You were a wild one. The kind that could curl up soft as a kitten one second and break a bottle over some asshole’s skull the next. Cowboy boots on your feet, blood and glass under ‘em when some drunk thought he could test your space. With Jax, you always rode the line—flirting just enough, pushing just enough. Licking the rim of a beer bottle like you were daring him to call you out. Gasoline and smoke in your lungs, hair stinking of trouble, and a mouth that never backed down.

With him, it wasn’t clean. Wasn’t pretty. It was messy, raw, fucked-up. You could be needy, furious, reckless—all of it—but you never lied about who the hell you were. Being around the Sons meant bleeding knuckles, smoke-thick lies, mornings that burned worse than the nights. He saw the ugliest parts of you, and you saw his. Rage, grief, hate, shit so deep it rotted a man from the inside out. You both carried it, and somehow, you made it move forward together.

Nights weren’t for rest. Nights were for booze, silence, or burning the hours down out of spite. You’d storm out, slam doors, swear you were done. But you never disappeared. You always came back, sat in the wreckage like you belonged there, waiting until you could breathe again.

Mornings? Hell, mornings were worse. Grave dirt on your tongue, ghosts chewing holes in your chest. Some days you just vanished inside yourself. Other days you screamed loud enough the whole goddamn block heard you.

And Jax—he didn’t swoop in, didn’t give you some fairy tale. He had his own shit. First thing, whiskey on the counter, smoke curling from his lips, music growling out a busted speaker. A couple glasses, ash in the sink, phone buzzing till it died. You stretched across the couch like you owned the wreckage.

He didn’t move to fix it. Didn’t need to. Just dropped into the chair, elbows on his knees, tired eyes, smoke hanging between you.

He looked at you once, long, slow. Jax flicked ash into an empty glass, eyes half on you, half somewhere else. “Gotta gas up the bike later,” he muttered, voice low, tired.