So technically its still Thursday here in Texas. Good news bad news. Good: Extra long chapter today. Bad: its long because I may not post next week. Don't kill me please.

My daughter has end of the school year stuff going on and it tires me out sooo bad. I'm still sleeping 12 hours a day and can only stomach 1 meal a day. I have NO energy. Next week is totally packed. I barely made it this week. So don't hate me if I don't post/post late/or post a short chapter next week.

Disclaimer: You already know.

Chapter 10

Carlisle couldn't lie, it was a good plan. It was logical and efficient. It would ensure that very few of their people died. Only one thing bothered him. "He is my SON! My only son. You expect me to just let you paint a fucking bull's eye on his back? Look it's a good plan, but can't we get some other patsy to play the part?! How about a Capone, or some dumb-fuck from Chicago or Boston. I've got a list of assholes that I want dead. Edward is not doing this!"

Charlie knew this would be a hard sell, "Look, he'll be protected by our best."

"So now you insult my father's crews?" Edward was not amused.

"My father is just trying to reassure you and your father that nothing will happen to you. It would look suspicious if your men start crowding you." Izzy was tired of the way the Cullens worked. Never mind that this plan would save so many of their men. They didn't look at them as extensions of their own blood. They didn't know what it meant to sacrifice. To give. That's why they will never be as large and successful as the Swans.

"Was this plan in place before or after our fathers made this deal?" Why the fuck am I still here asking questions?

"After. In fact it was made over lunch after discussing with, and disposing Demitri and Corin. He gave us the information we needed about the inner conflicts of the Vulturi Family." Selfish bastard.

Ed alternated between pacing and cracking various joints. "Look I'm fine with them coming after me. But this puts my entire family at risk. If they see that they can't get to me, they'll go through my parents or my sister and Whitlock. I can't speak for them."

Bella saw the truth in his face. He was worried for the women of his family. "Perhaps, we could at least train them in the basics. I could arrange for…"

"No. My wife and daughter will simply be put on lock-down and we will increase security."

Emmett tried not to flinch as his wife's fingernails drew blood from his hand. She was annoyed by weak women; but men who kept them that way pissed her the fuck off. He began to tap her back. The sign to stay quiet. He could almost feel the raging heat emanate from her. He knew that she would personally train both women even though she couldn't stand them. But he also knew his sister; and she was about to fuck the Cullens' world up. With his free hand he reached for the bowl of mixed nuts and watched.

"Every man, woman, and child connected to this world deserves the right to be able to defend themselves." Archaic chauvinist assholes!

"Not every woman wants to be an amazon." Jasper had the nerve to look right at Rosalie when he finally decided to speak. He hates her.

Edward briefly wondered how Emmett was able to stay calm when his wife just got insulted to her face. Why the hell is he smiling?

"First of all my daughters are not amazons! Second, I take great offense! What's good enough for my daughters isn't up to standard for the Cullens!?" Papa Swan…not happy. Mess with him. Mess with his son. But no matter how educated, strong, or well trained; those women are still his baby girls. Fuckers.

"Don't talk to my father that way! They're fine," Ed turned to Bella, "but not every woman wants to be like you. Some choose to remain ladies."

Oh shit. Both Swan men thought and moved to the edge of their seats. One hoped she'd hold her temper, the hoped she didn't.

"I'm not a lady. Please tell me then, Mr. Cullen, if I'm not an amazon, nor a lady; what am I?" Edward cracked his neck with stress and frustration. Bella stood up and stepped up to him, "I'm a Swan. And no matter who I marry, I will always remain a Swan." Motherfucker. A smile threatened her indifferent facial expression. "And I will be passing my family's ways down to any and all of my children no matter their gender." Come into my web. Fall into my trap, Junior.

"What the fuck?!" She must be bat-shit crazy if she thinks she'll be teaching my daughters how to be a raving bitch like her! "There is no way in hell Isabella. Not my daughters!"

