GUNNER: Southside Skulls Motorcycle Club (Southside Skulls MC Romance Book 3)

by Jessie Cooke

  The music got louder, and he could hear voices and laughter the closer he got to the end of the hallway. He took a deep breath before stepping out into the open. His experience on the boat had left him with a slight case of PTSD. He took a step out into a crowded room that resembled the great room of the Southside Skulls clubhouse. There was a long bar along one wall, pool tables, dartboards, television sets, and comfy-looking furniture. A jukebox was blaring heavy metal music and people were milling around everywhere. The difference he saw here from the clubhouse in Massachusetts was that there seemed to be at least a dozen families. Kids chased each other around and a couple of toddlers sat in playpens and chewed on teething toys. One woman sat on the edge of one of the recliners breast-feeding an infant. The smell of weed hung in the air but he didn’t see anyone smoking, and the only people drinking were those sitting up at the bar.

  “What the fuck are you doing in here?” Gunner started at the sound of the voice. He turned to see 8Ball glaring down at him. He was still surprised that he hadn’t remembered how fucking tall the guy was. The day-and-a-half ride in the van had been uncomfortable as hell with 8Ball and two other patched members of the Brownsville chapter glaring at him and watching his every move. Cody’s and Jimmy’s presence had probably kept them from leaving him along the side of the road before they hit the border, and Tamara and Billy had at least been there for company. But now that he was on his own, he was glad he’d taken his pain meds at breakfast time so his muscles were at least loose if he needed them.

  “I got restless,” Gunner said. “Is it not okay for me to be in here?” He was doing his best to make better choices. The best choice here seemed to be showing respect to the people that were feeding, housing, and protecting him and his friends, at least for now.

  8Ball continued to stare him down. Gunner forced himself not to look away. He wanted to show respect, but he wanted to make sure they didn’t mistake it for fear. At last the other man said, “You better have one of them prospects show you where you can and can’t go before you wander into trouble. You seem like you attract that shit. And don’t fuck with anyone’s woman, you got that?”

  “Got it,” Gunner said, suppressing the smile that pulled at his lips and would probably end with his losing a few teeth. He had to wonder why 8Ball was still so pissed about Mary Beth giving him head. From what Tamara said, he was used to sharing her. It must be the idea of sharing her with someone without a patch that he didn’t like. Gunner didn’t have to worry about it either way. There was only one woman on his mind, and when 8Ball finally walked away and left him alone, he scanned the room for her. When he didn’t find her, he went over to the bar where Patty was pouring shots. No one at the bar spoke to him as he took a seat on one of the stools, but they all seemed to be staring him down. He saw one of the girls that had been bringing him food and he smiled at her. She looked away, acting like she had no idea who he was.

  “Hey, Adam, you want some juice?” Patty didn’t have a sweet, maternal bone in her body; at least not one she ever let come to the surface. But now, while Gunner was surrounded by men that he just might not survive any encounter with, she wanted to call him Adam and offer him juice. He sunk a little lower on his stool and said:

  “I could use a shot.”

  “You’re still on medication.” That came from behind him, not Patty. He turned toward Tamara’s voice, and suddenly being babied didn’t seem so bad. He smiled at her and said:

  “It was worth a shot. Patty, I’d love some juice.” Patty rolled her eyes at him and poured him a glass of cranberry juice. Gunner noticed her making eyes at the old guy at the end of the bar as she sat the juice down in front of him. He wasn’t surprised to see “Louie” stitched on the front of the man’s kutte. “It’s good to see you,” Gunner said to Tamara. “I was getting a little worried.”

  She shooed the prospect on the stool next to him away like he was a fly. Gunner suppressed another grin as she took his place without even looking the poor guy in the face. “You were worried about me, or worried you were here all alone?” She had a sly little grin on her face. Gunner looked around the crowded room again and with a smile of his own he said:

  “A little of both, I guess. No one seems to like me much.”

  “You know how it is,” she said. “A lot of rumors circulating right now while no one has anything better to do. People get a little crazy during lockdowns. You want to take a walk?”

  “God, I’d love to.”

