For the first time since their adventure began, Sam was really worried about Carly. She had stopped talking the second they got in the car, and even before that, she had ignored the most pressing subject. What would she do, knowing that her father was behind all of this?
Carly had done so much to reach some kind of relationship with her father. Just the fact that Carly and Sonny were no longer together had seemed to heal some of the strains of their relationship. It wasn't perfect, by any means, but there wasn't the constant fighting about Carly's husband. All of that could have been gone in the blink of an eye, the second they looked at John Durant.
What worried Sam the most, though, was that the cold stillness that had overcome Carly during the drive to Manhattan had been eerily similar to the calm that had come over her when they stepped inside Royal's apartment building. They had both made up their minds to do whatever was necessary to get information out of Royal. But, Sam hadn't completely made up her mind to kill him and she thought that Carly had.
Sam preferred the hysterics from before. Not that either situation was an enviable place to be in. On one hand, her ex-husband had left her physically bruised, something she was probably not used to having done to her. On the other hand, her father was a kidnapper. For all they knew, he'd planned to take Michael and Morgan, too, but just couldn't get to them.
"I can't believe I'm about to say this," Sam said with a groan. She kept her eyes on the road, though occasionally took the chance of glancing at Carly out the corner of her eye. "But, Carly, could you say something? You're freaking me out."
Carly didn't say anything, but Sam heard a rustle in the seat beside her. She flashed a look out the corner of her eyes and saw Carly turn towards her. The ponytail that had previously held her back was now loose and her hair fanned around her face. She pushed one side back behind her ear, and she was pale. The things they'd done to Royal had little to no effect on her, but this knowledge… It made her ghostly.
"I know this isn't something you want to talk about, Carly, but it's something that needs to be discussed. We have to know what we're going to do when we get there. We have to have some sort of strategy. Otherwise, we'll just end up in jail and Durant will probably claim that I had Kristina all along and you helped me."
"He wouldn't do that," she said, her voice strained and distant. She turned back to look out the windshield. "He'd probably just talk us into going along with whatever plan he's got. Blame somebody else. He wouldn't leave us holding the bag."
"He might not have left you holding the bag, but he was sure as hell willing to let me hold the bag. He was willing to let me go to jail for a crime I didn't commit."
Carly went still again, staring out the window. Sam sighed. She wasn't about to go into an unknown situation without a plan. Honestly, they didn't even know if Durant would actually be there when they showed up. There could be guards, sitters, any number of people on the outside before they reached the inner sanctum where Kristina was waiting. For all they knew, there could be a fight on their hands that was bigger than either of them would be able to handle alone. This might have been something that they actually needed Jason and Alcazar to take care of.
Also, Sam was worried about Kristina. She didn't know if the little girl was scared, or if she was being treated well. She didn't know if Kristina knew exactly what was going on, or if they'd gotten someone competent enough to look after to make her believe that it was all a game. Sam barely knew Kristina, but that little girl was all that was left of her baby girl, and she couldn't help but feeling that it was her own child that had been stolen. Even if Alexis wouldn't let her near her… She still felt connected to her.
"How did you handle the things that you went through? Not just the miscarriage. I've been there before. Not the same way, I mean. My baby wasn't…" Carly sighed. "I know what it's like to lose a child, so I'm not talking about that. I mean… the other stuff."
The question caught Sam off guard enough that she actually turned to look at Carly for a brief second. She was starting down at her wrists, touching the purple and green mottled skin that blemished her arms. Sam sighed and looked back to the road. This was a conversation she'd expected to have with Jason at some point, but not with Carly. Of course, this whole thing was something she'd never expected to do with Carly. Playing Mission : Impossible with someone who had hated her guts a little over a month ago wasn't on her to-do list.
Sam sighed again and shook her head. "I don't know," she said. "It's just something you get used to, after a while. Choosing the wrong men, taking the abuse. After a while, it sorta feels like what you deserve, ya know? The punishment for making the wrong choices. Nico wasn't the first one, but I prayed for the longest time that he would be the last." Sam shrugged. "I guess I just… I don't know. I just came to expect it. That way, I'm not disappointed when it does happen. I'm just pleasantly surprised when it doesn't."
"Jason wouldn't do that to you," Carly said softly. "He's a good man. Too good for me, that's for sure. It's no wonder that I screwed it up with him. I probably knew that he was too good for me, deep down, I mean. And I should know that Lorenzo is too good for me, too. He'd certainly never do this to me." She sighed. "But, Jason won't hurt you. That's something no one with him will ever have to worry about."
"I know Jason won't hurt me. I figured that out way before we actually…" She paused, feeling uncomfortable. The whole conversation felt strange, the situation. Bonding with Carly felt like something out of a horror movie, and she was just waiting for the monster to hop out of the backseat and kill them both. "He was too nice to me, even when he hated me, ya know? He'd never hit me, which almost makes me surprised that I'm in love with him. I don't usually love anyone who's not going to hurt me. It's almost a prerequisite."
