A Vow of Silence

Chapter 6.

Jax

"Hey, mom, what's up?" I answered Gemma's call with my free hand, while the other held my gun. I was in the warehouse standing over Tyler's little problem that had now become a clean-up situation. As part of our agreement for 9ers loyalty, Tyler asked me to take out Chester and his rebel 9ers crew. It was an easy enough job, didn't take nothing but thirty minutes to get rid of them. But then my mom called, and things took a turn for the worst.

Apparently, one of the girls at Diosa's father had come into her job demanding money. My mom got in the middle of it and he laid his hands on my mother. Nero and the guy fought and then from what my mom told me, the guy got away. However, not without my kid seeing the entire thing.

We couldn't have gotten there fast enough, but much to my surprise, the place was already crawling with cops. "Who the hell called the sheriffs?" I asked Chucky who was standing at the door.

"Sandy. Her dad told her to," he said low enough for me to hear.

I shook my head in frustration and then went to go inspect my mom. She was reading a book to Abel who looked engrossed in the details. I noticed a red mark on her face from where the guy hit her, "are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm sorry," she said while looking up at me. I waved her off even though I was upset. Abel shouldn't have had to witness something like this. I didn't want him around anything like this, and I knew that his mother wouldn't have either.

"Where's the animal that hit you?" Chibs asked her.

"Left," she said waving her hand.

"How much did he see?" I asked referring to Abel.

"Not much," she said not fully extending her gaze to me.

"You good little man?" I said lowering myself to his level. He nodded his head but didn't use his words. I could tell just by the look in his eyes that he wasn't telling me the complete truth. But I had no time to question him further as the new sheriff knocked on the glass. Chibs and I shared a look as we went inside the office to deal with this mess.

"Shut the door please," she said as soon as we walked in. "Sherriff Althea Jarry," she introduced herself while extending her hand out to me.

"Jax Teller," I said shaking hers.

"Chibs," Chibs said while taking her hand.

"I didn't realize that this was a family business."

Nero spoke up, correcting her. "We're business partners. We run another place out in Stockton, as well."

"I know," Jarry said nodding her head.

"This is a rare occurrence for us. We run a legit, quiet business here." I said trying to ease the salt on this whole situation.

Jarry nodded, "I get it. All your paperwork's in order. Your permits are up to date. However, Mr. Haas, your employee's father, wants to press assault charges."

"Well, we're gonna be pressing chargers as well," Nero fired back. "He came in here and he smacked Gemma!"

"Mr. Haas says he came by to pick up the money his daughter owed him. They were having a family discussion, Gemma interfered, he told her to back off. Then, Mr. Padilla here went to town on him."

"Oh, come on that doesn't even make sense," I protested, situating myself up against the wall.

"I'll tell you what, I'll have a chat with the dad. Let him know how complicated these things can become," Jarry gave me a prolonged look that let me know that her talk wouldn't come cheap.

My eyebrows raised in surprise, "yeah, we'd appreciate that."

"You know what I would appreciate, I would appreciate you helping me find Juan Carlos Ortiz. He's the only member of your charter that we haven't interviewed about the murders."

I internally groaned at what she wanted. I had no idea where Juice was, and I wasn't going to hand him over to a fed. My beef with him was personal, it would be done through the club. "Juice split while I was inside."

"Yeah," Chibs chimed in, "he didn't really say much about where he was going."

"That's unfortunate because if I can't track him down, the DA wants to put out an APB."

I shrugged my shoulders, "I'll see what I can find out."

"What about the Chinese?" Jarry pressed, "would they have a reason to want to hurt your club?"

I made a face, "not that I know of. I'm a very big fan of their food." My smile broke when I heard Chibs snickering next to me.

"Are we done here?" Nero asked sprinting up from his seat, "Can I go?"

"Yeah, just stay reachable. I'm sure we can all work together to keep Charming safe...and profitable for everyone." My eyes squinted at Jarry's choice of words. This cop definitely wanted to expand her salary. "Understood?" she asked locking eyes with me.

"Yes ma'am," I said trying to contain my surprise. I mean, I knew that there were dirty cops. But to get one on my payroll this easily after dealing with boy scout Eli, was surprising.

On her way out of the room Jarry eyeballed Chibs, "we should connect later, Scotty." My surprise grew as I watched her walk out of the room along with Chibs.

"There is a new Sherriff in town. And apparently, she's looking for a profitable relationship." I said while grinning at Chibs.

"And a good ol Glaswegian humpin'," Chibs said with his eyebrows raised.

"I'm gonna let you guys do all the humpin'," Nero said breaking through us to walk out the door. "Barosky called while all this was going down. There's trouble at the docks."

"What trouble?" I asked as if I hadn't just annihilated Chester's crew at the same docks.

"I don't know, but I'm going to go down there and find out," Nero paused as a few cops walked by. "Look after your mom for me."

"Yeah, will do," I said before we embraced in a hug. Nero was a good guy, my mom deserved it after everything that happened with Clay. But aside from that, I couldn't let him in on my plans with Marks just yet. I still needed him clueless about everything for the Mayans.

When he was out the door, I returned to my son who was still holding onto to the book my mom was reading him. I sighed to myself as I approached where he was sitting. I sat down with a dramatic drop to the couch with the hope that it would make him laugh, but it didn't.

"Daddy, is anybody else going to get hurt?" my smile fell clean off my face at my son's question. He was too young to have these kinds of fears, and I knew that most of it was my own fault for having him around this stuff.

"No buddy, everyone is going to be okay."

"Promise?" his blue eyes stared into mine with every ounce of hope that existed in his little body.

"Yeah," I said placing a kiss on his crown. I knew it was a hard promise to keep but I could make some changes that would make him feel safer. Number 1 on my list would definitely have to be no more spending his days at Diosa. And...I looked down at Abel's emergency contact list for his daycare and nearly jumped out of my skin when I saw Chucky listed.

If my mom had chosen Chucky as an emergency contact list, then I needed some help...and fast.

[Some dialogue taken from Sons of Anarchy Season 7: Episode 3 Playing with Monsters]