13
Jax Is Really Alive
Chapter 22 Recap
Hale leads the investigation into the kidnapping of Abel and Thomas. He concentrates on three areas SAMCRO, Norco and Gemma. Skeeter and Aranora are going to look into SAMCRO, Jax and Tara will go to Norco to find Nero and Wendy and JC will hunt Gemma. JC makes it clear that he's a stronger and better person and he isn't that loser Juice anymore. He is there to help the boys. Skeeter, Aranora and JC leave.
Louise will run point on the search for the boys and provide all logistical support. She leaves to grab some sleep, but calls Hale with news. There's a news clip of Wendy. She tells every major TV station that Jax shot her up with meth and took the kids. She urges Jax to leave the boys somewhere safe and call 911.
Both Jax and Tara are furious. Tara turns on Jax and tells him that she's going to kill Wendy and, if they don't get the boys back, she may kill someone else. She storms off.
Hale asks Jax if they have hit a rough patch in their reconciliation.
Chapter 23 Fire Fight
"When I was in high school, I never would have imagined that my life would take this turn," Jax said. "Aliens, kidnapping and dead people coming back to life. What a fucked up life."
"It's better than your human life," Hale pointed out.
"Yeah, that's true. It's still a fucked up life."
"You want to grab some beer upstairs? I've set up my own microbrewery. I bottled a new batch of stout last night."
"Sure," Jax said.
"How did you die? I know Tara rescued you from the truck because alien or not, you wouldn't have survived that."
"How can you tell that I died?"
"There's a faint purple glow that isn't visible to the human eye around all hybrids or Paralorns."
Jax stared at Hale for a moment before nodding his head.
"I see it now. I don't know how I didn't notice it before. Tara killed me with a drug overdose. I should have told her that. She's already killed me once, twice is just asking too much," Jax said with a rueful smile.
Hale laughed.
"Life as an alien is always challenging."
"Especially when the mother you murdered in cold blood comes back to life."
"It was a surprise to the other Paralorns too. Someone was experimenting on humans before us. You have no idea the paranoid scramble that happened when I notified Ryland. Maybe Gemma will have a come to Jesus moment and be a better version of herself."
"There's plenty of room for improvement," Jax said.
He led Jax through the passages and the twists and turns until they arrived at a room that looked like a bar that should have been on the beach in Hawaii. Wooden floors, framed surf posters, a couple of tables with chairs and a large sand colored bean bag sofa gave the room the casual atmosphere Hale wanted after spending a long day as police chief.
He needed a place where he could completely relax into another world. He even had a sound system that played the sound of the ocean surf crashing on rocks.
Hale went behind the bar and grabbed two beer bottles from the cooler under the bar and handed one to Jax. They settled in at one of the tables.
"This is my secret room. Only my closest friends have seen it. It's kind of embarrassing."
"I get the room. You need a refuge. It helps you decompress and you can't surf all the time. My motorcycle was my escape."
"There have been some developments on the SAMCRO front. Brooke Putner was reported missing by her father yesterday. Isn't there some kind of SAMCRO connection with her?"
"She helped with Abel and Thomas. She was seeing Rat."
"What's his real name?"
"George Skogstrom. I don't think Rat would have hurt her. She has some mental issues. She's bi-polar and she's disappeared before."
"Her father didn't mention any of this. Not SAMCRO, her being bi-polar or her history as a runaway. I bet she's off her meds. How the hell does he expect me to find her when he doesn't give me a single scrap of information?"
"He may have thought you wouldn't look for her if you knew about any of that stuff."
"Could she have taken the kids? Wendy calls her to help with the kids, she finds Wendy out of it on drugs, so she took the kids. She could have watched after them here and there once she got them. When it got to be too much work, she disappeared so she could devote herself to the boys."
Jax thought about that for several moments.
"That's a real possibility. She would need somewhere to take the boys. Rat may know something."
"I'll bring him down to the station for questioning. Maybe away from SAMCRO, I can get some information out of him."
"If he doesn't know where she is, he may be willing to look for her if he knows that she's not in trouble if she took the kids to help them. Wendy's the one in trouble."
"I didn't mention this to Tara because I don't want to get her hopes up. The pieces fit neatly, but my instinct tells me there's more to it."
