Disclaimer: See initial chapter.
A/N: This would not be here right now were it not for the beta efforts of spacebabe who did an awesome work of catching redundancy and challenging me on 'telling' rather than showing, as well as fixing grammatical errors. I got too close to the work, couldn't tell up from down, and sat with this chapter for over a month before giving up on trying to do it on my own. Much thanks to spacebabe for the fresh set of eyes.
Clay gives Juice a wide berth once they get back to the clubhouse. He still can't wrap his head around what the boy did. Juice is just a kid in terms of war. He could've died, his body could've been blown to bits like Kozik's had been.
Clay's more than a little afraid of what he'll do to the kid if he doesn't, and he's not particularly keen on outing the both of them to the club at any rate. It might be his club, run under his authority at the moment, but with Bobby questioning his actions, he can't afford for any of the guys to realize that he feels more than just brotherly feelings for one of them in particular. Neither of them would be able to handle the flack if word got out that their little deal in Stockton had continued outside of prison walls.
Juice has been looking anything but his usual, carefree self of late, and the guys would no doubt make things worse for the kid if they learned of him and Juice. So, he stands in a corner, arms crossed over his chest and watches as Juice makes a beeline for the bathroom.
Seconds later, Chibs follows, and Clay gets a feeling in the pit of his stomach that doesn't sit right. It's not that he's jealous of Chibs, the man is a solid brother, and it's not like Clay and Juice have an exclusive relationship, or any relationship for that matter.
He pushes off from the corner of the wall and starts issuing orders, sending his men out to take care of business or go home to get some sleep, clearing out the place, leaving just him and Juice and Chibs. He doesn't want a confrontation with Chibs, and wonders how he can play things off so that the man won't be any more suspicious than he already is.
When Chibs finally leaves the bathroom and Juice behind, Clay is ready for him. Clay steps out of the dark corner he's been waiting in. "I sent everyone home; it's been a long day."
"Yeah," Chibs agrees, nodding, eyeing Clay as though he knows."You know the kid's been out of sorts since he came home, and I think it's got something to do with you." Chibs stabs a finger in his direction.
"Yeah, well, ain't none of us been the same since we got out. Go on home, Chibs."
Chibs leans against the counter. "Think'll wait for Juice."
Clay holds his hands out as though in surrender and offers Chibs his most innocent looking smile. "Look, it's been a shitty day. I'm exhausted. I don't know what you think I've done to the kid, but I'm just looking to close up shop tonight and hit the sack. I promise, I won't lay a hand on the kid."
Maybe it's the look of utter exhaustion he's sure is on his face, or the scrapes and bruises he'd gotten from Gemma, or maybe it's a combination of the both of them, but whatever the case, Chibs seems to believe him, and he's grateful.
"I'll be calling to check up on Juice," Chibs says as he walks out the door.
Clay watches in apprehension as Chibs leaves. Chibs has given him a warning, and Clay knows that it's only a matter of time before he goes to the rest of the club with this, because it's not something that Chibs will keep to himself for long. Especially not if Chibs feels that Juice is in any immediate danger.
He'll be damned if the fallout for this is going to land on him. First thing, though, he's got to make sure that Juice didn't tell Chibs anything. He's got to minimize any damage that the kid might've done just now. It's all about protection and self-preservation.
Clay paces in front of the closed door, uncertainty gnawing at his gut as he wars with himself about what to do about Juice and his suicidal run through the minefield. It's a sign that Juice is unraveling, and if he does, there's no telling what he'll spill to the rest of the club and that's something Clay can't afford to have happen so he needs to do some preemptive damage control here. There's also the matter of what the kid might've said to Chibs, if anything, about their 'extra-curricular' activities.
If Juice has told Chibs what they've been doing together they're both screwed, and that's not something that he can have happening. His position in the club means more to him than anything or anyone else. It was something he'd killed for, and he'd do it again, in a heartbeat, to hold onto it.
Resolved to do whatever it takes to secure Juice's silence and preserve his own position as president of the club, Clay knocks on the bathroom door and waits, his hand held aloft in a loose fist.
