secretlysamcro

But that hadn’t stopped someone from calling you, the melodic chimes of your ringtone continuing to fill the darkness around you. The disruption came from behind on your nightstand, the noise loud in the otherwise stillness. With an aggravated groan, you frustratedly flopped onto your back and glared up at the ceiling. 

“Goddammit, you fucking asshole,” you cursed under your breath.

You didn't need to check the screen of your phone to know whose name would be displayed across it. This wasn't the first time he'd called you in the middle of the night in the past couple of weeks since you’d broken things off with him, and he’d been shitfaced each time he had called. You thought you’d made yourself pretty damn clear when you'd chewed him out and embarrassed him in front of the other Sons that afternoon in front of the clubhouse, but still he refused to listen to you. He kept dismissing each time you’d told him that you were done with him and his bullshit.

Thirty seconds dragged maddeningly past before the call finally went to your voicemail and the cheerful noise of your ringtone suddenly ceased filling your room. As blissful silence enveloped you like a soothing blanket, your eyelids gradually closed and your body sunk comfortably back into your mattress. Generally when you ignored his calls, he’d just leave a message–which you promptly deleted in the morning without bothering to listen to–but it was still irritating that he kept interrupting your nights. 

Just as you felt yourself starting to relax and drift off towards sleep again, your phone’s ringtone trilled through your bedroom once more. Eyes snapping back open, you turned your head along your pillow and glared at your phone on the nightstand. Across the bright display you saw the name ‘Jax Teller’ taunting you, and you grit your teeth together in frustration. He didn’t usually call you twice back to back, and while a part of you felt a flicker of concern that maybe something was wrong, you reminded yourself that he wasn’t yours to worry about anymore. He didn’t deserve to occupy space in your mind, and it didn’t matter what was going on with him and his club.

Eventually your phone quieted for the second time as his call was once more sent to voicemail, and the screen of your phone grew dark. Holding your breath for a few seconds, you stared at your phone and willed it to remain quiet, hoping that Jax would take the hint and leave you alone already. But the screen lit up again, and Jax’s name once more appeared along it as your ringtone began to echo around your bedroom.

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” you growled.

Pushing yourself upright in bed, the sheets slid down and pooled along your lap. With your back resting against your headboard, you reached out and yanked the charging cord out of your phone with more force than necessary. Angrily swiping your finger across the screen, you felt your irritation reaching its breaking point. Clearly, ignoring him wasn’t going to work tonight.

“It’s nearly two thirty in the fucking morning,” you snapped into your phone. “The fuck do you think you’re doing calling me right now? I told you to fuck off, Jax. So fuck off.”

A heavy sigh came through the speaker, the sound somehow filled with so much pain that your stomach lurched without warning at the weight of it. You tried to ignore the tender ache in your chest, preferring to focus on your anger at him instead. It wasn’t like you’d wanted to end things with Jax right as you’d started falling for him, but you’d learned the hard way that everyone had been right about the Sons’ president. You should have walked away that first time he asked for your number when you’d taken your car in for an oil change, but that stupid fucking smile of his had been enough to hook you.

“‘M sorry,” he slurred, the evidence of alcohol in his speech. “I know ‘t’s late. Just haven’t heard from you in weeks.”

“Because we broke up,” you stated icily. “Which means I don’t want to talk to you, Jackson. We’re done.”

“C’mon, it was justa fight,” he countered. “You barely lemme explain–”

“Because I don’t fucking need to hear whatever bullshit you think is going to explain your behavior, Jax,” you shot back. “There isn’t an excuse that you could make for any of it that's going to make me feel any better.”

“‘S'not true,” he stubbornly disagreed.

Fingers gripping your phone tighter in your hand, you resisted the urge to bang your head backwards into the headboard behind you out of sheer frustration. You’d given him chance after chance for months to prove he was worth your time–four months to be exact. You’d ignored the earlier red flags, you’d tried to ignore the culture that permeated through his club with how they treated women, and you’d tried to ignore all the things everyone said around Charming about him. You had tried to get to know Jax on your own terms, giving him the benefit of the doubt over and over.

Yet he'd still disappointed you.