"It's a deal breaker." She looked to her brother and then to her father. The plan they discussed was almost at its end. All that was left was to reveal a truth. A painful truth. Bella and her family had been scarred by it; had been shaped by it. She was not ashamed. In fact, she feels that it helped make her stronger and wiser. It made her family tighter and more open. She knew it was something she would share with her future husband out of respect and trust anyway. Today would be the day.

Charlie acknowledged Bell's signal. It was time to seal the deal, "Son, why don't you and Rosalie take Mr. Whitlock to his wife. I'm sure he misses her greatly." He waited until they were gone, "Carlisle, why don't we talk in my office. I have a rather personal story to entrust you with. Bell, why don't you take Edward to your room? I'm sure you have much to discuss." With that, everyone separated.

Edward tried to calm down. He knew he had let his temper get the best of him again; he needed to rein himself in.

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When she led him to a library and through a reinforced door Edward was a bit confused. They walked down a flight of stairs where a junction ended the path; left, right, or center. Without a word, she headed left. His anger was easily dissolved in his pooling curiosity. Her heels held an oddly calming cadence. They passed a full gym and a weird obstacle course. Next were a small firing range and a few large logs with knives lodged in a faded bull's eye. The hall suddenly opened up into a loft style apartment.

She quietly took a deep breath and led him to a large sitting area where she often met and entertained her crew. She sat in her favorite antique chase lounger and kicked off her heels and leaned back.

There was something in the way she sighed, in the way she let her hard shell melt as she leaned into the chair. He couldn't put a name to it. But there was just something about this girl.

"How old were you when you first learned to shoot?" She asked.

"Six when I first held one and learned to take off the safety and fire. Seven I was loading and cleaning it."

"I'm guessing you were born knowing about the family business, right?"

"Of course."

"But not your baby sister."

"No."

"I'll presume that she never really got the talk."

"There has never been a reason. I did teach her to shoot when she turned seventeen."

"I'm sincerely happy that you never had to learn the lesson my family suffered through." She took a moment to gather her thoughts. She has made her peace with what happened; that didn't mean it took all the burn away. "My father had first thought that I could be out like your sister. He was so proud; he had a huge baptism for me. My mother had known better. My dad thought it was just her Latin superstition and paranoia. She insisted on everyone calling me Marie, my middle name. She was right. They were swamped with offers for alliances from every party goer. Even a month after he would get letters and calls from all over. They only saw me as a bargaining chip. A chance to attain more power. Mom was invited to bring me to 'play dates' with influential sons. They were going to hide me away for just a little while, but invitations turned to veiled warnings. Offers of alliances became insinuations of blackmail."

Edward could understand. His Family wasn't as influential as the Swans so Alice wasn't pursued like Isabella.

"My father only became more determined to keep me away from it all. He wanted to shield me, protect me. He made sure I knew the basics of self-defense and how to use a gun. I had two body guards as well. But I never got the talk. I never understood his place in the world or the power he held. One day after school, I was allowed to stop at my favorite ice-cream shop. Bobby was already in car with the engine going, Sam opened the car door for me, and then hell came for me." She looked away and her eyes relived her story. "Sam took a shot in the vest and threw me in the car while yelling 'Go! Go! Go!' Bobby barely got the car in gear when a van rammed us head on. Sam was trying to take out the second van that had trapped us from behind. Bobby tried to maneuver the car any way he could to get us out as bullets flew off the impenetrable glass of our car. When he saw it was impossible he rolled his window down just enough to fire and kill the driver of the first van. He tried to roll it back up and ram his way out of the deathtrap. He wasn't fast enough. Another man was able to stick the barrel of his gun in the window and shoot Bobby in the neck. With the last of his strength, he continued to try to ram our way out and seal the window. We only made it half a block. He told me to stay inside and trigger my tracker. With his last breath he told me, 'Your father knows and is coming for you. He'll always come for you no matter what. Remember Belly, he'll always come for you."

