A single tear rolls down his cheek and he quickly wipes it away, barely recognizing his own voice when he says, "I love you, Tara! Only you!"

Tara sees the tears in his eyes, along with the helplessness, truth, and devastation reflecting back at her.

She is sure the heartbroken look on his face matches hers to a T, but surely for completely different reasons.

She is heartbroken over the betrayal she has finally gotten confirmed today, and the pain that goes along with it, whereas he is heartbroken that he's been caught in his betrayal and the consequences that might follow.

So with that thought in her mind, she steels herself against the feelings his tears evoke in her. She is too devastated herself to allow his sorrow to outweigh her own.

She shakes her head, trying to stifle the sobs that begin to come on strong again, "I don't understand." Letting out a shuddering breath.

She wipes both hands across her face, wiping away her tears the best she can. The words just flowing out of her mouth, "You say you love me, and not her, then how did this happen? Why would you do this to us? To me? Did you even consider what this would do to me? Or were you just thinking I wouldn't find out? I mean, Juice knew about it. Which means the Club knew about it, right? Did Gemma know too?"

"It was a mistake," Jax replies, his voice heavy with regret. His tears have stopped falling, but his eyes are still red-rimmed, and his cheeks are bright red from the onslaught of emotions. "You don't know how badly I wish I could take it back, choose differently. But I can't. No matter how much I want to undo it, I can't, Babe."

"A mistake you wish you could undo? That's your answer? That's not good enough." Tara hisses.

"What else do you want me to say? You want me to drop to my knees and beg, darlin'? Because if that's what it takes, I'll fucking do it?" Jax pleads with her, daring a step toward her.

And he means it, every word. He is willing to rot in prison for her. Hell, he'd take a bullet to the head for her without giving it a second thought.

He is proud and he is arrogant, but in hindsight, after all the damage he's done to their relationship he'd also grovel for her, on his knees if he had to and beg her to take him back, if he could be sure that would do the trick.

"I don't want you on your knees. I want you to make me understand, Jackson." She angrily throws back at him. "I'm your wife! You owe me an explanation. You owe me that much. You owe me a reason why you would sleep with someone else. Someone you say means nothing to you."

"There is no reason why, Tara. I fucked up ... bad. I wasn't falling out of love with you. I wasn't in love with her. It was nothing like that. You have to believe me." He tries to explain.

"Then what was it? Were you drunk? High? What?" She searches his face for an answer.

Jax shakes his head, "No. None of that."

Tara's tears finally stop and she wipes at her face again, before her eyes bore into his. Her tone of voice gets angrier with each word she speaks, "Do you think she's prettier than me? Sexier than me? She's a whore and she's older, so she's obviously more experienced than me, is that it?"

"Tara, stop it." He begs with frustration in his voice.

But Tara continues rambling on, "Or you were just in the mood for a blonde again? I mean, there's Wendy, Ima, and now Colette." Tara raises a finger and counts along with each name she mentions. "See the pattern here?" She raises her eyebrows quizzically at him. "Or did she just offer you some kinky shit that you knew I wouldn't do? Was that it?"

"That's enough." Jax hisses back at her and steps forward, grabbing her by her shoulders before she can get away.

"No, it's not enough." She hisses too, shrugs his hands off of her shoulders, and pushes hard against his chest and he willingly steps back again. "You owe me an explanation."

"I don't know what you want me to say?" Jax asks with frustration in his voice. "I don't know what you want from me? Look, just tell me what you want, and I swear I'll fucking do it."

Tara shakes her head at that and lowers it once more as tears begin to prick at her eyes again. She tries so hard not to sob, raising her hands to cover her face.

Jax watches her intently, as if he is actually expecting her to give him a play-by-play of what to do, a list of her demands he could just check off one by one, and all would be good again. Like she alone holds the answers to make their world whole.