“Baby–”

“No,” you cut him off. The anger burning within you had you fully alert now, the haziness of sleep melting away. “Don’t fucking ‘baby’ me, asshole. You agreed to a relationship. You agreed to being exclusive. But did that ever stop you from letting the fucking girls hang all over you at the clubhouse? Groping at you and flirting with you while you just fucking stood there with your smug little smile? Even when I was standing right there?”

“I never wanted them,” Jax argued, a hint of his own anger mixing in with his inebriation. “I fuckin’ told you that. Repeatedly.”

“Yeah?” you retorted. “Well maybe you should’ve been telling the half naked girls throwing themselves at you that instead. Maybe you shouldn’t have always been winking at them and encouraging it. Maybe that would’ve worked better to prove your point, Jax. Seems like a pretty straightforward solution right there.” 

On the other end of the line, you heard Jax suck in a breath, but you already knew what he was going to say before he said it. You'd heard it countless times before, so you didn’t give him the chance to speak. You furiously barreled over him while glaring through the dark at the picture hanging innocently on your wall across the room. 

“And don’t even give me that shit about having a reputation to maintain, Jax,” you continued bitterly. “I don't care that you're some MC president, that shit doesn't slide with me. I tried to ignore it, I tried to view it from your side, but there’s only so much of that bullshit a self-respecting woman is willing to endure.”

“What?” he snapped.

“You fucking heard me,” you fumed into your phone. “What would you have done if I was out drinking and letting men hit on me like that, huh? Letting them touch me while I just winked and smiled and flirted back?”

Jax audibly scoffed over the line, his irritation steadily increasing. Good. Maybe you’d piss him off enough that he’d finally leave you alone, and you were determined to ignore the sharp stinging sensation in your chest at that thought, not wanting to delve into what it meant. You’d cried over him enough after that first week, he didn’t deserve more of your tears. 

“I’d’ve beaten the shit outta any guy who touched you, darlin’,” he answered, his words still heavily slurring together. “No one fucks with my girl.”

A bitter laugh tumbled past your lips as you shook your head at his answer. What a predictable reply from the Sons’ president, and it was infuriating how he couldn’t acknowledge the disparity within it. 

“What a damn double standard that is,” you shot back. “So you can flirt and let those girls put their hands all over you, but god forbid a man pay me a compliment.”

“Look, darlin’, I get you’re pissed ‘bout the thing with Ima,” Jax continued, blatantly ignoring the truth you’d just thrust on him, “but ‘t’s nothin’ to be jealous over.”

“Jealous?” you hissed into the phone, eyebrows incredulously rising up onto your forehead. “I’m not jealous, dumbass. You disrespected me. It was bad enough you let that annoying tramp onto the back of your bike for a ride to the clubhouse in the first place considering how much trouble she’s blatantly been causing, but you let her kiss you, Jax. On the fucking mouth. In front of everyone.”

“It was a peck!” he roared over the line. “You fuckin’ overreacted ‘bout it, too!”

Your last bit of control snapped, especially since he’d woken you up after two in the morning with another one of his stupid phone calls. You had work in the morning, you didn’t want to be dealing with this right now. An agitated growl rumbled deep in the back of your throat as you sat seething on your bed and glaring at the peaceful landscape painting across the room. 

He was always so damn stubborn. You doubted that he would ever even realize just how much he’d fucked up in that moment, which hurt in its own way. Because in his mind, he’d done nothing wrong throughout the entire relationship since he’d never slept with anyone else. But you weren’t one of the girls that hung around the Sons for fun, you weren’t like any of them just looking for a good time. You’d told him that you wanted something real and serious, and you’d given him the chance he’d asked for before he completely ruined the entire thing with his need to let the girls at the club stroke his ego when you should’ve been more than enough for him. 

“This is why I ended shit,” you said, a quiet, dangerous calm in your words. “You’re immature. Your head is buried so goddamn far up your ass that you can’t even see the truth when it’s in front of you, Jackson Teller. You were in a relationship with me, meaning the other girls shouldn’t have been treating you like you were open for business, and you certainly shouldn't have let them. And it damn well meant that none of them should be kissing you. Because eventually just a peck becomes just a blow job, right?”

