A/N: I do not own anything about Sons of Anarchy. It belongs completely to Kurt Sutter, and I am just so glad to be allowed to play in the wonderful world he created.

Chapter Eight

Charlie retched again and continued to empty the contents of her stomach into the toilet. A cold washcloth touched the back of her neck and she sighed as she slid away from the toilet and lay her face down on the cold, laminated floor.

"Ye alright, lass?" Chibs asked, kneeling down beside her and moving the washcloth from the back of her neck to her forehead.

Charlie grunted and opened one eye to look up at him.

Chibs chuckled and shook his head. "Ye drank an entire bottle of Jack; what did ye expect?"

Chibs backed up quickly as Charlie heaved herself up and retched into the toilet bowl again, wincing at the memories of his own horrible hangovers. Charlie picked the washcloth up off the floor and pressed it to her mouth, her eyes fluttering closed. "I didn't expect to fucking die this morning." She said weakly, falling back against the bathtub.

Chibs stood up and leaned down, grabbing her under her arms and pulling her up. "Come on. I've got something that'll help ye." Charlie groaned, but followed Chibs slowly into the kitchen. She lowered herself into a chair at the table as Chibs brought a plate and a glass filled with an orange drink to the table and sat it in front of her.

"A scotch egg and Irn-Bru." He said, smiling at her.

Charlie looked down at the plate and swallowed hard. "What?" She asked, looking down at the plate and poking the food with her finger.

"Scottish hangover cure. Irn-Bru is the best soft drink there is, and a scotch egg will cure a hangover just as well. Hard-boiled egg wrapped in sausage." Chibs saw the disgusted look on her face and sighed. "Just eat the damn thing."

Charlie picked up the fork on the plate and cut off a piece of the concoction, and ate it. It didn't taste bad, just different. She nodded at Chibs and took a sip of the drink, surprised at the good taste. Chibs dropped two aspirin beside the plate and said, "Just for good measure."

Chibs had locked her in the house and left around ten to go to TM, but only after tucking Charlie in on the couch with a bottle of water, a bottle of Gatorade, some crackers, and her gun. Charlie spent the rest of the day on the couch, nursing her headache and willing herself not to puke again. She was feeling better later that afternoon, and was making herself a bowl of chicken noodle soup when there was a knock on the door. Charlie jumped, startled, and walked hesitantly to the door, picking up her gun along the way. She looked through the window and saw Tully's white Mustang parked in front of the house. She sighed, unlocked the door, and opened it.

"You look like shit, pet." Tully said as he walked past her into the house, looking around.

"Thanks, come on in." Charlie muttered sarcastically as she closed and locked the door, and then headed back into the kitchen.

Charlie turned off the stove and reached up to get a bowl out of the cabinet, and she felt Tully move up behind her and place his hands on her waist. He pushed against her, pinning her against the counter.

"The club voted to work with my organization." Tully said, nuzzling her neck and kissing her behind her ear. Charlie shivered. "You didn't give them much of a choice, really, after getting kidnapped yesterday, but I wasn't sure how it was going to land. Close vote, from what I understand." He bit her earlobe, gently at first and then harder, eliciting a gasp from Charlie. "Your dad doesn't seem to like me very much. Neither does your brother."

Charlie let out a sharp laugh, trying to distract herself. "Yeah, well, you're somewhat of an… acquired taste."

Tully turned Charlie around and pinned her against the counter top again. Charlie looked up at him, wondering why she was letting this happen. Was she that desperate for sex? It had been a while… But Tully was not the answer to a dry spell. She was pulled from her thoughts as he placed his hand on her bruised cheek.

"Hell of a run, pet. Kidnapped yesterday, hungover today." He said as he rubbed his thumb over her bottom lip. He kissed her gently and pulled back with a smile. "At least you brushed your teeth." Charlie felt her cheeks heat up and she averted her eyes. "Let Tully make it better, pet." He whispered, sliding his hand down to her throat and kissing her hard, applying a small amount of pressure. Charlie moaned and rocked against him, bringing her hands up to pull his shirt from the waistband of his pants and sliding them up his chest. She raked her fingernails down his chest and across the skin above the waistband of his jeans.

Tully growled and squeezed her throat, and Charlie grinned against his lips. Tully broke the kiss and put his lips against her ear as he slid his other hand down her shorts and into her panties. "What would the club say if they knew their princess was a kinky little slut?" He whispered as he flicked her clit. Charlie gasped and rocked against his hand, whimpering with need. She clenched her hands on his waist, digging in her fingernails. "Do you want more?" He asked playfully.

