Pretty Boy
Juice Ortiz x OFC (Dakota Lowman)
Combining an Anonymous request and a request from @adela-topaz-caelon: Juice Ortiz x F!Reader, were the reader is Happy’s daughter and her boyfriend is Juice? and Juice x female reader where they're at the clubhouse or somewhere, just chilling to keep reader safe or something, and you get those cheesy moments of catching an eye, or an absentmindedly kiss that causes flusteredness
Warnings: language, alcohol, Juice being a lil cutie pie
Word Count: 4.6k
A/N: I tweaked each of these requests a little bit, but I hope y’all still enjoy it! I got the Happy’s Daughter request and immediately me and @garbinge started brainstorming OC ideas and we ended up with two daughters for Happy. Clearly we get carried away haha. This is just a fluffy little one-shot and a sort of wamrup/intro to the Lowman Sisters as OCs. We (when I say “we”, I totally mean me and Anj as a unit lmao) have big plans for them in the future and I can’t wait to take y’all along for the ride. In the meantime, enjoy this lil oneshot! xo
SOA Taglist: @masterlistforimagines @mijop @chibsytelford @xladymacbethx @i-just-read-stuff @kkim120 @everyhowlmarksthedead @toni9 @unicornucopia-fuckers @mayans-sauce @shadow-of-wonder @punkgoddess-98 @paintballkid711 @black-repunzel99 @jitterbugs927 @mrsstevenbuchananstark (If you want to be added to the list feel free to let me know!)
“Out of all the women in the universe,” Juice spoke up with a shake of his head, “I think the last two that need someone to watch their backs are Happy’s daughters, that’s all.”
Jax shook his head, “Everyone has someone watching their back, no exceptions.”
“Yea but they don’t need—”
He cut Juice off, “Club call, not theirs.”
Both of Happy’s daughters were sitting back, watching the entire interaction play out in front of them. It wasn’t something that they’d never gone through before, but they each knew that there was a more tactful way to go about it without making them feel like they were being saddled with babysitters. His youngest thought it was all bullshit, but she wasn’t willing to put up a fight over it. Her older sister, however, didn’t have the same reservations.
“Fuck this,” she stood up off her barstool, “You don’t get to make that call for me, Teller.”
“Hap said—”
“Well Hap isn’t here,” she rolled her eyes as she swiped her keys off the table, “Tell my old man if he wants someone to babysit me, he can do it himself,” she began walking towards the clubhouse door, “just like the good old days.”
“Diedra,” Jax stepped towards her, wrapping his hand around her forearm.
She immediately twisted her arm out of his grasp and used her other hand to shove him backwards, “Do that again and I’ll bust your fucking nose,” she waited a beat to see if any of them were going to try to stop her again, and when they didn’t, she looked over to her sister, “Call me if any of these assholes give you any trouble, alright?”
She nodded, “Alright.”
The clubhouse door slammed behind her, leaving an awkward silence in its wake. Jax glanced over at Juice, who was trying to look anywhere but at his VP and the young woman still perched at the bar. With a heavy sigh, Jax spoke up, “Don’t go two for two on losing the Lowman Sisters, alright? Hap is gonna wring my fucking neck over Di as it is.”
“He won’t,” she shook her head, chuckling slightly, “You think our dad doesn’t know what you’re dealing with?”
“You think that your dad is really gonna care about that when it comes down to it?” Jax retorted. Pinching the bridge of his nose, he tried to get his tone in order, “Sorry, Kota. It’s not on you. Just, please stay with Juice, alright? Just until we figure all this shit out.”
She nodded, taking a sip of her coffee and trying to pretend that she didn’t get a little bit of sadistic enjoyment out of Jax’s stress over her father and sister, “Sure, I can handle that.”
He didn’t say anything more before also heading out the door, managing to shut it a little quieter than the woman who had walked out before him. It left just Juice and Dakota by themselves in the clubhouse—everyone else either on club business or safely within the walls of their own homes waiting out the impending chaos.