After a few seconds, Juice pulls the door open, an apologetic look on his face. The words, "I told you I'm-" freeze in the younger man's voice before he even has a fighting chance of getting them out. His smile falters as Clay pushes him backwards into the bathroom, slamming the door shut behind them.
Clay doesn't want to do have to do this, but Juice's actions today have forced his hand. That, and seeing how relieved the boy, his boy had looked after Chibs had 'visited' him in the bathroom made what he was about to do to the boy a necessity.
Juice needs a reminder of just whose and what he was. He needs to be put in his place and shown what his role in the SONS is. And until he learns his lesson, Clay is going to limit his interaction with Chibs and some of the others who seem to be eyeing his boy. He isn't jealous; he's just doesn't care to share what is rightfully his.
***
"I told you I'm ..." Juice's words come to an abrupt halt when he sees that it's Clay, not Chibs, standing in the door. Shit, he thinks. I can't handle this right now.
"You need the john?" he asks, trying to sidle out of the door, but Clay's blocking it, his arms on either side of the door frame. Juice contemplates his chances of being able to duck beneath Clay's left arm, but realizes that it wouldn't be wise.
"Going somewhere?" Clay asks, and though there's a smile on his face, it is far from pleasant and Juice knows he's in deep shit.
"Just heading out of the bathroom." Juice hopes he doesn't sound as nervous as he feels. He gestures for Clay to move, but the man just stands there, blocking the way.
Clay gives him a strange look. "Why you in such a hurry? Chibs forget something?"
All Juice can think is shit.
"He just came to check on me," Juice says. "He didn't even come in the room, just stood outside the door and asked if I was okay."
Clay doesn't say anything at first, just chews his bottom lip and raises an eyebrow. Juice feels the palms of his hands getting sweaty, and he wipes them off on his jeans. He knows what's coming next. He remembers back to when he was a kid and had been caught in a lie by his step-father, and it didn't even matter how big or small the lie was, the beating was always the same, always left him unable to sit for days afterwards, and led to a 'vacation' from school.
Clay folds his arms over his chest and leans against the doorframe. "You're lying. I was watching. What'd you tell him?"
"I told him I was fine," Juice says, swallowing his fear, hoping that Clay can't hear the hammering of his heart which feels like it's about to jump out of his chest.
"That so?" Clay doesn't sound convinced. "He seemed a little upset when he left a moment ago. Thinks that I've got something to do with, how did he put it?" Clay cocks his head to the side and scratches his chin as though mulling the question over.
Juice holds his breath, knowing that this won't end well, no matter what he says to Clay. The man's already made up his mind, and it's not like he's all that far off-base anyway. Juice is a traitor, and as it turns out after his talk with Chibs, it was all for nothing.
"Something to do with you being 'out of sorts since we came back from Stockton.' What'd you tell him Juice?"
The man's hand shoots out quicker than Juice believes should be humanly possible when he doesn't answer right away, and before he can fully register what's happening, Clay's got his arm twisted up and behind his back in an ironclad grip and he's being shoved face-first against the far wall of the bathroom.
Clay pulls the door shut behind him and slides the lock into place. It makes a resounding click that is all too reminiscent of prison, especially given their close proximity and the unpleasant smells of urine and sweat.
Clay wrenches Juice's arm up behind his back – bones grating against each other – and then he shoves him up against the wall beside the toilet, and Juice can actually hear his shoulder 'pop'. He bites down on his tongue, but a strangled cry comes from him, and it fucking hurts. Feels like his arm's being torn right off his body.
Juice's vision tunnels, and he can't breathe, and he can feel the walls pressing in on him, like in, Indiana Jones and The Temple of Doom. Clay's never hurt him like this before. "Clay, stop, you're hurting me."
Instead of stopping, Clay pushes Juice until his cheek is pressed flush against the peeling paint of the wall.
"What'd you tell Chibs about us?" Clay's mouth is right next to his ear; his hot breath makes Juice shiver.
