𝘉𝘳𝘰𝘬𝘦𝘯 𝘔𝘦𝘮𝘰𝘳𝘪𝘦𝘴 - 𝙎𝙤𝙣𝙨 𝙤𝙛 𝘼𝙣𝙖𝙧𝙘𝙝𝙮

Forty-Five

Ellie's relationship with her father and grandmother is still suffering. She refuses to hangout, or even speak, to Gemma when she babysits Abel and Thomas. Jax is tired of her attitude and doesn't know what to do. Ellie is glued to her mom's side, wanting to spend as much time with her as possible, and spends most days in her office at the hospital. Tara continues to meet up with Ally Lowen in secret. She realizes how strained her relationship with her husband is when Ellie confesses something to her one day.

"Mom?" Ellie finds her in bed after her dad left for the day, "Can we talk?"

"Of course." Tara tells her, seeing her sit down on the bed beside her, "What's up?"

"When you were gone.... I found out something." Tara sees how sad she looks and wraps her arms around her, "Found out what?"

"That day, when I went to Lyla's," Ellie says and Tara nods, "Lyla said she came from a brothel? She said, she saw dad there... I asked dad why he was there and he didn't even try to deny it. I'm sorry."

"Oh." Tara gulps, fighting back the hurt that she instantly feels, "Thank you for telling me."

"I'm sorry." Ellie whispers, clinging to her mother. Tara closes her eyes and takes deep breaths. What the hell was she gonna do?

~ SOA ~ ~ SOA ~

Tara goes to pick up Abel and Thomas. Gemma asks if she talked to Wendy about the guardian thing. Tara asks Gemma to keep a secret, then tells her she's pregnant, eight weeks. She hasn't told Jax yet.

"If I tell you something, do you promise to keep it to yourself?"

"Secrets are what I do."

"I'm pregnant. About eight weeks."

"Oh my God. That's wonderful."

"The timing kind of sucks, but yeah-"

"H- How's Jax with it?"

"I just found out for sure. I'll tell him tonight."

"Oh, honey, we're gonna figure everything out, sweetheart. That's fantastic."

Jax sees the results of Tara's positive pregnancy test on his kitchen counter. Jax goes to Tara and tells her he loves her.

~ SOA ~ ~ SOA ~

The club is on lockdown after the Irish killed Filthy Phil and a prospect. Ellie, Abel, and Thomas are at the clubhouse. Ellie's sitting in the back, next to Happy, avoiding Gemma at all costs. She's waiting for her mom to return. Thomas and Abel are both in Jax's dorm room. Jax and the rest of the club return. They're waiting for a phone call from the Irish at 8PM. Jax sits at the bar and looks at his daughter, but doesn't say anything. Gemma sees and shakes her head.

Ellie stands up when her mom finally shows up. She makes her way through the crowd, "Mom, when are we going home?"

"Your dad said the club's on lockdown," Tara says, "We can't go home yet."

"This sucks." Ellie sighs.

It's two minutes until the Irish call. The club is hanging out. Waiting. Jax sees a pen with shamrocks on it and asks Chuckie where it came from. The delivery guy who brought the beer left it a few hours ago.

"Hey, Chucky. You know where this pen came from?"

"Yeah, it's a shamrock pen. Delivery guy left it a few hours ago."

"What delivery?"

"Beer. Gemma must've ordered it."

Chibs and Jax both realize they've received a bomb and shout to clear the clubhouse. Happy runs with Ellie outside and stands in front of her acting as a human shield. Jax runs to get a sleeping Abel from the back bedroom. He's running out the door with Chibs on his heels when all of TM blows.

Jax has Abel, Tara has Thomas, it seems like everyone made it out. They then watch as the clubhouse goes up in flames.

~ SOA ~ ~ SOA ~

Jax and Chibs walk through the burned out shell of the clubhouse following the Irish bombing. It's all charred. Jax sees his failure everywhere. "I did this," he says. Chibs doesn't disagree, but he finds the gavel and hands it to Jax. "We're going to fix this, brother. You hear me?"