“How pissed is your dad gonna be about your sister?” Juice asked, a smirk starting to curl the edges of his mouth.
Dakota laughed, shaking her head, “He’s not going to actually be pissed. He knows how Di gets about lockdown and shit,” she paused, smiling, “But he is going to make Jax feel like shit about it first.”
Juice chuckled, “Perfect.”
There were a few beats of silence before she spoke up again, “So do I get to know why I need a bodyguard or…?”
“H-happy didn’t tell you?”
She shook her head, “No,” with a huff she rolled her eyes, “he never tells me shit. I don’t, I don’t know why Di gets to know everything and I don’t. I don’t get what’s so different.”
“She is older,” Juice couldn’t pretend to understand the dynamics in the Lowman family but it seemed like an easy justification to offer up.
“By like, four years. That doesn’t mean shit.”
Juice laughed, “You sound a little bitter.”
“Bitter is in our blood, Juan,” she laughed as she finished off her coffee.
The use of his real name caught him off-guard. The two of them hadn’t ever really talked much, just little conversations here and there. He didn’t think that she knew his real name at all, let alone felt comfortable enough with him to use it. Despite the bite in her tone for every other word she spoke, there was a softness when she said it.
“Right,” he tried to keep himself focused, “Well, your sister seems like a girl full of answers so maybe you should ask her about it.”
“Glad I’m at least going to be locked down with a comedian,” she shook her head before getting up and tossing her coffee cup in the garbage, “So, what? You just gonna follow me around while I do things? Keep me company while I get a pedicure?”
He laughed, “I don’t think that you should really be out getting pedicures right now.”
“Well, then could you at least take me back to my place?” she laughed, “Di and I came together and she just stormed off with the keys.”
Juice couldn’t help the laughter that slipped past his lips, “Yea, yea I think I can handle that.”
As the two of them walked across the lot towards Juice’s bike, Dakota became very aware of the fact that the two of them hadn’t ever spent any one-on-one time together. They saw each other in passing at the clubhouse, and a couple times he’d worked on her car in the past, but they didn’t really know each other. She knew of him, the same way he probably knew of her. But they didn’t learn anything about each other, from each other.
In the past when she and her sister needed someone to watch their back because of things going on with the club, it would usually just be Happy, because that made the most sense. And realistically, Diedra had been right when she said that she could handle herself perfectly fine. If the two of them were left to their own devices they’d probably be okay, but it wasn’t a chance that the MC was willing to take. On a rare occasion or two Chibs or Tig kept an eye on them, but those men usually kept their distance.
Juice handed her a spare helmet, a lopsided grin on his face, “Where is your place, anyway?”
“Apartment complex just off Main?” she said as she clipped the helmet on, “Gray Street.”
He nodded, “Got it.”
She settled onto the bike behind him with ease, no stranger to the ins and outs of a ride. It caught Juice off-guard for a moment before he remembered who she was. He looked down to see her well-manicured nails interlocked over his stomach and he didn’t know why but it made him smile. She leaned against him a little, waiting for him to peel out of the compound. He checked with her to make sure she was good before taking off.
As he rolled into the parking lot of the complex, Dakota directed him where to go and park. Diedra’s car was nowhere to be seen. And while it had been made abundantly clear that she was in charge of herself, Juice still felt a little responsible for how everything had played out.
“You two live here together, right?” he asked as he put down the kickstand of his bike.
“Yea,” she unclipped her helmet and tousled her hair, “but she’s probably blowing off steam somewhere. Maybe tracking down our dad,” she laughed.
“Was it weird growing up with Happy as a dad?” the question came out before he could stop it, and regret instantly flooded over his features, “Fuck, sorry. I, I know it’s really not my business.”
She chuckled as she dug her keys out of her purse, “You’re fine. Don’t apologize so much.”
“Sor—” he stopped himself, “Right.”
