Seize Control

Juliette shuddered at the feeling of lips against her neck and fingertips ghosting across her skin. She bit down on her bottom lip and squeezed her eyes shut as the agonizingly slow movements against her hips began to pick up the pace. Her arms snaked up his bare shoulders, her fingers lacing behind his neck as she pulled his face down closer to hers.

The soft music flowing from the stereo speakers combined with the ragged breathing that filled the room masked the sound of heavy footsteps ascending the stairs. Her bedroom door was thrown open and Silas didn't even have a chance to get off of her before Jax started yelling. "What the fuck?!"

Juliette immediately sat up, clutching her comforter to her chest. "Jesus Christ, Jax! What the fuck are you doing here?"

Her brother's face was becoming redder by the second. His blue eyes were fixed in a hard glare on Silas and his fists were clenched at his sides.

"Jax, get out."

His icy glare then turned to her. "Julie-"

"I'll be there in a second," she snapped, cutting him off.

With one more death glare at Silas, Jax left the room and Juliette sighed heavily as she slipped out from under the comforter to pull on her black bathrobe. "Stay put. I'll be right back," she said, leaning down to kiss his cheek.

When she went out into the hallway, she found her brother leaning against the wall smoking a joint. She rolled her eyes as she shut her bedroom door behind her and walked past him, down the stairs. He was quick on her heels and as soon as she reached the bottom stair, he grabbed her arm, pulling her backward to him. "What the hell are you doing?"

"I thought it was fairly obvious," she retorted smartly.

"You know what I mean!"

"Jax, I'm eighteen years old, okay? I'm old enough to make my own damn decisions."

"No. You're just a kid!"

"Alright then, how old were you when you started having sex?"

"This is not about me," he said, shaking his head.

She ignored his statement. "Because I know good and damn well it was before you were eighteen, which makes this conversation pointless and you a hypocrite."

"It was different for me, Julie. I had a girlfriend that I was in love with."

Juliette sighed and took a seat on the stairs, running her fingers through her dark hair. "Well, I didn't want you to find out this way, or at all actually, but....Silas is my boyfriend."

He stared at her confused for a moment before he sat down next to her on the stairs. "What? For how long?"

"Since Christmas Eve. We've kept it a secret because we didn't want you guys or his parents to find out."

He sighed, rubbing his hand over the blonde stubble on his chin. "I'm sorry."

"I'm not stupid, Jax. We're being careful."

"Something every big brother wants to hear," he muttered sarcastically.

Juliette rolled her eyes and elbowed him in the side. "Hey, it's better than the alternative."

"No, the best alternative is for you to not have sex at all."

"Don't make me hurt you, Jackson," she threatened with the best glare she could muster.

He slowly broke out into a grin and pretty soon they were both laughing.

"Like you could hurt me," he scoffed.

"You'd be surprised what Chibs has taught me, big brother."

"Remind me to have a talk with him about his lessons later."

"No way. Any chance I can have to kick your ass is one I'm gonna have to take."

They sat quietly for a moment before Jax sighed, resting his hands on his knees as he stood to his feet. "I should get outta here."

"Why did you come here in the first place?"

A look of realization crossed his face. "Oh. Shit. I, uh, actually don't remember."

"Of course you don't," she replied, giving him an annoyed look. "You interrupted for no damn reason."

"Hey, believe me I would rather not have interrupted that."

"Get outta here," she told him playfully.

"Yeah, yeah. At least wait til I get out of the driveway before you go at it again." He walked to the front door and swung it open, stepping out onto the steps.

"Hey, Jax?"

He turned halfway to look back at his little sister. "Yeah?"

"Could you maybe keep this whole thing between us?"

"You know Mom's gonna find out eventually."

"It's been over four months and she hasn't found out yet."

"Hey, I'm just trying to help you out. You know how she is. If she gets the slightest feeling something's up, she won't quit til she finds out whatever she wants."

"I know. I guess I'm lucky you've all been so busy lately." Lately, the Club had been extremely busy with some other MC who was giving them a lot of trouble.

"It looks like we will be for awhile longer too. These dickheads are kicking out asses."

"What are they called again?"

"White Titans. Some hillbilly MC from Elk Grove. Think they're just gonna go into Lodi and take over the Bastards' business. It's startin' to get real personal."

"Jesus Christ, you guys just can't stay out of somebody else's business."

"Hey, the Bastards called us for help. We didn't just jump into this fight."

"Surprising," she muttered.

He rolled his eyes. In a matter of minutes, the siblings had gone from angry and annoyed to perfectly okay and back to angry and annoyed. He pushed a hand roughly through his shaggy blonde locks and pulled out the prepaid flip phone that was now ringing shrilly from the pocket of his jeans. "Yeah?"

Juliette watched silently as his whole face turned three shades whiter and his eyes grew wide. "Are you shittin' me?! What the fuck!" he yelled into the phone. "Yeah. Fine. I'm on my way."

