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*WARNING-Language and sexual scenarios

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****I'm also aware that certain character names may be used in my stories but scenarios are changed...thank you

Chapter 14-

Angel's POV

It was like floating, her body just drifting through a sea of black. Jax had screamed her name over and over again. He had sounded so far away as the ringing in her ears was brain splitting and she couldn't concentrate on him.

She had seen his face, tear-stained, as the blurry edges of her vision clouded over her eyes. She had tried so hard to respond to his touch, but she couldn't move, and then she was gone. His voice was gone, her room was gone…everything black and calm as she drifted around.

She couldn't remember much of anything else. She knew he had attacked her, Kohn, her prick stalker. She could remember him cornering her in the hallway of her apartment, slamming her against the wall. She could see his eyes shining through the black that surrounded her, remembering the way they glazed over before he began his brutal assault on her.

How bad was she hurt? She couldn't remember the pain, only that the taste of hot iron had filled her mouth. There was no way to know how long she was lost in the darkness, it didn't register to her when the ringing slowly faded and voices returned.

She couldn't make out specific sentences or words, but she could hear tones. Before she knew it she was making out shadows around her, feeling people touching her and smoothing her hair. Where was she?

All she could smell was disinfectant as everything around her was kept overly clean. The steady beeping noises pierced her ears next, followed by the steady 'drip' of an IV. Fuck, she was in the hospital.

"Uughh," Angel grumbled from deep inside her chest, startling her-self. "Uuugh," she groaned out again just to be sure she had actually made the noise.

The blackness surrounding her was all but gone, fading slowly as a dull light threatened to penetrate her eye lids. She heard somebody shift in a chair to the right of her, slowly she squinted her eyes open, allowing them to adjust to the light.

Her left eye wouldn't open any farther, the skin around it tightening as she tried. Her right eye opened a little more but she could feel the tightness surrounding it too, as well as her puffy eye lids making them feel heavy.

Angel opened her mouth to yawn and felt the pull on the left side of her face as well as pinching near her left eye and her mouth. She used her right eye to glance around, white walls surrounded her. She pulled her-self up to a sitting position and glanced to her right as she heard the sound of a shuffle again. Wavy blonde hair cascaded over the back of the chair as Lyla napped.

'Fuck,' Angel thought to her-self, glancing at the IV stuck in her hand. She glanced under her gown to see the little circular stickers that held the heart monitor in place. 'Fuck,' she reiterated in her mind, she must be pretty beat up.

As she reached up to scratch an itch on her nose she paused, bandages. "Fuck!" she said out loud, startling Lyla awake. "Shit! Angel, you're awake!" her best friend exclaimed before jumping out of her chair and gently hugging her. Angel gave her best smile, "yeah, how long was I out?" "All last night and all of yesterday, it's about 10am Monday morning now." Lyla perched next to Angel on her bed, "I'm just glad you're awake."

"Me too, it was weird…I felt like I was floating, I can't really remember much after I got slammed into a wall" Angel recalled. "The doctor says you suffered from a grade 3 concussion, the MRI showed you didn't have bleeding on the brain or anything tho. Thank God, you would have needed surgery if you had bled internally." Lyla recalled, "they said that you might not remember what happened."

Angel felt her mouth drop open, "that asshole beat me that bad?" Lyla nodded slowly, "yeah…you don't remember anything at all?" "Not after he started hitting me, no. I hope I never see him again."

Lyla cocked an eyebrow, "you won't. You're lucky Jax showed up when he did and took care of the situation." Angel cocked her head to the side, "you mean…he's…"she faded off as Lyla nodded, "dead as a door nail," she glanced at the closed-door before leaning close, "Jax put a bullet between his eyes."

Angel felt her mouth drop open again, "He did?" she glanced around nervously, "where is he? Did he get caught? Is he back in jail? Did he…" Lyla cut her off as she held her hand up, "calm down Nerves Mcgee, Jax is at the club house with the boys dealing with some trouble with the Irish. No evidence of that perverted freak is left anywhere in Charming."