Tara wipes away her tears, swallows the lump in her throat, and looks back up at him. Jax isn't sure what to make of the calmness that suddenly seems to have crossed her face when she finally speaks up, "I guess I shouldn't really be surprised that you're confused about how this..." She gestures with her hand between her and him. "... is supposed to work. And I guess I'm partially to blame for that, for letting you get away with all your bullshit time and again."

She expects him to comment, but he just looks guilty and confused back at her. So she clears her throat and continues with what she has to say, "The night Abel came home from the hospital, we had that fight, and then Donna died and you ended up spending the night with Wendy, and I called Chicago 'cause I was gonna leave, emotions were running high. Obviously, we both thought we were done that night ... and then when it turns out we weren't, and you told me that you'd made a mistake, that you'd slept with Wendy. I forgave you. We started fresh, clean slate and all that."

"That's ancient history, Babe." Jax chimes in.

"Is it though?" She asks and raises an eyebrow at him quizzically, "Then you slept with Ima."

Jax frowns, not liking where this is going, and interrupts her, "We already talked about that."

"No." Tara shakes her head, "We didn't. We talked about how you apologized, but what we didn't talk about was what happened right after the whole Salazar thing."

"I apologized." He reminds her of what happened right after. "Before the damn EMTs even took us to the hospital, I was already apologizing to you."

"I suppose that's true. You did, and with the circumstances, getting kidnapped, pregnant, the joy of having Abel safely home again and you being mere days away from getting sent back to prison, I forgave you again, right then and there in that moment. But the anger I felt about everything that had happened since Abel had been taken didn't really surface until after you went inside, after the shock wore off, and that's when you got scared I'd run, and the real apologizing started. But before that, you thought you'd gotten a pass from me. And I suppose eventually you really did."

"What the hell is this, Tara?" He interrupts her again, "You think I don't know what a piece of shit I was to you? Trust me, Babe, I know how much I hurt you, and I promise you it will never happen again."

"Then there was Colette." Tara continues, completely ignoring his words and he frowns at the mention of the older woman's name again. "I walked in on you with her. We fought. Then Bobby got shot. Clay died. And then you decided to take the fall for me, make the deal with Patterson. Turn yourself in that same night and before I knew it we were together in bed again."

"It wasn't like those other times, Babe, and I know you know it too. After all the shit we'd gone through, we reconnected. It fucking meant something." Jax scoffs, "So if you are implying that it was pity sex, because I was getting locked up again, you're full of shit."

Tara shakes her head, "No, that's not what I'm saying at all. I'm saying that at that moment, I gave you a pass again. I forgave you."

"I don't understand." Jax shakes his head, the aggravation obvious on his face, "Is there a point to all this?"

"The point is that in the past you cheated on me and because of the circumstances, because of everything that was happening to me or us at the same time, I let it slide. I forgave you and we eventually ended up back in each other's arms. But look at us now, Jax. Now that you're here, away from Charming. I'm just a doctor, not patching up criminals after hours, and you're just a mechanic, not a member or president of some gang. We're just two people, with two beautiful little boys to raise. And hopefully, that means neither one of us nor our children will get kidnapped or threatened with imprisonment ever again. So if we were to get back together, and you'd cheat on me again, there wouldn't be a pass coming your way. There would be no forgiveness left to give."

"I know that." He says with new hope in his eyes.

"Do you?" Tara replies with a questioning tone in her voice and shakes her head at him, "'Cause I don't think you do. You can't even tell me what made you break our wedding vows with Colette. I mean with Wendy and Ima, you at least bothered to explain the how and why. So if you don't know what made you cheat, then how can you be so sure it won't happen again?"

"'Cause I won't let it happen again." He answers with a firm voice, leaving no room for doubt.

"How?" Tara won't let up.

"I just know." Jax quickly replies and steps closer to her again, his eyes firmly trained on hers.

But Tara shakes her head and lowers her eyes to the small space left between them, "I'm sorry, but that's just not good enough for me anymore, Jax. I need to know why you did it? Why did you end up in bed with someone other than me? I need you to tell me why."

