stop them. I help people, that's what I do you see."
Kaitlyn looked at him not quite believing what she was hearing. Then she started to think back to all of the times they had been somewhere and he would help someone. He was always looking at that newspaper. She knew him well enough to tell by the look on his face that he was telling her the truth.
Gary sat back down on the bed. He rubbed the back of his neck and pulled the paper from his pocket. He opened it to the page with the article and handed it to Kaitlyn. "Only this morning, this morning was the ultimate test and I failed." Kaitlyn saw a tear trickle down his cheek. He wiped it away.
"If I only would have looked through the paper. Casey would be home. She'd be here with us." Gary said his head in his hands.
Kaitlyn couldn't believe what she was seeing. She was looking at her daughter's picture in the paper. She shook her head. No! She thought this couldn't be happening. She got up and headed for the window. She had to clear her mind. She had to comprehend what he had just said. There was complete silence.
"Are you telling me that you could have stopped this. You could have stopped this and you didn't." At that moment, she felt so betrayed. She might have been able to forgive him for hiding the paper from her, but in her grief, at that moment, she couldn't forgive him for the loss of her daughter.
He looked at her with pleading eyes. "I love you." He whispered.
"You didn't love me enough to trust me." She said softly sobbing. "Now my daughters' gone. Please just go."
Those were the words that Gary was afraid he would hear. He rose from the bed and headed for the door. He turned one last time to look at her. When their eyes met. She turned away. Heartbroken he did as she asked and left.
Thoughts raced through his mind as he walked the streets of Chicago. This morning he was so happy he had everything he had always wanted, a beautiful woman who loved him, a family. Yet, due to his inability to trust her love, he had lost, lost everything.