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"Carlisle, I can't tell you what it was like to get that distress signal. Everything I had done to keep her safe. All the precautions, all the hiding. I sent everything I had to that location. Her driver was dead. Sam took two shots but was coming to. All he asked for was a chance to help find her. Those fuckers put a gun to his head and told my daughter if she didn't come out they'd shoot him in the head. Even back then, she always put others ahead of herself. She got out of the car, Carlisle; she got out of the damn car."

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"I was eight. I was just a kid. I couldn't let them kill Sam. I couldn't. Sam kept yelling at me to stay in the car, he begged me to let him die. He had a crush on a girl named Emily. He had finally decided he was gonna ask her out that weekend. I could only think of him never getting the chance to ask her. I got out of the car and ran to Sam. I snuck the cell phone into his inner pocket as I hugged him. They were trying to pry me off when I grabbed his extra tracker and his pocket knife and dropped them in my boot. They dragged me away and shot Sam in the leg and shoulder. I had no idea why I was taken. I didn't even know who my father really was. If there had only been a silent moment; Sam tried to tell them Dad's name but I didn't know why. There had been too much shouting and shooting for him to be heard. If I had only known. If they had heard Sam's warnings. The bastards who took me didn't know I was the daughter of the infamous Charles Swan. They just knew I was some rich man's kid. My father had hid my identity well…"

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"…too well. Those bastards didn't know they signed their own death warrants when they took her. If I had been honest with my daughter; if I hadn't hid the truth, she would have told them exactly who I was and they would have brought her back. They sure as hell wouldn't have hurt her." It was early in the day, but he took a sip of cognac anyway. "But they did, they hurt my baby girl."

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"They searched me and got rid of the first tracker. It was the one I took from Bobby. I screamed but they just threw me against the wall of the van. I blacked out. I wasn't sure how long I was out. I had two more trackers on me. I had to wait for a chance to turn them on. The technology back then wasn't as great as it is now and I had to save battery power. I turned on the first one, mine. I remember thinking that I just needed to hold on until Dad could catch up. I had no idea they were half a day behind. I had been knocked out for ten hours then watched like a hawk for hours on end. They finally let me go to the bathroom at a gas station. I activated one of the trackers and carved my initials and the license plate number in the stall wall."

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"She was so smart. A quick thinker. We had lost thirteen hours before she was able to get that tracker on. But what disturbed me most was the fact that the store employee had seen crusted up blood in her hair and a bruise on her arm. I had never known such all-consuming fear and rage. My heart bottomed out when that signal died four short hours later. Somehow they had found it on her. I almost cried at the thought of their hands touching her; searching. We had a team that stopped at each rest stop. Every time she could she left something behind. A name, color of the van, a description, anything, everything. They switched vehicles and she was able to turn on her last tracker. At another stop she had written a description of it with the tag number. She also left the word 'trunk' and a little heart. They threw her in a trunk. She knew I was coming, and she still loved me. After what being my daughter had cost her; she loved me still."

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"I had tried to escape when they changed vehicles. I paid for it too. They didn't care how small I was, they beat the shit outta me anyway and tossed me in the trunk. I tore up everything I could in that trunk. My entire body hurt but the tracker was on and I broke through the tail lights hoping for a cop to stop them. Too bad they were driving me to a cabin in the middle of nowhere. When they finally took me out they beat me again and I lost conscience again. During that last beating the tracker was damaged and no longer worked." She didn't shed a tear. She didn't raise her voice.

"Seven. There were seven men. When I woke they had tied my ankles and my wrist together. They demanded that I give them all my personal information. They asked me who my dad was. They asked if I knew what he did for a living. I said nothing. I wasn't willing to. I knew my dad was coming to get me all I needed to do was hold on for a little longer. After hours of endless questions with no answers; one man unzipped his pants and shoved himself between my busted lips. He shouted at me that if I didn't use my mouth to talk, he'd find a use for it. I bit him, hard. He slapped me after I spat out his blood and laughed at him. It was worth it."

