The Callahan Dynasty

More Truths

"Where is he?" I growled at Carly.
She sat, tied to a chair in the basement.
Blood dripped from the side of her mouth, courtesy of Bella.

I would never hit a girl.
Carly gave a maniacal laugh almost as if Bella didn't just beat her up.
"I'm not stupid, Jason. Do you really think I'll say anything at this point? When I know you're going to kill me?"
I placed my hands on the arm rests of the chair she sat on and leaned in closer.
"Do yourself a favour and spill and I might consider making your death painless."
She gave me another bloody smile. "You don't care about where Dean is. You care about where your little girlfriend is."
I made the mistake of flinching at the mention of Kate and she definitely noticed.
She grinned and sat back crossing her unrestrained legs.
"Tell you what, Callahan. Let me go and I'll tell you exactly where she is."
"She's bluffing, Jason." Bella spoke from behind me.
"It's your bet to take." Carly spoke in a sing song voice. "I bet her pretty little fingers are getting chopped off one by one right now for ratting us out. You know how agonising that can be, right Jason? You've done it to hundreds of men after all..."
"Jason, she's just trying to get under your skin." Isabella continued from behind me.
Here was Carly whispering all these things, wanting me to act impulsively. And Isabella being the voice of reason.
Right now I was only ready to listen to the one that would lead me to Kate.
I heard the sound of a phone ringing.
It was Isabella's. She took it out and looked at the name. "It's Anthony. He must have just gotten out of surgery. I need to take this."
I nodded not really paying attention to anything she said unless it had something to do with Kate.
"Don't do anything stupid." She ordered before turning around to exit the room.
I clenched my jaw and looked at Carly.
She had a smug look on her face.
She must have been lying. She couldn't know.
But then again I didn't know how much anyone knew these days.
The Boss completely took me by shock when he revealed that he knew that Kate was in cohorts with Archibald.
I had to put on my best acting skills and pretend that I didn't know anything about it.
He assigned me to hunt down Archibald discreetly. But I was hoping to use that time to somehow get to Kate and get her out of there.
Unfortunately Archibald is smarter than I thought. He noticed how the security personnel was eyeing him and made a stealthy exit before anyone could detect him.
But not before raising hell. He had one of his little followers start shooting up the party to cause chaos so that no one would find him.
Unfortunately for Carly and a few others, their boss failed to include them in the plan and we ended up catching them.
In the midst of everything, I couldn't keep up with Kate's whereabouts.
Our suspicions, or rather the Boss' suspicions are that she escaped with Dean and took Harry hostage.
I knew better of course and I know that Kate would never willingly leave with Dean. So he must have taken her along with Harry.
I'm such an idiot!
Instead of protecting her, I chose to argue with her.
I knew how much hot water we were in but still I let her out of my side.
"Tell me what you know." I growled at Carly.
I was willing to do anything to know where Kate was as this point.
She jiggled the ropes that bound her hands to the chair.
"Untie me first and get me a safe distance away from this place then I'll tell you."
I narrowed my eyes at her wondering if she even actually knew anything.
She talked a big game about not being afraid of death but I could see the little 'Callahan wife trained' girl trying to talk her way out of this.
I had seen it in all the Callahanwomen's eyes. Don't get me wrong, they were all fearless and I respected them immensely.
Sometimes I believed they had more courage than me and my brothers combined.
But you could always see it in their eyes, my mother, Farah... even Bella. They were committed to their men.
I knew that if it came to it, my mother would die for her husband and her children, even Anthony.
I know that Farah, no matter how obnoxious she could be would take a bullet for her husband.
Miranda wouldn't think twice if she had to give up her life for any of us...
Bella would fight to the death for her father...
Callahan women are all strong and bulletproof. They know where their loyalties lie and most importantly, they know where their hearts lie.
That's how I knew that Carly had to be bluffing. She had been engaged to Harry. She was taught like a future Callahan wife ought to be taught, to remain loyal no matter what.
That's why I couldn't believe her when she suggested she was willing to give up her secrets so early.
I could maybe trick her into thinking I was letting her go to get my answers...
"She's lying." Isabella stated as she walked in and glared at Carly. "Anthony told me that Kate got away with Harry."
