Disclaimer: All characters, locations, concepts, dialogue, and story leading to this work of fiction belong to their respective copyright holders, no profit-making is intended.
Timeline and Spoilers: Anything up to and including Season 6, Episode 10: "Huang Wu"
Author's Note: Thank you for the overwhelmingly positive response to the last chapter, I hope I can meet all of the expectations that everyone has for this story. If there anything you want see added to this chapter or the next one, please let me know, I'll do my best to include any suggestion that's offered.
Genesis 2:24
Chapter 2: Big Moves
The first thing that Jax noticed when he woke up the next morning was the sunlight streaming through the windows. He turned and saw that his wife was still sleeping. She was so peaceful and beautiful. For everything she had tried to do to him and his mother, she never deserved death. Moments like this gave him a reminder that what he had planned was more than worth it.
He was worried about her, if the wrong person saw her today, especially when she went to the police station, she would be labeled a rat and treated accordingly.
He would tell her why he changed his mind yesterday, just not now. There was too much going on to get into all of that.
The reason was fairly simple. He had driven countless miles working for the club. He stayed in more than his share of crappy roadside motels. In many of the rooms, there was a Bible. When there was no booze or drugs, or when he was still keyed up from a fight or a woman. Basically, when he couldn't get to sleep, he would read the Bible. He would skip around the book. But the start was good to put him out. The Creation, Adam and Eve, all of that stuff would really help. He knew the story, the reading just let his mind go blank and before he knew it, he would wake up the next morning.
The part of the story that hit him yesterday was the first action man took after woman came on the scene. He bonded himself to her. And that was that.
When Jax had heard that his mother had threatened his wife. He was confused for a bit. He loved them both, but that Biblical story smacked him upside the head. Tara was his wife. No matter what she tried to do, that was still the case. He was more worried about his actions while she was in jail.
He had cheated on her, even worse, it was with the Madam of a brothel. But again, now was not the time. If she was going to tear his head off for that, it would be after she and their boys were safe.
He was brought out of his thinking by Tara waking up. Last night was great, they had been apart for so long, it was like they were rediscovering each other. He smiled as she stirred "Hey, babe."
"Good morning." Tara had some things of her own to think about. Her actions yesterday started out because she was tired of all the fighting. She never dreamed Jax would do what he did and what he said he was going to do. She expected him to be happy she was leaving their boys alone.
Jax wanted to refine the plan he laid out last night "I want you to wait until the afternoon to talk with Roosevelt."
"Why? I thought we were trying to do this before Gemma finds out." That seemed to be the crux of the plan last night, that certain people be kept out of the loop.
Jax sat up and swiveled so he was facing away from Tara "Mom's going to find out eventually, I just want you to be safe. My last act as president will be to have Bobby keep an eye on you until you leave town."
"Oh, I get it, and thanks, Juice kept getting on my nerves. I'm sure you heard that I almost ran him over." Tara shifted so she could look at his tattooed back.
Jax turned around and laughed at the memory "Yeah, you really trashed his bike, he was pissed."
"Good, I hated being followed like that. So, what is it, why do I have to be kept safe?" Tara did her own sitting up.
Jax liked the view, Tara's beauty hadn't diminished over the years. As he was getting dressed, he gave Tara a short summary of what was going on with the club "Well we have that thing going on with the Irish, the Chinese and the cops both want a piece of them. Also, Clay's trying to work a deal with the Irish to escape and start up his own crew. And hey, I'm sorry about having someone following you."
"You're just going to let him do that, after he tried to have me killed. And after what I pulled, I can't blame you for acting the way you did." After saying this Tara started moving around and getting ready for the day.
Jax had finished dressing "After today, anything going on with the club is behind us. If I hold onto every grudge from the past, we'll never get out of here."
"Okay, I'll wait, you better be careful, with our luck something will happen to fuck this up." Tara wanted to hear Jax's answer before she started her own routine.