“No, ‘s'not what I–”

“You don't respect boundaries,” you continued, talking right over him. “That isn’t how a healthy fucking relationship works. Not with me. I told you months ago I expect exclusivity, but apparently we don't define that the same way. So we are not compatible, and you need to stop calling me.”

A sharp, unexpected bang reverberated down the hall and through your house before the same noise echoed through the phone pressed to your ear. You jolted on your bed at the sound, startled by someone banging on your front door at this hour. 

“Don't say that,” Jax demanded in your ear. “I care ‘bout you, darlin’.”

It took you a second, your mind still focused on the noise at your door and not exactly on what he’d said, but it soon clicked in your brain why you'd heard the banging twice. Eyes narrowing suspiciously at your bedroom doorway, you realized that tonight Jax hadn't just drunk dialed you, he'd showed up at your front door, too.

“Please tell me you aren't banging on my door in the middle of the night,” you retorted.

“S'what if I am?” he countered.

Lowering the phone to your lap, your fingers squeezed the device in your increasing frustration, your head tipping back as you inhaled an irritated breath through your nose. No wonder why he’d called you so many times back to back–because he was just outside. Drunk and absolutely infuriating in his audacity thinking that he could get you to step outside and talk to him. Expelling the breath sharply between your lips, you raised the phone back to your ear and caught the last bit of what he was drunkenly saying.

“...just for a few minutes. I miss you. Just lemme say somethin’, a’ight?”

“No,” you firmly answered. 

The sharp slam of his fist hitting your front door echoed down your hallway while simultaneously coming through your phone. A scowl settled onto your face, your eyes stinging from how tired you were. It was not the time for one of his moody tantrums.

“Turn around and walk your drunk ass back down my steps and back to the clubhouse,” you ordered him. “I’m not opening the door for you, Jax. When I hang up in a second, I’m turning my damn phone on silent. If you continue banging on my door, I’m calling Roosevelt to come throw you in county for the night. Understood?”

“Baby, don’t–”

“Get. Lost.”

He’d started saying something else, but you pulled the phone away from your ear and smashed your finger on the key to hang up the call. True to your word, you put your phone on silent immediately afterwards, not risking having him call you back and keeping you awake. But if he did keep banging on your door, you absolutely would call the police department and let them deal with his intoxicated ass. 

You were done with him.

But as you tossed your phone back onto the nightstand and slid down beneath your sheets, you didn’t hear anymore banging on your front door. You thought you heard a disgruntled voice outside, but as you rolled back over and closed your eyes, snuggling underneath your blanket, you ignored it. Just like you ignored that throbbing ache in your chest that he’d reawoken with his drunken call tonight.

Because Jax was not good for you and he never would be. There was no changing his nature, no matter how tragic that'd been to accept.

You’d woken the next morning to your alarm and a faint headache growing between your temples. Throwing off the sheets, you'd rushed to get ready for work, going through your usual morning routine of showering and chugging down a cup of coffee. By the time you were slipping on your shoes by the front door, you were exhausted from yet another interrupted night of sleep.

Thankfully you hadn’t heard anything else from Jax last night, and you assumed that meant he'd done what you said and walked his ass back to the clubhouse. You only lived a few blocks from it, so you weren’t exactly concerned about him getting lost or hit by a car while ambling down the sidewalk in the early morning. And as you often reminded yourself, he wasn't yours to worry about anymore.

Grabbing your keys from off the hook by the door, you opened it and prepared to head out to work for the day. But as you'd swung open the screen door, you nearly screamed at the sight of a body laying just outside on your porch. The scare was short-lived when you quickly realized who it was though, and you caught yourself before you'd actually let out a shriek. 

Standing there with your mouth hanging open in disbelief, you stared down at Jax where he lay propped up against the wall of your house and beside your front door. He was lucky you hadn’t hit him with the screen door when you’d swung it open, though judging by the state of him, you doubted he’d have noticed and reacted if you had. He looked as if he’d just stubbornly passed out there early this morning, too wasted to have done what you told him to and walked back to the clubhouse.

