“What the f—what happened?” His father swore sparingly and didn’t like the word fuck, so Gunner tried not to use it around him. Funny; it was Gunner’s very favorite word.
“An excellent question. Lot of people want to know the answer. You took a bad beating. You remember that?”
As sleep packed up and left his aching mind, Gunner did remember. The Reverend and the Sheriff—sounded like some kind of fucked-up blues duo—and the deputies. And Leah. Fuck, he remembered Leah. The night they’d had. The ride. The scene at her house. Her father hitting her. The beating on the side of the road.
He’d gone to save her, and she’d turned him away.
He lifted a hand, meaning to rub his face, but he landed on stitches, which hurt, and the movement of his arm made something stab at his chest, and there was an IV thing stuck in the back of his hand—he dropped his hand back to the bed. “Yeah, I remember.”
His throat hurt, too. And fuck, he might actually be dying of thirst, now that he’d noticed.
“You want to tell me who? Why?”
No, he most certainly did not. “Just my shit, Dad. Can I get a drink of water?”
“Sorry. I can’t give you water. Maxwell, just my shit is not an answer. You almost died, son. You might still lose a kidney. It’s high time you get control of your shit before I lose another son. Do you hear me, boy?”
His father’s words quaked with emotion, and, shocked, Gunner focused and saw that his stoic, gritty old man was near tears. Sam Wesson was the kind of man people called ‘a rock.’ He rarely expressed any kind of emotion, no matter how good or bad things got. He wasn’t cold; Gunner had always felt his father’s love. But it wasn’t something on display. It just was. Like air. Invisible but constant. And necessary.
When Gunner’s mother and brother had died, his father hadn’t cried—nowhere anyone would have seen, at least. He’d simply gotten even more taciturn. For several months afterward, he’d barely spoken, but he’d otherwise lived his life as usual.
To see those faded blue eyes shimmer with unshed tears now shook Gunner with guilt. “I’m sorry. I know I’m fucked up. I don’t know how not to be.”
His father’s hard hand clutched his. But before he said anything more, Deb’s sleepy voice rose from behind him.
“Hey. He’s awake?” She stood up and stepped to their father’s side. “You’re awake.” With a smile, she added, “Loser.”
“Skank.”
Deb flicked his arm. “Delaney and a bunch of the guys have been waiting outside since you were in surgery. And…” She glanced at their father before she continued, “And Leah Campbell’s with them.”
“Leah’s here?” Gunner tried again to sit up, and failed again. Shit, this hurt—and there seemed to be a lot of wires and tubes. What all was wrong with him?
Again, his sister and father exchanged a look between them. Then their father pressed gently on his shoulder. “Take it easy, son. All this—it’s some way about the Campbell girl, ain’t it?”
“Dad, come on,” Deb protested. “Reverend Campbell couldn’t do this.”
“She’s here?” He couldn’t get past that one idea. Leah was here, waiting for him? In the night? How had that happened?
“She was. You want me to go out and see who’s still around?”
“Yeah. Yeah.” He tried harder to sit up, and something in his belly seemed to give. “Agh! Fuck.” A machine started beeping, and he fell back. “I need to see her.”
Deb went to the door. Their father stood where he was and held Gunner’s hand.
~oOo~
He didn’t get to see her right away. First, a male nurse came in, flipping a switch that flooded the room with white light, and checked his machines and his vitals. Gunner discovered that he was pissing into a bag that hung off the side of the bed. When the nurse lifted the bag to check its contents, Gunner saw that whatever was coming out of his kidneys through his dick was very, very wrong. That liquid seemed thick and had a brownish-red color.
“Looks a little better,” the nurse said and drained the bag into a tub, which he then carried into the bathroom.
Fuck, that was better? Maybe he didn’t want to see Leah. Not like this.
No, he totally wanted to see her. He needed to.
While the nurse was still puttering around the room, a young doctor came in. From her, he learned that the beating had done a whole lot of damage inside. He had two fractured ribs. They’d had to open him up in two places so they could close him up in four places inside. Including his stomach and one of his kidneys, which he might still lose, depending on whether it could resume function. Everybody seemed pleased that his urine had turned brown. Apparently he’d been pissing pure blood.
And he had a concussion and forty-seven stitches in his face and scalp. In the annals of beatings he’d taken, this one ranked pretty fucking high. His big ‘joke’ was that he had nine lives, like a cat. Gunner figured he was down to about three lives left.
He was in ‘serious but stable’ condition, whatever that meant. They were waiting to see if his kidney would recover, and watching for ‘sepsis,’ which had something to do with his stomach. He couldn’t have anything to eat or drink because of said kidney and stomach. Gunner was getting too tired and sore to follow all the doctor mumbo-jumbo closely. But Deb had asked the doctor approximately four billion questions, so he figured she had all the info in hand.
It came down to this: he was going to be out of commission for a good while. He’d only that day—or was it the day before?—gotten back on his bike after his broken hand, and he hadn’t even been officially cleared for it yet.