"Charlie?!" Chibs' voice cut through the moment, and Charlie heard the front door slam against the wall. "Tully?"

Tully growled angrily, but didn't move. "I am really starting to hate these fuckers."

Charlie heard footsteps and the sound of a slide moving back and clicking into place, chambering a round. Tully pulled his hand out of her shorts and slid his fingers into his mouth, pulling them out slowly as he stared into Charlie's eyes. "Still delicious." He said.

"What the hell?" Chibs said gruffly, and Charlie looked over to see him pointing his handgun at Tully. "Tig told ye last night that ye aren't allowed in me house."

Tully pushed away from Charlie, who gripped the counter to stay standing, and looked over at Chibs.

"And I told him that my pet is too much fun to stay away from." Tully said as he mockingly raised his hands into the air. "But I'll go. Don't want to upset you, Scotty."

Tully grinned at Charlie and kissed her bruised cheek gently, then stepped around Chibs and headed towards the front door. Charlie heard it shut behind him, and she took a deep breath as she looked over at Chibs.

"Ye're asking fer trouble wit' that, lass." Chibs said as he set his gun down on the counter and headed to the fridge, taking out a beer and popping the top.

Charlie slid the pot of soup back onto the stove and turned on the eye to heat it back up, taking deep breaths to calm herself. "I know. But he'll find a new interest and move on, especially if the club keeps interrupting his… attempts."

Chibs leaned his back against the counter beside her and took a sip of his beer. "Ye hope. He calls ye 'pet', an' it's not endearing-like… it's… it's possessive. The way he looks at ye… it's like ye're his dinner."

Charlie got a bowl down from the upper cabinet and poured her soup into it, got a spoon out of the drawer, and took her dinner to the table. She walked back to the kitchen and poured herself a glass of milk, and then she sat down at the table and looked over at Chibs who was still standing in the same spot. He was trustworthy, and she knew that. He hadn't said anything about her scars until she herself had to open up about, and he was so easy to talk to…

"Mine and Tully's relationship – if you can call it that – wasn't, or isn't, based on… feelings." Charlie said hesitantly, staring down at the bowl of soup and stirring it with her spoon. "It was pure lust. And fear, honestly. And… I mean, the sex was phenomenal. But the fear added a… a different element."

Chibs walked over to the table and sat down beside her, slamming his bottle down on the table. "Fer Christ's sake just spit it out. Between Tig and Happy, ye can't surprise me. What, ye like it rough?"

Charlie felt her cheeks heat up and she continued to stare at her soup instead of looking at Chibs. "Well, you could describe it that way. It's just… It was more than simple hair pulling or rough fucking, it was… It was pure domination and fulfillment. It was exciting and dangerous because he was dangerous, and he was very experienced. You have to realize, I was nineteen when this happened. This was pretty much my first introduction to sex. I mean, David took my virginity, but it wasn't mind blowing. And-"

"David Hale?" Chibs interrupted her, his voice full of disbelief. "Jesus Christ, I thought Happy was just fucking with us about ye and Hale."

Charlie rolled her eyes and looked over at Chibs. "The man won't say ten fucking words to me, but somehow he has the notion to spread gossip about a small and chaste kiss that David gave me, and that I did not return."

Chibs shrugged his shoulders and took a sip of his bottle. "We gossip." He said simply. "And I think our enforcer doesn't know quite what to do wit' ye. He's scared of Gemma, we all are, but she's older than him and Clay's old lady. Wit' ye, ye're just Piney's daughter, but ye can be damn frightening. He calls ye Hurricane Charlie."

Charlie didn't know how to respond to what Chibs had just said. This implied that Happy spent a bit of time contemplating Charlie and how she fit into the dynamic of the club, but she shrugged it off. She didn't particularly know how to handle Happy either, but she didn't worry about it because he wouldn't be staying long. "Well, he can get over it and just keep his mouth shut until he goes back to Tacoma."

"He isn't going back. His mom is sick, she lives in Bakersfield, and we voted in his transfer last night."

Charlie sighed and started eating her soup before it got cold again. Great, now the gossip was staying.

"So, back to yer fucked up choices in relationships…" Charlie groaned and resisted the urge to bang her head on the table. "Hale – ye considering tha'?"

Charlie scoffed and shot Chibs an incredulous look. "Yeah, totally Chibby. Me and Hale, walking down the street, holding hands. The cop and the school teacher. We'll buy a house with a white picket fence, I'll squeeze out a couple kids, and we'll live happily ever after. Except, of course, the kids will have to dodge bullets from both sides of the family, who just might happen to be shooting at one another."