“But in answer to your question,” they slowly made their way up the stairs to the second floor of the apartment building, “He…he tried. He does the best he can, you know? I think all our parents do,” she put the key in the lock of her door, “Doesn’t mean that their best is always good enough, but it’s all they can do.”
She was about to step inside when Juice put an arm out in front of her to stop her. She chuckled, nodding for him to go in first and scope the place out, even though it was highly unlikely that anyone ended up there looking for her or her sister.
About a minute later she heard Juice’s voice calling for her to come inside. She laughed as she stepped in, locking the door behind her before tossing her purse off to the side and instantly kicking off her shoes. Juice watched her, and as she sauntered her way into the kitchen he really began to question how the two of them never ended up really speaking to each other. He and Diedra had had a handful of conversations, although they weren’t deep or filled with a lot of pleasantries. But he felt like he had a better idea of who she was, than who her little sister was. She was always kind unless provoked, but she kept to herself a lot of the time.
“Smoothie?” she offered as she pulled a half-full blender out of the fridge.
Juice laughed in surprise. Usually when he was at someone’s house they offered beer, or something stronger. He’d never even been offered water before let alone a smoothie. He shook his head, “I’m good for now, thanks.”
She shrugged, “Suit yourself.”
By the time Diedra came back to the apartment, the sun had long since set. Dakota and Juice were camped out at the counter, both of them laughing hard at whatever story Juice had been telling. They heard the sound of the key in the lock and both of them looked over at the door expectantly. Diedra walked inside, kicking off her boots and tossing her keys immediately. She’d seen Juice’s bike parked outside and wasn’t enthused, and when she could hear their laughter from the hallway, she had the feeling that he wasn’t going to be in a rush to get back to the clubhouse or go home.
She looked about as exhausted and frustrated as she felt. She’d gone and tracked down her father, which did nothing to help the current situation. On top of him being upset about how she was handling the whole protection side of things, he was mad that she had gone out on a manhunt to find him, completely defeating the purpose of having someone keeping her safe.
“You don’t have to stay, you know,” she skipped over the pleasantries and got right to the point, “With the two of us here we should be alright.”
“I, uh, I don’t mind,” Juice didn’t know why he found Diedra to be just as intimidating as her father, but he did, “I can hang out a little longer.”
She shrugged, not looking to argue about it, “Suit yourself,” she looked at her sister, “I’m gonna go shower.”
Dakota gave a wordless nod and watched her sister disappear to the other end of the apartment. She let out a sigh and shook her head—she didn’t know the details of her older sister’s day, but she didn’t have to. Dakota could tell from the moment she walked in that the day hadn’t gone in her favor. She’d try to be there for her if she thought it would get either of them anywhere, but if there was one thing that she’d learned about her sister in all their years growing up together, was that those kinds of things happened on Diedra’s terms, and no one else’s.
“She always this cheery?” Juice asked with tiny smirk, “Or just when I’m around?”
Dakota laughed, shaking her head, “It has nothing to do with you, personally. It’s…complicated. Honestly, she’s gotta like you on some level because she hasn’t threatened you yet. But either way,” she reached and rested her hand on his for a moment, “I’m glad you’re here.”
The touch was light and momentary but Juice felt it course through his entire body. He cleared his throat, trying to do anything besides stare at his hands, “Well that’s…that’s nice to hear.”
“And not that I’m trying to rush you out, but for the sake of your own self-esteem,” there was a playful smile on her face, “you might wanna just head out and come back in the morning. She’ll be a little cooled off by then.”
He nodded, “Yea, yea okay,” he hopped up and they both made their way towards the door, “Lock it behind me.”
She rolled her eyes, “Yea, I’ve done this before.”
He stood in the hallway for a moment as Dakota leaned against the doorframe, a smile beginning to tug at the edges of her mouth. He wanted to reach out and hug her, but he knew better. He shoved his hands into his pockets to fight the urge.
