Chapter 6
The next morning broke with a bright and clear blue sky,
and the heavy rainstorm had washed the city streets clean.
I woke up to the smell of fresh coffee in the kitchen,
and I stretched my stiff legs under the warm soft blankets.
My hip ached slightly from the fall on the dining room floor,
but the pain felt incredibly different and much more manageable.
It was no longer a mysterious injury from a faceless ghost,
and it was a wound that I could finally begin to properly heal.
I picked up my phone and saw fourteen missed calls from home,
and there were dozens of desperate text messages from my mother.
She begged me to call the police and drop the severe charges,
and she said Elise was terrified and crying in a cold holding cell.
She said our family was being destroyed by the local media,
and she told me I was the only one who could save them now.
I read the frantic messages with a completely blank expression,
and I pressed the button to permanently block her phone number.
Rowan walked into the bedroom holding a large mug of coffee,
and he smiled when he saw that I was finally awake and alert.
He said the local news was already running the shocking story,
and he said my father's business partners were panicking badly.
The auto shop owner had given a full interview to the press,
and she had exposed the bribe and the cover-up to the world.
My father's pristine public image was completely shattered overnight,
and his wealthy friends were rapidly distancing themselves from him.
The doorbell rang suddenly and loudly through the quiet house,
and Rowan went to the front door to see who was visiting us.
I heard a familiar voice speaking in low and tired tones,
and I realized it was my brother-in-law Graham at the door.
Rowan invited him into the living room and offered him coffee,
and I walked out of the bedroom leaning heavily on my cane.
Graham looked absolutely terrible and completely exhausted today,
and he had dark purple circles under his bloodshot tired eyes.
He stood up quickly when he saw me enter the bright room,
and he apologized profusely for invading our private safe space.
He said he had spent the entire night walking around the city,
and he said he could not bring himself to go back to Elise.
He told me that Elise had called him from the local jail,
and she had confessed even more terrible details on the phone.
She admitted she had been jealous of my running career before,
and she said she was angry that I was always the favorite child.
She said she hit me on purpose in a moment of pure blind rage,
and she said the rain was just a convenient excuse to run away.
I sat down heavily on the sofa as the new truth hit me,
and I realized the accident was actually an attempted murder.
Graham covered his face with his hands and started to cry,
and he said he was filing for a massive divorce this afternoon.
He said he could not be married to a violent and cruel monster,
and he promised to testify against her in the upcoming trial.
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I thanked him quietly for coming to tell me the horrible truth,
and I felt a cold resolve harden deep inside my broken chest.
