The next few days were some of the worst that had ever happened since Ana'd lived in Charming. Luanne was dead, beaten to death by some rival porn producer. Juice still couldn't come home, because he was still passing a lot of blood. Ana visited him every chance she could, which were mainly during breaks at the garage and after she clocked out. She'd taken Gemma up on the job offer, and now her days were spent filing papers and getting rid of old reciepts.

Gemma had given her the day off and Ana found herself sketching in Juice's hospital room again as he watched something disgusting on the Animal Planet.

"Why, tell me, are you watching this?" Ana asked, disgusted as a lion ripped apart a zebra.

"I don't know," Juice admitted, shrugging. "Good news, though. I may go home tonight or tomorrow."

Ana smiled as she finished the sketch she'd been working on. "Done," she said.

Juice craned his neck so he could see, but she closed it before he got a good look.

"Aw, I was trying to see," he complained, sticking out his bottom lip. Ana laughed at the cuteness of it all and opened it up to her latest sketch and handed it to him.

"It's me," Juice said, looking over it with interest. "With hair."

Ana nodded as she took the book back. "I actually like the hair. Makes you look younger and nicer."

Juice cracked up. "That's why I had the haircut. It's not biker-like to look young and nice. You have to look hardcore."

Ana opened her mouth to retort, but was interrupted by a knock at the door, and then it opened to reveal Jax and Bobby.

Ana automatically knew something was up. All that had been happening this past week was yelling and fighting. Now they were here with grim looks, but plastered fake smiles on their faces when they saw Juice.

"How's my favorite pincushion?" Jax asked. "Damn, didn't know you had company, bro. What's up, Ana?"

"Hey, Jax," Ana said. "Hey, Bobby."

"Hey, beautiful. Keeping the Rican here happy?" Bobby asked, hugging Juice. Ana observed the two men with a skeptical eye. This wasn't good at all.

"Man, I'll tell you, I miss you guys, but the view is definitely great in here," Juice said, winking at Ana, who rolled her eyes and began sketching another page.

"Better off you're in here, man. Shit's crazy out there," Jax said.

"I heard what happened to CaraCara. Crazy shit man," Juice replied.

The room got quiet and Ana looked up to see Bobby and Jax looking at her expectantly.

"Is this the part where I should leave?" she asked. "Club shit and all that?"

Bobby cracked a smile.

"You're right, Juicy, she is a smart one." he said.

Ana looked at Juice, who looked worried. He didn't want her to go, but she wasn't exactly in a position to refuse Jax and Bobby.

"I'll be back?" she asked him.

"Please?" he asked back. He knew this wasn't good either, Ana noticed.

Ana nodded.

"Okay boys, I'll be outside. Don't rough him up. He may not be my boyfriend yet, but he's still nice to look at," she said, grabbing her sketch pad.

"Thanks, darlin," Jax said.

Ana was sitting down not even five minutes when Jax walked out, distressed. She didn't know what went down just now, but it was probably dealing with everything that happened this past week. Jax still couldn't look at her without looking guilty, but she'd given up trying to find out why.

"Give them a few minutes, sweetheart," he said, sniffing.

"Jax?" Ana asked. "Look, I know we don't talk often. Matter of fact, here lately you can't look at me. But your wife is awesome, your mom is probably my best friend, and Juice...well, I don't know. I care about him a lot. All of that makes me connected to you in some way, and I know when something's up."

Jax smiled a little and hugged her.

"You're one in a million, you know that, right?" he said, pulling away. "You remind me so much of my mom and Tara, but you're different in some way, too. I shouldn't be saying this, but Juice loves you. Enough to throw a punch at me for insulting you."

Ah. There was the reason why he'd been avoiding her. He felt bad.

"Don't worry about that, I'm used-"

"You shouldn't be used to people insulting you, Ana," Jax said severely. "And I am so fucking sorry for saying it. Like I said, Juice loves you, and he's going to need to know if you're in or out. Don't string him along just to shatter his heart down the road. I love him, but I don't think he's going to be able to handle that."

"He loves me?" Ana asked, strangely.

"Yeah," Jax said, nodding. "He hasn't said it. He doesn't need to. You've changed him, he's not quite the moron he was before. But he's going to need a steady, and I think you're it. You're his safe haven."

Bobby came out then and saw Jax and Ana. Shaking his head, he walked over and put his hand on Ana's shoulder.

"He needs you," he said simply. "Let's go," he said to Jax, a little harshly. Ana stood there looking after the two men as they walked away. She put her emotions in check as they turned the corner, and she walked back into the room to see Juice wiping his eyes.

"Everything okay JC?" she asked, concerned.

He looked at her and smiled a little. "Yeah. It'll be fine."

"What happened? Or can you talk about it?" Ana asked.

"I could, but I don't want to. Not right now."

"Juice-"

"Can you just...lay with me for a little bit? I just want to forget what just happened and I want a pretty girl to lay down with me," he said sadly.

And dropped her sketch pad on the table and went to his bed, where he scooted over.

"Sure," she said, lying next to him. He put his arm around her and sighed.

"Life fucking sucks sometimes, Ana."