"Nothing," Juice says, and he struggles against Clay's hold on him, trying to get his arm to work so that he can get the man off of him. "I didn't say anything to him about us, I swear. He just wanted to know if I was okay after what happened in the minefield, crazy Scot thought I was suicidal or something." Juice tries to laugh, but it comes out more like a garbled sob.
It's a partial truth, but Juice can't tell Clay the rest, that he'd confessed to Chibs that the new sheriff had been blackmailing him because he had some dirt on him. He couldn't tell Clay what he told Chibs, that his real father, not the one listed on his birth certificate, was a black man. Juice knew that the least of his worries would be getting kicked out of the club if Clay found out about his real heritage. There was no doubt in his mind that the older man, his mentor, would kill him if he found out that he'd been fucking a half Puerto Rican, half black man.
Clay eases his hold a little. "Are you?"
The floor feels like it's buckling beneath Juice, or maybe it's his knees that are buckling. Juice can't seem to breathe and spots of white light dance before his eyes before it registers that Clay isn't asking him if he's black, he's asking if he's suicidal. He almost sags in relief, but Clay's grip on him makes it impossible for him to move much.
"No," he manages to say around the lump in his throat. He shakes his head to emphasize his denial.
Clay, like his step-son, Jax, would have reservations about keeping a possibly suicidal person in the club, whether he was using that individual as a fuck buddy or not.
"You sure about that?"
Juice isn't sure, but he thinks he detects a hint of concern in Clay's voice."Yeah," he says, relieved that Clay seems to have bought his half-truth.
"Then why'd you make that mad dash through the minefield?" Clay asks, and this time Juice doesn't even have to lie.
Feeling a little self-conscious, he laughs and shrugs as much as he's able to. "I had to protect you and Romeo" he says. "You're the club president and he's one of our allies. If anything happened to either of you, we'd all be screwed. If something happened to me, well," he shrugs, smiling a little, "I figure I'm expendable." Juice's face is still pressed up against the wall, his arm feels like it's ready to fall off, and he can feel Clay breathing at the back of his neck.
He isn't expecting Clay's reaction to this confession and is confused at first as to why he's seeing stars, but then, through a fog of pain, he realizes that Clay slammed his head into the bathroom wall. He gazes in shocked fascination at the crumbling plaster, the small dent his forehead has made in the wall.
Only Clay's hold on him is keeping him upright as dizziness makes his stomach rebel. He's grateful in stomach rebel. He's grateful inat Juice is still facing the wall, with his arm up behind his back. akes him cry out to Clay wit an out-of-body sort of way that he hasn't had anything to eat since breakfast or he'd be losing it right now.
"You're not expendable," Clay says. "And if you ever pull a stunt like that again ..." he trails off and runs a hand down his face. "I'll kill you myself," he finishes in a haggard whisper, which takes Juice by surprise, because that's not at all what he'd expected from the club's president.
Such an open display of emotions is not something he readily associates with Clay. Chibs, sure, but to hear such raw emotion in his leader's voice floors him.
"I would've been fine," Clay says, letting go of Juice's arm and backing away just far enough for Juice to straighten himself and turn around. "You shouldn't have taken that kind of risk for me or Romeo."
Unsure of what to say, Juice just shrugs, and starts to relax a little. What's happened, happened, and there's no going back. Much as he wish he could, he can't turn back time. If he could, he'd change not only his deal with the sheriff, but also what was going on between Clay and him. Hell, he'd change a lot more than just that.
Juice's heart is starting to beat at an almost normal rate, his breathing too. His arm's numb, and his shoulder burns, but he thinks that maybe the worst of it is over. Clay's had his say, put him in his place, and Juice thinks that, all in all, things could've been much, much worse.
"You still don't get it, do you?" Clay's voice is rough, angry, and Juice's heart jumps right up into his throat again.
It's a rhetorical question, one that Clay apparently thinks he already knows the answer to, so Juice doesn't bother with trying to answer it.
"Fuck," Clay says, and he scrubs his face with his hand and then sets his jaw.