  “Come on,” she said as she stood up. “You can bring your juice.” She was poking fun at him. Gunner picked up the juice and drank it down like a shot. Winking at her he said:

  “I think that’ll hold me until we get back.”

  He followed her toward the front door of the clubhouse. She was wearing tight blue jeans and he willed himself not to stare at her ass. It seemed like all eyes were still on them, and he wasn’t looking to get shot again. Instead he looked at her pretty hair that lay softly against the back of her t-shirt and imagined running his fingers through the soft blonde highlights. That led to him thinking about running his hands down across her shoulders and then her breasts. He almost had to close his eyes and picture something ugly, but then he saw 8Ball standing by the door. That worked.

  “Tammy, honey, where are you going?” Gunner didn’t like the way 8Ball called her “honey” or “sweetie” or sometimes even “princess.” He’d done that a lot on their trip back in the van. Tammy didn’t seem to be bothered by it, but she didn’t seem to be impressed with it either.

  “Taking a walk, 8Ball.”

  “You sure that’s a good idea?” His eyes were on Gunner again.

  “Good or bad, it’s mine to make,” she said, smugly. She knew how to use her status as Randall’s daughter, that was for sure.

  “Well, of course it is, but shouldn’t your enforcer be with you, is all I’m saying.”

  “My enforcer is Wolf and he’s manning the tower as we speak. I can’t imagine any safer time to take a walk. Now, if you’ll excuse us please, 8Ball, I’d appreciate it.”

  He stepped aside, shooting another deadly look in Gunner’s direction. Gunner didn’t hold back his smile that time. He was sure before this was over he’d have to fight 8Ball again. He hoped he had time to completely recover first, and he was damned sure going be sober. He’d love nothing more than to beat that guy’s ass.

  Gunner walked next to Tamara, past a row of Harleys parked out in front of the brick clubhouse. The Texas hills surrounded the compound, and the sun was just getting low enough in the sky to dip down behind them. It cast a glow across the chrome of the hogs that was almost blinding. Tamara led him to a cobblestone path and they walked in silence toward a large shop. The doors were open, and a few men were inside working on bikes or cars, or just hanging out and drinking beer. They all said hello to Tamara and she greeted each one of them by name. Gunner got the same kind of looks from them that the guys inside had given him. Once they were past the shop he said:

  “So, I haven’t seen your father or brother or any of the guys that were in San Antonio with them.”

  “Dad’s here. He’s up at his house, I think.” She gestured toward a small hill about half a mile away. There was a nice white wood and brick colonial style house surrounded by a white fence with horses grazing in the front. It wasn’t at all what Gunner would have expected for Russell Covey’s residence and, if not for the gun towers on either side of it, it could have been a picture on the front of Good Housekeeping.

  “Oh, nice house.”

  “Yeah. He built it for my mom,” she said, sadly. “Anyways, Tommy went out with the enforcers today. I’m not privy to club business but it’s a safe bet that they’re wreaking havoc on Eddie’s businesses.”

  “Before all of this happened with the fight and Eddie’s money…do you think it would have come to this, if not for that?”

  She stopped walking and looked at him. “You have to stop feeling guilty. This is not your fault. The Head Hun
ters have stayed out of San Antonio, and for a while Eddie stayed out of our territory, but for the past couple of years he’s been slowly moving back in. He’s got teenagers out here in the hill country boosting luxury cars. He’s got a couple of his loan sharks working the businesses out here. When I was in nursing school I even heard he had some of his kids pushing drugs at the middle school. Swinger has been out of town a lot lately. I’m not sure what’s up with that, but he’s taken a lot of our enforcers with him and Dad’s been left to deal with things here. He’s confident enough to run the little bastards out of the county, but he was doing his best not to go to war with them while the club was split. All this business with you pushed him into making a decision he would have had to ultimately make anyway. Swinger and the rest of the enforcers are headed back. They should be here by tomorrow and in the meantime, every chapter in Texas has sent guys in to help, along with alliances. Eddie Martini might be powerful, but in the end, we’ll overwhelm him just in sheer numbers, I’m sure of it.”

