Money Can't Buy Happiness

Chapter 30

Jax didn't open the conversation with pretense or pointless chatting. When Tara answered she sounded tired and uninterested in his reason for the call but that wasn't the only reason he didn't prolong getting to the painful point.

"You asked about me and Kate," he said quietly, "So I'm gonna tell you."

"If you're admitting guilt," she snapped but Jax didn't let her finish.

"I'm not guilty, not the way you think, Tara," he sighed. "Last year, when Hap was locked up after the bullshit charges we caught for the shit on the highway, Pope was going to kill him."

"Why?" She was incredulous. "Why Happy of all people?"

Jax closed his eyes knowing the details were going to be a hard sell especially with his history coupled with her anger but he went on.

"Pope was one of Katie's clients." He heard Tara click her tongue, her disapproval of the other woman growing. "When Hap found out he was pissed, shot up Pope's office and it started a goddamn battle."

"Pope doesn't strike me as the kind of guy that would share," Tara said, unsure where it was all going.

"He's not," Jax said with a scoff. "He wanted to play  games, we got locked up and he fucked with Katie's head. We got out but Hap had to stay in, he got tuned up but we didn't know then it was part of the plan."

Hearing the emotion in his voice Tara couldn't help but soften. "What did he do, Jax?" She remembered the time, she remembered the heaviness that plagued them, him really, and how he suffered in silence for months. Hap left, then he came back, the Katie's suicide, it was all fitting together.

"Got me, Katie and Juice together, Juice was doing the IT shit for him, he was there when Hap when rogue." Jax was silent but Tara gave him the time he needed to find the right words and say them without wavering or growing too emotional. "Pope had Hap in the infirmary, one of those CCTVs hooked up, and he told me and Katie if we didn't sleep together, he'd kill him."

"Bull. Shit." Not only did Tara not believe him but she enraged by the lengths he had gone to trick her.

"Why do you think Hap left?" Jax growled, her disbelief stinging no matter how much sense it made for her to be so very skeptical. "Why do you think Katie tried to kill herself? Why I was at the clubhouse, trying to keep shit together, and keeping you at arm's length? It wasn't just to keep you out of the shit with Pope, Tara."

"You killed him," she said, barely above a whisper.

"Me and Hap," he corrected her. "Had to pin it on someone else to keep everyone here safe, besides no one else knew what happened so we didn't have to save face. It was personal."

"You're her father," Tara said, her shock audible in her monotone voice. "You're Charlotte's father."

"Yeah," he said sadly. "We kept in touch when she left, we got close, and when she came back she was still dealing with shit."

"So are you," she told him. "I have to go."

"Tara," he begged, "The shit between me and Katie is there but it ain't like we chose it."

"I have to go," she was angry he wouldn't just let her hang up.

"Tar-" the line went dead.

--

When Jax didn't contact Katie she worried, about him and her and their daughter but she left him be in case he hadn't actually called or he did and needed time. Sitting in the suite, her mind wandering to darker places, Alec arrived back without Charlie.