MissTeller-Ortiz-Dixon: Thanks for the review, can't give away the answers to your questions though... you're just gonna have to keep reading ;P I'm glad you're enjoying the story, you have no idea how happy it makes me feel, knowing people actually like my work :):)
Sliver of Melody- Thank you for the review! So happy you enjoyed :):)
Bamby
SPOV
I held on to Clay as he rode into TM, backing up to fit next to all the other bikes. Jumping off, I handed him the helmet I'd used, nodding a silent thanks for the ride and for letting me stay at his place for the night. I knew mum would need the company, so I had crashed in my old room. There if and when she needed me.
"You're going to church now?" I asked, watching as he got of his bike.
He nodded, looking over at Jax as he pulled in. "Need to tell the boys, figure out how we're gonna fix all of this."
"Clay." I rested my hand on his shoulder. I sighed, looking to the ground. "I wanna be there-"
He butted in. "You know it's church. You can't-"
I shook my head, stopping him from going on. "I have done everything you and Jax have ever asked me to do. Without question. But I need to be there when you tell them about mum. That's all I'm asking for."
He sighed, looking to Jax as he walked up to us. Hand on hips, he nodded, looking down at the ground. "Only this once."
"Thank you."
"Ready?" Jax came to stand with us.
"Letti's joining us." Clay shrugged, moving towards the others.
Jax looked between the two of us, frowning with confusion. "What?"
"Don't ask. Let's just go." Clay told him before turning to Bobby.
"We're all here." he nodded to the president.
Nodding to Kip and Tig who were passed out in the boxing ring Clay said, "Wake them up." Without stopping, he walked into the club house, Jax and I close behind.
Standing by the pool table, Juice frowned as he watched me walking towards the chapel. "What are you doing?"
Before I could answer, Clay gestured to the chairs that at leaning against the wall and away from the table. "Letti, you can stand by Half-Sack." he said over his shoulder as we walked into church.
"You're joining us?" Juice asked me even more confused, walking beside me as we moved around the table. "And what's with Jax having his patches back on?"
I grabbed his hand, squeezing it. "Just, wait."
JPOV
"Guessing this has to do with those patches being on your cut?" Bobby asked Jax as we waited for Clay to get the meeting going.
I kept looking over my shoulder at Scarlett. I was sure the others were too. I had never seen a woman join in on a club meeting...
Jax nodded. "Yeah." voice low and steady. "I'm not going Nomad."
"That's good news, Jackie boy." Chibs noted, everyone nodding in agreement.
But Jax just kept looking down at the table. Something else was going on. "Just listen up."
"The night of Bobby's party..." Clay started. "Gemma never drove into no barricade. She was jumped on 18. They took her to the utility house, three of Zobelle's crew. And they gave her a message to deliver. Stop selling guns." he looked away, obviously struggling. Scarlett moved towards him, laying a hand on his shoulder. Placing his hand on her's he went on. "They raped her."
"Oh, God." Chibs sighed.
Everyone was shocked. We had never expected something like that. Not to Gemma. She was our mum, the Queen. She held us together. To think she had been dealing with all of this without us this whole time. The idea of her keeping it secret, of her bottling it up something like this...
"Jesus, Clay." Tig shook his head, just as shocked as the rest of us. "I'm so sorry."
Clay looked to us again, jaw tight. "One of them was Weston."
"What do we do?" Ope asked, ready to take action.
"We get bloody. And then we chop their goddamn heads off!" Chibs answered, everyone cheering in agreement.
"No!" Clay spoke, shutting us up. He nodded to Jax.
Letting out a shaking breath, calming himself, Jax started. "We ain't ever seen an assault like this. And as much as I would like to cut their hearts out..." he shook his head. "Show of force just puts us back in jail. We gotta do what they're been doing. You know, find a weakness. Unravel them."
"And until then, nobody reacts." Clay looked at each of us. "You see Zobelle, you see Weston, you see any of the crew, you- you swallow the urge to kill them and you walk on. Understood?" we all nodded, as much as we didn't want to agree we had to.
"We gotta get our hands on some guns." Bobby noted. "Cupboard is bare."
Clay sighed, shaking his head. "Chinese gun source is laying low since the immigration snafu. It's gonna be weeks before we see any of that shit."
"We gotta tap our personal stock." Jax suggested. "Everyone bring in what you got."
Clay nodded, business seeming to be done.
"Zobelle came to me in the hospital."
We all froze from getting out of our seats, looking to Scarlett.
"Zobelle came to you? Why didn't you say anything?" Jax asked, looking at his sister with fear in his eyes. We were all thinking the same thing. What did he do to her? "What did he say?"
