Gunnar: A Motorcycle Club Romance

by Nina Levine

  He then spends hours kissing every inch of my body.

  Touching me.

  Slow fucking me.

  Showing me the love he still feels deeply for me.

  Mason’s preferred way of showing his love is with physical action, whether that be sex, or fighting for those he loves, or doing things for loved ones. Tonight, he shows me unequivocally how much he loves me, and I wonder how we’ll go on from here.

  26

  Gunnar

  Chelsea was right: spending a night with her was a bad fucking idea. I woke just after 5:00 a.m. and spent an hour watching her sleep before leaving the bed more fucked up than when I arrived at Alexa’s last night. I didn’t wake her even though fucking her was all I wanted to do, because each time I have her makes it fucking harder to walk away again.

  I don’t know what the fuck we’re doing here; all I know is I’m not going to survive it.

  “Mason.” Chelsea’s voice cuts through my thoughts as I shower.

  Turning, I find her joining me. Her hands are on my waist before I can stop her. Fuck, not that I want to stop her. That’s fucking evident in the way my hands automatically go to her body too.

  “Tell me what you’re thinking,” she says right before her lips find mine.

  Our kiss quickly grows urgent, and I push her up against the shower tiles as I begin to take what I need from her. When I finally drag my mouth away, I rest my forehead against hers and say, “The only thing I’m thinking is that this is a fucked up mess.”

  Her fingers dig into my waist and she nods. She doesn’t say anything, though. There’s nothing fucking to say, because I said it all.

  Fucked. Up. Mess.

  And yet, I know I’m going to keep taking every stolen moment she offers because I only want her, and I’ll take her any way I can get her.

  Fuck.

  Too much fucking thinking about shit I can’t change.

  I just need to fuck her.

  Lifting my head, I growl, “Turn around.” When she frowns, I take hold of her hips and turn her myself. Then, sliding a hand between her legs, I say, “I need to fuck you, Mayfair, and then I need to get the fuck out of here.”

  “Mason,” she starts, but I cut her off. I don’t want to hear anything she has to say today.

  “No,” I throw down between us, harshly, “We’re not fucking talking anymore. We did enough of that last night.” Fuck, we talked for fucking hours, and while I want decades more of talking with her, I’m not going to get that, so I don’t fucking want scraps of it from her.

  I push two fingers inside her. She’s already wet for me, and while I usually like to take my time with her, I don’t have that in me this morning.

  I fucking need to be inside her, and I fucking need that now.

  “Fuck!” I roar as I slam my dick as far as I can in her. “Fucking hell.”

  Chelsea presses her hands to the tiles and takes every thrust, every ounce of fury, every shred of hate I give. I love her so fucking much, but she’s not mine to give that to.

  This is all I have left to offer.

  After, I pull out of her and exit the shower without looking back. I find my clothes, dress, and get the fuck out of Alexa’s apartment, wondering how many days it’ll be before I’m back looking for more. Back begging her to dig around some more in the fucking hole in my chest she put there.

  “You look like shit,” J says at lunch when he takes the stool next to me at the clubhouse bar.

  I drink some of my beer. “I feel it, too.”

  “What’s going on, brother?”

  I look at him. “Should we call Madison and the girls? Maybe have a fucking sewing circle with them.”

  He arches his brows. “You’re a moody motherfucker lately, Gunnar.”

  “Yeah, and I don’t see that coming to an end any-fucking-time soon.”

  “Fuck, how long since you’ve been laid?”

  I suck back some more beer. “That’s the problem, brother. I had some this morning and I fucking shouldn’t have.”

  “What shouldn’t you have had this morning?” Nash asks, joining us.

  “Pussy,” J says.

  Nash frowns. “I can’t, for the fuckin’ life of me, think of one time I had pussy when I shouldn’t have.”

  J takes a swig of his beer. “Me either, brother.”

  “Gunnar!” Griff calls from the doorway. “Need you for a minute.”