"It all comes back to Wendy and what was going on with her. Maybe Nero can shed some light on Wendy's state of mind."
"I didn't want to say this in front of Tara, it would just stoke the fires of her hatred for Wendy, but you need to face some facts about your ex-wife. She doesn't give a damn about either of those boys. They're props and she uses them when she needs them.
"She loves you and she'll do anything to get you back. She thought when you discovered what Tara had planned to make sure Gemma didn't get the boys when she was going through her murder charge ordeal, that would drive you away from Tara permanently and into her arms. She cries, has a drug relapse and is remorseful for her part in Tara's plan. It was all just one big manipulation."
"A junior Gemma."
"She's worse because she doesn't care about the boys. She wants you back. She's willing to play mom for the boys if that's what it takes to get you, but she will never put their needs and welfare ahead of her own like Tara does."
Jax thought back over Wendy's conduct and he realized that Hale had put his finger on a fact that had escaped him. He was absolutely right about Wendy.
"The morning I was going to go off on my killing spree, I had sex with Wendy when I got back from killing Gemma and Unser. When she and Nero left in the car with the boys, I told her I loved her."
Hale laughed.
"If you had only known you were under surveillance. I know that did not go over well with Tara. You're lucky she wasn't so mad at you that she let the truck crush you."
"I explained to Tara that I meant I loved her as the mother my child."
"I bet that didn't go over well with her."
"It didn't. I think I can find Nero's uncle and convince him to get Nero to contact me. He may at least give me a direction to look. He may even still be in contact with her. Maybe he can set up a meeting."
"I've tried calling Wendy, but her phone isn't working. I think her attorney probably took her phone. I have a feeling her attorney may have done that to keep Wendy from saying something stupid."
"I don't know why I'm surprised that Wendy blamed me for taking the boys. When she almost got arrested for using drugs when she was pregnant with Abel, she got real religious real fast. She blamed me for shooting her up with meth and taking the kids because she knows she's looking at child endangerment charges."
"Tomorrow morning, I'm going to have Louise call the attorney and see what she can find out. Her attorney doesn't have a land line for her office. She uses a cell phone. I'm hoping that she uses that to talk to Wendy. The aliens have some tech that will let us trace any call the attorney makes. I'm hoping that after Louise talks to the attorney, she'll call Wendy and we'll get Wendy's location. Just don't let Tara kill Wendy."
"I won't. Tara's just a little crazy with the boys being kidnapped and she's never liked Wendy."
"There's more news on the SAMCRO front. Chibs is going to have to find himself a new girlfriend. Althea Jarry decided that she didn't want to do any jail time, so she was looking to make any kind of deal, she didn't care who she had to give up."
"She didn't really know anything about SAMCRO," Jax said.
"SAMCRO was the least of her problems. The second the news got out she was going to rat out any and everyone, it was only a matter of time. She got killed yesterday. First day out on bail," Hale shook his head. "She goes to a bar, meets a guy and takes him home. She caught it all on hidden cameras from the sex to her murder. Guy was a prospect for a small time outlaw MC called Death Merchants out of O town. They do nickel and dime hits with aspirations to be high end hitmen."
"Who hired them?"
"No one. The Death Merchants paid off Jarry to lose some evidence on a couple of murder charges."
"She get killed in Charming?"
"No," Hale said. "She was living in a house in an unincorporated area of San Joa County. When I told Tara not to kill anyone in Charming, I had an Unser/Clay flashback. My biggest fear is that I'll end up like Unser without any moral compass. My death experience made me realize that I needed to be less rigid, but it's a hard line to walk. It's simpler to have zero tolerance policies and rigidly enforce rules."
"Unser lost his moral compass because of Gemma. He would have done anything for her and he did. Same way with Clay and my father. She brought out the worst in men. I think Nero believed he could help her to be a better person or maybe she had him fooled and he didn't understand just how evil she was."
Hale smiled. "That's funny. My mother told me once that you had it all, looks, charm, intelligence, but if you didn't get away from your mother, she would destroy you."
"I knew she could be overbearing, but I thought that was normal. A mother loving her son. It wasn't. I can't even think about seeing her again. That's going to take me awhile to work out."