Ana laid there and twined her fingers in with his. She could feel him quietly crying behind her, and that made tears fill her own eyes. She never felt anything bad toward the club before now, but right now she hated the Sons for making Juice cry. She didn't know what happened. She wasn't sure if she wanted to know, but she knew that the man who was holding her deserved so much better than what he had.

After he woke up, Juice told Ana that Jax was going Nomad. Nomad meant no home, no charter, just you and the road. It was MC purgatory. Ana sat in the chair as he tugged his shirt and kutte on. His jeans were already on, he'd done that when Ana went for coffee. He did end up being released that night and she was giving him a lift to his place.

"So Nomad is bad?" Ana asked as he put his boots on. He nodded and winced as he stood back up. He sat on the bed and waited for the doctor to bring the discharge papers for him to sign.

"An MC is like your family. Club comes before everything once you patch. Blood family, friends, everything moves back a row. Jax told me this. He said once you patch, the MC is your family. That charter is your home. Jax going nomad is him turning his back on the family to a lot of people," he explained.

Ana nodded. "That's understandable," she said. "How do you feel?"

Juice shrugged. "Doesn't matter. Gave my yes vote. He wanted to do it."

Ana would have said something else, but then the doctor came in with papers. After signing them, a nurse showed up with a wheelchair to wheel him out.

"I'll take that," Ana said harshly as the nurse made goo goo eyes at Juice. Juice sat down and held Ana's bag as she grabbed the handles of the chair. Smiling slightly, she took off running down the hall, Juice laughing like crazy as she did. He was eager to be out of the hospital, and if he had to be in the chair to get out, then she could do this however she wanted to.

Juice sat in the front seat as Ana drove, laughing as she sung off key to the Temptations. One thing he realized about Ana was she didn't give a fuck if her voice wasn't like a singer's. If she liked the song, she was going to turn it up and sing as loud as she could.

"Quit laughing at me, Juan, and give me directions to your place," she said, turning down the music.

"You could take me to the clubhouse. My place is in a bad neighborhood, and most of my shit's at the club anyway," Juice said. "And sorry, but I've never seen you look so happy before."

Ana grinned again as she turned onto Main Street.

"You being released is the highlight of my week," she explained. Juice listened as she talke about all the tensions at the club. She did mention that Happy was talking about patching Redwood, although he'd only mentioned it to her for the time being. She also told him that Gemma seemed to be losing her mind day after day.

Soon they pulled up to the clubhouse, and Juice sighed as they got out. Ana carried a bag of his stuff as they walked into the clubhouse, and they were greeted by Chibs and Bobby.

"Juicy boy, it's glad I am to see you," Chibs said. Juice hugged Chibs back tightly. Last time he'd seen Chibs, he was bleeding out on the concrete outside. Chibs pulled away from Juice and ruffled his hair affectionately. "You need a haircut, boy."

"I'll do that," Bobby said. "Thanks for being there for him, Ana."

Ana smiled at the two older men affectionately. "It wasn't a problem at all, no need to thank me."

"I'm glad you're out," Chibs said, winking at Ana before turning to Juice. "Clay and Jax both just called. Church tomorrow morning."

"I thought Jax-"

Chibs shrugged.

"I don't know. He just said it was important that everyone was there. Oh, and Ana, don't come in tomorrow. Garage is closed," he said to Ana. "They'll pay you still, but you can't come in until Gemma calls, okay?"

Ana nodded, confused. "Alright. I guess I'll see you guys later."

Juice took her hand. "I'll walk you out," he said, ignoring the catcalls behind him.

They walked out to her car and Juice leaned against the passenger door. His thumb traced patterns against the skin of her hand as he stood there quietly for a moment. Ana looked up at him, Jax's words ringing in her head.

"He loves you, you know."

Juice caught her eye and smiled softly.

"I'm glad you're around, you know," he said. "Not many chicks could deal with all this shit."

Ana gave a sarcastic smile.

"You know me, I'm all about the badassery," she said. Juice chuckled and pushed a piece of hair behind her ear.

"Thanks, Ana," he said. "Really. For everything."

Ana's breath caught in her throat when she saw how he was looking at her. It was a look of desire and wanting and pure love, and it turned her insides into mush. She couldn't think, or barely breathe as his lips fell on her cheek tenderly.

"No problem, Juan," she whispered as she pulled away. "I uh should get home. I'm actually pretty tired. I know you are, too."

Juice sighed in disappointment as he saw those damn defenses go up again, and he mentally cursed those two bastards who broke her.

"Yeah," he said, hiding his disappointment with a smile. "I'll call you tomorrow?"

She nodded, hugging him quickly as she opened her car door. "I'll be waiting."

Juice watched her drive away, disappointment still reigning through his body. He knew she wanted him, too. The next move was on her, and he was going to try to break down those walls as soon as he could, because she deserved to be happy, and he knew there was a lot of things he couldn't do. But he could definitely make her happy.

Happy New Year, everyone! New chapter, yay! I think everyone knows what comes next and I promise, it's going to be soon when these two kids finally make it official.

I hope everyone had an awesome time over the holidays.