The angry glint in Clay's eyes makes his stomach clench painfully. He's expecting another blow, hell, he's expecting Clay to go ape shit on him, and he wonders what he'll tell everyone, how he'll explain the split lip, the swollen eye and the broken nose. How he'll explain to the guys why he didn't fight back, without being marked weak or a coward.
Clay shifts his weight and flexes his hands. Juice flinches, preparing himself for the first blow.
The strike never comes, but Juice is struck with a new horror as the man forces him around and pushes him face-first into the wall once again.
Juice attempts to gain some leverage, to get his hands in a position where he'll be able to push away from the wall so that maybe he'll be able to face Clay and talk some sense into him, let him know that he does understand what the older man was getting at, and that Clay doesn't need to do this. But, his head's spinning, and his shoulder is screaming in pain, and he can't seem to find purchase on the wall.
As the hand Clay's not using to pin Juice's cheek to the bathroom wall moves to the front of his jeans, Juice pushes back, trying to push Clay off of him, but the other man is stronger and uses his body to keep Juice in place.
"Don't do this," Juice says, his voice breaking. "Please," he adds, hating how desperate it makes him sound. "Please, Clay," he says as Clay's fingers make quick work of his zipper and button.
"Shut up," Clay growls, his lips brushing against Juice's ear as he presses his chest flat against Juice's back so that he can free his other hand and keep Juice in place.
Juice can feel the man's dick pressing against his thigh, and he panics. He doesn't want this, not right now, not ever again. He has to get away.
Unable to think about anything other than escape, he slams the back of his head into Clay's face. It causes Clay to back up a little. Now able to move his hands to a better position, Juice places them against the wall and pushes away from it, ignoring Clay's cursing as he fights to free himself. His unbuttoned jeans are slipping from his waist, he's lost too much weight over the past few weeks that none of his clothes seem to fit him properly anymore. He grapples with Clay, trying to get the man's hands off of him.
"Let me go!"
He shoves at Clay, but the other man's grip is solid and Juice wonders why the fuck Clay's arthritis doesn't kick in right now. He does the only other thing he can think of when Clay manages to keep an iron grip on him, he kicks out at the man. Unfortunately, his jeans slide further down his body until they're at his knees.
He moves to back away from Clay, hoping that the move will cause the other man to lose his hold on him. He doesn't even realize his mistake until it's far too late, and he's sprawled out on the tiled floor, his head fitting to split from knocking it hard against the sink when he tripped over his own jeans and fell. He reaches a shaky hand up to the back of his head.
He pulls his hand back, looking at his fingers in mute, confused fascination. They're coated red with blood. He blinks when the light cuts off and looks up to find Clay looming over him. A look of pure anger makes the man's face look ugly and distorted. Juice scrambles back, away from Clay, slamming his head into the pipe of the sink. The room swims in and out of focus, and he fights to stay conscious. He can hear ringing in his ears. He wedges himself between the sink and the wall in an attempt to stay out of Clay's reach.
Juice makes himself as small as possible, but Clay manages to pull him from his hiding place. His head is throbbing, keeping perfect time with the frantic beating of his heart, but his body and his mind are sluggish by comparison. He's unable to fight back when Clay drags him out of the corner by the front of his shirt. His arms and legs aren't cooperating with his need to get away.
Clay backhands him. Juice's tongue darts out between his lips and he tastes blood. It's coppery, like a penny. He remembers swallowing one when he was a kid, choking on it, coughing it up into the toilet while his mother slapped his back to dislodge it. It had cut his throat, tinted the toilet water pink. He could taste the blood for days afterwards every time he swallowed. His lip feels like it's doubled in size, and Juice knows that he's going to be a mess when Clay's done with him.
Clay's kneeling on the tile in front of him. He twists Juice's tee-shirt in his hand. The fabric cuts into Juice's neck, choking him. He watches with numb fascination as Clay winds up to backhand him a second and then a third time.
Clay's breathing hard, there's spittle on his lips and one of the rings on his right hand is spotted with red. Juice knows that he should understand the significance of that, but his head is spinning, or maybe it's the bathroom that's spinning and he can't seem to think straight.
Thoughts?