[ 45 ] 2014 

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"Mum's fortune--part of it should be rightfully yours, Arthur. Help me get rid of him, and the three of us can split all the money. You, Clarissa, and me."

-

Once over the wall which surrounded Calum's house--which his uncle was currently residing in--both Harley and James ran in a direction opposite the one Arthur and Calum were headed. The guard that had been chasing them outside the front gates, opened them with an automatic remote and entered the property, calling after them with a booming voice, "Stop right now! You are on public property and I have the authority to arrest you." He said to the teens.

"Can he actually arrest us?" Harley asked James as they ran further onto the property.

James gave a shrug of his shoulders, but didn't stop running. "I don't know, maybe. But what does it matter? Either way we can just mind control them into forgetting we were ever here." A smile formed on his lips at the idea of getting away with something illegal, even if it was minor.

It was a few minutes of running and they were sure they had lost the security guard. Harley drastically slowed down her pace and her breathing was labored. She finally paused and leaned against the thick trunk of a tree with heavy foliage to catch her breath. "Geez." She huffed, more tired than she should have been. "I really haven't ran this much in a long time. I'm out of shape."

James stopped beside her, not bothered by the running they had done. He hadn't even broken a sweat. Harley was slightly jealous that he and Calum, and her brother Billy were so athletic while she was essentially a couch potato--an over-desired couch potato. Sure she did cheerleading, but she was barely even good at it. She was mediocre at best, while there were girls like Cindy who were good at it and actually liked it. 

Looking her over with an attempt at subtlety, James commented, "I think you look great."

"Stop." She shot him a glare. Pushing her tired body away from the tree trunk, she gestured towards the house which was several feet ahead. "Let's go find a way to get inside so we can help them."

He only nodded and followed behind her. They were almost to the door when they were stopped by someone's voice. "Where do you think you're going?" The authoritative voice of a house security guard asked them. Both teenagers turned around slowly, knowing they had been caught and that they were in trouble. It was the same security guard who had been trying to catch them earlier.

"We were just trying to find a private place to make out." James explained with a cynical smile on his face. "You understand, right mate?" Looking directly into the guard's eyes, James added in a low--yet hypnotic tone of voice. The way he did it almost reminded Harley of a snake seducing its prey. "Why don't you return to your security booth and pretend this never happened?"

Unamused, the guard replied. "Yeah, nice try, boy."

That was when Harley spotted the necklace he was wearing. The pendant was a tiny glass container with chrysanthemum leaves ground inside. Harley looked at James and then at the necklace, hoping he would see it. Her blue eyes were saying to him, he knows what we are and he has chrysanthemum. Their abilities would not work on him as log as he had that necklace. James seemed to catch on rather quickly and with lightning speed reached for the necklace, yanking it off the security guard. 

Immediately the guard flinched in surprise and there was a sizzling sound heard in James' palm as he held the pendant in his hand. "Okay. Go back to your security booth. You didn't see anything." Harley ordered, her eyes concentrated on the guard's.

The guard nodded, repeating her words in a daze. "...I didn't see anything."

He walked off robotically, leaving them there near a back entrance to the house. As soon as he disappeared from sight, James let the necklace drop out of his hand and into the grass. In his palm was a very visible and severe burn mark and he winced, taking a good look at the damage. "God, that was so fucking painful." He said, blowing some air into his hand to relieve the pain. "I can't believe one stupid little plant can do that to us." As he spoke, he easily tore off a piece of his coat fabric and wrapped it around his palm expertly. He then flexed his hand a few times to make sure the makeshift bandage was comfortable enough.

Harley knelt down and picked up the necklace by the chain, without ever touching the pendant. "This is how you properly hold something poisonous, James. Just for future reference." She dangled the necklace back and forth in front of his face. He flinched back in fear that the pendant might come in contact with his skin once again.

"Shit, Harley. Get rid of it." He hissed.

But she shook her head. "This might come in handy."

Grabbing a fallen leaf from the tree nearby, she wrapped the necklace in it and stuffed it into her jeans pocket. 

