Tammy stayed in one of the empty rooms in the clubhouse. After her fight with Gunner she didn’t want to see or talk to anyone. She spent the rest of the day trying to figure out what she was going to do with her life. She hadn’t told Gunner, or anyone else, but she had been looking at hospitals in Massachusetts and Connecticut. She had been fantasizing about starting a new life…a life with Gunner. But now, she had no idea what to do. If he didn’t trust her enough to even let her explain why she wanted Zack to go with her to Texas, then she didn’t think he trusted her enough for her to try to build a relationship with him. Her life was already a mess. The last thing she needed was relationship drama, and a broken heart on top of it all.

It was early morning before she finally cried herself to sleep. When she woke up, the light coming in the room told her it was much later than she’d planned. Zack was probably waiting on her. With a pounding head and swollen eyes, she jumped up and pulled on the clothes she’d worn the day before and ran out of the room. She started for the great room to look for Zack before she remembered she still had to get her things from her and Gunner’s room. She didn’t know if she hoped that he would be there, or not. It would only hurt more to see him again, but it would have to hurt less than never seeing him again at all. She stopped in front of the door and knocked. When he didn’t answer, she let herself in. The bed was neatly made and Gunner’s duffle bag was gone. He’d left, and he hadn’t even said goodbye. Her first impulse was to cry again, but she sucked it up. She was far from a wilting flower that cried at the drop of a hat. Gunner was gone; she’d deal with it the way she’d dealt with everything else in her life.

She grabbed her travel bag out of the closet and dumped her clothes out of the dresser into it. After she collected her toiletries, she slung the bag up on her shoulder and headed out again. This time she stopped and knocked on Zack’s door. She hated doing that. Usually she was setting herself up to catch him in the act of fucking some slut or other. Zack didn’t answer, but Tammy thought she heard someone moving inside. There was a strange sound coming from the room as well. It almost sounded like a little animal, or a baby. No fucking way did Zack have a baby in his room. She raised her fist and knocked again, this time a little louder. That sound, the soft cooing, turned into a cry and a shush in hushed tones.

“Hey! Zack! Open the door!”

“I’m right here,” Zack said, coming around the corner. He was wearing a white t-shirt without his kutte and a pair of sweat pants. His hair was disheveled and his eyes bloodshot.

“Who’s in your room?”

“Not your business, Tammy. Leave it alone.” He stepped between her and the door when she heard another cry.

“There’s a baby in there.”

“Shh!”

“Me shh? You don’t think anyone else can hear that? What the hell are you doing with a baby?” She realized then that he was holding a cup in his hand. She looked into it, expecting it to be coffee. It was milk. “Zachary, what’s going on?”

With a sigh, he put his key in the lock and turned it. Once the door was open, he grabbed Tammy with his free hand and pulled her inside. A woman about Tammy’s age, with huge, frightened eyes, sat on the edge of the bed, bouncing a baby in her lap. The woman’s eyes were as bloodshot as Zack’s. Zack handed her the cup of milk and she laid the baby down on the bed. Tamara watched the scene with disbelief as the woman filled a baby bottle with the milk and stuck it in the baby’s mouth, finally calming him. “Tammy, this is Nicole, and that’s Chase.” Zack had a little smile on his face when he looked at the baby. Tammy felt like she was caught in the Twilight Zone.

“Uh, hey…” Tammy managed.

“Hi,” the woman said, shyly. She had picked the baby back up and was rocking him while he drank his bottle.

“Um, Zack, can I talk to you outside for a minute?”

Zack looked at Nicole, who gave him a nervous smile. “I’ll be right back.” She nodded, and he stepped outside with Tammy.

“What the hell is going on? Who is that?”

“Nicole and Chase,” he said, as if that explained it all.

“Damn it, Zack! Stop playing stupid games. We’re supposed to be on the road already.”

“Shit.” He dragged his hand through his hair. “I’m sorry, Tams…”

“Sorry about what? Don’t tell me you’re not going with me to see Tommy.”

“I just can’t right now. I’m really sorry, but Nicole needs me, and I have to find a place for her and the baby to stay before Stone finds out she’s here.”

“I don’t know what the hell is going on, Zack, but you’re acting crazy. Who is she?”

“She’s hiding from her ex-boyfriend. He’s an asshole and an abuser. He’s been tormenting her because she won’t take him back, and I need to help her find a safe place to stay until I can deal with him.”

“None of that tells me why you’re involved in this. Oh my god! Is that your baby?”

Zack laughed. “Oh, hell no. No, he’s not mine. He belongs to that piece of shit and he’s threatening to take him away from her if she doesn’t take him back. She actually let him come back around to see the kid, in hopes that would satisfy him, but he got physical with her and she texted me and asked for help. I know you want to see Tommy and I promise to take you, but can it wait a day…or two?”