Finally closing your mouth, it twisted into a frown as you examined his appearance. Jax’s head was slumped to the side over one shoulder, his neck twisted at an uncomfortable angle as he lay half upright against the wall. His eyes were closed, but an angry purple bruise had bloomed around the left one. His usually groomed and styled blonde hair was sticking up in varying places and no longer slicked neatly back, the greasy strands hanging around his face. Glancing further down, you noticed that he’d passed out still clutching his phone in his hand. That’s when you saw just how battered and bloody his knuckles were, as if he'd recently gotten into a fight with someone. 

He looked like an absolute wreck laying there, and he reeked of whiskey.  A slight breeze blew past where you stood on the front porch, and the strong scent caused your nose to wrinkle instinctively at the sharp tang of it. For the briefest moment you wondered what had led him to drink quite this much last night. Was it the breakup that had caused him to overdo it? Or was it problems and stress related to running the club? 

Shaking your head roughly, you abruptly shoved that thought aside. The answer didn’t matter. Jax wasn't yours to deal with anymore. You did not care about why he'd gotten so shitfaced last night.

Turning around, you finished fully closing the front door and stuck your key into the lock, twisting it and locking up your house before carefully shutting the screen door behind yourself. Attention returning to Jax, a tired sigh blew past your lips before you bent at the waist and leaned forward, snatching his phone from his slack grip. He didn't even twitch as you took it, and you rolled your eyes at his unconscious form while straightening back up. 

Flipping open his phone, you scrolled through his contacts list before finding the name you were searching for. You hit the button to dial their number and held the phone to your ear as it rang, staring down at Jax who was still entirely unaware of your presence.

“Stupid, stubborn asshole,” you muttered. 

Resisting the urge to kick the sole of his Nike with your foot, you listened to the phone ring a couple of times before the call was finally answered. You weren’t surprised at how tired the Scotsman sounded on the other end considering how early in the morning you'd called. And if Jax was this wasted, you assumed the others had also been up late getting drunk last night.

“Jackie boy?” Chibs greeted, slurring thickly like he'd just woken. “Somethin’ the matter? ‘S’barely seven.”

“It’s not Jax,” you flatly replied. “Your president is passed out on my front porch. I need to go to work, but if he’s still there when I get back for lunch, he’s going to be the sheriff’s problem. So I suggest you send someone to collect him before the police do.”

Not waiting for Chibs to respond, you hung up the call and snapped Jax’s flip phone shut. With a careless flick of your wrist, you tossed it down at Jax, watching as it bounced off his chest with a soft thunk before it fell into his lap. 

Your lips pressed together as you stood there, taking in how pathetic he looked all bruised and stinking of alcohol. This wasn't the man you'd met months ago at Teller-Morrow Automotive, the one who'd charmed you and left you tongue tied. He looked nothing like the cocky, arrogant bad boy who did whatever he wanted damn the consequences. 

“I told you to get lost,” you chastised. “But you can't even listen to that, can you, Jax Teller?”

Jax didn't answer–not that you expected him to. With his head still hanging limp at that awkward angle over his shoulder, you knew he’d be feeling the poor choice to pass out on your porch for the rest of the day. 

“You're a mess, you know that?” you continued, aware that he couldn’t hear a single thing you said. “You're throwing your whole life away and it's such a shame to watch. If you'd just stop letting that damn club control you, you might actually be able to listen to that heart I know you've got buried inside of you. But you're too busy always trying to drown it out with booze instead.”

You'd seen glimpses of the man he could be in the time you'd been with him. It was why you'd stayed for as long as you had, because you’d seen a warmth hidden behind that guarded exterior and you'd wanted to see more of it. But he hadn’t given you much more of himself, always too concerned with being the man he claimed he was expected to be as the Sons' president instead of just being Jax Teller.

“And it's not my problem,” you whispered to yourself.

With a defeated sigh, you turned and stepped down the stairs of your front porch, leaving Jax laying unconscious and propped up beside your door. While you made your way to where your car sat parked in the driveway, you caught the distinct rumble of a motorcycle roaring to life through the early morning from just a few blocks away. A telltale sign that Chibs at least had the good sense to listen to you.