Judas Kiss

Chapter 42.

Arielle

I slowly closed Abel's door so that I wouldn't wake him. It had taken me almost an hour to put him to bed because he'd been so shaken up ever since Tara's attempted kidnapping. It broke my heart to see him so confused and scared that I'd get hurt too. And I noticed that he'd been extra clingy with me, and was sneaking into my bed at night when he'd have bad dreams.

All of this further pushed me to stay in contact with Wendy. I've been looking forward to our meeting and I'm hoping that she'll see the value in leaving Charming. Jax knows how bad things are becoming, and I have no doubt that he'd support my departure. However, a departure with Wendy would have him second-guessing that support. I know he'd much rathered I leave with Tara, even though he knows we'd claw each other's eyes out in the first week.

I smiled at the thought, betting money that we'd bicker and argue the first day. Men like Jax were so naive, cute but naive. They always thought they could fix something by lumping everything together until it fit.

I had planned on running myself a bath but then I heard keys in my front door. I was put off by this considering that I had taken some time off to watch Abel, and no one should be here to take him. Jax being here this late made absolutely no sense to me.

"Hi," I said awkwardly while staring at him with a confused expression. He nodded his head at me and held a bottle of whiskey in his hand.

"Want to join me?" he offered, which further confused me because it made me wonder how many people he'd gone through before coming here to share a drink with me. I mean, surely, I couldn't have been his first option. "C'mon, it'll be like old times," he said before disappearing into the kitchen.

I heard him rummaging through my cupboards in search of cups, and I'd recently organized everything. I cringed at the thought of him messing it all up, so I joined him in the kitchen to prohibit a mess.

I stood by him as I opened the cupboard and pulled out two glasses. I hadn't realized the tears in his eyes until I was near him, and despite my best efforts, I was truly concerned about his well-being.

"You alright?" I asked.

Jax just shrugged and poured the brown liquor into the glasses. He was never the one to talk about his feelings. He usually bottled everything up until he exploded like a volcano. "Just coming to terms with being a sh*tty husband."

My eyebrows rose as I looked at Jax in surprise. I wasn't expecting this response, and a part of me wondered what might've happened for him to come to this realization. "What made you come to that conclusion?" I asked curiously.

"You."

I chuckled dryly, "Oh, and how did I do that?"

Jax threw the brown liquor back and swallowed it all in one gulp. I thought this was going to be a one-and-done until I noticed him pouring more into his cup. "No matter what I did throughout the years, no matter what the club was going through. You always managed to hold yourself together. At first, I thought it was an act, but then as the years went by I realized that it was your way of survival."

I stood there silently as Jax said things that I would never dream of him saying before. Jax had said a lot of things to me throughout the years, but nothing quite like this. I wondered what was plaguing him to cause him to spill such random information to me.

"I still remember the day Opie and I told you about Donna. You were so heartbroken and I realized then that it was one of the few times that I'd seen you lose it. I felt like someone had shot me in the chest because I knew that I was the one causing you pain."

I poured myself some more liquor as Jax continued to pour out his heart over situations I'd either long forgotten or was trying hard to forget. With every confession came more liquor until he and I were drunk with sadness.

I never could tell for sure what was going on with Jax. He did a good job of masking his feelings and shutting me out. I didn't know what to make of this new Jax who wanted to tell me everything.

"Do you still love me? Even if it's a little bit?" Jax looked down, embarrassed at his own question.

"I don't think there'll ever be a time when I never love you, Jackson," I answered honestly. The liquor had taken my sober thoughts and vocalized them from a place I tried to hide. "I think that's why everything you did hurt me so much. You knew I loved you and yet you did them anyway. I would have much rather you reject me from the beginning, than stringing me along for so many years."

I wiped away tears that escaped my eyes. I was filled with so much emotion that it was becoming impossible to ignore. Jax's eyes began to water again, and I allowed him to envelope me into his arms. It felt raw and powerful and a little like closure. I had no idea I needed this until tonight.

"I love you too, Ari," he whispered in my ear. "I was just too much of a coward to be vulnerable with someone new, so I went to what felt familiar."

I said nothing to this as we stood in the kitchen still locked into each other's arms. I'd usually get mad upon hearing Jax's endless declarations of love to me because they were rarely followed by action.

He had made no attempts to leave Tara, and I had no intentions of fighting anymore. His love was poisonous but at the same time was like medicine to me, and I longed for the day when I would be free from it.

When we pulled apart, I stared into his beautiful eyes and saw all of our good times play in front of me. For the first time in a long time, I longed for him and I knew that he longed for me. It had to be the liquor and the emotion because the next thing I knew, his lips were on mine.

There was no battle for dominance, or the need to prove ourselves. It felt like we understood each other, and looked passed our nakedness and into our souls. For the first time, I saw the gentleness and fear in his eyes, and I questioned if it'd been there this entire time.

When did Jax look so scared? Why was I only now noticing? Had I been a terrible wife to not have noticed his internal turmoil for all these years, or was this new? Questions ran through my mind,