Book 1 Chapter 6

Opie

Opie pulled up to the compound he had dropped the kids off at school that morning before going to Clay. The days seemed to be getting easier as he worked on them. Ellie and Kenny were having a rough time with their homework, and Opie did not know what he was going to do. Opie had initially thought he might hire a tutor for the kids, it was spelling words, but the school did a phonics type of shit. Opie didn't know what he was doing, he was trying to be a good dad, but he didn't even know how to be a dad. The twins weren't even born when Opie went to prison. He missed so much that he didn't know the first thing about being a dad. Once at TM, Opie got off his bike and headed towards the clubhouse. To say he missed being a part of the club was an understatement.

"Brother!" Chipps voice called excitedly as he walked up to Opie, "Clay called church in 5."

Opie nodded as he walked over to his old man, who had his oxygen mask on, "you okay, pop?" the question was simple but loaded simultaneously. Opie knew his dad was a ticking time bomb. Piermont Winston was a hard ass, he was strict, but he was caring at the same time. When Mary left when Ope was a kid, his dad kept him afloat. Money was hard to come by sometimes, and his dad had to work a lot of hours with the club and the garage, but he made it work. Opie didn't understand how his dad got it done.

"Fine, son," came his dad's grave voice as they had a staredown, "you?"

Opie shrugged, "yeah, trying to figure out stuff with the kids and the club. Struggling with the kid's homework, think I might see if I can get someone to come and help them." Opie was working on getting all his debts settled, but his old man didn't need to know that.

"That's boy," Piney said, slapping his hand on Opie's shoulder.

Church was quickly called, which caused all members to sit and walk over, depositing their phones into the box. Opie sat in his seat, looking down at the redwood table. He wanted to be there; he had enjoyed being seated at this table since childhood. So why did it hurt at times to be here?

"Alright, the church is in session," Clay began as he lit up a cigar. "Let's start. We will be busy the next few weeks. We have a few runs scheduled—that's when we will be moving the guns up north. We have new intel on Alverez and Darby's little alliance. Get that shit under control before it comes to bite us in the ass."

"Happy is running for Quinn this week, so he will be in Tacoma for a bit. Anything we need him for will have to wait till we can get the killer down here." Jax explained, looking around at his brothers.

"Juice, did you get anything about the certain doctor I asked you to look up?" This caused Opie's hair to rise on his neck as his eyes fell over to the kid.

"A shit tone," Juice grabbed his laptop as he started to click it, "Alright, so the dentist Gemma got to work on Tig, and Opie knew is Rebecca Nicole Croce. The first daughter of Marcus and Sylva Croce. She was born in Sedona, Arizona, and moved to Tacoma, Washington at 13."

"Do you have why they moved?" Tig asked. They all knew that SAMCRO had a charter in Tacoma. If this girl's family tried to get at the SONs, hitting one of their larger charters was a step.

"Oh yea, so done a little digging and turns out Marcus Croce is doing life in prison for the murder of one of his wives," the whole room was silent as they stared at Juice. "His charges are murder, premeditated murder, child endangerment, and child abuse. One night he just snapped and killed his old lady before trying to kill his kids." Juice explained as he made a face looking up a clay. "The girls went to live with their grandmother, where they graduated. Rebecca went to the University of Alabama for dental school. She moved to Chino, California started a job at the prison. Then showing she moved to Charming roughly six months ago."

Opie didn't know how to feel, excited that the woman he had told close to his whole life story wasn't an evil woman who set out to destroy his club but also confused at the life she went through.

"She is clean, no police records, no traffic ticks. I did find why she left Chino, though," Juice said, hesitant to say as he looked over at Opie. None of them understood what had gone down with him and the dentist. Opie had just lost his wife, and while he was taking back his life and doing what he needed for the club and his kids. He was still a man with needs. They could all understand that. So, the idea that this was a release for Opie was more practical to all of them. "So Rebecca seemed to have submitted six harassment claims to her boss two months after Opie got released. I had to crack into the firewall they had up in their system to see the complaints, and damn."

"Just spit it out, man," Tig's annoyed voice tried to speed this along.

"Okay, okay. So, it says two inmates decided they would mess with the dentist. She has one where they kept coping a feel, the next says one tried to kiss her, it is the last one she broke her contract for, she was almost raped."

The chapel was silent. Opie could feel eyes on him as he tried to rein in the anger plowed into his chest and tied his stomach in knots. Opie calmed his face as he stared at the Puerto Rican. "Does it say who it was?" the edge to his voice was rough and rugged but ignored the say. His brother's eyes seemed to follow his movements as he shifted in his seat.

"It doesn't say two inmates, but their names are sealed," Juice looked to their president, then back to his computer, "the only thing they have is a statement they made," Clearing his voice, he said the words he knew would start shit, "Prude bitch wouldn't give it up to anyone but the big guy, the SON. I thought she should know there were better options out there."

"Fuck." came Jax's voice as he bit his lip and looked at Opie, then over at Clay. "We going to do something?"

Clay gave him a confused look and shook his head, "it happened in Chino. The girl may have helped Tig, but she isn't family. She isn't an old lady. At best, she's an ally." Clay puffed on his cigar and looked over at his stepson.

"She helped Opie and Tig," Jax fought back, raising his voice, "just let me and Opie go talk to her and see if she knew who did it. If she doesn't remember or if they are still inside, we let it drop."

Clay signed as he raked his eyes over at his stepson. Jax was just like his dad. John was out-spoken and hard-headed when he got something in his head. Clay finally agreed to take a few draws from his cigar and smacked his gavel to end church.

Opie kept his face neutral. He didn't want to let anyone see his anger as he got up from the table. Ope didn't even understand the anger that was flooding through him. Sure she had cared for him while he was in Chino, pulling him out of his cell, sneaking items when she wouldn't, but he didn't know her. Their conversations were in code, all nouns, no names. She had sat there and listened to him talk about his now-dead wife, his kids, his family problems, and his mommy issues and never once said anything about the difficulties she was facing. The whole ordeal pissed him off.

Opie followed Jax out of the club and to their bikes. Ope didn't know what was going on between Jax and Clay. The two had always been able to get on each other's nerves, but nowadays, they despised each other. Jax would question Clay's decisions and choices he made for the club like he wasn't the president. Opie just tried to keep his head down and out of everyone's drama.

The two drove down Rebecca's street, following Juice's directions juice had given them. Opie noted a decent part of town as he looked at the different houses that all seemed to have the white picket fence dream. Jax slowed down and pointed to a more petite cream two-story pulling his bike in the driveway. After turning off his motorcycle, Opie got off, lighting a cigarette.

"Alright, man, you gotta tell me," Jax started after lighting his own, "What is with you and the chick?"

Opie gave a confused face only to drop it when Jax's knowing look slid across. "We got to know each other in Chino. She would pull me out each teeth cleaning and tell them I had terrible gum disease or some shit like that. We'd end up just sitting and talking. It felt good to talk to someone that wasn't giving me shit. She just listened." Opie took a long draw from his smoke before getting mad, "I don't know, brother. I spent a lot of time with her on the inside, but we never fucked. I stayed faithful to Donna. That doesn't mean I didn't want to." The end was quite more broken than anything.

"Shit, man," Jax signed as he blew smoke from his nose.

"I married Donna. I had an obligation to her and the kids. I felt enough guilt getting out with feelings for another woman. I stomped it down and out when I got out, Jax."

Jax felt like that statement was more Opie trying to talk himself down from the ledge than for his benefit.

"Okay, man," Jax put out his smoke and walked past Opie, patting his shoulder. "When you get your head out of your ass, let me know."