-

Inside the house, they were fortunate enough that the entrance they used was an old service exit that the staff was no longer using. It led directly to the kitchen which was empty, except for one person. A maid, about Harley and Calum's age, that she remembered from when she used to visit his house when she first moved to Sydney.

It was Kila.

The maid was startled by the footsteps coming from the service exit no one used anymore and her hand quickly grabbed a frying pan that was atop the stove for self defense. She was about to use it on the intruders when she saw two teenagers stumble into the kitchen. One of them was a stranger to her--a handsome stranger--while the other was Harley Quinn. The maid gasped and put the pan back on the stove as she half-whispered with excitement. "Miss Harley Quinn, I haven't seen you around here in a while!" Looking to James who was walking up right behind Harley, the maid straightened out her uniform and raked a hand through her hair as she greeted him. "Well, hello there." James only waved at her and shot her a smirk.

"Kila," Harley sighed, ignoring their little exchange and rushing to the maid's side to hug her with relief. "I'm looking for Calum. You wouldn't happen to have seen him, would you?"

The girl in the maid outfit nodded her head. "I did. He also used the service entrance just a few minutes ago, and I almost knocked him out with a frying pan. I should probably stop doing that, but I always fear its a ghost or something. The spirits have always had a particular liking for this place."

"Where did he go?" Harley wondered. 

While they talked, James took the liberty of going to the cupboard to grab a glass and poured himself some water. He then leaned with his back against the marble kitchen counter as he drank his water.

Her voice seemed to lower into a softer whisper as she replied, "Master Cole doesn't know this, but there are secret openings in the walls of the house--very much like the ones in the Russian monarchy's Winter Palace. They can get you anywhere you want to go without being spotted. Only Master Con and his grandson Calum knew about the passages. I found one of them by chance when I was a little girl, but the others are hard to find. Its here in the kitchen, in the pantry room."

"Take us there please." Harley begged.

"Wait." James interrupted them. "Won't we get lost in there? Its probably like a fucking maze."

The blue eyed girl gave a shake of her head. "We won't. I happen to have a great sense of direction."

"Why do I feel like that's a lie?" James asked her.

Harley rolled her eyes at him. "You can stay here with Kila if you want--if you're scared. I'm going in there to find Calum and make myself useful. So decide now, James Brady-Park."

He sighed, pushing himself off the counter and placing the cup in his hand on top of it. "Of course I'm going. I'm the official Harley Quinn baby sitter on duty right now. Not going would be the end of me."

Kila walked ahead of them, leading them to the pantry room where they kept dry ingredients for meals and eating utensils. She walked to the end of the room and pushed aside some heavy cardboard boxes to reveal a plain wall. Finding just the right spot, she pulled the wall aside to reveal the opening to a tunnel within the house. It was dark, but Harley entered it without hesitation. James followed behind her--a bit more hesitantly--with his cellphone light on. He quickly hurried ahead of Harley Quinn to protect her from harm like he had been assigned.

From the opening that led out into the pantry, Kila whispered to them, "I would go with you, but I'm needed in the kitchen since Master Cole fired all the other kitchen staff. Good luck." And with that, she closed the pantry wall, leaving them in total darkness except for the flashlight.

-

"I happen to have a great sense of direction." He mocked in something of a girly voice as Harley stood at a fork in the maze-like interior to the walls in Calum's house. There were two possible paths to take, and Harley Quinn didn't know which one to choose. "Well, I happen to have a great sense of knowing that we're fucking lost."

"Mate, I am so close to ditching you in this place." She warned. Picking a direction at random, she pointed to her left. "Let's just go this way."

She walked down the limited space between the walls with James following after her. 

Harley was relieved and knew they were going in the right direction when she heard the muffled voices of an argument that was unfolding nearby. Two of the voices sounded familiar. Two of the voices belonged to Arthur and Calum, the this must have belonged to Cole Hood. She followed the sound of the voices, which got clearer and louder as they got closer.

"This house and this money rightfully belongs to Calum. Your father wanted it that way." Arthur tried to reason with his half-brother Cole, his voice slow and calm. 