"Christ, ye don't have to be so aggressive, Hurricane Charlie."

Charlie narrowed her eyes into a glare and Chibs chuckled, giving her a smug grin. "Alright, so ye won't give Hale the time of day, and ye've got some sort of Stockholm Syndrome mixed with some… fetish thing goin' on wit' Tully."

"Well when you lay it out like that, you make it seem like I'm heading into Happy/Tig territory." Charlie grumbled as she returned to eating her soup. She was feeling better physically, but Chibs wasn't helping her feel better about herself.

"I'm not sayin' that there's anythin' wrong with what ye like, lass. Variety is good; ye could teach it ta some o' the crow eaters, honestly, 'cause as much as I like giving them a good punch up the kickers, they can get pretty boring when all they care about is if ye've got the kutte on or not." Chibs said definitively, and Charlie shook her head and laughed.

"I will get right on that, Chibs. Tuesday afternoons will be 'Sex Training with Hurricane Charlie.'"

"That's got a nice ring to it, that does." Chibs said, clinking his beer bottle against Charlie's glass of milk.

Charlie was curled up on the couch under a thick blanket later that evening watching "The Shining" with Chibs, who was laid out in the recliner. He had kicked off his boots and removed his kutte and laid it across the back of one of the kitchen chairs, but he hadn't changed into his usual sweatpants and t-shirt that indicated that he was in for the night, so Charlie expected him to leave at some point. She heard a motorcycle pull into the driveway and the engine shut off. Chibs sighed and hoisted himself out of the recliner, kicking the stool so that it folded up and returned to its place.

"It's goin' ta be a late one." Chibs said as he walked to the front door and opened it, then stepped back to the kitchen table to pull on his kutte and shove his feet into his boots. He picked up his gun from the counter and slid it into the inner pocket of his kutte. Charlie leaned her head back and saw Happy come through the front door. "I 'ave to be at the meetin', but Hap's goin' ta stay here wit' ye and make sure everythin' is fine."

Charlie, angry, tried to untangle herself from the blanket and stand up from the couch, but only succeeded in falling onto the floor. She wriggled her way out of the blanket and stood up, her face burning as Chibs dissolved into laughter and Happy's lips twitched into a grin. "I was fine today all by myself. I don't need a babysitter."

Chibs wiped a tear from his eye and held onto his stomach as he recovered from his laughing fit.

"Jerk." Charlie muttered.

"I know ye don' need a babysitter, but things aren't finished wit' the League. Zobelle is still in town, and we don' know if he's decided to move on or keep goin', what with Weston dead now. Clay thought that we should keep an eye on the immediate family, which is you, Gemma, Tara, and Abel." Chibs straightened his kutte and stepped towards Charlie. "Gemma, Tara, and Abel are at Jax's house wit' the prospect. And ye-"

"And I get Happy because Clay knows that we just get along so well." Charlie said sarcastically, throwing a glare in Happy's direction. She received a blank look from him.

Chibs sighed and kissed her forehead, then walked to the door. He turned and looked at them both, saying, "Don' shoot one another. An' don' fight in me house an' break shit. Do it in the yard, like the white trash we are."

"I don't hit women." Happy said in his usual gravelly voice as he picked up the television remote from Charlie's blanket on the floor and sat down in the recliner. "She makes me reassess my philosophy, though." He added, seemingly as an afterthought as he pulled the lever and the stool sprang out from underneath the chair, catching his feet as it lifted.

"Ye best be careful wit' that, Hap. She just might like it." Chibs said, grinning at the shocked look on Charlie's face as she turned to him. Chibs shrugged and left, closing and locking the door behind him. Charlie turned, her face red once again, and saw Happy staring at her with an eyebrow raised.

"Oh bite me." She growled, grabbing her blanket from the floor and falling onto the couch with a huff. "I didn't say that you could turn the channel."

Silence.

"This is my house, you know. I pay rent here. I don't want to fucking watch cartoons."

Silence.

"It's polite to respond to people when they speak to you."

Happy turned his head slowly and looked at Charlie, who was sitting cross-legged on the couch with her blanket in her lap, staring Happy down. She watched as he clenched his jaw.

"It's polite to not be this fucking annoying to a guest." He responded, his eyes flashing.

"A guest?" Charlie scoffed, throwing the blanket on the floor and standing up. "I didn't ask you here. You're welcome to leave any time, and give me my television back. I can work a gun; I'll be fine."