"For Christ's sake, I can't." Jax blurts out in frustration.

Tara throws her hands up in the air, a gesture of defeat. If he isn't even willing to try to sort through his feelings, then she is done, done with him. She is giving up. "Then there's really no point in us talking anymore, is there?"

"Meaning what?" Jax raises his eyebrows in question.

"Meaning, we're done," Tara says angrily and starts walking away from him. "I want you and all your shit out of the apartment when we get home."

"Jesus Christ," Jax mumbles under his breath, lowers his head, and turns away from her, running his hand through his hair in obvious frustration. A moment passes before he turns back toward her, trying to catch up with her retreating form, yelling after her "Tara, wait."

Tara continues walking, not responding at all, until Jax catches up with her, grabs her by her arm, and spins her around again to face him.

They stare at each other and Jax opens his mouth to say something, "I'm …," is all he mutters, but then freezes again before he finally speaks, "I'm trying."

"Trying what?" Tara replies and folds her arms in front of herself.

"Trying to explain ... how it happened." He answers, the look in his eyes softening with regret. "It's just ... it's just that I know there's nothing I can say that'll justify it. I mean, it's not like someone put a gun to my head. What happened, it's on me, making a horrible choice, one I regretted immediately."

Tara sighs, "Go on."

Jax takes a deep breath and exhales, he digs out a cigarette from the front pocket of his flannel shirt, but instead of lighting it up, he simply just twists and turns it between his fingers and it dawns on Tara then just how nervous he actually is, "We had that fight, about Wendy becoming the guardian for the boys. And I was so pissed that you went and had those papers drawn up. Then Eli showed up, arresting you. I honestly didn't think they'd actually press charges against you, so when they put you in cuffs, I was still mad about the fight, and I just froze. Abel was crying, so I got him out of bed, sat down at the kitchen table, and then it all hit me at once what had just happened, and I felt like shit for how it all went down. How I let them walk you out of our house without so much as saying a word to intervene."

"Why are you telling me this?" Tara interrupts him.

Jax frowns, "Because I was in Stockton, checking out the new Escort place, when Lowen called to tell me you didn't want me at your hearing the next morning. Just like you didn't want to see me the entire time you were locked up."

"So you're saying this was my fault?" Tara points a finger at herself, her eyebrows raising in disbelief.

Jax shakes his head, getting frustrated again, "No, that's not what I'm saying, Babe. But I knew that this is how you'd take it. That me explaining the how and why is just gonna sound like lame ass excuses to you. Which they are, because I know there is no justifiable reason why I did what I did. That's why I didn't even wanna start down this goddamn rabbit hole in the first place."

Tara looks away and takes a deep cleansing breath, before she looks back up at him, "You're right, I asked for this. I asked you to tell me."

Jax swipes his hand down his face, and exhales audibly before he speaks up again, "What I'm trying to say is that I was scared. I was scared about our fight. I was scared about those charges against you. For you. For us. For our boys. For not knowing what it meant that you didn't want to see me. All that shit ate at me the whole time you were gone, and all I wanted was you. To see your face, to reassure me, and to know that we'll be alright. So all that was going through my mind, on top of all the other shit with the Club that went down. Lyla getting raped and beaten. Hell ... I don't know, I just had a head full of shit I needed to deal with, things I needed to figure out. And she was just there, all calm and collected. The opposite of how I was feeling, 'cause in my head there was a war brewing, noises I couldn't drown out coming at me from all directions. And you know, I could stand here and tell you that she made a move on me, but I'm the one to blame because all I had to say was no, and I didn't. What she did, I mean, it was just her job. And I just missed you, needed you so much, but you weren't there and she was there. That's all there was to it."

Tara's eyes fill with fresh tears when she nods her head, too choked up to even try to speak for a long moment.

"That was it?" She finally manages to get out, her voice breaking as she speaks.

Jax nods his head, still busying his hands with the cigarette that looks like it is about to fall apart.