"My father had four family fortunes under his name." Cole hissed with much venom in his tone. One of the fortunes had been rightfully his--belonging to his family, one had been Anne-Sophie Fontaine's fortune which she shared with her husband when they married, one had been Claire Feeney's fortune which she shared with him after their secret relationship and subsequent marriage, the last had belonged to Ashton who had shared it with Claire, and she in turn had shared it all with Con. He had outlived them all and inherited millions, which he then inherited to his favorite grandson Calum. "And he never once thought to give Clarissa and I anything. Richard and his bastard family got all of it." 

"Money isn't everything, Cole." Arthur continued his attempts at getting him to surrender the house and the fortune peacefully. They were brothers--half brothers through Claire feeney who was their mother--and Arthur didn't want to hurt him unless it were absolutely necessary. 

"You say that because you grew up without it." Cole replied bitterly. "You grew up an orphan who probably had nothing growing up. But you know," He said as the thought came to him. "Mum's fortune--part of it should be rightfully yours, Arthur. Help me get rid of him, and the three of us can split all the money. You, Clarissa, and me."

There was a silence in the room as Harley awaited an answer. She had just reached the very spot in the wall where she knew they were standing just on the other side. Cole sounded the closest, and she thought it to be the back wall of the office with all the books in it. Behind one of the desks was a large portrait, which she assumed was what hit the opening to the wall passages. 

Nudging James silently, she whispered to him, "Kick this wall open. Please hurry."

He nodded without protest and took a step forward, kicking in the wall with all his strength. The material of the opening fell forward with all and the portrait on the wall along with it. It fell on top of Cole Hood and started the two standing across the desk from him. Arthur's hand went right to his Diamond Rose gun, but he stood back when he saw Harley jump out from behind the wall, followed by James Brady.

The impact of the wall and the large portrait falling on him were enough to knock Cole out cold, leaving him on the ground underneath the rubble.

Harley rushed to Calum's side and jumped into his waiting arms.

"I was so worried about you." She told him, her arms wrapped tight around him.

"Worried about me, babe?" He eyes her with an eyebrow raised. A smile soon made its way onto his lips. "I was worried about you being alone with him." 

Harley let out a laugh and pinched his cheek. "Jealous?"

"Ah, a little." He admitted.

"I'm not attracted to James." She assured him. "Not anymore."

Interrupting their moment, James looked down at the man on the ground. "What are we going to do now?" He asked them.

Calum sighed. He and Harley pulled away from each other's arms and he leaned on the wooden desk in the library office room. "We have to wait for him to wake up so that we can convince--or force--him to sign some documents which will transfer everything back to me. Whatever method we use will be up to him, I personally would prefer force just so I can beat his face into his skull. But at least that gives us the advantage that we can tie him up or something while he's unconscious."

"And how did he even get the fortune transferred over to himself in the first place, if it belonged to you?" The hunter asked yet another question, hoping to clear things up for himself.

"When he kidnapped me, he forced me to transfer the fortune to his possession." Calum explained. "He said that if I didn't, he would hurt Harley. So of course I gave him everything. I couldn't let anything happen to her. I would die."

"Okay, well help me pick him up." James said to Calum, beginning to push away the rubble that had fallen on top of Cole Hood. 

Before Calum could respond, Arthur stepped forward. 

"I'll help James." The older man said. Gesturing to the doors to the library room, he said, "Calum and Harley make sure the doors are locked. We got two guards out of the way, but we don't know how many guards he really has guarding this house."

Calum nodded his head and Harley followed him to the entrance of the room, away from the rows of shelves filled with books. 

Now they were so much closer to it becoming a reality--Calum was one step closer to getting his life back.

- 

finally a new update for this story. i realize its been a while. but i've gotten so much more into my kpop fics at the moment. still, i'll try to at least have an update posted at least once a week. i know i say this a lot, but i will make a bigger effort this time.

thank you to all the people who still read this and have been here through everything. it has meant a whole lot. so close to the end now, and after the last chapter, i will start posting the alternate endings. neither of the four will be the OFFICIAL ending, because i want to leave it up to you to chose which is the one you want to see as the official ending.

qotd: have you all started school already? im going to start on monday. kill me.

have a great week everyone!

-clary xx