Happy snorted and turned back to his cartoons, ignoring Charlie as she took a step towards him. "You'll be fine… You took a beating from the Brotherhood, hooked up with their unstable leader, made out with the Deputy Chief that has it out for us, and got yourself kidnapped. You'll probably be the reason when this alliance with the Brotherhood blows up or you'll get us arrested because of Hale. I wouldn't trust you to walk to the fucking mailbox and back. You're a disaster."

Charlie bit the inside of her cheek to keep from replying. She started to taste blood and clenched her fists, then she realized that he was right. If the alliance with the Brotherhood blew up, it would probably be because of her relationship and past with Tully, and people would probably die. Because of her, and because she really was a disaster. She had been so worried about pulling Clay and Tig into the light because she thought that they would destroy the club, but she wasn't any better. Charlie sniffed and blinked, hard, to stop the tears. She wasn't going to let Happy see her cry.

Happy flicked his eyes over to see her bend down and pick up the blanket from the floor, grab her Makarov from the arm of the sofa, and head down the hall. "There's beer in the fridge." She said over her shoulder, and then she went into her bedroom and shut the door.

Charlie threw the blanket onto the bed and set her gun on the bedside table. She sighed and turned on the small lamp on the table, then crossed to the door to turn out the overhead light. She fell onto the bed, face first, then grabbed a pillow and hugged it to her chest as she turned onto her side. She was exhausted, both emotionally and physically. Last night hadn't resulted in the best sleep, mainly because she had passed out only for a few hours before she woke up and proceeded to vomit everything that she had ever consumed for hours on end. She closed her eyes, promising herself that she was just going to rest for a few minutes, and then fell into a deep sleep.

Chibs pulled into the carport and cut the engine on his bike early that morning around two, rubbing the back of his neck as he climbed off. It had been a long night, and Cameron Hayes getting shot hadn't made things any easier on them. Those Mayans had almost ruined everything, and the club was lucky that Tara was in the picture now, because Chibs could only do so much.

He didn't know what to expect when he went into the house. Charlie could be out back burying a dead body, or Happy could be doing the same… Best-case scenario was that they were both in the living room watching TV like civilized people. Chibs chuckled to himself as he put his key in the lock. He doubted that the best-case scenario was true. Chibs opened the door and found Happy still in the recliner, watching cartoons. Charlie was nowhere to be seen.

"Everythin' good?" Chibs asked as he kicked off his boots by the door and pulled off his kutte, hanging it from the coat rack behind the door.

"Yeah." Happy said as he climbed out of the recliner. "Pissed her off I think. She's in her room."

Chibs pulled the fridge open and got out two beers, popping the top on both and meeting Happy at the kitchen counter. He handed one to his brother and took a sip of his own as he gave him a onceover. There weren't any new bruises or scratches, so it must not have been a physical confrontation. "How'd ye manage that, brother?"

Happy shrugged as he chugged down half his beer and then set the bottle down on the counter, looking down at his hands. "Said some things I probably shouldn't have. Might have called her a disaster. What do I know? Hurricane shouldn't be this sensitive. She's basically a brother."

Chibs shook his head at his brother's ignorance. Happy wasn't an idiot, but his ability to interact with women ended when he kicked them out of his bed immediately after fucking them. "She's had a couple hard days, Hap. And this Tully guy… That whole mess is, well, a mess. She's confused. Conflicted. An' I don' think that the club is makin' it any easier. Every decision she makes is about the club, not her."

Happy grunted and finished his beer in two gulps. "She wasn't thinking about the club when she climbed into bed with Tully and the Deputy Chief. She's going to get us killed."

"Charlie's sex life isn't going ta kill anyone. Except maybe Tig, who might explode with anticipation." Chibs looked as his brother again, analyzing him. Happy was hard to read because the man didn't let much show, but something was up with him. "I think yer problem is that ye might be a bit jealous."

Happy blinked at Chibs. "Jealous? Of what? I get enough pussy."

"Aye, but is it good pussy?" Chibs asked, pointing at him. "There's a difference. Charlie's not a crow eater. She's strong and fiercely loyal to the club. Ye wouldn' have ta hide anythin'. Clay's the only one lucky enough to have someone like that." Chibs winked at him. "Apparently, Charlie's kinky too."

"Not interested." Happy said, walking back into the living room and digging his keys out from his pocket. "Sounds like you might be, though."

Chibs followed him and shrugged. "Nah, not that she wouldn' be great. Nice ass, great tits. But she's starting ta grow on me like a sister would."

Happy opened the door and turned back to look at Chibs, the corners of his mouth turned up slightly. "A brother wouldn't notice her ass and tits."

Chibs laughed and slapped his back. "Eh, I said she was startin' ta be like a sister. I'm not a blind idiot."