Charlie dragged her tongue along her split lip as she rested her head on the cool panelling and rested her eyes for a moment. She couldn't remember the last time she'd been in a fight, but she could hear her blood pumping loudly in her ears, and she can't help but smile. It probably looks a tad bit demented but she doesn't care.

Hitting Gunther had felt good. She couldn't remember when she had started to hit or when she had stopped hitting him, but his body was currently in a crumpled heap in front of her, his blood pooling from his nose and the cut on his face. And all she could feel was pride at her handiwork. She glances up at the rest of Gunther's sycophants, and flashes them her pearly whites for a moment as police officers shove them aside so they can get to her. She lets them grab her arm, and drag her up. She doesn't bother to resist as she's pushed against a wall and has her hands cuffed, she does wince at how tight they were.

As the adrenaline ebbs away, and she begins to feel the sting in her knuckles and hands, and her thoughts immediately shift towards her daughter. She was glad that Harper was young enough that she wouldn't remember seeing her mother getting arrested. Her thoughts shift and focus on Santana, for a brief moment and she had to wonder if Santana would be impressed. Gunther was nothing more than a beta, but she had kicked his ass, it hadn't really been much of a fight. Her final thought on the matter as she hauled into the back of a police car, is that her dad was going to fucking kill her.

~ O ~

Russell paced back and forth, for once not giving a damn about how it looked. There was a part of him that had always known that Charlie would end up here, in jail, but this had been the first time she'd been arrested. It wasn't the first time that she'd gotten in trouble with the law, but it was the first time that he hadn't managed to clean up her mess before they could cuffs on his daughter. "Shit." If Maribel heard about this, she'd go out of her way to make an example out of Charlie.

"Russell."

Russell turns to the voice, his attention falling on his mate and he immediately relaxes as she enters his space. "Judy, I'm handling it. I've already called the lawyer, and I've already talked to the—" Russell trails off staring at Santana.

Judy looked over at Santana who had taken the baby carrier away from her the moment that they had gotten in the building. She flicks her attention back to her husband, Santana was Charlie's mate and she could see the concern on her face. "What happened?"

Russell tore his eyes away from Santana and looked at his mate, "She attacked her boss. Security called the cops before I could handle the situation. He was a beta, Judy. I thought that having a child would mellow her out, change her but we're back here again."

"Why did she attack her boss?" Santana asks, causing both Fabray's to turn to her. She clears her throat and immediately looks away deciding to check on Harper.

Judy sighs and turns back to Russell who is giving her a look, "Charlie and Santana are friends now," Judy said dismissively. "Is she okay?"

"Yes. They'll be releasing her shortly," Russell replied. Cleaning this up was going to be expensive. He had hoped that she had changed. It looked like things were finally looking up, he was going to have his family back. Charlie was going to get her GED, and get her degree and be a productive member of society.

Judy nods, at least they weren't going to hold her. She needed to make sure her daughter was alright before she got to the bottom of this. "You need to find out exactly what happened here. Before we make a decision how to handle this I want to have all the facts."

Before Russell can respond the door slides open and Charlie walks out rubbing the back of her neck. Her attention is immediately drawn to Santana and she blinks, "Santana? What are you doing here?" It takes Charlie another moment to process that Harper is there as well. "Harper?"

"I ran into your mom and we were talking when your dad called, I came with," Santana lies with ease, holding up the carrier so Charlie could look at her daughter.

Charlie paused and turned, finally noticing her parents, her eyes darting towards her father immediately. She's not truly surprised that Judy puts herself directly in between them and reaches to touch her cheek. "Sorry mom."

"Let's go home," Judy said firmly before looking at her husband. He frowned at her, but after a moment nods and pulls away.

~ O ~

"Why?"

Charlie flinched at her fathers tone and glanced at Santana and Harper as she put on her seatbelt. "Gunther swiped my phone while I was eating my lunch. He was going on about how useless I was, because I was eating lunch late because he dumped all his work on me and I finished late. I was pissed, he said something and then I don't know."

"You don't know?" Russell hissed.

"Russell," Judy said patiently looking at her husband. She can hear him tightening his grip on the wheel and turns to look at her wayward daughter. "What did he say that made you lose control?"

Charlie bites her lip and glances at Santana before swallowing, "It doesn't matter, he kept pushing, and I finally snapped. I'm sorry."

"You're sorry," Russell repeats before pulling the car to the side roughly, and slamming his hand against the hazard lights, before turning to look at his youngest daughter. "Charlotte, you could have killed him. Sorry isn't going to cut it this time, and I'm tired of always having to clean up after you. Do you have any idea how much this is going to cost me to fix? Do you know that every time you fuck up like this you drag the Fabray name through the mud?"

Charlie swallows, and stares at the ground even though she can feel her anger starting to boil over, she hadn't asked him to come and save her. She certainly hadn't asked that he clean up after her, she was a grown adult who could handle her consequences. "I'm sorry," she repeats through gritted teeth.

"You need to be more than sorry!" Russel yells, his voice raised. He wanted to shake her, she was destroying her life, and she wasn't a child anymore where you could get away with simple sorry's. "You put that man in the hospital, and I'm going to need more than a sorry Charlie. I'm going to need to know why you did it, what could he have possibly said that caused you to lose control?"

The tension in the car was thick and when Santana looked over at her mate, she could see the tick in her jaw. She could see the embarrassed look on her face, and more importantly she could see how tightly Charlie's fists were clenched. Immediately without thinking about it she reaches over and touches Charlie's hand, stroking her knuckles with her thumb, hoping that her small gesture is enough to bring Charlie back from the edge. She's met with a low growl from Charlie, but she doesn't remove her hand and eventually Charlie opens her hand just a bit for her to slide her fingers in so Charlie can hold her hand for a moment.

Charlie squeezes Santana's fingers for a moment before pulling her hand away. "He insulted someone that I cared about. I didn't snap when he insulted me like when he called me stupid. I didn't snap when he got the rest of the crew to make my life difficult, I tried to keep my head down and just do the work."

It's at that moment that Harper whimpers, breaking the tension and Charlie immediately drags her attention away from her father to immediately start to fuss over her, taking her rattle and rattling in front of her trying to catch her attention.

A look of hurt flashes across Santana's face, as she watches as Harper practically inhales her fist and stares at the rattle with a look of pure concentration. The only person who seemed capable of causing Charlie not to be a ticking time bomb, was Harper. It also seemed that Gunther had made the idiotic mistake of insulting Harper to Charlie's face, when was Charlie going to fight for her?