She jumped off the bed and headed for the door, "as a matter of fact, I should go call Opie and let him know that you're awake so he can let Jax know. They'll both be so pissed if I don't," and with a wink Angel was left alone with her thoughts.

Jax had killed Josh Kohn, and he had gotten away with it. If there was a bright side to being the old lady of a member of an MC it was this, you could get away with almost anything. Angel gently reached up to touch her swollen face, she still hadn't looked into a mirror. Her fingers brushed along the length of a cut under her left eye being held together with what felt like butterfly bandages.

She didn't feel any pain though, the IV she was on must have been a morphine drip. She glanced up as her door opened and a doctor she didn't recognize walked in, "Good to see you're up Miss Delaney, I'm Dr. Greere. How are you feeling?" Angel began to answer as the man began to shine a small light in her eyes, "I feel fine, a little stiff but that's it."

Dr. Greere nodded, "that's good. You're pupils seem to be dilating normally, another good sign." He slid the light back in his pocket as he grabbed her chart and began scribbling away, "how about pain? Any headaches? Sharp pain when you move your head side to side?" Angel shook her head slowly, "nope, none." He jotted something else on the chart before approaching her side once again.

He gently peeled back a bandage from her nose, "the swelling stopped, it hasn't receded yet but it's good to see it plateaued." He replaced the bandages, "we had to re-break it while you were out, it should heal fine."

He moved the hair from the right side of her face, "you have a fracture in your eye socket on this side, assuming from a blunt object. There's bruising and some swelling but it seems to be healing fine."

"How's my head?" Angel asked him, shifting just a little. "There was no direct damage to your brain, no hemorrhaging. You should be able to leave in a day or two, I just want to keep you monitored for a few days." Angel felt her-self pout, she hated stays in the hospital. He picked up her charts once more and gave her a smile, "don't worry Angel, Dr. Knowles trusted me to work with the Sons, you can trust me too." He nodded before heading out of the door.

Dr. Knowles? Tara? That couldn't be, Jax had told her that she had moved back to Chicago after their break-up. What would Tara be doing helping her anyways? As far as Angel was concerned, Tara was out of the picture. She wasn't sure she should trust anybody if she was the one who recommended them.

Lyla bounded through the door then, "they're both on their way," she beemed as she took her seat back in the chair. "Why the fuck did the Doctor who just checked up on me reference Tara?" Angel asked, wasting no time. Lyla's smile fell, "don't get mad Ang, but Jax called her after he saw how extensive that bastard had beaten you."

"Is she still in Charming?" Angel could feel her blood boil just slightly as Lyla responded, "no, she's in Chicago. She called Dr. Greere and he agreed to help out the club on the condition they get him a supply of those prescription oxy's that Bobby scored. Don't be mad at Jax, he couldn't really call an ambulance with a dead guy lying on your floor."

Angel pondered that thought for a moment, Lyla made a good point. She didn't want Jax to land major jail time like her father had on a murder charge, and if that meant he had to contact Tara then she had to trust him. "Yeah…you're right. It's just hard, you know, with their past and shit."

"Mhmm, but you gotta trust Jax. He's grown up…a lot." Lyla gave Angel the 'you know what I'm talking about' look. Angel nodded, pushing all negative thoughts aside. "Do you have a mirror in that suit case of yours? I wanna see what all the fuss is about," she smirked while pointing at her face.

"Yeah, but I don't know if you're going to want to see…"Lyla dug into her over-sized hand bag, she pulled out a small compact mirror and passed it to Angel, "it's pretty bad babe," Lyla spoke softly as she sat back next to Angel on the bed. Angel took a deep breath before holding the mirror up to gaze at her reflection, she couldn't help but gasp at what stared back at her.

The whole left side of her face was a deep purple which faded off into nasty looking yellows near the edges. Her left eye was swollen almost shut, she could see the white of her eye was completely red from broken blood vessels.

Forming a half-moon around that same eye, and buried in the puffy purple bruises, was a gash being held together with surgical tape. Angel felt her eyes watering at the realization of a scar staring back at her, forever reminding her of the horrors of her attack.