"So it happened the night before my hearing?" She asks to clarify and when Jax nods again, Tara wipes the tears away that begin rolling down her face.

"And after?" She inquires further.

"I left. Right away." He answers. "Feeling worse than I did before."

"What about the other time?" She won't let up.

Jax swallows hard, "That's a different story. I was pissed at you. For what you did. And I wanted to hurt you back." He chuckles humorlessly, "But the real fucked up thing is that when I was with her, you were all I saw. Both times."

"Please, don't," Tara begs him to stop now, shaking her head and looking anywhere but back at him.

"It's the fucking truth though. And that's what you wanted to hear, isn't it? You want the truth. So one minute I'm so pissed at you for lying to me, wanting to leave me, wanting to divorce me, then the next I'm fantasizing about you, having you, being with you. Retreating in this bubble inside my head where we're still happy together ... and then you walk in and I see double, for a split second there's two of you."

He shakes his head at himself and starts to rip the cigarette into tiny pieces, letting them fall to the ground by his shoes, one by one. "Trust me, Babe, I know just how fucked up that sounds."

Jax shakes his head as tears well up in his eyes again, and he haphazardly rubs a hand across his face to wipe them away, "Maybe there's something wrong with me. Maybe I'm just all fucked up."

Wiping at her own tears she doesn't have the strength nor the will to tend to his wounds on top of her own. "Yeah, maybe you are."

It is obvious that's not what he expected her to say, she can see that by the look in his eyes, but Tara doesn't care, at least not while she is still processing her own feelings and pain about everything he's just revealed to her.

They walk side by side but don't talk at all on their way back to his truck, nor on the drive back toward the city.

Neither of them wants to face the boys in their current state of mind, so words are exchanged about that and they decide to stop at a small diner to get a bite to eat.

They barely speak at the diner as well, just sitting across from one another and eating in silence for the longest time.

Jax is hardly able to take his eyes off of her, more than once wishing he could read her mind, wondering what exactly is going on in that pretty little head of hers, because he's imagining the worst.

Meanwhile, Tara tries to avoid looking at him, seemingly focusing her attention elsewhere, but in all actuality, she is just lost in her own thoughts as she absentmindedly picks at her food on the plate in front of her.

He finishes his meal in full, while she has barely touched hers.

Suddenly Tara turns her head and actually looks right at him, her voice eerily calm and so low that it is almost drowned out by the noisy conversations and music playing around them. "Can I ask you something else? About her?" She takes him by surprise.

I guess that answers his question about what's been on her mind the whole time.

"Here?" Jax looks back at her quizzically. "Now? With all these people around?"

Tara looks around for a moment, taking in the other patrons before she focuses her attention back on him, sitting right across from her. "They're all busy talking and eating, and besides, it doesn't have to get ugly."

She tries to reassure him. "I'm all cried out, so you don't have to worry about that. I'm not gonna make a scene." She adds for good measure, but Jax knows that isn't necessarily a promise she could keep. If he says the wrong thing, tears are probably going to flow once again.

But he has to admit that she is right about the other guest, everyone seems so engrossed in their own conversations that they probably wouldn't pay any attention to what he or she had to say.

He sighs, not at all thrilled that she wants to go yet another round, but wanting to appease her he pushed his plate to the side so he could rest his elbows on the table, his hands busy with the thin paper strip his straw had come in, repeatedly wrapping it absentmindedly around the tip of his index finger.

Wishing for the hundredth time that they wouldn't have picked a non-smoking establishment.

"Alright." he reluctantly agrees, "Fire away, sweetheart." He meets her eyes and gives her the faintest of smiles, not entirely sure if it came across as such.

Tara pushes her own plate away just enough to fold her arms on the table in front of herself, before she looks right back at him, "Earlier you said, that it was just a mistake. That you don't have feelings for her. Then how come you were holding hands with her, kissing her, when I saw you?"