"He told me to tell Samcro that he wants you to cut off the One Niners. He claimed he doesn't want anymore troubles, and that he was hoping I could fix everything." she sounded so small, so guilty. "I didn't want to say anything because I knew shit was going on in the club and everything was going bad. I didn't want to make things worse."
"Call Gemma and Tara. No one is to be alone. We can't have anything else happen." Clay told Half-Sack. The prospect nodded and left without a word. Turning to Scarlett Clay placed a hand on her shoulder, pulling her into a hug. "You stay here, okay? I don't need you back in the hospital."
She nodded, leaning forward to rest her cheek against his chest. "I'll just hang out in the garage and work or something." she stepped back, walking out of the church.
I went to follow her as the others all headed out, but was stopped when Jax grabbed my arm. "We need to talk." he said, closing the door and leaving us in the chapel by ourselves.
"What's up?" I asked, trying to play it cool. But it was clear I was nervous.
All the anger for Zobelle and Weston left me as fear took over. Jax was my VP, my brother, my family. But all that meant nothing to him when it came to Scarlett. His sister came first.
He sat back down, grabbing a smoke and lighting it. Putting it between his lips and taking a drag before speaking. "You've been screwing my sister."
I tried to think of a way to explain, but all I came up with was, "I swear I didn't hurt her or anything like that. It just happened."
He nodded, looking anything but happy. He actually looked ready to rip me to shreds. "You going anywhere with her, or is it just for fun?"
How the hell was I supposed to answer that? If I said it wasn't just fun, that implies I want her as my Old Lady- and Jax didn't want her to be someone's Old Lady. But if I said it was just for fun, he'd kill me for using her like that. And anyway... I hadn't even thought about it. I mean I knew I didn't want anyone else, she was great. But we hadn't exactly talked about what we were doing.
When I took too long to answer, he spoke up again. "I'll make this easy for you." he leaned forward, crossing his arms on the table. "Are you still sleeping with her? Or have you stopped?"
"It was only twice, and it was awhile ago." I answered, hoping it was the right answer.
"So, it's over?"
I swallowed nervously. "I'm not sure."
"She likes you. I know my sister well enough to see that. So you've got two options. Move on. Or, commit." he stood up, walking towards me. Patting me on the shoulder he added. "But if you hurt her, I'll make sure no one finds your body." his eyes were emotionless, and I knew he meant every word.
As soon as he left, leaving me to stand there alone, I left out a breath I had been holding. "Oh, shit..."
SPOV
I sat in the office, tapping a pen on the desk as I let thoughts run through my mind. With the drama that always seemed to follow the club... I was starting to wonder why I'd come back home. I had been on the run for months, why'd I come home when I did. Why hadn't I just kept running? Would things be better if I hadn't come back? Would that be worse? Was this just my luck? Would I ever catch a break?
"Hey."
I looked up to see Juice standing in the door way to the garage, TM shirt on. "Hi." I responded as I leaned back in the chair.
"You told Jax."
"Yeah, I know. I was just so pissed he was going Nomad. I wanted to hurt him like he was hurting me. You know?"
"I get it. Anyway, he would have found out eventually right?" he moved closer, coming to stand next to the desk. "We had a little talk... well, he talked. Asked me questions and scared the crap out of me."
Shifting where I sat, I suddenly felt guilty, wondering what Jax might have said and done to him. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah." he nodded, looking surprising calm and collected. "He actually gave me a couple of options..."
"Options?"
"Leave you alone completely. Or commit."
"And what did you chose?" I asked out of fear and curiosity.
"Well..." he looked to the ground and for a moment I felt my heart sink, thinking the worst. "That's why I'm here..."
"Shit." I stood, pushing past him. "The club right? You're scared that if you commit, things will go bad and you'll be excommunicated or something. Well you know what? You can go fu-"
He grabbed my arm, pushing me against the wall and pressing his lips against mine in a heated kiss. After a moment, he let go of my arm and grasped my waist instead, allowing me to slide my hands up his chest and around his shoulders. I melted into the kiss, drowning in him.
I could smell the oil on his shirt and the faintest bit of deodorant. I could taste peppermint from the gum in his mouth. I could feel the warmth and tenderness of his grasp. I could hear my heart beating hard, and the sound of our lips smacking together. As I pulled back and looked into his eyes, I could see the heat there, the want for more.
He grinned as we stood there, panting. "I told you, you were worth the risk."
I was still shocked from that breath taking kiss, but still managed to speak. "Are you saying, you want to... commit? As in... date me? What about the guys? What if they hate this idea? What if it doesn't work out? What if-"
He brought his lips back to mine in another heated kiss. His tongue pushing it's way into my mouth, flicking and running along mine. I moaned, pulling him closer. Every nerve in my body burned, just like every time he touched me. It felt amazing.