“I’ll see you in the morning, then?” she asked.
He nodded, “I’ll be here bright and early.”
She laughed, “I’ll have coffee ready, then,” she paused, “Goodnight, Juan.”
He smiled, “Goodnight.”
A little while later, when Dakota was already in bed scrolling on her phone, there was a knock on her bedroom door. She turned on the light and called for her sister to come in. When the door opened, Diedra was standing there wrapped in her towel, clothes draped over her arm as she propped herself against the side of the door.
“You all good?”
Dakota propped herself up on her elbows, nodding, “Yea, yea I’m good. You good?”
She shrugged, “I’ll be alright.”
“You wanna talk about it?”
“Pfft,” her annoyance wasn’t aimed at her sister, “Nothing to say. Same shit,” there was a beat of silence, “Juice stay here with you all day?”
She nodded, “Yea. I know you don’t like him but he seems swe—”
“It’s not that I don’t like him,” she let out a small sigh, “the whole situation is just a fuckin’ mess. Plus you and I are adults—we don’t need fucking babysitters.”
Dakota couldn’t do anything besides nod, “I know. I just, I don’t see the point in fighting it if we’re just gonna lose.”
“You’re only fine with it because they saddled you with the pretty boy,” a knowing smirk crossed Diedra’s face for a moment.
Her little sister laughed, “Certainly doesn’t hurt to have something nice to look at in a pseudo-lockdown.”
“Mhm,” she shook her head, “Just don’t do anything stupid, alright?”
“Never,” she laughed, “Love you.”
“Love you.”
With that she shut the door and made her way off to her own room. Dakota flopped back down onto her pillow with a sigh, trying to get everything in order in her head. All she ever really wanted to do was keep the peace, but it was practically an impossible task at this point so she wondered what the use was in even trying anymore.
True to her word, the next morning there was already a pot of coffee made by the time that Juice got there. Truthfully, she’d just set an alarm specifically for that purpose and then gone right back to bed. That was made evident to him by the fact that she answered the door half-asleep, hair still a bit of a frizzy mess from a night of tossing and turning. She smiled and waved him in but didn’t say much of anything, wordlessly gesturing to the coffee pot to let him know to help himself.
“Not a morning person?” he chuckled.
She shook her head, running her hands down her face, “No, that’s always been Di’s thing. I’m a night owl.”
As if on cue, Diedra came bounding into the apartment, headphones still on and drenched in sweat from her run and workout that morning. She saw Juice standing in the kitchen and offered him a slight nod as she made her way directly to the bathroom to shower. She lightly patted Dakota on the back as she walked by, letting the gesture serve as her greeting for the morning.
“So,” Juice drummed his fingers on the edge of the counter as he watched Dakota pour them each a cup of coffee, “what’s the plan for today?”
She shrugged as she slid it across to him, “You tell me,” she took a sip, “I got some school shit I gotta do, but I can do it here or at the clubhouse if that’s better. I still don’t know what the fuck is going on, so I’m following your lead on this.”
No one had ever said those words in that order to him before. He took a long drink out of his coffee cup to buy himself a few extra seconds to think, “Um, I mean, clubhouse would probably be best. More people around,” his eyes flicked towards the other end of the apartment, “I’m guessing your sister is just gonna…”
“Do whatever she wants to do?” she laughed, nodding, “Sounds about right,” she stretched, taking a deep breath, “Alright. Let me get ready and we can head out.”
“Okay,” he sat down at the counter, “No rush or anything.”
While he was finishing his coffee and waiting for Dakota to get ready, her sister emerged back into the kitchen, no longer in her sweaty workout clothes. She had on a baggy hoodie and a pair of running shorts, hair still down and damp as she opened the fridge to start pulling together her smoothie for the morning.
“Where you two crazy kids off to today?” she asked as she set everything on the counter.
“Just to the clubhouse,” he paused, trying to figure out if she should ask what he was about to ask, “You?”