He angrily shoved the phone back into his pocket and turned back to his sister. "I really gotta go now."

"Something wrong?"

"Major shit. You should stay here, okay? Don't go out for anything."

She nodded her head quickly and jumped up from the bottom stair, throwing her arms tightly around his waist. "Be careful, Jax. Please."

"I'll be fine, Jules. Stay here."

She dropped her arms and he immediately ran out to his bike in the driveway, leaving her standing in the doorway to watch as he sped off, not even taking the time to put on his helmet.

Once he had fully disappeared from view, she shut the front door and locked it before going back upstairs to her bedroom. Silas was reclining against the headboard, now fully clothed. He immediately noticed the frown on her face as she shut her bedroom door behind her and stripped off her robe, replacing it with the clothes she had been wearing earlier in the day. "Went badly, huh?"

She shook her head as she crawled under the covers and into his side. "No, the talk actually went okay. But then someone from the Club called. Jax told me to stay here and not to leave for anything. Please stay with me," she begged.

"Of course. I wouldn't leave you here alone and this stressed out."

"I have this feeling something really bad is going to happen."

His arm snaked around her shoulders. "I'm sure they have it handled, Jules. They know what they're doing."

"Yeah," she agreed. "That's what scares me."

The next two hours were very tense and stressful. Juliette was on pins and needles waiting for someone to call and tell her everyone was okay. The longer she waited for that call, the more stressed out she became. What if they weren't calling on purpose?

She practically jumped out of her skin when she heard the front door slam but was quickly relieved when she heard Tig calling her name from downstairs. She jumped up from her bed and flew down the stairs with Silas following behind her. Tig was standing at the bottom of the stairs waiting for her and the look on his face only discouraged her more. "Come on, sweetheart. We gotta go to the clubhouse."

"What's wrong?"

"Just come with me."

"Tig-"

"Go, Julie," Silas encouraged, nudging her forward. Tig, who just seemed to now notice the boy standing behind her, gave Silas a glare as he grabbed Juliette by the arm and led her outside to his motorcycle. She jumped on behind him and strapped on the black helmet just as he drove off.

The first thing Juliette noticed when they arrived on the lot was that the Club's van was parked right by the clubhouse doors. She was right on Tig's heels as he burst into the clubhouse and as she looked around, she did a mental headcount. She immediately noticed two missing and she grabbed a fistful of Tig's cut, yanking on it so that he would turn to look at her. "Where are they?" she asked him, her voice shaking.

He grabbed her shoulders and pulled her back to look at him. "Now Julie, don't get upset. Everything's gonna be fine."

"Where are they, Tig?"

"Come here," he sighed, leading her to the chapel doors. He pushed one of the doors open and pushed her inside, shutting the door back behind them. She stared down in disbelief at the man sprawled out over the wooden table, dark blood soaking through the white towel resting on his abdomen. Chibs stood over him, pressing firmly on the cloth in an attempt to stop the bleeding.

"Tig, what the fuck's she doin' in here?" he asked as soon as he saw Juliette standing by the door.

She ignored Tig's answer and slowly stepped closer to the table, looking down at the man bleeding all over the chapel's table. His eyes were closed and his face held a grimace. Her hand automatically went to touch his battered face before reaching up to run her fingers gently over the tattoos inked into his scalp.

"Let's go, Julie," Tig said from behind her.

"No."

"You shouldn' be in here, Julie girl," Chibs told her from across the table.

"I'm not leaving!"

The two men looked at each other before Chibs finally shrugged. "Alrigh' but you're gonna make yourself useful if you're stayin'."

Juliette wasn't quite sure what he meant until she looked up at him and saw him holding up a pair of surgical scissors. She wasn't sure where the Club had gotten the medical equipment but she knew better than to ask questions. "Um, what?"

He handed her a pair of latex gloves and she quickly pulled them onto her shaking hands. "Okay, I need ya t' hold this open while I get the bullet."

She stared at the wound in Juice's stomach where the bullet had torn through the flesh for a moment before allowing Chibs to place her hands where he needed them to be. "Good. Tha's good. Keep it like tha'," he told her as he picked up what looked like a pair of tweezers and began to dig into the wound.

Juliette tried to focus on what Chibs was doing but her eyes kept going back to Juice's face. His eyes stayed closed even though Chibs digging into the gunshot wound in his stomach must have been incredibly painful. She decided that it must have been so painful that he had passed out.

"Got it!"

Chibs removed the tweezers from the wound and held them up at eye level, showing Juliette the small gold bullet. She breathed a sigh of relief. "So he's going to be okay?"

"Aye. Soon as 'e wakes up. Take a few weeks t' heal though."

She nodded as she pulled the bloody gloves off her hands and put them on the table, sitting down in the chair closest to Juice's head. She just watched him while Chibs sewed up the wound and left the chapel.

She decided she wasn't going to leave until he woke up.