Jax still felt numb when it came to Gemma being alive. He needed to keep his focus on Tara and finding his boys. Figuring out what he was going to do about Gemma could wait. Maybe even forever.
"I looked into Nero a little. The two guys he killed were really bad guys. One of them liked to sexually abuse his daughters when they hit the age of two. He's three for three. The baby that was with the mother when Nero killed the guy was only a few months old, so she was spared his sexual abuse. He got minor slaps on the wrist, court ordered counseling and probation. Pedophiles can't be fixed and there is no true justice for the victims. The world is a better place without that guy."
"You have some history with that?" Jax guessed. There was too much anger in Hale's voice for there not to be a personal connection.
"Yeah, I dated a girl in college. Great girl but troubled. Her uncle molested her, her mother refused to believe her brother could do something like that and she picked her brother over her daughter."
"That has a vaguely familiar sound."
"Yeah, I guess it does. She killed herself," Hale's voice grew husky.
"Don't carry guilt around for that," Jax advised.
"I don't. I just wish I could have known what to do, what to say, how to help her. I suggested counseling. She was in a dark place emotionally. I thought she was getting better when she had really just decided to kill herself.
"The other guy that Nero killed liked to carve up hookers, put his initials into their breasts. He used a screwdriver to try to puncture one hooker's breast implant while it was in her. He's been the last known person to see a couple of girls who went missing, but there's never been enough to arrest him. The bodies were never found."
"Too bad the justice system doesn't weigh the value of the people you kill. You pay the same price whether you kill a saint, scumbag or a serial killer."
"That's kind of why I want to help Nero. I had Louise prepare a package. It's a new identity. Driver's License, social security card, a couple of ATM cards with enough money for him to live on a year or so. There's also a car registered in his new name, title and insurance card are in the glove compartment. His new ID is good, but it isn't bulletproof like a Paralorn ID. It will hold up to a fair amount of scrutiny as long as he doesn't get himself into too much trouble. Louise has the location for the car. There's also a cabin rented in his new name with utilities already turned on in New Mexico. It's a good place for him to blend in. All I ask is you give it to him in person, so I'll know it went to him and his uncle didn't keep the money. In the end though, it's up to you to give it to him or not."
Jax stared at Hale with shock. He couldn't believe his ears that Hale was helping a fugitive flee from prosecution with a very thoughtful and expensive new start in life.
"You have changed," Jax said.
"I just don't think Nero should lose his freedom for killing those two guys. In some weird way, it feels like I'm balancing out the scales of justice for my girlfriend killing herself. At least that guy won't be around to molest anymore of his own kids and his friend won't be scarring and probably killing hookers."
"Thank you for doing this for Nero."
"I saw some of the surveillance on that last day. I heard what you told Nero about how you wanted him to tell your kids the absolute truth about you—that you were a criminal and a killer. That was the moment when I realized that you were finally thinking right. It's also why I'm willing to stick my neck out to help if you have any ID problems."
"Thanks for Nero. Thanks too for me. Tara said you just volunteered to do it."
"You deserve a chance to make something of your life. You helped save my ass a few times when I was a kid; I'm just returning the favor. This is it though. You've got one chance. I'm not going to go down the road of always looking the other way like Unser."
"I think you'll be OK. Just don't hook up with Gemma," Jax said.
They both laughed like it was the funniest joke they had ever heard. Hale went to the bar, grabbed two more beer bottles and brought them over to the table.
"Tell me, did you and Tara ever get together in high school?" Jax asked.
"Really?" Hale looked at Jax with amusement. "Ask Tara."
(What happens between Hale and Tara is revealed in Tara's Story)
"Tara and Ryland hooked up when she returned to life," Jax said.
"Yeah, I know," Hale said.
He sounded about as happy about it as Jax had when he found out.
"Ryland, the guy you want to hate, but can't because he is just that good."
"Exactly," Jax said nodding his head in agreement. Jax felt like he'd gone back in time when he and Hale were friends. It also made him miss Opie.
"He's just so damned perfect."
"He's got to have some dark secret," Jax added.
"I don't think he's a serious threat to your relationship with Tara. She cares about him, but she isn't in love with him."
"I've always thought that you had a crush on Tara," Jax said.
