Chapter 8 - Counselling

"I agree with you bro, with no evidence and Catherine can't identify any of those mask guys, then it's really hard to locate and hunt down the people responsible for her kidnapping, I might as well start forgetting about the kidnapping incident and just improve the security of the building. I will no longer allow Catherine to go out on her own from this building, to prevent the kidnapping from happening again," John said.

"That's the best thing to do bro, it's better to be safe than sorry...I mean safety first before anything else," Romeo agreed. "By the way, the interview of Catherine from TV stations and other media outlets regarding her sudden release from her kidnappers will push on as planned next week in the 13th-floor conference hall. The only invited media outlets were the ones we run our missing ads in the last few months. Her released created a huge interest from the media. They were wondering if you had given a ransom and how did she release and what time? So far we already acc.u.mulated their questions and we will only select the ones we intend to answer, after selecting the questions and briefing Catherine of the answer then everything will be ironed out regarding the news conference," Romeo said.

John stretches his feet on the floor and took a deep breath. His never fond of the media circus but it's something that needs to be done once and for all.

"Okay, bro. Allow only one question per media outlet so that the news conference will be over as soon as possible. My wife doesn't like her face plastered on TV and being broadcasted live all over the country, I have to convince her several times about the news conference before she finally agreed to it and she has two conditions, she will wear a sunglass during the broadcast and it should be a short interview and if it will go on for too long she threatened to walk out. I don't want to subject her to a news interview but we have received a lot of calls from media stations urging us to air our side on her mysterious kidnapping release so we just have to do it so that they will stop bugging us and we all can finally leave the kidnapping incident behind us," John said.

"The police station was also inviting Catherine to drop by and answer some question regarding the kidnapping, so I still have to convince her to go to the police station, it's only a one time visit though, just for record purposes," John added.

"Looks like next week's gonna be a busy day for you and Catherine," Romeo commented.

"Not really, we will just take things one at a time," John said.

"Do you still need to bring Catherine to counseling and therapy sessions so that she can get over her trauma completely?" asked Romeo.

John shook his head. "We discuss it several times but she always said no. She said that she is mentally and emotionally alright and no need for the counseling, all she needs to recover fully is to be constantly surrounded by me and our precious babies..."

"Well... Catherine knows herself better than anyone else. But maybe what did happen to her during her captivity was not that too abusive or traumatic that is why she can recover easily," Romeo voiced his opinion while sipping the wine in his glass. "I'm just wondering bro if your wife was not missing... she and Joseph will meet for sure. Do you think your psycho brother will harm your wife because of his burning desire for revenge? Your wife could be the one in Caroline's shoes, my God! I can't imagine what Joseph will do to Catherine!" he sighed deeply.

That kind of thoughts never crossed John's mind, he was not able to think about it until now when Romeo brought out the topic, given that Joseph has a deranged mind during his last days on earth, he could have done something bad to Catherine and the unborn baby. Was there a twist of destiny that somehow occurred and it's Caroline who suffered Joseph's wrath instead of his wife?

"If the worst thing happens, we could have lost three lives...Joseph's, Catherine's and baby Angel..." said Romeo, his eyes mirrored his dread of what could have happened if Catherine was the one Joseph abducted.

John shuts his eyes, just thinking of that possibility made his heart froze with fear, he winced in pain.

Romeo looked at his friend in the eye, they were staring at each other.

"D-do you think that Catherine's abduction is a blessing in disguise? Or maybe God allowed your wife to be abducted by the lesser evil so that she can escape Joseph's wrath? It's kind of an absurd coincidence. You know things like this happened in real life. For example, the guy loses his permanent job then after a few months of getting jobless he was finally accepted on the job of his dreams, when he thinks he finally loses hope, that is when things start getting back on the right track again. Then here's another example, a guy who fell in love with somebody so bad, then that person betrayed him and had an affair with another person then they got married and the guy feel so heartbroken and he wants to commit suicide but then he met another wonderful person who values his true self worth and falls in love again and they live happily as a married couple... now things like that do exist and it happens regularly in our lives all the time, it's hard to explain things while they were occurring in motion and we only got to understand things after the events unfolded," explained Romeo.

John stared hard at his friend as his words began to sink deeper into his consciousness. "Life on earth indeed works in mysterious ways..." he murmured.

"That's right!" Romeo responded. "Bro, I just want to ask you about this, would you rather suffer 11 months of physiological torture then afterwards get rewarded to continue to live with Catherine happily ever after after the kidnapping... or you'd rather don't want her missing, yet later on Joseph will take your wife's life along with your unborn baby on his journey to death. See...sometimes, we really don't have any choice on what happens to our lives, coincidence happens unexpectedly, and what really matters is the life we will be living after the trials has ended just like the guy in my example who loses his job then got his dream job later on and then the person who got betrayed by his girlfriend yet find true love and happiness in the arms of someone new..."