aravenamongcrows on Tumblr (ask and submissions are open!)

General trigger warnings for this story: Language, smut, mentions of rape, abuse, drug use/overdose, violence/death

CHAPTER 27: ICED OUT

It was still relatively early by the time all of Sydney's paperwork was complete, her personal items had been returned, and she was free to leave. Hale was leading her out of the station and to his vehicle where she climbed in, her wrists free of cuffs.

"You still hungry?" He asked as she buckled her seatbelt.

"I knew you wanted to take me out." She cocked her brows with a grin.

The deputy chuckled, putting his keys into the ignition and starting his vehicle as he began driving the few short blocks to the diner on Main Street.

"Damn… Who's dick d'you gotta suck around here to get yourself one of these fancy little things?" She slapped the side of the wagon with the hand that she had dangling out the window. "No pussy ass squad car for you, Mr. Hale." She looked to the deputy expectantly.

"I should ask you the same…" He referred to the beauty of a car that the young woman drove like a maniac. "Looks like I could take some pointers."

"It was my dad's car." She chuckled when he actually cracked a joke. "No dick sucking involved." She raised her hand to clarify with a playful smile.

Hale laughed freely as he pulled into the tiny parking lot of the diner, getting out and strolling up the pathway to the front door with his former prisoner in tow.

"Good morning, David!" The jolly waitress greeted, the tops of her pudgy cheeks almost touching her eyelashes as she smiled at the handsome deputy. "Well… Aint this a sight for sore eyes!" She widened her grin, taking a step back to gaze upon the gorgeous couple that stood before her.

"I told you before Doreen, all you gotta do for a bigger tip is toss a little extra powdered sugar on my waffles, the flattery ain't necessary." Sydney winked.

"You two know each other?" Hale looked between the woman he had known his entire life, and the newcomer who he was only just becoming acquainted with.

"Oh darlin, I have gotten the pleasure of getting to know this sweet, sugar pie over the past few weeks." Doreen squeezed Sydney's hands affectionately before leading them to a booth at the back of the restaurant by the window.

"I'll be back with coffee! Are you both havin your usuals?" The pair nodded their confirmation - one of the nice things of a small town.

"You're even more popular than I thought." Hale observed aloud.

"Soon I'll be more popular than you, deputy." She smirked at him across the table.

Jax was making his way to TM from his house which he'd started staying at recently, since Wendy was no longer there. He took the long way down Main Street after discovering over the last few days that he'd found an unexpected sense of peace in the morning commute. By chance, he glanced into the bay windows of the diner to see none other than Sydney and David Hale having breakfast. He snarled when he witnessed the snake of a girl chatting and laughing with the cop who had made it his life mission to destroy his club, racing to the clubhouse and forgetting all about his peaceful ride.

"Chicken and waffles with powdered sugar and double bacon…" Hale looked at Sydney's food with a raised eyebrow - the absolute last meal that he would've expected the petite blonde to order.

"What can I say? I can take a lot of meat." She winked before digging in.

Hale laughed into his black coffee, setting the mug down before he got started on his vegetarian omelette and turkey bacon.

"God, you even eat like a cop." Sydney winced.

"What exactly does a cop eat like?" He raised a brow as he speared a piece of egg with his fork.

"A pussy." She retorted, cackling when he snorted and choked on his food in response to her joke.

The pair finished up their meals and Sydney excused herself to use the restroom while Hale headed to the front of the restaurant and paid for their food as punishment for losing the bet they'd made that she couldn't finish her entire plate.

"You takin that one back to the street corner?" Hale heard from behind him, recognizing the voice of one of his older colleagues, turning to see Benson and Smith standing behind him - stopping for their morning supply of coffee and donuts.

"Not exactl-" A sweet voice cut off Hale's response.

"I asked him for a ride to Lodi." Sydney seemingly appeared out of nowhere. "All you small town boys can't afford me." She winked.

Hale stared at her in surprise for a few seconds before chuckling. "I'll see you two later." He nodded before opening the door for Sydney, tossing a smirk over his shoulder at the men as he followed her out.

They drove to the clubhouse in silence, Hale feeling conflicted over the fact that he'd had such an enjoyable morning with the woman who he was supposed to despise - the woman who was helping spread crime throughout his town, the woman who worked with the men that corrupted his superiors. She wasn't supposed to be sweet and funny, charming and adored by everyone she met, she wasn't supposed to make him laugh and smile more than he had in months. She was supposed to be unreasonable and greedy, but she was the opposite.

"Thanks Davey…" He was brought out of his head by her delicate hand resting over his when he parked on the relatively empty compound.

"It's like I said before." He spoke with no emotion. "Just doing my job."

