Abandoned House - Belfast
Rosalie's head was thumping from all directions; dehydration, hunger, exhaustion, smacking her head off the car door, and then smacking her head off the butt of that fella's pistol. She must have dozed off finally, from sheer exhaustion; how long for, she couldn't really say. Her groggy eyes glazed over the room. She jerked herself upright and pushed herself back into the wall, struggling to get further away from the stranger in front of her face.
"Hey. Hey." He hissed and raised his hands a little.
He put his gun down beside him and pulled the tape carefully away from her mouth, imploring her to stay quiet, he was here to help. She groaned and brought her bound hands up to the tender skin.
"You alright?" He asked as he drew a knife from his waistband, and cut along her bindings, "Can you walk?"
Rosalie nodded once.
"Alright. Come on then, Princess." He said, and held out his hand, "Let's get you home."
Rosalie hesitantly took the man's hand, and he pulled her up to her feet with relative ease. He clocked her stagger a little, akin to a baby deer, the second his hands left her, and then subtly caress the side of her aching head, as though she were more than a few shots in, waiting for the world to turn right side up. He was not remotely convinced she was actually up for this, but there was no other play here.
He pushed the window up slowly, painfully slowly, and stuck his head out; he flashed his torch out into the darkness, once.
"Right." He whispered, and held out his hand to her again, "Ready?"
She stared at him, incredulously. He beckoned her over and pointed out the extension below them, and then a bin shed or compost bin structure below that.
"Piece o' piss." He whispered back, with a wild grin, and offered his hand once more.
She accepted his aid, and carefully made her way out of the window, stepping as lightly as she could onto the slate tiles below. He followed closely behind her, ready to grasp any slips or tumbles. He tapped her arm towards the end of their perilous descent, and shuffled around past her, dropping to the ground below, and turning back to help her down in a rather gentlemanly manner, like a maiden lifted down from her horse. Rosalie dismissed that little line of thought as the concussion's doing.
"Awch, shite. Fuckers chomping at the bit, as per!" He hissed, and pulled her back down against the wall, back into the shadows.
"What?" Rosalie whispered, making no sense of that, any of this, for that matter.
He gestured out to the treeline in the distance, and ordered her, "Run for those trees."
Men started barking at each other throughout the grounds. Um, no, Rosalie thought, I think I'll stick with squatting in the secret shadows, thank you very much. The sound of splattering bullets erupted moments later. Rosalie crunched down in fear.
"NOW." The man hissed and dragged her up and out of there.
He shoved her onward, and fell away to cover her back. She heard him holler something to the men hurtling themselves towards the house, but she couldn't make it out. She ran, and she ran, straight through the spots dancing over her vision, through the stitch in her side, the heaving and huffing protests of her lungs. Rosalie turned back to check on her saviour and he slammed into her, snatching for her wrist and dragging her further into the forest, even faster.
"Where are we going?!" She bellowed up at him.
"Shut up!" He seethed back, and suddenly dragged her down behind a grassy verge.
They skidded down the grass on their sides. Rosalie groaned at the sudden impact, and caressed her knee with her free hand. He gestured to stay down.
"Who are you?" She scorned and snatched her wrist out of his hand.
He looked back, in derision, and gestured to slowly creep further down the hill. He hissed back, "Quiet."
More men skidded their way into the distant forest, calling out in what she assumed now was Irish; they didn't sound particularly friendly. Her saviour pointed back at her, gesturing to stay down once again; these weren't friends.
"What are they saying?" She asked.
Her shoulders bunched again at the sound of bullets smattering and echoing throughout the forest, and then, nothing.
"I think we're good." He whispered, turned back to her and scoffed, "What part of shut up confuses you?"
"What part of give me a damn answer confuses you?!" Rosalie scorned and she snatched the blade out of his belt.
She pushed herself up to her feet and pointed the knife at the man. He merely scoffed back at her, with another wild grin, in genuine disbelief.
"Okay, Princess." He scoffed, and dropped his shoulders in amusement, "Cute. Real cute. Hand it over."
"Answer me." Rosalie hissed back.
He gestured wildly at the now eerily quiet, creepy forest they stood in, and scorned, "I'm the guy that's trying to protect you from that fucking shite show back there, god knows why." He attempted to snatch the blade back but she slipped out of his grasp, just. He sighed, heavily, and said, with a chuckle in his throat, "You got a real gratitude problem, you know that?"
"Why are you helping me?" She said, very quietly.
She wasn't afraid of him; truth be told, there was something oddly familiar about him. Her shoulders dropped in line with her guard, ever so slightly, and he saw his chance. He snatched her wrist and yanked her body back into his stronghold. His arm locked against her neck, her free hand grasping against his choking hold. He pried the blade from her fingers and shoved it back into his waistband, before shoving her back before him. She rubbed her tender neck and scorned back at him. A searing tear prickled her eye.
"Don't drop your guard. Even for a second." He uttered and crept up to survey the horizon once more. It was time to move. He glanced back, briefly, stunned at her sudden adherence to a basic request, and then he saw her, through the faintest light of the moon finding its way through the treetops; he saw her, and he felt for her. He asked her, with a twinge of veiled guilt, "You alright?"