I felt a small wave of relief. As much as I hated to say it, Harry loved Kate and wouldn't let her get hurt.
But still, I wanted to be the one to ensure her safety.
I looked back at Carly and she gave Isabella a sour look for ruining her plan.
"Fine." She started. "If that's how you want to play it... let me go or I'll tell Mr Callahan just how his darling children helped one of his enemies escape."
She definitely was cunning enough to be a Callahan, I'll give her that.
I looked at Bella and she shared my worry. Right now, we had an advantage because the Boss still didn't know how deep we were in with Kate.
He just thought she was a girl who infiltrated our family in order to get revenge for the hit he ordered on her family.
"You wouldn't like that, would you?" Carly asked clearly thinking she had the upper hand.
Isabella sighed. "No we wouldn't."
She took a step closer to Carly.
"So we'll have to shut you up for good."
Before Carly could question her, Bella took out her handgun and shot Carly clean through the chest.
Carly's lifeless body slumped down into the chair.
Isabella put back the gun without emotion on her face.
Sometimes I forget how ruthless she can be.
"The Boss said no one dies without his order." I told her.
"So what? You wanted me to let her run her mouth?" She asked.
She was right. And I didn't even care one bit about Carly Monroe. I cared about finding Kate.
"So does Tony know where they are?" I asked Bella knowing she would know who I meant.
Isabella shrugged. "Maybe? I don't know. We didn't have the chance to talk much before his doctor gave him a sedative."
"Is he okay?" I asked suddenly remembering that Kate wasn't the only person I should be worrying about in this whole situation.
"He just ripped his stitches. He'll be fine. He's just a little jumpy... you know how you Callahans can be, always wanting to be where the action is even when you're hurt." Bella rolled her eyes as she grabbed a sheet from the closet of the bedroom we were in and threw it over Carly.
"Knowing, Harry, he'll probably take her to one of his safe houses." Bella explained.
"Why would he take her to a Callahan safe house?" I asked wondering why Harry would do something so stupid. "If Archbald infiltrated the hotel and our docks, I bet he found out where we hide out too."
Isabella rolled her eyes. "Not Callahan safe houses. His safe houses. Or I guess you can call them his 'getaway' houses. Miranda set some up across the next town for him. He used to use them when he needed to get away... after the Seattle incident."
I frowned. "How did I not know about that?"
I knew that Harry was never the same again after the Seattle incident but I didn't know all the times he would disappear that it was to get away from our family.
"Because you're selfish." Bella snapped.
I glared at her. "Hey, don't you ever say I never cared about Harry"
"I'm not saying you didn't. I'm just saying that all this... Jason. Training, missions, girls... you were always so competitive with Harry because it was always a game to you. You always wanted to one up Harry and me... But all the while, you forgot to open your eyes and realise that we weren't playing your stupid little game anymore."
I remember how Harry and I used to keep score of how many missions we succeeded in.
It was our thing. How we would keep things interesting.
How was two brothers challenging each other wrong?
"You know, if you're jealous of what Kate and I have-"
Isabella let out a humourless laugh.
"And here you go playing the same old stupid game. Jason, you ruined me with how toxic our relationship was. I was so drunk on it that I didn't realise until it was too late. What you would do to me... what we would do to each other..."
I knew she was referring to how when we would go on jobs together, we would each choose someone to seduce and whoever got the others number first won.
It was honestly harmless. And I almost never had to kiss those other girls.
"That meant nothing, I already told you." I growled at her.
"The fact that you still don't see it proves my point." She continued. "I loved you and only wanted you but because you got bored, you wanted to add other people into the equation-"
"Those people we flirted with meant nothing..."
"Yes they did!" She exclaimed and I noticed tears in her eyes. She shook her head and quickly blinked back the tears.
As I said, Isabella never let anyone see her cry.
"You can never tell when people are hurting. You couldn't tell when I was hurting, you couldn't tell when Harry was hurting... I thought you would realise your mistakes after Harry and I ran away. That's why I gave us another chance. But you are in capable of change, Jason. That's why I don't want you with Kate. It's just a matter of time until you break her too."
Isabella turned around and stormed out of the room.