Sydney smirked, knowing that she had succeeded in twisting him up the way she'd intended to. She opened the door, closing it with a smile before she strolled over to the clubhouse where Jax sat on a picnic table.

The VP stood when Sydney approached, standing next to her and waving to the good deputy with a sarcastic smile as he drove off. Sydney chuckled, turning to head inside before she felt her body being violently slammed against the rough bricks of the building.

"I see what you're doing, you little whore." Jax seethed his evaluation while he held her against the wall with his forearm pressed harshly against her chest. "Fuck Tig to get yourself a patch, fuck Hale to get out of charges." The blonde man spit the angry accusation at her.

Sydney tried with everything she had to channel the strength and control that she had seen her President possess yesterday as her veins coursed with pure adrenaline in the type of moment that she would usually thrive in. But it was countered by the anger heaving in her chest under his restraint - boiling over when he mentioned her only fucking Tig to get a patch. She jabbed her fist into his stomach, her foot hooking his ankle and knocking off his balance as she spun him around and switched their positions, swiping the gun from the back of his pants in the process.

Jackson Nathaniel Teller, the Vice President of the mother chapter of the infamous Sons of Anarchy outlaw motorcycle club had found himself pinned to the wall by a girl half his size, with the barrel of his own gun pressed to his forehead.

"D'you wanna accuse me of shit? Or d'you wanna hear what I found out on my little field trip?" Jax said nothing, shaking his head as he looked away but she stopped him, using the barrel of the gun to bring his angry eyes back to hers. "Lay your hands on me again? I won't leave that face so pretty." She snarled, pushing off of him and walking into the clubhouse. "Call church." She called over her shoulder as she tossed back his gun.

"Why the hell, would you bring Hale here?" Tig yelled, his voice echoing in the chapel from his seat at the table.

"I didn't see your ass waiting to pick me up!" Sydney yelled back. "Bringing him here shows him that we aren't hiding anything."

"Enough!" Clay yelled - the recent events having completely stripped him of his patience. "Tell us what was yesterday really about."

"Order came from A.T.F. Some fed you guys pissed off. Josh Kohn?"

"Who the hell is that?" Clay scowled, looking to his crew for answers.

"No idea." Jax shook his head.

"Well whoever he is, he followed Little Red Riding Hood over here to the warehouse bones." She gestured to Jax. "That's why Hale's so sure that it's our facility. Kohn called for the raid after he tailed the Mayan shootout on Tuesday. He and Hale wanna start an official investigation with A.T.F. but they don't have enough evidence, so we need to make sure it stays that way."

"So you're sayin that you got your pretty little ass thrown into a dirty prison cell, just to get intel?" Bobby asked skeptically.

"Is that so hard to believe?" She stared at the old man stoically. "The club protects their own… And I didnt have any priors." She smirked, earning a couple of chuckles before she turned her attention to Clay. "Unser didn't know about it until it was happening, this wasn't payback. He got our message loud and clear. He got baldy to drop the charges against me as a show of good faith." She stated firmly, fiddling with her necklace. She felt for the old cop after the short time she'd spent with him, it was clear that he had a soft spot for the M.C. for some reason or another - a soft spot that he was allowing to kill him.

"I'll let Unser know that we're good." Clay assured with a nod.

"Did Vegas get up to Indian Hills okay?" Sydney asked Clay but looked directly at Jax.

"Yeah… They did." He nodded, watching the harsh staredown going on between the two blondes.

"Good." She turned back to her President. "We done here?"

"Uh, yeah." Clay wasn't used to seeing her so eager to leave. He knew something was going on, but she had only given him reason to trust her thus far - deciding that she had earned herself the benefit of the doubt at the very least. She'd proven that she knew what she was doing and whatever it was that she had going on behind the scenes with the VP - like everything else she did, it was for a reason.

"Hey!" Sydney heard Tig calling after her as she scurried to her car, but she didn't stop. "Hey, where you goin?" He squinted once he reached her open window, resting his arm on the warm roof of the black car.

"Got somethin I need to do." She answered coldly, shifting her car into reverse.

"You scared the shit out of me yesterday, you know…"

"Sorry." She replied with a weak smile.

Tig realized he wasn't going to get the response he wanted, lifting his arm off of the vehicle to let her leave when he noticed the angry red patch on her shoulder from where her body had hit the wall - his eyes shifting to the discoloration on her chest that had earlier been concealed by her long hair. He'd known something had been off this morning when her hand had taken up permanent residence on that damn necklace, and now his mind was going into overdrive as he realized that it may be much worse than he'd originally thought…

"Stop."

Sydney exhaled sharply, ripping up the parking brake and turning up to face him. "What?" She asked impatiently.

"What happened?" He asked just above a whisper, the worry trembling in his voice as he lightly brushed his fingers over her aching chest

"I said I have to go." She replied after staring at him for a few seconds. She wasn't in the correct mindset to deal with his growing need to protect her - something she had spent her entire life learning how to do herself.