She glanced back over her shoulder, her expression serious for a moment before she cracked the smallest of smiles, “I’ll be around. Got some shit I gotta handle.”
“Anything I can—”
“All you gotta worry about is my sister and the club, Juice,” her tone was firm, but not mean.
Before he could say anything more, Dakota walked back out into the kitchen. She looked back and forth between her sister and Juice, surprised at the lack of tension in the room. There wasn’t the fear of god in Juice’s eyes the way there had been the night before.
“We’re gonna head out,” she gave Juice a slight nod towards the door before looking back at her sister, “Text me when you get where you’re going?”
She nodded, “Sure thing. Don’t let him wipe out on the bike.”
Dakota laughed as she looked over at Juice, “Well, guess we’re taking the bike.”
Dakota made herself comfortable at one of the tables in the clubhouse. She had her headphones on and her schoolwork spread out across the table in front of her. Between her notebooks and her laptop, there was just enough room for Juice and his computer on the other side of the table. Every now and then she’d look up and catch him staring at her, and she’d offer up a smile before diving back into her work. Juice wanted to ask her about it, wanted just about any reason to listen to her talk, but he stopped himself.
It was late in the afternoon when she finally leaned back in her chair, taking her headphones off with a groan. She ran her hands down her face as she shook her head, trying to get her brain to slow down. Juice looked up at her, chuckling quietly.
“It’s going that well, huh?”
“Go back to school they said. It’ll be good for you they said,” she laughed, rolling her eyes, “Fuck this. I don’t know why I’m paying to suffer.”
Juice couldn’t help but to laugh, “Sorry it’s so rough.”
She shrugged, “It’s fine. I just need to complain about it sometimes,” she smiled at him, “And since you’re the one who is stuck with me, you’re the one who has to hear it. Sorry.”
“You can complain as much as you want,” a smirk tugged at his lips as he drummed his fingers on the table, “I don’t mind.”
That was the routine that they fell into for the next week. Each morning Juice would show up at her apartment, make small-talk with Diedra that got less and less awkward as the days went on, and then they’d head to the clubhouse once Dakota was ready. On the days when Juice was actually working at T-M, Dakota would set herself up at the picnic table outside, or if she was just reading, she would find an empty chair in the garage to sit in so that the two of them would stay close. It wasn’t that they really needed to talk all that much, but the proximity was nice. And, for the time being, they had the cover of the fact that he was supposed to be keeping an eye on her.
In the midst of a sea of fleeting touches and soft smiles, neither of them brought themselves to say anything to address all the feelings that were bubbling up. A few times, Juice almost did. There were moments, after he’d park his bike at the clubhouse or her apartment, and she’d leave her arms wrapped around him a little longer than necessary. She’d keep herself flush against his back despite the fact that she didn’t need to anymore, and he’d almost get the nerve to say something to her. But it never quite happened. He’d see her reading, taking notes on something that was way above his paygrade, and every square inch of his brain would scream at him to tell her that she’s beautiful, but the words always got caught in his throat.
“Guess what,” Diedra strode over to the picnic table where her sister was sitting, laptop set up in front of her for class.
She looked up, eyebrows raised, “What’s up?”
“As of,” she looked at the time on her phone, “One hour and twenty-five minutes ago, we are no longer on fake, need-a-babysitter lockdown.”
Dakota laughed, shaking her head, “I don’t think that you ever really were.”
“Yea, well,” Diedra laughed as she swiped up her sister’s drink and took a sip of it, “now Dad can’t keep giving me shit about it. So that’s a plus,” there were a few beats of silence, “You gonna break the news to pretty boy over there? Or you gonna let the club do it?”
She smiled, shaking her head, “No news to break. Shit will just go back to business as usual.”
“He’s gonna be real fuckin’ bummed about it, you know.”
She arched one eyebrow, “Why does it feel like you’re encouraging this?”