"She kissed me." He rebuts without missing a beat.

Tara shrugs her shoulders at that, yet her voice is still calm and low, "It didn't look like you minded. I mean, I didn't see you push her away or anything."

He takes a moment to think about his answer this time and leans forward, resting his forearms all the way on the table now, before shrugging his own shoulders as he gives his response.

"There was a meeting at Diosa. It was just business." He tries to begin to explain.

He pauses for a moment, before starting up again, "Every now and then we'd all meet up, Alvarez, Barosky, her, me, to discuss business, nothing more. And I guess you could say that she's a little handsy. I already told you that I don't love her, but I don't hate her either, so I've honestly never thought nothing of it until Friday night, when you said that you saw us, and I realized how badly that hurt you."

Tara looks away from him as if deep in thought now for a long moment, before she finally turns her attention back to him, "It never occurred to you that flirting around with the woman that you cheated with would make me upset?"

Jax shakes his head, "I'm sorry, Babe, clearly I wasn't thinking."

"Clearly." Tara repeats, before making an observation, "You like her though!" The tone of her voice made it clear that this isn't a question, but rather a statement. She is proud of herself for remaining calm and collected, despite the painful topic.

"I guess." He shrugs as he narrows his eyes on her, "I don't think she's a bad person, Tara. She's just trying to make it in a man's world, working with the only thing she has to offer. But I don't have feelings for her. Truth be told, if it wasn't for us talking about her, she wouldn't even cross my fucking mind, Babe. Ever. She means nothing to me. And I have no illusions that I mean anything to her either. As a matter of fact, she's probably rubbing up on Bobby now, since he took over my president's patch."

That last bit he says and what it implies catches Tara's attention, "You think it was all about your patch? Your rank within the Club that she was after?"

"Yeah, I do." He nods.

Tara thought about it for a moment, and she'd be lying if she said that it didn't make her angry at the other woman all over again. But she decided to move on. She honestly doesn't care who the madam is sleeping with now or her reasons why.

But Tara did have something to say that she simply needed to get off of her chest. "There's just such a double standard for men and women within that life. And I often wondered if the Club way of looking at it is just so deeply ingrained in you, that you're not even aware of what's right or wrong anymore."

"Babe?" Jax starts to interrupt, but she won't let him.

"I mean, do you even get it at all? Why it upset me to see you with her again?" Tara searches his face, but before he could even answer she adds, "I guess what I'm trying to say is that if it would hurt you, piss you off, don't you think I have a right to feel the same way when roles are reversed? I mean, John and I broke up today, and you've made it pretty clear to me that he's a sore spot for you. It's like you can't even think straight whenever I mention him. So can you humor me and imagine for just a moment, that a couple of months from now you'd see me walking hand in hand with him, and watching me just stand there, letting him kiss me? How would you feel about that? And even if I reassured you that he means nothing to me, would that make it any better somehow?"

Jax meets her eyes head-on, and she can see the anger that thought alone provokes in him, before he even opens his mouth to answer her, "You're absolutely right. At the very least I'd probably wanna beat him to a pulp. So, yeah, I get it. You had every right to be pissed, Babe. And nothing like that will ever happen again?"

Tara looks somewhat relieved that at the very least it seems like she's getting through to him.

Then Jax brings her back out of her thoughts, "Not that I'd discuss any of it with you while we're still in here, but for the sake of full disclosure, is there anything else you wanna know about the Club? About what happened? You just gotta ask."

Tara shakes her head without even having to think about it, "No, I could care less if I never heard another word about the Club."

"You got it, Babe," Jax reassures her that he won't bring the topic up again.

X

Jax pulls his truck into his previous parking spot and kills the engine. Both of them got out, Jax waited for her to come around the front of his pickup and they crossed the street together, heading for the front door of the apartment building.

But when they reach the door, and Jax begins fumbling with his keys, Tara reaches for his arm to gain his undivided attention and says, "I don't think I'm gonna come in."