Tig ground his teeth as her car rolled out of the lot before he punched the side of the nearest vehicle, which luckily for him was just the TM truck. "Fuck!" He yelled before hitting the truck again. "Fuck, fuck, fuck!" His fist slammed into the metal with each curse that left his mouth, hissing as he shook out his hand and stalked into the bar for today's lethal dose of whiskey.

Sydney knew she needed to go home and shower off her uncomfortable night in jail and frustrating morning at the clubhouse, but she couldn't get herself to do anything before she carried out the one task that hadn't left her mind since the day before.

"Excuse me?" Sydney approached a middle aged redhead who was carrying a clipboard once she'd passed through the sliding glass doors of St. Thomas. "Do you know where I can find Dr. Knowles?"

Margaret Murphy looked the provocatively dressed blonde up and down before scoffing. "The women's clinic is down that way." She pointed towards a hallway to their left.

"It's a personal visit actually, but next time I need to kill a baby or fight off chlamydia, I'll remember that." Sydney smiled sarcastically before heading towards the emergency room to ask someone more helpful and less judgmental.

"Sydney?" She heard from behind her, turning to see exactly who she was looking for. "Hi, are you okay? I saw you in a cop car yesterday?" Tara's brown eyes scanned her disheveled appearance after a night in a prison cell.

"Yeah, I'm fine." Sydney brushed off the look that accompanied the doctor's question. "Is there somewhere we can talk?"

Tara's brow creased but she nodded, leading them to an empty counselling room and with a couch where they sat down. "Is everything okay?" She asked once the door clicked shut, her anxiety over Kohn making it harder than usual for her to keep her cool.

"That phone call you got when I was here last… That one I asked you about? Does it have anything to do with why you were at the police station yesterday?" She tried to broach the sensitive subject as subtly as possible.

Tara's face fell. "Gemma told you." She scoffed with a shake of her head.

"What?"

"God! Is nothing private around here?" She stood, her hands dragging across her face in frustration as she began pacing around the room, going off on a tangent. "How fucking stupid of me to think that I would come back here and be safe. No! Everything is all about the fucking gossip."

Any other day, Sydney may have had a bit more sympathy over her outburst - but today was not that day. She was exhausted, sore, dirty, antsy, tired, and pissed off. She stood hastily, taking two giant steps before her black, cork wedges had her standing nose to nose with the hysterical brunette.

"I watched my mama get beaten half to death on the daily, so forgive me for being concerned." She sneered. "I came here out of the goodness of my heart - as a friend. I'm not Gemma." She stepped back, letting her angry eyes linger as she sat back down, brushing her hair over her shoulder.

"I'm-" Tara broke down when she saw the bruises on her chest, understanding now why she wanted to help her. She collapsed to the couch and buried her face in her hands as she sobbed. "I'm sorry, I'm just- I'm a mess. I'm on edge, I don't know what I should do."

"Who is he?"

"A guy I dated in Chicago." She took a deep breath. "Things got weird, I tried to end it, he got violent. He's here, in Charming, for me."

"Did you tell Jax?"

"No because-" Tara tried to find the right words. "I'm the reason you got in trouble yesterday…" She whispered shakily.

"How?" Sydney didn't understand.

"Kohn!" She yelled, feeling like it was the only way she could make herself say his name. "He isn't here on business, he's here for me. He found out about my past with Jax and he's trying to scare me away from him."

"The fed…" Sydney pieced it together, finally understanding why Tara was so hesitant to tell Hale.

"He's dangerous. I've tried to tell the cops in Chicago and it only made things worse. I thought that if I told Jax it would be safer, but I was wrong. If I tell him, Kohn will only keep looking for things to crush the club."

"So that's why you're back." Sydney surmised with a nod.

"It's not like that." Tara snapped.

"It's kinda romantic if you think about it…" She joked.

"You're… You're not gonna tell him?" She looked into the eyes of the blonde girl sitting across from her, surprised that she was willing to keep her dirty little secret - a secret that she could use as leverage.

"I told you, I'm not Gemma. But you need to let Jax deal with Kohn."

"What? What do you mean deal with him?" Sydney didn't answer, she just stared at the older woman knowingly. "You think I came back here because I knew that Jax would kill him for me?" She barked in offense before she came to her own realization that maybe Sydney was right. Subconsciously, it was exactly why she'd come back… "And you're telling me to let him do it? God, maybe you are Gemma." She chuckled.

"He's a criminal Tara. It's what he's good at, so let him be." She nodded. "Men put us through enough shit, we deserve a little something in return." She gave a sympathetic smile.