Jax gave that boyish smile of his, it helped him charm her on more than one occasion "I'm just stepping down as the president, the real hang-up will be patching out. Everybody has to agree to let me go. It's kind of a big deal with all of the stuff I know about the club. You're the one with the hard day."
"Right, so I'm supposed to call you once I figure out where I'm going?" Tara had put on a robe, she was going to make coffee, and then finish getting ready.
Jax had to clarify one last thing before he headed out "No, only call me when your away from Charming and well on your way to wherever. Once I know that, I'll swing by my Mom's and pick up the boys."
"I can't wait to see them again. You want anything for the road?" Tara was perfectly willing to make whatever he wanted.
Jax just wanted to get started with everything, his whole life was going to change today. "Naw, I'm good, I'll pick up something if I want it. I gotta to get over there and call everybody in."
He walked over to her, kissed her deeply once, and then went to grab all of the stuff he needed that wasn't in the bedroom. Tara watched him the entire time, she didn't know when or if she would see him again.
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Jax pulled up to Scoops & Sweets. How twisted was it that an ice cream shop served as a cover for the club. He had called all the full members he could. The only one who would be missing today was Happy. His vote would have to be made by proxy.
Jax breezed through the front part of the shop. He nodded briefly to Brooke. He was glad to see she was in this early. She gave a good face to the front of the shop. He could feel some satisfaction, his father was inadvertently involved in her mother's death. If all went well neither he nor his kids would be involved in anything like that.
By the time he got to the back and temporary clubhouse, nearly all of the full members were there. Tig saw him first "Hey boss, what's with early wake up call, I had a great night with a young crow eater, she was eager, drunk off her ass, and so was I."
"Jeez, man, I'm sorry. Been there. I can promise this'll be a quick meeting." Jax could always count on Tig to be wild. He could count on all of the members for certain things. Chibs could be steady and direct. Bobby had a certain wisdom and heart.
Chibs got things back on track "So, Jackie boy, you got us up at this ungodly hour, why?"
"Okay, I get it, sorry everybody, let's just get started, Juice, I'm pulling you off watching Tara. Bobby you're on that now." Jax had moved to the head of the table and had was holding the gavel.
Bobby and Juice both nodded, they were used to assignments like this. Bobby was still a bit stunned by what Tara did to Jax. He had given her some heartfelt advice, and at that point she was neck deep in her plan.
"Alright, next thing, I'm resigning as president. Stepping down, that's it, I'm done." Jax' declaration caused a murmur around the table.
Tig was the first to object "What the hell!"
Bobby was next "You sure this is the right time for that. We got a lot of shit going on."
"We always do, whoever takes my place, I'll let them in on everything I've got planned." Jax expected the resistance, it was an immense responsibility to decide what was best for the club. He looked around to see there was anybody else who wanted to say his piece. Chibs looked like he wanted to, but he was still thinking things through. "If there's nothing else, we should get to replacing me."
The subsequent election was close, with Bobby and Chibs garnering the most votes. Bobby won narrowly. It was decided that Tig would hold Happy's proxy vote. He used both votes for Chibs. But more of the table, Jax included, voted for Bobby.
Jax removed the President patch. Bobby would add it to his kutte after the meeting. For now they changed seats. Bobby looked at Jax, there was something going on with him "Do you want to be part of the leadership at all?"
Jax shook his head and said "Actually, I want to patch out."
A stunned silence greeted this request. Jax stepping down as president, with everything going on with his family, seemed like the right choice. Wanting to leave the club, that was new and unexpected.
Bobby spoke up, as was his duty now "We'll have to vote on that, what's going on?"
"It's Tara and my kids. They were at TM when it got bombed. I've been thinking about Opie, look what happened to him." Jax ran his hands through his hair. This was the shakiest part of his plan, if he couldn't get out of the club, he'd be stuck and there was no way he could make sure his family was safe.
Tig spoke next, seemed that was appropriate, he had accidentally killed Donna, thinking it was Opie when they thought he had turned "Hey, we know man, but leaving, really?"