  “That’s good to know.”

  The loud boom of a gunshot and then multiple gunshots pierced the air around him and cut off his words. Gunner moved to cover Tamara with his body, taking her to the ground in the process. The gunshots popped from out near the front gate, and then the towers for several seconds, and then stopped just as abruptly. That was when they heard the rumble of Harley pipes as a pack of them approached from the gates. Tamara pushed at Gunner’s chest until he moved off her enough so she could see what was going on. Men with weapons were running out of the clubhouse and everyone was talking in loud voices as the Harleys came to a stop and killed their engines.

  “What the hell is going on?” she said.

  Gunner saw the man fall sideways off his bike before Tamara did. He wasn’t sure from the distance they were at, but it looked a lot like Tommy. The other men were gathering around him and there was more shouting. Some of the men were jumping on their bikes and heading for the front gates. “I think someone’s hurt,” he said cautiously. That was when Tamara looked at the bike next to the group of men. She let out a little cry that sounded painful.

  “Tommy! That’s Tommy’s Softail! Gunner, it’s Tommy!”

  29

  When Gunner and Tamara made it up to where the group of men were huddled around, she began to claw and push them out of her way until they’d made a path and she could see Tommy lying on his back in the dirt with blood bubbling up out of a hole in his stomach. “What happened?”

  “They were waiting for us across from the gates. They opened fire, but just on Tommy. They weren’t even aiming for the rest of us,” one of the guys told her.

  “Well, what the fuck are you idiots doing just standing here? You want to watch him die? Call a fucking ambulance!” She was screaming at them as she pulled off her t-shirt and used it to apply pressure to Tommy’s wound.

  “Tammy, if we call an ambulance the law comes with them.”

  “So you let my brother lie here in the dirt and die? Are you fucking insane? Gunner, go inside and tell one of the old ladies to call an ambulance and my dad.”

  Gunner started toward the clubhouse. 8Ball and another guy with long greasy hair stepped in front of him. He told them, “I don’t think we have time to fuck around right now, boys. Move aside.”

  “8Ball, I swear to god if Tommy dies I will kill you myself,” Tamara screamed. He still didn’t move. Gunner pulled back his fist and the guy with the greasy hair landed a punch right in his side where his stitches were. The punch that Gunner landed on the side of 8Ball’s face wasn’t as hard as he’d planned for it to be, but he was pissed and in pain so his adrenaline was beginning to kick in. He grabbed the smaller guy with the greasy hair by the throat with one hand, and at the same time he brought up his knee, hitting 8Ball in the gut while he was still reeling from the punch. A few of the other guys started to move in on him and Tamara screamed again, “He’s dying, you fucks! Leave Gunner alone and help me get him to a hospital!” The doors to the clubhouse swung open then and Billy was looking at Gunner wide-eyed as 8Ball crumpled at his feet and the other guy was still fighting for breath.

  “Billy, tell someone to call Randall and an ambulance. Tommy’s been shot.” Billy didn’t hesitate to turn around and go back inside. The other bikers advancing on Gunner had stopped at Tamara’s urging, and one of them had knelt beside her asking what she needed him to do. She had him hold the t-shirt while she checked Tommy’s pulse.

  “Shit!” She put her small hands in the center of Tommy’s big chest and started pressing down. Gunner had never seen anyone perform CPR in real life, but it didn’t look to him like she was strong enough to compress her brother’s big chest. He let go of the biker and scrambled down next to her and said:

  “Here, let me do it.” She nodded and moved her hands. He put his exactly where hers had been and started doing what he’d seen her do. She was breathing into Tommy’s mouth and the other biker was doing his best to keep the blood from squirting out with every compression. That was the scene Randall rode up on. He jumped off his bike followed by two other men.

  “Jesus fuck! What happened?” His words were drowned out by the sounds of approaching sirens. The sound of them seemed to make him forget Tommy for a second and he said, “Who called the fucking cops?”