  Thank fuck for Griff.

  I eye J. “Thanks for the pep talk. It was real fucking enlightening.”

  “What the fuck is wrong with him?” Nash says as I walk away.

  I tune them out as I head towards Griff. “What’s up?” I say when I reach him.

  “Got a stack of jobs I need you to pick up tomorrow. We’ll need to start early so I’ll need you to be here at six in the morning. You good with that?”

  I nod. “Yeah.” I’m more than good with that. Anything to take my mind off shit.

  He checks his watch. “Okay, good. I’ll see you then.”

  He heads down the hall towards the office and I make my way out to my bike. Scott okayed me to take the afternoon off to spend with Mum.

  She’s in bed when I arrive. My father lets me in and tells me to take my boots off before coming in. I tell him I fucking know his house rules before leaving my boots at the front door and stalking to their bedroom. With the mood I’m in today, we’ll be lucky not to go a fucking round.

  “Mason,” Mum says, turning her head on her pillow to meet my gaze as I enter the room.

  I walk around the bed and sit on the edge next to her. “How are you feeling?” My chest tightens as I trace my eyes over her face, noting how weak and exhausted she looks. I can’t fucking lose her to this shit, and as much as I don’t believe in imagining the worst when someone’s sick like she is, I’m fucking worried.

  She smiles, but it’s not a full-throttle smile. Not even fucking close. Reaching for my hand, she says, “Don’t worry about me, darling. Let me do the worrying. That’s a mother’s job, not a child’s.”

  “Fuck, Mum, you don’t need to waste your energy worrying about me. You need to keep all your energy for getting better.”

  “Please don’t use that language. You know I don’t like it.”

  She’s been telling me this for a good fifteen years, and still I fuck up. I always was the son who couldn’t get shit right.

  “Tell me what the doctor said.” Alexa told me she was seeing him this morning.

  A look passes in her eyes, the kind of look that I know means she’s hiding something from me. “He didn’t say much, just that he wants to keep an eye on me still.”

  “Don’t lie to me, Mum. What is it?”

  She watches me silently for longer than I know is good. Finally, she says, “I have nerve damage from the chemo. It’s just started, but the doctor says it can last for a long time and that it can get worse. He’s started me on new medication to try and help with it.”

  If I thought my chest was tight before, I had no fucking clue. Now it’s fucking tight. “What does that mean? Nerve damage? How does it affect you?” It doesn’t sound fucking good, that’s for damn sure.

  “I’m having trouble gripping things and am dropping things. My feet go numb and sometimes I have trouble walking too.” She squeezes my hand. “Please don’t worry about this. It’s common from what the doctor has said.”

  “Fuck, it doesn’t matter if it’s common or not, the fact is you have it, and I don’t fucking want you to have it.”

  She doesn’t bother to mention my language. Not this time. She’s my mother, after all, and she knows every piece of my soul, so she knows I’m fucking struggling here. “I know, darling, but I have faith in my doctors. I trust they know what they’re doing and will get me through this.”

  I want to punch something. Someone. Any-fucking-thing. And I sure as fuck want that doctor to take back this diagnosis. It’s bad enough that she has cancer; she doesn’t need to be dealing with this shi
t as well.

  I stand and pace beside her bed. My entire body is crowded with the kind of wild energy I need to get out, and since punching her walls is out of the question I’m left with pacing.

  “Mason.” She sits up. “Please come and sit with me. I want to hear about what you’ve been up to.”

  If my mother knew what I’ve been up to, she wouldn’t be asking me to tell her. I know that for sure. She raised me hoping I’d turn out to be a far different man than I’ve become, and while I am more than fucking good with who I am, I don’t share much of what I do with her.

  I sit and talk about the one thing we both love: her children. “Alexa got smashed last night while I fixed her showerhead that was leaking. And apparently, Calder’s still being an ass to her at work. You really need to have a word with him about that. She won’t stick around working with him if he keeps that shit up.”