"Yeah, really, what about what happened to Dawn, you being part of the club led to that." Jax knew that was low, but he had to use everything he could. He saw Tig close his eyes and his hands ball into fists.
Tig was remembering his daughter's screams as she was burned alive in front of him. It was painful and he let Jax know "You asshole."
Hoping to head off a fight between the two. Chibs asked Jax "It does make sense, but we're already thin as far as numbers go." Chibs wasn't lying, they had lost a number of Prospects and Phil during this new fight with the Irish.
"Guys, I'm not looking for anything, I just want out. I don't want to end up like my father, or just as bad, like Clay, rotting in jail while my wife and kids suffer." He wouldn't beg, but he looked at each member in turn.
Bobby put an end to the discussion "Alright, we'll vote on it, Jax, wait outside, I'll let you know when we're done."
Jax left the room. After he closed the door behind him he breathed a sigh of relief. He waited at the front of the shop. He sat at the counter. Brooke finished sweeping the shop and cleaning behind the counter and looked at him curiously. It seemed to take forever for Bobby to come out so Jax could know his future.
Jax saw that Bobby wasn't happy, maybe that meant good news. What he said next seemed to confirm that after he sat down next to the former president "We agreed, you're out. Give me your kutte. Don't know what you want to do about your ink, you can keep it. Might cause you problems later on though."
Jax shrugged out of his kutte and handed it over. "Thanks, couple of last things. About Happy, if you need to, Marks and the Niners could help deal with the Chinese. With the Irish, Patterson wants them bad over the KG-9s, she's offering immunity if the club gives the cops a shot at capturing them. It's you're call if you want to go down that road. And about following Tara today. She's going to talk to the Sheriff. She just wants to see how far away she can go while she waits for her trial. Once she leaves Charming, you can stop tailing her."
"What about you? What are you going to be doing?" Bobby was still having a hard time getting a handle on everything that had happened and all that was going to go down in the next couple of days.
Jax now had some time to kill, actually he was thinking about one important detail he had missed in his plan "Well, brother, I was thinking of doing some shopping. I need to find a cage to use, I need the extra seats for the kids."
"What happened to you?" Jax wanting out of the club was strange enough, but now he wanted a car. Who was this man and what happened to the guy he knew for years?
Jax had thought about that question, he didn't have an easy answer, so he gave a vague something or other "I had my eyes opened." That was the truth, just a stripped down, bare bones version of it.
"Is that all, well, I'm off to keep an eye on your wife. Anything else?" Bobby patted his friends shoulder.
Jax hopped off the stool, he felt weird without his kutte. He would just have to get over it "Yeah, when everything falls out, Gemma is going to come tearing through here. I'll have a new phone number. When she's on the warpath give that to her and tell her to call me, I'll handle it from there."
Jax handed a slip of paper over to Bobby. Now he had two burners, one for Tara, and one for staving off disaster, these guys didn't deserve to be set upon by Gemma. With a smile at the new president, he turned and left. He probably should have bid everyone a farewell, tried to make amends with Tig. That just wasn't his life anymore, it was very likely he would never set foot in a SAMCRO chapel ever again.
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Tara spent the morning being nervous. Usually she was busy with the kids or Jax. On the bad days she was in jail or the hospital. Now she had time to think. This led to her thinking of various scenario's that would keep her or Jax here. Maybe Gemma or Unser would show up out of the blue. Maybe there would be some gang thing that would make Jax change his mind. Something like that always seemed to come up.
She was relieved when she heard the roar of a motorcycle, she smiled slightly when she saw that it was Bobby. Her fears had surfaced for a moment, the Sons weren't the only ones who rode those things. That would fit with her history if some Mayans decided to pay her a visit. She'd been kidnapped by a biker before, someone who her husband had humiliated.
The ride to the police station was surprisingly uneventful. It seemed to be a slow day in Charming. This was both good and bad. It meant that Tara could speak with Roosevelt fairly quickly. But it also meant that more attention was paid to her. Her recent escapades had given her some notoriety.