The right side of her face was bruised too, albeit not as bad regardless of her broken eye socket and nose. She could still open her right eye, even if it wasn't all the way, but it pinched just slightly when she got to a certain point. She glanced at her mouth next, her upper lip was puffy and she could see three stitches in a neat line down the middle of her bow.

A small bruise on her neck caught her eye, she followed it with her mirror and realized there were four more identical to it…she had been choked. "There's a few more bruises on your back and thighs. The worst of it is on your face though." Lyla leaned her head softly against Angel's as her tears began to slowly fall…

Jax's POV

Jax lingered outside of the chapel doors. Church had just gotten out and he couldn't remember half of what was just discussed, visions of Angel's broken and bloody face danced around in his mind and Tara's condescending words were being played on repeat.

"Why should I help you Jax? You've always been so good at helping yourself," Tara spoke into the phone, disappointment in her voice when he had spoken Angel's name. "Tara, please…I'm sorry for everything but now isn't the time. Please." He had begged her for a few minutes before Tara agreed to call a Doctor friend of hers in Charming and arrange a deal with him.

He ran a hand through his hair as he sat on one of the vacant bar stools, his mind still reeling. Tara had kept true to her words, and within moments Jax had been on the phone with Dr. Greere and Angel was one step closer to help.

As far as he knew though, she was still unconscious in the hospital…his poor Angel. Jax glanced down at the vibrating phone in his hands before sighing and hitting ignore for the second time that day. Before hanging up with Tara, he had agreed to see her once she came back to Charming to settle her parent's estate.

She had said she needed closure, that she couldn't get over him without it, and he owed her that didn't he? It was his priority to the club that had ruined their relationship in the first place, not to mention his infidelity. Now she was trying to call him and he wasn't sure if he should answer.

He knew Angel was insecure about his past relationship with Tara and just knowing that he had agreed to see her once more was going to drive a wedge in their relationship but he couldn't go back on his word now. Tara was due in town in just a few weeks and he was conflicted on if he should tell Angel about their meeting or just keep it from her, saving her from more pain.

He sighed again as Opie came up to him, "she's awake bro." Jax nodded, all thoughts of Tara leaving him as he headed for his bike. "Lyla said she just woke up a minute ago, docs lookin' at her now," Opie said as he followed Jax outside.

"I hope she's okay, that asshole did a number on her," said Jax as he hooked his helmet under his chin, grimacing at the memory of Angel lying bloody and broken on her bed. "She is, but are you alright?" Opie spoke as he followed suit. Jax didn't know how to answer, he knew Opie was referring to the killing he had done the previous day.

Jax had never killed somebody point-blank before. He had never watched the life drain from a person's eyes at his own hands. It had changed him, he felt him-self grow colder the night before. It hadn't been a significant change but he knew since putting a bullet between Kohn's eyes that he wouldn't be the same.

"I'll live Ope," he smirked as he kicked his bike to life. "I know you'll live brother, but I know what kind of life you'll be livin' after killing that guy. I still can't shake my first kill. Don't matter if they deserve it, shit'll haunt you," Opie shouted over the loud rumble of the motorcycles.

Jax let his best friends words sink in as he let his bike lurch forward. Opie was right, he couldn't shake the thought of Josh Kohn's empty eyes staring blankly up at him. He knew that asshole had deserved what he had gotten, that a monster like him shouldn't be walking around freely, but wasn't Jax a monster now too?

He let the warm fall air wrap around him as he sped towards the direction of the hospital, Opie on his heels. Was he a monster? He had taken the life of a man he hadn't known. What if Kohn had a family somewhere and they were worried sick because he was gone?

The photos of Angel that Kohn had hidden away in his brief case flashed before his eyes and at that moment Jax realized, he didn't give a fuck if Kohn had a family or not…that bastard deserved to die after what he had done.

He didn't care if anybody missed that sadistic asshole, he just cared about revenge and took solace in knowing that he had gotten it. What kind of person was he becoming? Jax blew out a long breath as he thought of his fathers manuscripts. He needed to read them again and re-focus before he became some one he hated...before he became some one like Clay...