  That was when Tamara looked up at him. There was fire in her eyes. “Are you fucking kidding me? I told them to call an ambulance. Your son is dying.” Gunner kept doing what he was doing until the ambulance drove in and he was pushed out of the way by one of the medics. That was when he looked around and realized all the men that had been standing around were gone except for 8Ball and his sidekick. Gunner hadn’t seen them disburse, but he assumed they had plenty of practice making weapons and other things disappear when the cops were around. So far, the front gates were holding the cops off, but it wouldn’t be long before they got there.

  Tamara was still wholly focused on Tommy as the medics worked on him, and Gunner saw Randall standing a few feet away, on the phone, eyes focused on what was happening to Tommy as well. One of the medics was starting an IV, and the other was putting a pressure bandage on his wound. That one was on the phone with the hospital and Gunner heard him say that Tommy had a “weak pulse” and his blood pressure was “bottoming out.” Gunner had no medical knowledge but he knew as bad as that sounded, it meant Tommy was alive, at least for now.

  Once they had him somewhat stabilized, they loaded him onto a gurney and into the ambulance. That was when Gunner heard Tamara amping up again. “He’s my brother! My twin!”

  “I’m sorry, miss, but it’s policy that no one can ride in the ambulance.”

  “I’m going with him!” Her voice was high-pitched and raspy. She sounded like she was on the verge of losing it. Randall ended his call and went over to Tamara. “I’m going with him,” she screamed at her father.

  “Come on, Tammy, we’ll follow them,” Randall told her. He snapped out orders to two of the enforcers standing by to follow the ambulance. The other two were already on their bikes waiting for Randall. He gently but firmly pulled Tamara back from the doors so the medic could close them. He let go of her and she stood there frozen for a few seconds before finally turning toward Randall, who was already getting on his bike. Gunner was shocked when Tammy didn’t immediately get on the bike with her father. Instead she ran toward him and threw herself into his chest, sobbing. He cradled her in his arms as Randall started the Harley and gunned the engine impatiently. Gunner finally kissed her on top of her head and said:

  “You better go. I’ll find a way to get there, okay? Where are they taking him?”

  “San Antonio General,” she said. She took a small step back and looked up at him. Her golden-brown eyes were shining with tears and she had snot running down her face. Gunner wanted to take her back into his arms and keep her there, but the look on Randall’s face told him that might be suicide.

  “Go with your dad. I’ll find a way there, I promise.”


  “Please,” she said. It was a pitiful plea that tugged at his heart. He’d never had a sibling, so he could only imagine what she was feeling. He wasn’t even sure why he was the one she wanted there with her, but if that was what she wanted, he’d find a way even if he had to hitch a ride with the cops.

  “I promise,” he said. “Go.” She hugged him tightly again, then ran over and grabbed the helmet Randall was holding out to her. She climbed on the back of his bike and Randall took off toward the hills even as she was buckling it. Gunner watched them go, not surprised there was a way off the compound that would keep them from going past the cops still up at the gate. He turned around to face 8Ball and his friend then and noticed Billy had stepped back out of the clubhouse with his phone in his hand. He held it up toward Gunner but before he could say anything Gunner said, “I need a ride to San Antonio.”

  “Fuck you,” the one with the greasy hair spat out. Gunner looked at his vest. It said “Dogg” on the front of it.

  “Do you know who I am, Dogg?”

  “A piece of shit that has somehow wormed his way into this club. I don’t know what you’ve got on Randall but I’m finished kissing your Mexican ass.”

  Gunner smiled. “Puerto Rican,” he said with a purposeful accent. “I’ll fill you in on why I’m important to Randall and this club. First of all, Dax Marshall, the president of the Southside Skulls, who as I’m sure you know have a strong alliance with this club…he’s my brother. Doc Marshall was my father. Secondly, Randall is indebted to me for saving his daughter’s life.” That part wasn’t exactly true. Randall probably liked him less than the rest of them, but these dickheads didn’t need to know that. “Now, if either of you would like to fuck with Dax or Randall, then by all means go ahead and keep fucking with me. But if I were you, I’d make the smart, easy decision and tell me where I can get a bike and how I can get out of here without going through the front gates.”