Delaney was going to bust a vein. Fucking hell, he could lose his patch over this.
~oOo~
When the doctor left, after describing some long-ass list of tests and procedures she was going to schedule, Gunner closed his eyes. On the other side of the window, morning was happening, but he was exhausted. He needed to hit the red button on his pain thing, and he still hadn’t seen Leah.
“I need Leah.”
“You need rest,” his sister countered. Their father had followed the doctor out of the room, peppering her with even more questions.
“Leah first.”
With his eyes still closed, he felt Deb’s hand on his. “Are you and she together? Is Dad right that what happened to you is about her?”
“Deb, let up. Get me Leah.”
“Okay.” She kissed his cheek and left.
In the moments that he was alone, Gunner tried to work his mind so that he could make sense of the past day or so, but the concussion still had him pretty scattered. The only thing he could seem to land on was Leah. She was here. It sounded like she’d been here all night. But she’d told him to go away.
When the door opened, unmuffling the busy sounds of the corridor, Gunner opened his eyes.
Delaney stood in the doorway. Very much not Leah. Nobody was listening to what he needed.
“Where’s Leah?” Would the president know who she was? Gunner didn’t fully understand what had been going on while people had been cutting him open and sewing him shut.
“You and me first, kid.” Delaney pushed the door completely closed and came to the side of Gunner’s bed. Crossing his arms over his chest, he asked, “Talked to your old man. You got yourself pretty fucked up. He says we almost lost you.”
Gunner’s father had been somewhat less than ecstatic when he’d signed on to prospect with the Bulls, but he hadn’t protested. He’d simply asked, after a long bout of processing silence, if Gunner was sure. He’d been sure, and that had been the end of it.
Over the years, in wending ways Gunner didn’t fully grasp, his club family and his blood family had made a connection—not deep, but true. It didn’t surprise him at all that his father had gone out to update his president.
“That’s what I hear,” he replied to Delaney’s statement. “But I’m okay.”
Delaney chuckled. “Son, you ain’t been okay as long
as I’ve known you.”
Not knowing whether that meant censure or concern, Gunner stayed quiet.
“Talk to me about this little girl who’s been waiting with us all night. This Leah. You got her twisted all the way up, son. My shoulder’s soggy from all her crying. She says this is her fault. I got her story, now I need yours.”
For maybe three seconds, Gunner considered icing Delaney out. What had happened between him and Leah was personal. Private. Even what had happened in Grant seemed like something he didn’t want to share and shouldn’t have to.
But that wasn’t really a choice. He’d been beaten near to death by Osage County law, and the president of the Brazen Bulls was standing at his hospital bed demanding to know why. What was more: Leah was here, she’d somehow come with the club, and she’d told Delaney…something. She’d blamed herself.
That was where he had to start, then. “It’s not her fault. Don’t blame her.”
“Talk it out, Gun. From the top. Everything you remember.”
Gunner he wasn’t sure where, exactly, the top was. So he started with finding her at the party. Once he started talking, he remembered everything, and it all fell into place. Knowing the kind of detail Delaney expected, Gunner told the story as vividly as his throbbing head and sore throat could manage. By the time he finished, Delaney had moved from the side of the bed to stare out the window. Rain struck the glass in spatters and streaks; the president seemed transfixed.
The silence got to be too much after a while. “I know you said I was out of chances after the thing at Terry’s last year. I know I fucked up.”
“Tell me something, Gun.” He turned and gave Gunner a hard look. “All this shit with the girl, it came on fast. But you’ve been grindin’ your gears all summer. I’ve been wonderin’ when you’d blow up. I’ve been trying to watch out for it, but you always seem to slip by me. So I need you to tell me something.”
“Okay.”
“Is there something there?”
Not sure what he was asking, Gunner didn’t know how to answer. Delaney came back to the side of the bed and crossed his arms again.
“You’ve been tryin’ to get yourself killed all the time I’ve known you, Gun. You’re like the fuckin’ Tasmanian Devil, turning into a psychotic dervish whenever who the fuck knows what sets you off. You’re a good kid, and you do good work, and you’re loyal as fuck. I love the shit out of you, but you try my patience, son.”
“I know. I’m s—”
Delaney threw up a hand. “Don’t. I know you’re sorry. I know you control what you can. But you need an anchor. I thought it would be the club, but we’re not enough. Maybe it’s that little girl out there, who don’t know shit about shit in the world. You never had a serious girl as long as I’ve known you, and now, out of nowhere, you about got yourself killed over this girl, after one damn night with her. Sitting with her in that waiting room, I think I finally figured you out. You need somebody to need you. Martin was that for you, wasn’t he?”
Gunner flinched hard at the sting of his brother’s name, and his belly flared hot pain. “Shut the fuck up, Prez.”
Delaney sat again in one of the chairs. He scooted it close to the bed. “Answer me, Gun. Did you look out for your brother?”
