The Scottish Thistle and The English Rose by HaylsValo

Chapter 6: Telling Tales

Clay Morrow was hung over. His head was spinning and aching, his stomach was protesting every movement he made and he'd had so little sleep he felt like he'd fall asleep at the table, sitting up and everything. He wanted nothing more to go home and crawl into bed with Gemma, but as he'd just received a call from The Niners that was an impossibility. So now he was pissed, and he was going to make the rest of the goddamn club aware of it.

"I just had Laroy on the phone…" he growled, fists clenched, eyes narrowed and stalking round the table at the rest of the club, all in varying states of alertness. Laroy, in an attempt to mend the bridge's burned in Oakland a few months before with the attempted murder of Piney and the girls they accidently killed as a result (Authors note: See Tig/Boo One-Shot) was giving SAMCRO a heads up that the Mayan's were sniffing around, asking questions about a missing Nomad. A Nomad that would have been travelling along the highway between Charming and Oakland. And they suspected that the Redwood Originals had something to do with it. "He tells me the goddamn Mexicans suspect we killed one of their Nomads and that Alvarez will bring that blood to Charming if he finds out for certain it was us." Clay's attentions immediately went to Tig. This all came back to him, he was the one that had killed the guy – without consulting the club – and this shit would be on his shoulders should the blood land in Charming. Tig didn't flinch under Clay's glare but glared right back at him, his blue eyes blazing fiercely, yet so cold they look like ice.

"Hey I made a call man, that Mexican bastard was going to rape your little girl!" he stated firmly, jaw twitching as he attempted to reign in his anger. He couldn't believe that Clay was reacting the way he was over the Nomad Mayan. Sure it was coming back to bite them in the ass, but wasn't it better to deal with the Mayans that to let Boo get raped? Did Clay not get that? Clay didn't miss the twitch in Tig's jaw, and knowing the Sergeant at Arms as well as he did, knew that he was holding his rage in. That only seemed to anger the President more.

"You should have called the club first, now this shit is falling on all of us!" he snarled, pointing at Tig before then pointing to himself, his real point made clear. Tig's shit, his decision was landing in his lap. The rest of the club stared on in steely silence, uncertain as to what to do. It wasn't like Tig at all to contest Clay.

"And what I was about to stand aside as he raped Boo huh? Just let him! I killed him because I had too!" Tig asked brazenly, shuddering as his own words played out in his mind. Himself, standing aside and watching emotionlessly as some Mexican asshole beat Boo into submission and raped her as she wept, her big blue watery eyes staring up at the Sergeant at Arms in terror and confusion, questioning why he was doing nothing to help her...

"I would have made the same call brother." Chibs said, finding to confidence to talk as he slapped Tig hard on the back. The Scotsman didn't understand Clay's anger either, if someone had tried to rape his little girl, dared to touch Kerrianne, then death would have been a certainty. A long draw out death that Chibs would have taken great pleasure in.

Tig nodded once in thanks, his eyes scanning the rest of the room, demanding with a look an answer from the rest of the club. What did they think of all this? What would they have done? No one dared say anything back for a long while, looking between Tig and Clay as if trying to work out which side they landed on. Eventually, Jax heaved a heavy sigh and spoke up.

"Look Clay, Tig made the call any one of us would have made, let's just work out how we're going to get past this." He said frankly. In his mind, it didn't matter what had happened or what should have happened, all that mattered was the here and now and how they were going to deal with it. The rest of the club murmured in agreement, silencing Clay before he had a chance to speak up again.

"We still have this bastard's bike right? Maybe we can let it find its way onto enemy turf…" Piney said, lips twitching upwards slightly. The Mayans Fatboy was still sitting out in the garage, tucked out of sight in a corner and covered with a sheet. Piney didn't say it, but he wanted the bike to land in Niners territory. It was just 6 weeks since they'd tried to kill him and the anger was still raw, fresh. He knew it would never pass though, the Niners were trying to build bridges with SAMCRO, were interested in buying the clubs AK's so that they could defend their heroin trade. Profit came before all else in the club with Clay.