She didn't respond to him.
"Come on." He whispered and offered his hand, "It's clear."
She didn't move. He sauntered over to her, and assured her, "Nothing's gonna happen to you. Entire Army's looking to build clout with Mack." He extended his hand and told her, "I'm Eoghan. Charged with getting you home. Those fuckers weren't saying anything worth repeating. Anything else you need to know?"
"Rosalie." She said, and accepted his hand.
"Can I take you home, Rosalie?" He asked her.
Teller Morrow Automotive Repairs - Charming, California
Jackson perched on the bench, and lit a cigarette with his bruised and bloodied hands. He had his time to cool down, after taking his frustrations out on the side panelling of a van; Jimmy had no line on Grace, Cameron had come to Belfast alone. Clay nodded to the guys and they headed on over to their V.P. Chibs sat beside him, in solidarity; considering his love of Jackson, along with the years and experience he had on him, tempered his own impulse to lash out in grief.
"Hands look like mine feel." Clay told him.
Jackson exhaled the smoke out of his lungs slowly, his hands twitching, wincing. He told his guys, "We stick with Plan A. You guys drop off the guns. Me and Clay'll pick up Mom, we all head North, and find my kid."
Opie presented a stuffed envelope to Jackson and he informed him, coolly, "Here's ten grand for Serg's tracker." His friend stared back at him, a little confused, and he explained, "Sold the Panhead."
The Sons acknowledged what this meant, the strength of this act of brotherhood. Jackson embraced his friend, heartily, and rasped, "Thanks, bro." Opie brushed it off as nothing, and slapped his shoulder. Jackson turned to everyone stood before him, and asked, "We ready to do this?"
"Absolutely, yeah." Chibs declared.
The Sons all nodded in agreement, and dispersed.
"I'll wire that to Serg's guy in Vancouver." Bobby offered.
"Yeah." Jax said, earnestly, slapping the packet into Bobby's hands.
Chibs clapped Opie on the arm and gestured to hang back from charging ahead with the other Sons. He extended a hand to the man, and rasped, "Thank you, brother. Means a hell of a lot."
"It's all good. She helped me build it." Opie said, with a shrug.
Chibs laughed, and said, "Had to change her screen wash for her, the other week; so, don't give me that shit. This was all you."
Callaghan Estate
Rosalie was sat at the window box, peering out into the massive sprawling grounds surrounding the impressive estate. She'd arrived last night in the pitch dark, and hadn't truly appreciated the scale of the place. She watched the groundskeepers beavering away, tending to the flowerbeds, raking away sharp paths in the gravel, ride-on mowers humming along past them. It was busy down there.
Malcolm Callaghan watched his granddaughter for a moment. He watched her neck crane a little at something else outside catching her eye, before he chapped on the open door. Rosalie simply turned and stared back at the man. Under an entirely different set of circumstances, Rosalie would be taking in every detail of the man before her; her late mother's father, the patriarch of the Callaghan family.
"Did you sleep well?" He asked, and spoke over her continued silence, "This was your Aunt Jenna's room, back in the day. It didn't look anything like this, of course. She plastered all manner of guff on these walls; bands; singers; her own art; some of it was right old tat; looked like a wall out of the underground or something."
Rosalie said nothing.
"She's a very good artist, our Jenna. Her talent is surely a gift from God, and it radiated at such a young age. Some talents, they require years of dedication and practice, but she was brilliant right out of the gate, she could mimic any style, but I always preferred her own." He said, and lost himself in thought once more, with a light scoff, "Even when it was something unearthly, or she was stopping my heart with another proposed tattoo design; it was hers; it was special. She did the most beautiful mural in your nursery, in fact. It was a scene out of the Hundred Acre Wood, but the lines were so delicate, and it was... just charming."
Rosalie said nothing. She thought only of her Aunt Jenna, giving her a hearty pass on forgetting her manners in this instance; then she thought of her own tattoo, weaved over and around a scar.
"Your daughter's beautiful." Malcolm said, "She have a name?"
Rosalie said nothing. She rested her hands on her knees and exhaled slowly.
"It'll come to you." He said.
She rose up from the window box and she finally broke the twenty-one year silence she'd had with the man and asked him, "Where is she? I don't see Cameron Hayes kicking about this castle looking to apologise."
Malcolm waited a beat, treating her to a taste of her own medicine, and then he explained, "The Council convened. If we left Cammy to Jimmy or Clay, then his death would have been brutal. Man's a fool. But he doesn't deserve that."
He stood before her, with his hands rested inside the pockets of his slacks, at ease; his unwavering, casual demeanour irked her somewhat. She unwrapped her tightly folded arms and huffed out, "What does that even mean?"
"He's gone. Quietly. Kindly. Best option for all involved." He said, coolly. He never stated it, but she couldn't have endured what she had without surmising it; Cameron was dead. Malcolm brushed a hand against his stubble, pensively, and then he stated, "You're nothing like I thought you'd be."