When she entered Roosevelt's office, he looked at her searchingly. She had misled him a couple of times in the recent past with her plan to get her and her kids out from under the situation in her family and this town. She wasn't his favorite person. It didn't matter that her intentions were good. She went about it the wrong way. "Mrs. Knowles, can I help you with something?"
"Yeah, and I don't mind being called Mrs. Teller. Me and Jax made up. On that note, he wanted me to ask, how far from Charming can I go while I wait for my trial?" Tara couldn't blame him for his hostility. She had used him during her plan. Some of the stuff she did came close to being unforgivable for a reasonable person. Unfortunately, Gemma was not reasonable when it came to her family, so everything Tara did was way past wrong.
Roosevelt was wondering now. Was this just another scheme to take her kids away from their father? "What have you got planned? Much as I loathe the Sons and what they do, Jax Teller still has custody rights. Legally, you can't kidnap your own children."
"No, there's nothing like that going on, I just need to get out of here, I'm leaving the kids with Jackson." That was mostly true, she didn't mention the threat that caused all of this. He wouldn't take her seriously anyway, she was now in 'the boy who cried wolf' territory with Roosevelt and Gemma.
The sheriff wanted to pry a little, but he didn't want to be part of another scam. "Well, as long as you don't leave the state, you won't be breaking any laws there."
"I have to stay within California, that actually gives me more options than I thought. One more thing. I want to go into hiding. I want to go somewhere where there is some safety." Tara had thought there would be a set range she was allowed, being within the county seemed right. But this opened up countless possibilities.
Roosevelt considered her implied question "Well, if you want safe, you'll want to get away from most of the gang stuff. That rules out most large cities where you could melt into the crowd. Now I'm just spitballing here, but you probably want to stay off the Sons' radar too, so no small towns along any interstate. They've got charters all over the place. Honestly, I'd say somewhere in the central valley, medium-sized, out of the way. Take all that together, Merced seems like a good choice."
"Merced, huh, and why would that be particularly safe?" Tara was surprised by Roosevelt, his guesses were right on the mark. She had already thought about some of what he said. One thing she had overlooked was the Sons' mobility, or for that matter, Gemma's ability to get around. Her original plan was to head north and setup in Redding or Corning. They were small and close to the Oregon border, If everything went to plan, Her and Jax could leave California easily. The problem with this plan was both towns were along I-5 and an easy ride from Charming.
Roosevelt looked Tara over, it was his job to try and figure out things unsaid. Right now she was a mixed bag. Her plan to leave town with her kids had blown up in her face, she was showing that. But she was also happy for some reason. "It's a county seat, so there will be a strong police presence. Probably muncipal and county police, so corruption should be low. The town being in the valley helps, it's not on the transit routes for things like guns, drugs, or people. So you just have to watch out for local crime."
"Okay, sounds good, now when do you expect my trial to start?" Tara was actually starting to believe this might work. All she had to do was plan out how long she was staying away. She'd have to appear for her trial, it's start would dictate how she would live between now and then.
Roosevelt was wondering what was going on, Tara was going to leave without her kids, that was unlike her in so many ways "Unless something changes, I'd say about two weeks. It won't be around here, Stockton handles most of that stuff."
"Thanks Eli, you've been a big help." Tara finally smiled for the first time. Things were actually moving forward, now Jax had to come through with his part of the plan. She was happy and about to leave.
But Roosevelt asked her a question that caught her at the door "Tara, just be straight with me, what's going on?"
"As I said before, nothing, you don't need to worry about it. If everything goes the way I hope, your job is going to get much, much easier." Tara was worried that she had let something slip. Roosevelt didn't say anything, he just looked at her quizzically. She his office and the building soon after. She checked her GPS when she was back in her car. From that she knew she had head southeast.
After Tara had left, Roosevelt was left wondering. She said there was nothing to worry about. In his time as a cop, he had learned that usually when someone came to him and told him there was nothing wrong, there was something going on. He'd do some investigating, drop in on the Sons' new home, see what was going on there. The pieces just weren't adding up.