  Her eyes widen. “Alexa got drunk on a weeknight?”

  I chuckle, my goal achieved. I’ll do anything to help take her mind off what she’s going through. “Don’t be so shocked, Mum. It’s not the first time and it won’t be the last.”

  “You kids will be the death of me,” she says, not realising what she’s saying. I fucking hope we’re the death of her, when she’s in her nineties, rather than this cancer taking her out.

  “Have you heard from Hayden? He was supposed to call me last week but didn’t.” I’m fairly fucking sure he’s too busy fucking his co-star to bother picking up the phone and calling me, but she doesn’t need to know that.

  “Oh yes, he called me last night,” she says before launching into a long story about how his movie is going.

  Mum likes the details in shit, so a story that takes her half an hour to tell is one that could be told in less than ten minutes, but I don’t give a fuck. I’ll sit here and listen to her for hours. And I do. By the time she falls asleep next to me, we’ve been talking for almost three hours.

  I move off the bed carefully so as not to wake her. After covering her with the blanket, I exit out into the hallway and head for the front door. I’ve got a head filled with a clutter of thoughts over her and am not thinking straight when Dad stops me halfway down the hall and says, “She doesn’t need you coming over and confusing her.”

  My eyes lock onto his. “The fuck does that mean?”

  “It means that I don’t want you coming over to see her.”

  I stare at him. How the fuck did I come from him? “You’re a piece of fucking work,” I snarl. “I’m coming over to see her. You’re not fucking stopping me.”

  “I wasn’t the one who stopped you coming to see her in the first place, son. That was your choice, and now you’ll see the consequences of your actions.”

  “What fucking consequences?”

  “Did you ever wonder where the cancer came from?”

  This is what my father does to me. What he does to all his children. He uses lies and manipulation to get what he wants, and often what he wants is to make his sons feel worthless. He may have achieved that goal often enough when we were kids, but since becoming men, not one of us buy into it anymore. However, we’ve each had to figure out how the fuck to deal with him and his bullshit, and my way was walking away from him. Unfortunately, that also meant I didn’t see my mother for a long time, and that, I fucking regret, but no fucking way am I going to stand here and take the blame for her cancer.

  “You’re a fucking doctor, are you now, Dad?” I shake my head at him. “Save the bullshit. I’m not fucking interested in hearing it.”

  His lips pull up in displeasure. “If there’s one thing I regret in my life, it’s bringing you into this world, Mason. You are not a Blaise as far as I’m concerned. Your mother was too damn lenient with you, allowing you to run wild all over the place when you were a kid. And with that girl too.”

  Every muscle in my body tenses. “That girl?”

  “Chelsea,” he snaps. “I imagine she’s as bad as her father. God only knows what her influence over you did. It’s the only thing I can put your bad behaviour down to because your mother and I did our damnedest to fix you and make you a real man.”

  I advance on him, my fists clenching by my side. “If you ever say another bad word about her, I will fucking make it so you don’t.”

  His nostrils flare. “I don’t know why you’re defending her. She showed you the whore she is when she left you and married Joe Hearst.”

  My fist is in his face before my brain catches up. He stumbles back before coming at me with his own fist. I block it before it connects with my face and hold it as I say, “I’m gonna walk the fuck out of here now before I do something I’ll regret.” I shove his hand away. “But if you ever fucking say something like that to me again, I won’t hold myself back again. And trust me, Dad, you might think you didn’t turn me into a real fucking man, but I sure as fuck fight like a motherfucker.There won’t be much left of you if I get my way.”

  I stalk out of the house, regretting the fact I let him off the fucking hook. I did that for my mother. Next time, all fucking bets are off.

  By the time I get home, I’m worked up over both of them. Mum’s news today has rattled me while Dad has angered me.