Edward didn't want to hear any more. His anger had returned tenfold. He saw the truth and the hurt. Yet, not a single tear. He was amazed that she was so strong at eight years old. Amazed that she was so strong now.

She was gonna make him listen. She saw his discomfort and anger, but he needed to know. He needs to know the truth. He needs to know how my old ignorance died in that cabin. She smoothed out her skirt and took a deep breath. "They laid me down on a small twin bed and jacked off on me. They rubbed there disgusting cocks all over my face and body. They all yelled obscenities and threats of what they were going to do to me. I tried to roll over and away from them as they came on me. They decided to play a poker tournament to see who got to rape me first. I made my way under the bed where I started to cut through the rope with Sam's knife."

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"I was out of my mind with worry. We found the car at the dead end of a forest road. There were two paths so I divided the men. I swear I felt her pain. I felt her fear. To think that at that very moment a card game was being played with my Bella's innocence on the table. She could have gone into shock. She could have lost all sense. Lord knows that any other little girl would have. But not my Isabella, no, she kept her head and had a plan. We heard a gunshot and we all ran towards it."

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"They were getting drunk and started to ignore me. I watched as I held the cut rope in place. Only one man, the one I had bitten, ever looked my way. There was a gun resting on the edge of the table closest to me. A window was open above a desk. I waited for that one man to get up to use the restroom. As soon as I heard him lock the door I quietly made my way to the table. I stabbed the man on the right in his chest with one hand while I grabbed the gun with the other. I shot the man on the left as I ran to the desk and climbed out the window. It didn't take long for them to storm out of the cabin. I didn't know where to run so I climbed a tree and hid in the foliage. I hadn't realized how long the journey had been. It was already twilight of the next day. The growing darkness was a blessing to keep me safe. I heard the voice of that one man yell that he was gonna find me and rip me apart. I held on knowing my father was near. I could feel his worry and his rage. I swear it was palpable."

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"It was so hard to stay quiet. All I could hear were their taunts of all the deviant twisted things they planned to do to my child. Those sick fucks didn't deserve the right to die swiftly. My girl was hiding somewhere in the darkness. I would not have a stray bullet claim her. I quietly had the word spread that no shots would be fired and that I wanted them all alive. We methodically surrounded them. My men couldn't help beating them to near death. I called out to her to let her know it was safe to come out. She didn't. My son who wasn't much older than her had insisted on coming. He told me to count off the men. We had six. A pinecone hit Emmett's head. It wasn't safe. We had missed someone."

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"I heard Dad's men disperse to search. I would have just yelled or climbed down, but I saw the man crouching down by a bush holding his gun. He was shaking and gawking at my father. He looked terrified. The evening was growing darker and I could barely see a limping Sam step in that bastard's line of fire. Before it registered, I held up the gun and shot at him. I only clipped his thigh but it was enough. Sam heard him scream and grabbed him. That fucker just kept screaming he didn't know who I was. He didn't know who I belonged to. I held on to that gun as I slowly crept down the tree. My brother met me half way down. He had tears in his eyes and hugged me and helped me down. My father grabbed me the minute he was able to reach me from the lowest branch. My body hurt but I let him crush me into his chest anyway."