Rosalie's expression scrunched up. She scoffed and said, "Oh. Really. Forgive me if I'm not making the best first impression, what with the car crash, and the kidnapping and the getting shot at and dragged through the arse end of nowhere for two days!"
Malcolm suppressed the smirk, and he said, thoughtfully, lightly, "It's all your da." He paused and gestured to her, "Look of your ma about you, 'til you start talking."
Rosalie stared back at him, and suppressed her own unwelcome sprig of emotion: pride. She was exhausted, physically and emotionally. The last thing that she wanted to be doing right now was bantering back and forth with this old man.
"Where is my daughter?" Rosalie asked him again, "Please. You said you know all about this pain, so please-is she okay?"
"Yes." He said, genuinely, "She's fine. She's safe. This ain't the way I wanted you coming back to Ireland...but I guess your welcome's as true as any. Lotsa moving parts here, darling. I'll make good on what I promised you, but it's going to take a little time to get her back here. I'm not taking any more undue risks. I've got some things to attend to the day, but I'd like us to have dinner tonight, and I can explain everything to you then, alright?"
"What am I supposed to do until then?" Rosalie asked.
"You'll have the run of the place, so...whatever you want." Malcolm said, and turned to leave her, "I'll see you at seven."
"Uh, you got a phone?" Rosalie asked, "Mine's...probably on a country road somewhere, in bits."
He told her, "Jenna knows you're well."
Rosalie's heart thumped to the ground, and she struggled to keep the 'oh, shit' expression clean off her face.
"Where is…that guy?" Rosalie rasped, and answered his squinted gaze with, "I was...not very polite to him, and I'd like to thank him for getting me out of there."
"Eoghan?" He asked and told her, "He's about. Stables usually."
Callaghan Estate - Stables
Rosalie dressed herself in what she assumed were Jenna's old clothes; she rolled up the cuff of the jeans twice for her legs didn't go on for days like her Aunt's, and she chose the only old band t-shirt she didn't lose herself in. It was weird being here, by anyone's standards, but weirder still were the interactions with the staff on this Estate who knew her name, knew her family much better than she ever would, and tried incessantly to tend to her, run her a bath, make her breakfast. It was busy, and lively, but distinctly lonely.
"Morning, Princess." Eoghan greeted her as she approached the stables.
He was tending to a regal looking mare, brushing a beautiful chestnut coloured coat. She stopped a ways from him, her arms wrapped around her waist in a manner that didn't fit the warm, still day. She was unsure, and she was guarded.
"She won't bite. She's a sweetheart." He joked, acknowledging the decent distance between them.
She relented, and approached the horse, patting her gently on the neck.
"So, this is what you do for fun around here?" She asked him, "When you're not...out murdering?"
"Work, actually. Only called out for some murdering, when the stakes are especially high." Eoghan informed her, flatly. He sauntered around to where she stood and said, "You don't need walls built up so high you can't see the sun, not here. So, breathe out. You're the closest thing to royalty around these parts, darling. Got a line of people'd wipe your arse if you asked 'em."
"Noted." She rasped, as she watched him work.
Eoghan tossed the brush onto the bench and rose up, wiping his hands on his jeans. He didn't know what he was expecting, in the light of day, or the limited light streaming into the stables; something resembling a light bulb flickering on? No, she wouldn't hold his gaze for long enough.
"You don't remember me, do you?" Eoghan asked her, and laughed, "Shit. That's bad for the old ego."
"From last night?" Rosalie asked him, with a scoff, "Vividly. I'm not that good at repressing shit."
Eoghan led the horse back into it's pen and gave her some hay to munch on. He beckoned Rosalie to follow him outside, and he gestured to different parts of the grounds as he told her, "You know, we actually used to play together out here, as little kids. Build forts in those woods. Play with the dog, pick berries for your gran, you used to call me-"
"Winnie." Rosalie finished his sentence. His stride lightened a little, and she told him, "I remember...tying napkins to beanie babies and parachuting them off the staircase."
Eoghan laughed, recalling the ill-fated idea, and said, "Aye. They fucking flopped to the ground, and you burst out crying."
Rosalie laughed too, for the first time a while, and she said, "Come on. I was, what? Five?"
"Aye, I'll let you off." He laughed.
They walked a little longer, back towards the house, under the gaze of many different staff members buzzing around, attempting to look busy, certainly waiting for anything to report back to their boss.
Rosalie admitted to him, quietly, "I'm sorry. Turns out I am pretty good at repressing shit."
"It's alright." He said, genuinely, "Abject terror, pitch black of night. Makes sense."
"I didn't mean you." She said, with a little shake of her head, "Anyway, I just wanted to thank you, for saving me."
"Course." He said.
"Of course." She uttered, a little sad at that response, and she stopped in her tracks to ask him, "Those men that were driving me from the airport-"
"-knew what they were signing up for." He said.
She took a beat to try to unpack that, but she didn't get all too far. She sighed and asked, "And...that is? To get brutally murdered as a taxi driver?"
"It's all way bigger than you, darling." He said, "It's not your fight. It's not your life, so, you won't see it. See you around."