  I reach for the bottle of rum in my kitchen and pour myself a drink. Throwing it down my throat, I drink it all in two gulps. I pour another, and another. I’m a quarter of the way through the bottle when I place my hands on the kitchen counter and drop my head. Squeezing my eyes closed, I suck in some deep breaths.

  She’s not going to fucking die.

  I won’t fucking let her.

  Fuck.

  I push off from the counter and stride out to my garage. Ripping my shirt off, I punch the punching bag I’ve got set up in here.

  Again and again.

  Over and over until I can’t fucking breathe.

  It was light outside when I started; it’s now dark.

  And I don’t feel any fucking better.

  I can’t think straight. I can’t even begin to process one thought, let alone all of them.

  I go back into the kitchen and pour another drink. It’s sliding down my throat when I know what I fucking need. And fuck if I’m making shit happen before stopping to think it fucking through.

  27

  Chelsea

  Mason: I need you.

  I stare at my phone, re-reading Mason’s message over and over.

  He has never sent me a message like this, so I know it’s big, whatever’s causing him to tell me he needs me.

  Me: Where are you?

  Mason: At home.

  Me: I’m on my way.

  I take a moment to steady my thoughts.

  He was so angry with me this morning that I wasn’t sure when I’d see or hear from him again. I’ve spent today wondering if last night would be our last time together. I know it should be just as much as I know I’m not ready for that. We’re in a cycle now, and I don’t know how we’re going to get ourselves out of it.

  I grab my keys, purse, and phone, and head out to my car to drive to Mason’s place. I’m almost there when a call comes through from Joe. I want to ignore it, but I know he’ll keep calling until I answer.

  “Hi,” I say. “What’s up?” He’s not the kind of husband who calls me each night he’s away to see how my day was. He only calls when he wants to tell me to do something.

  “I need you to go into my study and locate some paperwork and email me a copy.”

  Shit. “I’m not at home, Joe.”

  “Where are you?”

  “I’m out at dinner.”

  “Who with?”

  “Alexa.”

  He’s silent for a beat. “How long until you’ll be home?”

  “I don’t know. We’ve just sat down.”

  “Chelsea, your job is to be by my side in everything I do. I need this paperwork.” He’s annoyed, that’s clear in his tone. But fuck him. My job isn’t to sit around and wait for orders.

  “It’s going to have to
wait. I’m not going home yet.” I’m not letting the man I actually love down. Not tonight when he needs me.

  “Let me know when you’re home.” He ends the call without another word, and I think about how much I truly despise him and how I really need to figure out his damn computer password. I tried again today, still with no luck. I’m going to dedicate hours to the task tomorrow before he comes home in the afternoon.

  I arrive at Mason’s house five minutes later, the familiarity of it rolling through me as I walk up the five stairs to his front veranda.

  I count each step, taking them slowly, my heart beating faster with each one.

  I remember the first day I visited him here. It was three days after the night we got together. I walked up these stairs that first time with butterflies in my stomach. Being with Mason was everything I ever dreamed of, from when I was younger and all the way through those eight years we weren’t friends. He was the boy I could never forget, the boy I still stalked on social media. I dreamed of a life with him in it, never actually thinking that would happen, and then there he was, in it.

  He was my everything.

  We talked about getting married, having kids, and growing old together.

  He told me he would never look at another girl ever again.

  I told him we would be buried together for eternity.

  We planned all the countries we would visit, all the bucket list items we wanted to tick off together, all the ways he’d fuck me when he was eighty, and still couldn’t get enough of me.

  We weren’t supposed to end up like this, with me walking up these stairs as anything but his girl.

  I reach his front door and knock, hating that I have to do that.

  We weren’t supposed to end up with me having to knock on this door.

  He opens it and I inhale sharply at the look of pure torment on his face.

  “Mayfair.” My name falls from his lips on a ragged breath, and I move without thought.

  I step inside and wrap my arms around him. I don’t know what’s happened, but I know this man needs me more than he’s ever needed me.