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Jax got Tara's call just as he had finished picking up a car. He could've went to TM, they would have given him a great deal on something. But that could leave a paper trail, he didn't want that. Now that his kutte and patches were gone. He traded away the last part of himself for an older truck with a crew cab. He wasn't ready to go down the sedan or van route quite yet. He was still Jackson Teller, not a damned soccer dad, at least not yet.
As he talked with Tara, he smiled as he imagined them a little ways down the road. She would be a doctor somewhere, pulling down good money, his skills were more limited. The best he could hope for was eventually running an auto shop, until then his primary job would be looking after his kids when Tara wasn't around, he had seen how brutally long her shifts could be, especially in someplace like an emergancy room.
There was a twinge of sadness as he watched his bike being taken away. Just one more part of his life that was changing. Like he thought she would, Tara had picked a good place to go. Jax was good at thinking tactically, stuff like where targets were, how to get to them. As evidenced by her recent plan, Tara could think of the bigger picture.
As he drove to Gemma's, he thought again about Opie. Before Tara had come back all those years ago, his best friend looked just like this. No colors or patches, driving around in a truck like just another regular guy. Jax offered silent thanks, his friend may have died protecting the club, but he was also helping Jax get his family out.
Jax pulled up to the front of the house. Jax got out of the truck. His feet barely touched the ground when a small, blonde missile slammed into him with a squealed "Daddy!"
"Hey, little man, been having fun?" Jax picked Abel up, and the boy smiled and was about to reply when he was interrupted.
Gemma came out of the house holding Thomas and said tiredly "I'll say so, what do you feed that kid. He's got more energy than someone on speed. He's been running me ragged. Hey honey."
Jax veered from the kiss on the cheek while he took Thomas. He still very aware that this was someone who had threatened his wife, but now wasn't the time to confront her "Hey Mom, just came to pick up the kids, thanks for watching them. By the way, Tara told me what you two talked about. She said she was sorry, and she left. So we don't need worry about her."
Abel piped up now "Where'd Mommy go?"
Gemma answered him "Not far baby, she just needed some time alone."
Abel countered with a small "Oh."
Gemma turned her attention back to her son "That's good Jackson, she was trying to take our boys away, I couldn't let that happen, so I gave it to her straight."
Jax' immediate thought was 'the fuck you mean by our boys, they're mine and Tara's, not yours.' what he said was far different "You're still you Mom, I'd hate to be on your bad side. Anyway, I'll take the boys today. We can split days taking care of them, or I can call Wendy in to help, or Lyla."
"We can handle it, Wayne would be happy to help." What Gemma didn't say was that she didn't want the junkie or the porn-star anywhere near her grand-kids. She would be the most important woman in their lives. All the mistakes she made with Jackson or her Thomas, she could avoid with these two. She would do it right this time. And there would be no John or Clay around to screw things up. Now that Tara was gone, and maybe soon she would be in prison for a long time, she would be out of the boy's lives for awhile. Gemma could put her stamp on them by the time Tara got out. She slipped and smiled when thought of Wendy trying to get close to Abel again, it would happen sooner or later and Gemma couldn't help but think of ways to put Wendy in her place.
Jax saw the smile, he had seen it before, when they had plotted to kill Clay after he sent the cartel after Tara. She was planning something, and whoever was on the other end wouldn't like it. "Alright, thanks Mom, I'll see you later okay."
With that and a quick goodbye from his mother he got Abel and Thomas situated in the truck. He'd swing by the house real quick, pick up anything Tara left behind, there was some stuff she couldn't move with her car, and then he was out of here. The more distance he put between himself and his mother, he would be better off, and his kids wouldn't have to deal with all of her craziness.
As Jax pulled away Gemma was struck by a question she forgot to ask 'Was that a new truck? He was probably doing a test drive for TM, making sure everything was working right. I'll head over there later, can't leave Chucky alone for too long. Then go and see how Nero's doing.'
Everybody would soon be in motion to one place or another. Eventually Jax and Tara's escape would be noticed. But for now, they were a step ahead of everyone else.