He nods.
My brother doesn’t speak much on a good day, but when he’s in his Terminator mode, he doesn’t say a word. It’s like he doesn’t want to waste any energy on talking when he can add it to his punches.
The two of us walk up to the clubhouse like we own the place. The Outlaws don’t know us, so we’ve left our cuts with our bikes and are walking in the front door while the rest of the Heartlands prepare to ambush them from behind after we’ve distracted them.
A few of our prospects are stationed across the street with the guns, ready to hand them out if things get hot.
It’s around eleven o’clock at night and the bar is loud and packed. Shiny bikes are lined up along the outer wall and I grit my teeth, wondering which one belongs to Gunner. I have a strong desire to shove it up his ass.
I’m picturing the black around Stella’s beautiful green eye as we walk into the bar and look around. It’s a standard biker dive bar. Shitty music. Empty beer bottles everywhere. Bikers getting hammered.
A big burly biker with an Outlaw cut on and a big long red beard steps up to us almost immediately. “Who the fuck are you guys?”
Beckham stares him down as I look around for Gunner.
“You pussies lost?” he asks in a threatening tone.
“Where’s Gunner?” I ask.
He steps up to me and pokes a finger into my chest. “Who the fuck is asking?”
I grin as I look down at his finger that’s digging into my left pec. “If you want to keep your finger, I suggest you move it and tell me where Gunner is.”
“What the fuck are you going to do?” he hollers.
“Nothing,” I say with a shrug. “But my pit-bull of a brother here will bite it off if you don’t remove it in three, two, one…”
The big lug doesn’t remove it, so Beckham grabs his beard and yanks him forward. The rest of the bikers start to notice and begin crowding around, looking for trouble.
I’m scanning their leather cuts, looking for a name, looking for a title, looking for the man who’s about to have taken his last breath.
The big guy starts to fight Beckham and my brother knocks him out cold with one hard punch to the temple. He falls to the floor and the bar erupts.
I kick a guy in the chest as he advances on me and then grab a beer bottle and break it over the head of another guy.
It’s chaos as the women and non-bikers flee out the door. The Outlaws swarm us.
Out of the corner of my eye, I see someone hit Beckham on the head with a glass ashtray.
I clock two men in the chins, dropping them both. A third guy rushes at me, but just before he arrives, the man who hit Beckham with the ashtray comes flying through the air and collides into him.
I’m taking a couple of hits as I fight back. They’re everywhere.
One name keeps repeating in my head, urging me on.
Gunner. Gunner. Gunner.
I want my vengeance.
The back doors explode open and the backup pours in, attacking the advancing bikers from behind. Finally, we get a bit of room to move. Beckham is bleeding from his temple, but he’s in the zone, dropping every biker he can get his hands on.
Sometimes, I think my brother would have been better suited to be born in the Roman Gladiator days. He would have been the most famous man in Rome.
I step back for a second and just admire his work as he slams a man’s head into the bar and then elbows someone else in the face. I’m lucky my older brother has always been nice to me or I wouldn’t have survived my childhood.
It’s then that something catches my eye.
President is written on the cut of the man swinging a pool cue at one of my Heartland brothers.
My eyes are locked on him as he swings it, hitting nothing but air, and I see his name.
Gunner.
My jaw clenches. With fists squeezed tight and blood boiling, I storm over there.
I cut through the chaos and focus on him. There’s a pounding in my ears as adrenaline rushes through me.
I was born to protect Stella. This is what I was put on the earth to do.
I was made for this moment.
Buzz is fighting him, dodging the swinging pool cue with his fists in the air.
“Buzz,” I say as I put my hand on his shoulder. “This fucker is mine.”
He doesn’t argue. He just looks at the rage in my eyes and moves on.
“You want some too?” Gunner asks as his grip tightens on the pool cue.
He swings it and I raise my forearm letting it slam into me. I grin, feeling the stinging pain and letting it amplify my rage.
“You laid hands on my girl,” I growl as he swings the pool cue back, ready to hit me again.
“That skank waitress?” he asks with a snarl. “I should have fucked her on the bar. She was begging me for it.”
The rage snaps inside me and I lunge on him. He tries to fight back, but there’s no way. I’m overpowering him in every way because I’m fighting for my girl.
A few hard punches, sends him falling to the floor with me landing on top of him. I crack my elbows into his jaw and then he reaches into his boot and pulls out a knife.
I grab his wrist as he tries to stab me with it.
“All this over a stupid club slut?” he hisses as we fight over the knife. “Fuck her and fuck you!”
His arm shoots up and my grip slips. He’s about to stab me in the stomach when I block his arm with mine and plunge the blade into his heart.
“No one touches my Stella,” I whisper as I stand up over his body and watch him die.
The rest of The Outlaws are fleeing out the door