“Fuck you, D. Fuck you. Take my patch if you want it, but don’t fucking try to shrink my head.” Delaney was wrong, or at least not fully right, but it didn’t matter. Gunner didn’t want anybody digging their fingers in his brain, especially not to try to get ahold of his brother.
“Brian, that’s enough. Max needs to rest.”
Gunner’s father was back, and Gunner could have cried for relief. But he still didn’t have what he needed.
“What I fucking need is Leah!” He kicked out, sending the bed table rolling away with a clatter. A fiery pain in his belly and around his back stabbed through him and brought him enough calm that he settled again.
Delaney gave him a wry grin. “I don’t want your patch, Gun. I want you to have what you need so I don’t have to take it. I’ll go get your girl.”
~oOo~
Finally, finally, finally, when the door opened, it was Leah. She still wore the sweats he’d given her the day before. Her hair was lank and stringy, and she looked almost as tired as he felt. She was a sight for sore eyes.
His dad bowed out as she came in, and they were alone.
She came right to the bed. “You look even worse than yesterday.”
He grinned. “Well, thanks.”
Pink bloomed across her face. “No, I mean—I’m so sorry, Gunner.”
The right name sounded exactly right in her voice. “Not your fault.”
“It is. My dad…I think he made this happen.”
Gunner had known that much before the sheriff had landed his first punch. “Then it’s his fault, not yours.” Lifting a hand that felt about four times too heavy, he pulled on her crossed arms until she unwound them and he could hold her hand. “How are you here? I thought…I thought this couldn’t happen.”
“This?”
“Us. Leah, tell me what happened.” As far as he could see, she didn’t have more than the one bruise on her cheek.
Her eyes dropped to the blankets over his legs. “I…I told him everything.”
“Everything?”
“Well, not, like, details. But I told him the things I’ve done. I told him who I am.” Her laugh was among the sadder sounds he’d ever heard. “He didn’t like that much.”
“Fuck.” He pulled her hand, bringing it to his chest, pulling her closer. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah. I mean…I don’t know. He didn’t hurt me again, if that’s what you mean. It felt a little good, telling him the truth. But…” Whatever she’d planned to say faded out as she stared at their linked hands. “You almost died.”
“I’m impossible to kill.” He laughed—and shut it off when it made him hurt just about everywhere. “I know. I’ve tried.”
Her eyes flashed up to his. “What do you mean?”
“Nothin’. Leah, you still haven’t told me how you can be here.”
“I told my dad that I didn’t want to pretend I was just The Preacher’s Daughter anymore.” Whenever she said the words ‘The Preacher’s Daughter,’ they always sounded like they’d been capitalized, like a name or a title. “I told him—I told him I wanted to be with you. I mean, I know I shouldn’t have said that. I don’t even know how you feel. I don’t want you to think…I don’t know. But you don’t have to—don’t think I expect you to…to want to be with me.”
“I took a beating for you. Remember how I came and wanted you to come away with me?”
“Yeah.” The word had a misty sound.
“That should answer your question, then. But my question’s still hangin’ there, Leah.”
She pulled free of his hand and walked to the window. Just like Delaney, she watched the rain. “My dad is an alcoholic. A pretty bad one. Ever since my mom left. Maybe before that. Nobody knows. Maybe the mayor knows a little. They’re friends. But nobody else.”
Gunner had a vague memory of news from home, in his early Army days, about Mrs. Campbell disappearing. He’d been focused on other things at the time, and town gossip hadn’t ever held much interest for him, so it hadn’t made much of an impression. His mind conjured an image of the Reverend Campbell he’d grown up with. The man in his head was neatly dressed and polished, with a steady and kind demeanor. His most recent impression was a far distance from polished or steady, or kind, but he’d put that to a father’s worry for his missing daughter.
“Yeah?” he said, to encourage Leah to keep going with the story she’d so clearly begun.
“Yeah. I take care of him. He’ll fall apart without me. But he said some things yesterday that made me see that all he sees when he looks at me is his ‘angel.’ That’s what he calls me. He only sees the person who takes care of him. He doesn’t see me. Maybe he never did.” She turned and faced him. “Anyway, I told him I wante
d to be with you, and I was going to be with you, but that I wanted to still take care of him. He told me to pack a bag.”
“What? He fucking threw you out? Are you shitting me?” He started to sit up without thinking and dropped back when his body reminded him what a bad idea that was. That fucking machine behind him started to beep again.
She came back to the bed and set her hand on his shoulder. “Not exactly. He wanted me to stay, but in his way. He doesn’t want me. He wants his image of me. It’s hard to keep that up, and I can’t anymore. Especially after yesterday, I just can’t.” She made that sad laugh again. “Anyway, that’s how I can be here. I went to the clubhouse to make sure you were okay, and they were all looking for you. I told Delaney what happened, and Willa called and found you here. I came here with Mo and Willa.”
Twist (The Brazen Bulls MC Book 2) Page 15