"I tend to screw it up with the ones that won't hurt me. AJ Quartermaine may have been a lot of things, but I knew he wouldn't actually hurt me on purpose. I can even admit now, looking back, that he didn't push me down those stairs. Oh, I'd never say it to his face, and until the day I die, I'll probably keep throwing it in his face when we fight, but I was just as much to blame as he was. And we all know how I screwed up with Jason. And Lorenzo…" She sighed. "It seems like all the good gets messed up because I've got to be with the one person who's wrong for me in every way."
"We all make bad choices, Carly. It's a human trait that none of us are ever going to be able to escape. I mean, look at us. I'm pretty sure, right now, that we're in the middle of one really big bad choice, ya know? 'Cause bonding aside, this has got to be one of the stupidest things that either of us have ever decided to do."
Carly snorted a laugh. Out the corner of her eye, Sam saw her wipe away a couple of tears. "You have no idea the idiot things that I've done. This actually ranks pretty low on the scale of dumb as hell compared to some of the things I've done."
"Oh, really?" Sam smirked. "I doubt that. If I can't think of anything dumber…" She paused. "Wait, no. I'm thinking scaling the side of a burning building with Jax was a pretty stupid thing to do. So maybe this is my second dumbest, but can you really say you've done dumber than this?"
"I faked insanity to get out of a prison term because I shot Tony in open court. I stole my mother's husband. I was a cheerleader in high school. Can you get much dumber than that?" Carly laughed and shook her head. "And the dumbest thing of all… I went back to Sonny after he shot me in the head. So yeah, I think I've done dumber."
"All of those were less wise things," Sam told her. "Dumb is like… The last mission you went on that was absolutely ridiculous, even when you did it. That kind of dumb."
"How about dumping Courtney's car after she hit Elizabeth? And I have to make sure that I mention the fact that I was pregnant at the time, I almost went over the cliff with the car, and Lorenzo's the only reason I survived. Talk about stalking coming in handy." She snorted. "But yeah, I'm figuring that was pretty stupid."
"Well, you have a point there." Sam laughed and she felt a little more comfortable. She thought that it wasn't necessarily the situation itself that was so uncomfortable for her as much as the person she was in it with. Sam was all for moving on with her life and leaving the past behind, but she couldn't get over the fact that she was doing all of that with Carly. Though, Jason would probably be overjoyed if the two could come out of this closer than they'd gone into it. He might even say that after he was done yelling at them for being idiots. "So, how about we just say that this ranks with the second dumbest thing that either of us have done?"
"Deal." Carly laughed and let it taper off. The car went silent again, lasting until they hit Manhattan traffic and were stuck sitting in the middle of a busy street at night. About twenty minutes. Carly broke the silence by saying, "I want to believe that he has a good reason for this, Sam. I want to be able to believe that the next on his list weren't Michael and Morgan, but it's hard. And I know if he gives me a good enough reason, I'll believe that he wasn't going to take my boys."
"We have to be prepared, in case he's not there. What if we get there, and Durant's not there?"
"Then we find him, and we make him explain." She reached into her pocket and pulled out a small black tape recorder. "If Royal had just been willing to talk without the torture, I'd have taped him and this would have all been over. No matter what he said… I'd have turned the tape over to Ric just to end this whole thing."
"Would you really? I mean… If you had on tape that your father was behind the kidnapping, could you have just forgotten this whole little mission and gone to the police? Just to clear my name? Just to clear Jason?"
"I…" She stopped then sighed. "I don't know. Giving it to Sonny would have been a death sentence, I know that. And I don't want to get my kids back just because Sonny was tossed in jail. Especially not because he was tossed in jail for murdering my father. Besides… Sonny wouldn't have done it himself."
"He'd have told Jason to do it."
"Exactly, and Jason would have done it. As it is…" She sighed. "I walked into that building knowing that Royal was a dead man, Sam. I knew it. Whether Sonny had him killed for his betrayal or I did it. I knew he'd be dead. I was expecting him to say that Michael and Morgan were next, ya know? And if he'd put my boys in danger, I would have killed him. But it didn't even end up being about my boys. It wasn't even about you or Jason or even what Sonny did to me. Royal put a child in danger, and I couldn't let him live. I knew that going in there. I knew that he was going to die."
"Carly… What does that mean, now? What does that have to do with Durant?"
"It means…" She turned towards Sam and her face was threatening to crumble. Her bottom lip trembled. "It means that there is a huge part of me that tells me that I'm going to walk into that building and my father will be a dead man. A part that says I won't even give him time to explain, and I don't know if I can push it down by myself."
"Carly…"
"I'm trusting you, Sam. I'm trusting you now more than ever. I've never been nice to you before, and the only reason you'd have to help me is so you don't end up an accessory to murder. Lorenzo covered up Royal, but if you and Jason are going to be in the clear, he can't cover up John and I can't kill him. If this little bonding moment of ours means anything, I don't know, but Sam, I'm trusting you."
"Carly… What are you saying?"
"I'm saying…" She sighed and closed her eyes. Tears leaked out from beneath her lids and she reopened her eyes. "I'm trusting you to stop me from killing my father the second I see him."