Jax let out a soft chuckle, "It's your place, Babe."

She smiles softly, her own keys in her hands now, "I think I'm just not feeling up to pretending to be a happy Mom right now."

"Tara?" He says with concern in his voice.

But she shakes her head, "It's fine, really. I'm fine. I just need a little bit to process everything, and some alone time. You get that, right?"

Jax nods, but doesn't like the thought of them not returning to the boys together.

"So could you tell Christy thank you for me, for watching the boys? And would you mind getting the boys ready for bed on your own tonight?" Tara glanced at her wristwatch, "I'm sure she's made them dinner by now, so you shouldn't have to worry about cooking something for them."

"I got it, Babe. I've dealt with much worse before, can handle two preschoolers on my own."

"Thank you." She replies, and is about to turn to walk to her car, when Jax speaks up, "Where are you gonna go?"

"I don't know. Haven't thought that far ahead yet." She replies honestly. Right now she just wants to make it to her car.

"You're not going back to that trail in the woods this late?" Jax questioned her with obvious concern etched into his face, "Because gun or no gun, that's not a place to be late at night all on your own."

"I'm not." She reassures him, "You really don't need to worry about me. I was thinking more along the lines of some coffee shop, or someplace like it."

"Okay." Jax nods, but it is still obvious that he doesn't want her to go. But he knows that he needs some time to think about everything they've talked about himself, so he understands where she is coming from.

"Okay. See you later." She smiles slightly and with that, Tara turns, and Jax watches her get into her car before he unlocks the front door and quickly steps inside.

X

Jax is lying passed out on the couch, when his cell phone on the end table by his feet begins to ring. It takes him a moment to come to, but when he realizes that the ringing is coming from his phone, he quickly sits up. He turns on the lamp on the table and hurries to unplug his phone from the charging cable. He squints at the screen, and when he sees that the caller ID says that it is Tara calling, he quickly flips it open and raises it up to his ear. A sense of dread fills him when he realizes that this means she hasn't come home yet, while he has been fast asleep.

"Everything alright, Babe? Where are you?" He asks before she can even get a word in, his voice raspy with sleep.

"Is this Jax?" Says a deep manly voice on the other end of the line, jolting Jax completely awake instantaneously.

He can feel the old familiar fear course through his veins again, like it had never left. His worst nightmare, the one with her lying on their kitchen floor in a pool of her own blood flashes before his eyes as if it had all just happened. Followed by a list of Club enemies that might've still had it in for him.

"Who are you? How the fuck did you get my wife's phone?" His heart is beating out of his chest because he already has a pretty good idea of how.

"Easy now. No need to get all pissy with me." Says the man, "This is a courtesy call, my friend. You were listed as the emergency contact on her phone here. My name's Frank, I'm the barkeep over at Old Joe's Tavern on Brunswick Drive. I think I got your wife over here, and she's not looking too good right now."

That initial dread disappears just as fast as it had appeared, and Jax lets out a sigh of relief. But then he can't help but worry for another reason, "Is she alright? What happened?"

With the phone wedged between his ear and shoulder, he stands and steps back into his jeans that he'd discarded on the floor in front of the couch, closing them and buckling up his belt, before reaching for his t-shirt and hoodie he'd thrown across the back of the armchair.

"She came in here a couple of hours ago. Sat alone at the bar here all night. She hasn't had that much to drink either to be this out of it, at least not as far as I know. Unless of course she's already had a few before she showed up in here. That I wouldn't know anything about. But the reason I'm calling is, there's a couple of fellas over here that I get the impression would like to take her home, so you might wanna get on over here as soon as possible, son. I'll keep an eye on her until you get here."

Jax tries to process everything he's just been told, "Old Joe's Tavern, you said? Brunswick Drive?"

"That's it. Hurry on down here."

"I'm on my way," Jax replies and hangs up the phone.

X

Author's Note: Thank you for all the reviews. Can't wait to hear what you think of this chapter. xoxo