I quickly pushed him back, needing to make something clear. "I'm not your Old Lady."
Chuckling lightly, he leaned in again. "So what, you're my girlfriend?" he asked, moving to press his lips on my jaw bone, kissing me there before he began to move lower with each kiss.
I shook my head, closing my eyes as I enjoyed the attention his lips were giving me. "I don't like that either. How 'bout I just be... yours?"
Humming contently, he pressed a kiss to my neck. "I like the sound of that."
Sliding his hands to my thighs, he lifted my legs so they wrapped around him. I moaned as he playfully bit my neck, pushing himself against me. Suddenly I was well aware of the bulge in his pant, pressing against my thigh as his hand moved to unbutton my pants.
My head fell back against the wall as my eyes rolled back and a moan fell from my lips. My skin tingled, my head was foggy and all I could feel was Juice. His lips, his hands, his body. My arms moved so I had a better hold of him, drawing him closer, needing more. Grinding against his hand as it slipped past my underwear, I couldn't think straight anymore. All there was, was Juice...
"Opie! Clay!"
Juice and I suddenly pulled apart at the sound of Jax's panicked voice. Hurrying over to the window, we looked out to see him across the lot.
"Stay here." Juice looked to me before running out after my brother.
I watched, seeing Ope holding Tig by the shirt, fist up and ready to hit him. By the looks of things- at least from where I stood- it looked like he had already gotten a few good shots to Tig's face.
The guys rushed over to them, Opie walking off without saying a word. Jax told Juice something, who then ran back to the office.
"What's going on?" I asked, moving to stand next to him as he picked up the phone.
He shook his head, telling me he didn't know before speaking into the phone. "Yeah, Tara, are you nearly here?" there was some talking on the other side before he went on. "No, it's Tig. He got into it rough. Need you to bring some supplies. We're out." there was some more noise before he hung up and turned to me. "You think you can check out his face before the doc gets here?"
"Yeah, of course." I nodded before following him out of the office.
...
I sat on the bed in Tig's room, watching as Tara finished up fixing his face. She had come before I could really do anything, but I didn't mind. She was the real doctor so it was best she took care of things.
I rocked Abel in my arms, smiling down at him.
"How are you feeling?" Tara asked out of nowhere.
When Tig didn't answer I looked up, seeing that she was actually talking to me. I shrugged, eyes falling back to my nephew. "I'm fine."
Grabbing some things from the table, she handed them to Tig. "Clean up the scrapes on your hands."
"All right." he took the stuff and got up, moving to the bathroom. "Thanks, doc."
Once he was gone, she moved towards me and sat on the bed. "You were nearly raped, Scarlett." her voice was low so I was the only one who heard.
Staying just as quiet as her I nodded. "Yeah. Kohn nearly raped you, but you're fine. And my mum was actually raped, look at her. She's still a strong and loving woman." I kissed Abel's toes. "I'll be fine."
She frowned. "How'd you know about Kohn?"
I forgot she didn't know Jax had told me... "You know Jax tells me everything. I'm his sister, he comes to me when he needs to talk... although I guess he comes to you too, now." I gave her a reassuring smile. "You don't have to worry. I won't tell."
Kip walked in then, limping around as he focused on whatever job he was doing. But as he moved around, Tara and I couldn't help but watch, seeing that he was clearly in pain.
"You okay?" Tara asked him.
"I think something may be going on with the implant." he shrugged, obviously in pain.
He'd gone in to get a second testicle surgically put on, seeing as he'd lost his other one while he was a soldier. I didn't really know the full story, I just knew he had one ball, which is how he got his nickname, and now he had two balls.
But if he was right and there was something wrong, I could only imagine the pain and discomfort.
"Going on?" Tara stood, moving back to her bag as she started cleaning up.
He nodded. "Can I show you?"
"No, no, no." I covered Abel's eyes just as Kip dropped his pants.
"Oh!" Tara exclaimed, looking at the obviously infected ball... "My God."
"That's bad, right?" Kip asked idiotically.
"You think?!" I snapped, looking away.
"That's very, very infected, Half-S..." Tara stopped herself. "You have to get to an ER. Now."
The door opened then. Clay and Bobby walked in only to freeze as they got an eye full of Kip.
"Holy Mary of Ball." Clay's turned away as quickly as he could.
Bobby shook his head, looking at the ball. "Shit, you got kind of like elephant nuts."
Kip turned around, pulling his pants up. Before he could though, Tig walked out of the bathroom. One look at Kip and Tig threw up, spinning around and hurling into the toilet.
"Oh, come on!" I shook my head, holding Abel to my chest as I got up. "There's a baby, here." I scolded, walking out.
Bamby