"Okay, I'll tell him." Tara agreed before Sydney got up to leave. "Sydney, I'm sorry." She called after the younger woman, hesitating when she turned to face her. That I didn't know Tig was doing same thing. "About your mother."

"I'm not." Sydney smiled sadly, walking away and letting the heavy door close behind her.

Sydney was walking down the stairs in her house after a long awaited shower, squeezing excess water out of her hair when her doorbell rang. She scowled, not expecting visitors or having heard a bike pull onto her street. She tiptoed to the peephole, peering outside and groaning when she saw Tig standing there.

"We need to talk." He slurred when she opened the door, stumbling into the house and almost tripping over the threshold.

"You're drunk?" She raised a brow, seeing that it was still before noon on a Thursday. "And you drove?" Her voice rose as her eyes landed on his mode of transportation: the dented TM tow truck parked horribly in front of her driveway.

"M'fine." He shrugged, shaking out his sore hand.

"No. You're not." She barked when she realized the dents were from his fist and not from something he'd smashed into along the way, almost wishing that it had been the latter. "Did we not just fucking talk about needing to stay off of A.T.F.'s radar?" She smacked him in the shoulder. "Go take a shower and sleep this off."

"I said I needed to talk to yo-"

"I don't give a shit what you said, I'm not talking to you while you're like this. We can talk when you wake up, or you can leave. Choice is yours."

Tig hung his head, moping as he turned toward the stairs and hobbled up them, taking much longer than needed. He hadn't gotten drunk because he wanted to avoid having the conversation or not be present when they had it, he'd gotten drunk because it was the only way he could muster up enough courage to do so. He wanted her to know the truth - why he was acting the way he was, but that meant that he had to face the awful memory that he'd spent decades trying to forget, something he was not ready to do sober.

"I'm not changing my mind, go!" She pointed up the stairs.

He chuckled when she called out his tactic, continuing up the stairs at a normal pace before he practically rolled into the cold shower - thanks to her use of every drop of hot water. He sat on the tiled floor while water washed over his head, drenching his curls while they hung in his face as he stared blankly at the drain. He eventually managed to heave himself up, barely towelling off before landing face first on her bed, passing out instantly.

The previously intoxicated man woke up a few hours later, lifting his head and gaining his bearings, finding that she had covered him with a blanket at some point during his sober-up slumber. His mission quickly returned to his mind as he stumbled to the bathroom to find his discarded clothing, pulling on his jeans and boxers - not bothering with his socks or shirt before he headed towards the stairs.

Sydney looked up from her position on the couch, turning off the TV when Tig entered the room shirtless and sat on the loveseat across from her in silence, looking down to the hardwood floor as he tried to make himself say what he needed to say.

"Did you have a good nap?" She raised an eyebrow playfully, dropping it when he shook his head and remained staring at the ground. "There's leftovers in the fridge." She referred to the lunch she'd made while he was sleeping off his morning margaritas.

"I'm not hungry." He shook his head again.

"You need to eat somethi-"

"Syd…" He looked up at her with a pained expression, knowing that he couldn't do it. "Come here." He practically begged her, holding out his hand.

Sydney uncrossed her legs and walked over to him cautiously, gently brushing her fingers against his, sending a shock rippling through his body. He pulled her into his lap where he wrapped his arms around her, desperate for as much of the intoxicating feeling as he could get.

"I'm sorry…" He whimpered into her hair - the emotions, exhaustion, and effects of the alcohol all taking over and breaking him down.

Sydney whimpered when he pulled her against the warmth of his bare chest, a simple action that had so much power over her. She squeezed her eyes shut, hugging him back as she ran her fingers through his curls soothingly.

"We gotta stop this." He shook his head, pulling back to look at her with his tear-filled, blue eyes.

"What?"

"Bein stupid…" He clarified, brushing a wavy piece of white-blonde hair behind her ear.

"I'll stop when you stop." She smiled softly, brushing her nose against his. He chuckled, holding her face in his hands as he pressed his lips to hers, pulling away and resting his forehead against hers.

"You were right, there are things that we can't tell each other right now." He decided that agreeing with her was what was best for him right now - it's not like she was wrong, he just wished that she was, that he wasn't too much of a pussy to just tell her why he was scared. But if he didn't force her to share all of her secrets, she wouldn't force him, which was what he needed. "But I want to get to a place where we can." He assured her that he did want full transparency with her eventually, but he knew it couldn't happen overnight.

"Okay." Sydney nodded, satisfied with that agreement.

"I love you." He looked up into her gorgeous emerald green eyes, nodding his sincerity.

"I love you too." She nodded back, stroking his hands that were cupping her face before she leaned back in, kissing him deeply.

"So, you have fun in Unser's cage?" He grinned when their lips parted.

"Oh, Sergeant." She grinned back. "Have I got a story for you…"