Page 1 of Gunner

Chapter One

Gunner

January 2025

Sitting at the bar, my whiskey untouched in front of me, I watched the room. It wasn’t my night to be at The Queen’s Diamond, the bar in town. But I was here most weekends.

When Jack’s old lady Sam ended up in the hospital after some prick roofied her at this very bar, the Silver Shadows came up with a plan to have brothers sitting here on the weekends, watching over the patrons.

We wanted the women in town to be safe. They had a right to go out and have a drink without having to worry about being raped. But the real reason we were here instead of drinking at the clubhouse was to catch the son of a bitch who was doing it.

For months now, there had been reports of women being drugged at the bars in the towns surrounding Diamond Creek. When it happened here, to an old lady no less, it was time for us to step in.

We weren’t a large club compared to many around the country. Hell, we weren’t even large compared to the Mother Chapter in Arkansas, so we didn’t have the manpower to put brothers in bars all over this side of the state.

However, when it edged into our town, you could be damn sure we would put a stop to it.

Looking around, my eyes landed on one brother who had no business being here tonight.

Or any night right now.

Cash sat at a table in the corner, a bottle of whiskey in front of him. I had taken him off the roster because he couldn’t stay sober.

It had only been a week since his old lady died, and we all felt her death. No one knew she was sick. Well, sick wasn’t the right word. She’d had an aneurism in her brain that burst. No one had known. She hadn’t told anyone, and no one knew why.

Even Ryder, who was the closest thing she had to family, hadn’t known. That might have been the only thing that kept Cash from killing him when he signed the papers to donate her organs.

Rachel listed Ryder as her next of kin. I had my own theories as to why, but in the end, it didn’t matter. Rachel made her own decisions for her own reasons, and they should be respected.

Cash had been drinking since the day we buried her. Which was why he shouldn’t be here tonight.

“Hey, Gunner.”

Turning to Grace, I smiled.

“Hey, babe. How long’s he been here?” I asked, tipping my head toward the corner.

Grace turned and flashed a pained look at Cash. “A few hours.”

“How many bottles?”

“Only that one. I told him that was the only one he was getting,” she said with a sigh. Turning back to me, she asked, “Why wasn’t he taken off the schedule?”

“Schedule?” I asked, confused.

She gave me a look that said, ‘Do I look stupid?’

Silently cursing King, I relented. “We took him off the schedule, but King ordered the prospects to monitor his drinking, and since Cash can’t outrank King, I assume that’s why he came here.”

I should have known Grace would figure out what we were doing. King underestimated her, thinking she wouldn’t notice a sudden uptick in how often a brother was here. Usually, Johnny the prospect was the only one here on the nights she worked.

“If you want to call someone to come get him, I can knock him out,” she offered with a sparkle in her eye.

I knew what she meant.

Hell’s Inferno.

It was a whiskey distilled in Virginia by the Sons of Hell MC. To say it packed a punch wouldn’t even come close.

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