“He seems less shitty than most the other guys you’ve brought around.”
“We’re not even—”
“I know,” Diedra chuckled, “I know you’re not. But he’s chomping at the fuckin’ bit so I’d say something before he thinks that he’s completely lost his shot.”
Dakota’s nails clacked on the surface of the picnic table as she tapped them, clearly thinking about everything her sister had said to her. Diedra walked away, letting her little sister mull over what she had said.
As the afternoon was drawing to a close, the guys all came out of church into the main expanse of the clubhouse. Everyone was whooping and hollering, and it was clear that whatever the issue it was that had arisen, had been taken care of. Everyone else who was already at the clubhouse joined in on the cheering, despite not knowing all of the details.
Diedra and Dakota were camped out at the bar, each of them smiling and shaking their heads because they knew the antics that were about to ensue. The music immediately got louder and the prospect behind the bar skipped over grabbing glasses and just took out a few entire bottles of liquor to set on the counter for the guys to grab.
After a few minutes of the initial chaos, Dakota felt someone’s hand land on her shoulder. She turned around, expecting to see Juice, but instead came face-to-face with her father. She smiled up at him as she took a sip of her beer.
“Glad everything got sorted.”
He nodded, “For now,” there was a pause as he looked her over, “You’re alright?”
She laughed, “Yea, Dad, I’m alright. I’m not the person at the top of the priority list for anyone who is out to get you. And even if I was,” she nodded towards her sister who was now at the other end of the bar in a heated discussion with Tig about something, “between Di and Juan, no one was getting to me.”
His brows furrowed when he heard her refer to him by his real name, “He didn’t do anything fucking stupid, did he?”
She almost choked on her beer, shaking her head, “No, no he didn’t. Jesus Christ, Dad, cut the kid some slack.”
“Alright,” he nodded, pulling her in and placing a chaste kiss to her forehead, “I love you.”
She chuckled, nodding, “I love you too.”
Happy disappeared into the crowd and it was only a few moments before the stool beside her became occupied. She glanced over, a smile spreading across her face when she saw the person she’d been expecting originally.
“Congrats on, well,” she chuckled, “whatever you guys did.”
Juice smiled, shaking his head, “Just keeping ourselves alive and outta jail for another day. That’s all,” he paused as he took the beer bottle being handed to him by the man on the other side of the bar, “Guess you’ll finally be able to go and get your pedicures now.”
She laughed, “Yea I guess so. The invite is still open if you wanna come with me. It’s quite the experience.”
“Tempting,” he leaned onto the bar, letting his elbows rest on it, “But I think I’m good.”
“You know, even if you don’t want to go and get pedicures with me,” she sipped on her beer, “We could find something else to do that we could both enjoy.”
He looked over at her, a tentative smile on his face, “Yea?”
She shrugged, “Yea. Preferably something not early in the morning. I’d love to go back to sleeping in,” she couldn’t help but to laugh.
“You didn’t have to wake up early, you know.”
“Yea, but, I wanted to. I…I like spending time with you.”
That statement hung in the air for a few seconds before she gently nudged his knee with her own. It snapped him out of whatever train of thought he was trapped in, his eyes searching hers waiting to figure out the next move. She smiled, a quiet laugh passing her lips before she leaned in and kissed him, her hand coming to rest on the back of his head.
Shock went through his body for a moment as he forced himself to realize that it was really happening, that it wasn’t just a dream. His hand lightly gripped onto her thigh as he let himself lean into her. When she pulled her lips off of his, they each laughed, the sound of it soft against the raucous noise of the clubhouse.
“I’m free tomorrow,” Juice forced out through the surprise coursing through his system, “If…if you wanted to do something.”
Dakota laughed, leaning back onto her seat but letting her hand tangle up with his, “Yea, I could do something tomorrow.”
“Afternoon?” he said with a laugh.
“Yea,” she laughed and gave his hand a squeeze, “Tomorrow afternoon is good.”
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