"When Tara came back to life, she was in rough shape for awhile," Hale said neatly sidestepping the subject. "Part of that was the violent way she died at Gemma's hands. On top of that, the Paralorns were worried about the boys since Thomas is in line to be King, so they were running all kinds of surveillance. She saw some of what you did to the Chinese guy Gemma put her murder on."
"I keep wrestling with that. Did Juice and Gemma come up with the Chinese lie because they weren't smart enough to figure out they didn't need to say anything or did they do it because they wanted to watch me burn?"
"Why would Gemma want to hurt you like that?"
"It's what she does. She hurts me and makes me more dependent on her. I can't take care of my kids if I'm focused on getting retribution for Tara's killing."
"You know her better. I thought she was desperate to point the blame somewhere, so she had to solve Tara's murder or you might look into it yourself."
"That's a more favorable explanation for Gemma and Juice or JC as he now calls himself."
"I don't think Gemma's smart. I think she is cunning. If she'd been smart, she would have been surprised that Tara and Roosevelt were killed. Cunning is coming up with the lie to point you in a direction away from her."
"I don't know what it would have taken for me to see myself and my life for what it was if Tara hadn't been killed. Even then, it took a little while. Now, it's so clear, I don't understand why I didn't see it all before."
"Gemma. A lot of the blame is yours, but you were born into it. It's hard to think beyond the way you were raised."
"In the end, my father realized his mistakes and was going to leave the outlaw lifestyle. SAMCRO ordered his death."
"History repeats itself. There's a green light on you. Is it possible SAMCRO kidnapped the boys?"
"I hope they wouldn't do something like that, but if they felt I betrayed their trust by not killing myself. I don't know. They might be desperate enough to take the boys. I could call them and see how that goes."
Hale thought about that for several moments.
"Let's give Skeeter a day or two to take the temperature of SAMCRO. See what they are currently thinking about you before we make a move in their direction."
Jax nodded agreement.
"You're the one in charge," Jax said.
"Funny that we've kind of come full circle as friends."
"Even when you were at your most uptight, you were never petty. You could have made SAMCRO's life hell by pulling us over for little petty violations. I remember when I was fighting AJ Weston when you showed up and arrested him. You saved his life for a few hours anyway. I think that was the moment I hated you the most."
"I was trying to save you too," Hale said, finishing his bottle of beer. "It was only a matter of time before you caught a murder charge. I didn't want it to be in Charming."
"I know that I deserve all of Tara's harsh words for the way I handled everything after she died . . ."
"It didn't start then," Hale interrupted. "When she returned to life, she was also traumatized by the way you left her twisting in the wind over that murder charge. If my father hadn't died last year, he would never have let them charge Tara with murder. It was all a political stunt trying to get to the MC."
That was another mystery Jax wondered about. Tara was very close to Hale's family. It was part of the reason he was so suspicious that there was something between Hale and Tara back in high school.
"I failed her when she needed me the most because I put SAMCRO ahead of everyone else," Jax said.
"Do you think you two will end up back together?"
"I don't know. Sometimes, I know we'll work out and other times . . . " Jax shook his head and took a long pull on his beer bottle. "Ryland told me that I should want the best for Tara and he was better for her."
"He's probably right there, but she's not in love with him. I think she could be happy with him. I think she could find happiness with you or maybe even someone else."
Jax had a feeling that someone else was Hale. He couldn't blame him for wanting to be with Tara.
"I'm going to get some sleep. I need to be up early and it's going to be a long day. Just ask Taz to direct you to your room. I wasn't sure about you and Tara, so I gave you separate rooms."
"Thanks for everything."
The next morning, Jax, Tara and Louise were sitting at the kitchen table when Hale walked in from outside.
"Aren't you supposed to be going to work? You're going the wrong way," Tara said with a smile.
"I got called out last night. Someone torched Scoops."
Next Up
Tara's hormone levels skyrocket and she tries to resist Jax. All she can think about is sex and all he can think about is sex with her. It's an alien hybrid side effect. Instead of cramps, bloating and the desire to kill all men (that last one may just be me), hybrids get intense sexual desire at ovulation.
Upcoming: Nero reveals stunning news about Wendy. Jax and Tara begin a desperate hunt for Wendy fearing that she many have sold the boys to pay a meth debt.