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"I held her so tight Carlisle; I broke down and cried as I clung to her. I brought my son into the embrace and held my children with a renewed sense of relief and joy. I promised to never let anyone hurt them. I promised to always be there. I promised I'd die for them. It was the first and the last time my men have ever seen me cry. But I'll tell you; almost all of them had tears in their eyes. No one felt shame for it. If anything it brought us together as a family. Leave it to my Bell to bring people together. I picked her up and brought her to the twisted fucks we had tied up. I asked if there were any others. She whispered that we had them all and she wanted them to hurt and she wanted to go home to her mom. I held her and Emmett in the car. I arranged for a helicopter to bring us the rest of the way. I never let her go for a minute. I ordered my men to keep those fuckers alive and to bring them here to face me later. Carlisle, she was covered in those bastards' fluids. There wasn't an inch of her that was swollen, bruised, or bloody. She was almost unrecognizable. It took her three weeks to heal enough to leave her bed. It was only sheer determination that allowed her to escape. She had a partially dislocated arm, broken radius, fractured fibula, several concussions, multiple fractures to facial bones, and was severely dehydrated. I don't know how she did it. She was eight. My baby was only eight."

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"My family finally came to me with the truth. After listening to the prisoners' constant pleas that had they known whose daughter I was they never would have touched me. The long imprisonment helped to break them down. They turned on each other. Confessed to what they did, but that it wasn't as bad as what the other did. You know how it goes. My father gave in to my request to be there when he killed them. They were kept alive but painfully so. The men would take their anger out on them constantly. Finally I was ready. I watched as my mother tortured a man with acid before used a golf club to beat him to death. My father had Sam throw him in the corner and let another man in. My father electrocuted him several times and then slit his wrists with a dull knife. My brother used his favorite bat to break every bone in one guy's body. Em was in a crying rage by the time he made it up to his skull. Even Sam got to kill the man who had shot him. But then that one man came in. I had been sitting on my father's lap. He had been against letting me watch, but I screamed and cried that I needed to watch them die. My father handed me over to mom as he made his way to his victim. But I couldn't let my dad do it. I needed to do it."

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"He kept crying that it wasn't his idea. That he never wanted to do it. That he didn't know who she was. They all said the same damn thing. I felt her come up behind me. She held my hand and told me to strip him down." Charles took another long sip.

"Sam tied him to the wall and cut away his jeans. Sam never left our side. She had saved his life twice. He couldn't understand how a little girl could willingly sacrifice so much for him. He had already been willing to die for her. Now his devotion knows no bounds. Because of her actions, she won the love and loyalty of all my men. They'd sacrifice themselves or even me before they let harm come to that girl." He grinned at the thought. He wouldn't have it any other way.

"I hadn't even seen the scalpel she had in her hand. She used it to point to the bite mark on his dick. My blood boiled. I vaguely heard my wife sob and my son almost growl. Even in my blinding rage, I was impressed with her. So brave, so strong. Even after three weeks he still bared her mark. She had hurt him bad. Before I was able to rip into him; Bella cut off his manhood. She looked to Sam who was in shock but was also in complete amazement of her, and told him to lower him. When the screaming man was at eye level with her, she gagged him with his own cock and told him to keep it there. She then duct taped his mouth to keep it there. She stood back and watched him choke and bleed to death. She didn't shed a single tear. She watched as the rest of the men died. She was reborn from it. She made us all promise to not lie to her anymore. She told me years later that she had made her peace with what happened. Can you believe that she was grateful for how strong the whole fucked up experience made the bond between all of us? She feels it made her stronger and wiser too." He finished off his glass and looked a stunned Cullen in the eye. "I will never underestimate the evil that man can do. Nor will I ever deny my blood the right to defend themselves. My family had to learn the hard way. So did Marcus. Don't be a fool Cullen."

"I have no words Charles. What can I say?"

"Say that you will learn from my mistakes. Society is not getting any more civilized. Ignorance is not bliss my friend. It is a weakness, a vulnerability. A war is coming whether we fight together or not. No matter which way we fight you need to protect your family. If our kids don't marry your girls will still be a target and you know it. So will mine. Who do you suppose will make it out alive?"

Okay so no crazy angry mobs? Last week Renee got to have her say. This week Charlie got the last word. What did you think of the abduction and Charlie?

So hopefully I'll be able to stay awake enough to finish a whole chapter. But never worry I don't plan to ever abandon this story.