“No! I’ve waited weeks. My brother could be dying while I’m rotting out here in the middle of Bumfuck, Tennessee, and now I feel like I’m trapped in an alternate universe…one where you give a shit about a mother and her baby.” The tears won out. She couldn’t hold them back any longer and as soon as the dam broke, she began to sob. Zack looked like he wanted to run, but instead, he put his arm around her and pulled her into his chest. Tammy was pissed at herself, and she didn’t understand what was going on with her any more than she understood what was going on with Zack. She’d never been a crybaby; this was getting ridiculous. She pushed back from Zack with the intention of telling him that she was just going to go on her own and suddenly, she was staring over Zack’s shoulder and into Gunner’s blue eyes. He looked from her to Zack and said:

“Sorry to interrupt. I just forgot something in the room.”

Tammy didn’t say anything and neither did Zack, but she watched him until he disappeared around the corner at the end of the hall. “What are you doing?” Zack asked her.

“What am I doing? You’re kidding, right?”

“No, I’m not kidding. I know what I’m doing. I’m getting myself into deep shit for…shit, I don’t even know what for. You, on the other hand, finally have a decent man that loves you and you’re about to let him walk out of your life…for what? Your brother is in a coma. You can’t fix that. Your father is in hiding from the same people that want to kill you, and instead of riding off into the sunset and living happily ever after with that goober down the hall, you’re going to let him ride off without you. I thought you were so much smarter than that.”

Everything Zack was saying, Tammy had said to herself the night before, but it pissed her off for him to say it.

“You don’t understand about me and Tommy, even as long as you’ve known me. He’s all alone. He’s in pain. If it were me, he’d be there.”

“What I know about Tommy is that he’s as protective as hell of his sister. You’re probably the only person that Tommy has ever loved in his life. Do you think if he had a say in this, he’d want you walking back into that mess out there?”

He was right again. It made her want to punch him. “No. But like I said, if it were me, nothing would keep him away.”

Zack sighed. “Okay Tams. Let the best thing that ever happened to you walk out of your life. I can’t fix it for you. Shit, I can’t fix my own shit. If you still want me to take you to Texas, we’ll go tomorrow. Right now, however, I need to deal with what’s going on in my room. I’ve got to figure out a way to get them out of here without anyone seeing them, and get them to a hotel or something. I’m sorry.” Zack rarely apologized for anything. Tammy could see in his eyes that he really was sorry. She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Tommy would still be there in a day or two…at least she hoped that he would. Tammy realized that she was being selfish. She didn’t know who that woman was in Zack’s room, but no mother and child should be put out of their own home by an abusive piece of shit.

“Okay. Let me know when you can go,” she said.

Zack put his hand on her arm. Something was different in his eyes, but she couldn’t put her finger on what it was. Maybe it was that he just seemed more human to her than he had in a long time. He genuinely cared what happened to the mother and her child, and that touched her. “I will, I promise. But, Tams…think about what I said before the kid hits the road, okay?” She nodded just to satisfy him and watched him slip back into his room. She looked down the hallway where Gunner had gone and then back in the direction of the great room. She started to turn that way when she heard Gunner’s voice behind her.

“Tammy.” She closed her eyes for a second to try to block out what the sound of his voice did to her. Finally, she turned and looked up at him. Those blue eyes still did it for her every time.

“Hey.”

“Hey. I’m getting ready to take off. Patty and Billy are going back to Texas. it turns out. Manuel is going with them. I guess he and Patty are an item now.”

“I thought Billy was going with you to Massachusetts.”

He looked sad and her heart hurt for him. She knew how much he cared for Billy. It was going to hurt him to leave his friends behind. “Yeah, me too. But his life is in Texas and it wasn’t really fair for me to expect him to just pick up stakes and move almost two thousand miles away. I’m going to miss them both, but I feel like I need to get to know my family.”

She nodded. He had understood when she said she had to go see her family. He had even been willing to change his plans to take her. It was no wonder he was so upset with her. She hadn’t even given him a real chance. “Gunner, Zack found out that Eddie has a hit out on you in Texas. My family is still in danger. Zack thinks his father is involved in all of that, and the only person that could get away with taking me back to see Tommy is Zack. Nobody would hurt me if I went with him, and nobody would hurt you if you were two thousand miles away and with your family.”

“So you asked Zack to save you because you were worried for my life?”

“Yes, and I was trying to tell you that yesterday but you got all jealous and pissy.” Gunner’s lips twitched at her calling him pissy. “I don’t want Zack, you big, stupid idiot. I want you…fucking alive.”

He smiled. “I’m sorry. This is new to me. I’ve never been…I’ve never had…fuck it. I’m in love with you, Tammy. I’ve been trying not to say it again because it freaks you out, but I love you.”

“I love you too.”

“You do?”

“Yeah.”

“Then why did it freak you out so badly when I said it?”

“Because I didn’t want to love you. I don’t want to be in love with a biker.”

“In my defense, I’m not a biker.”

She rolled her eyes. “Yet. By this time next week you’ll be wearing a prospect patch. I’m just so tired of all that shit.”

“I don’t have to be a biker. There are lots of other things I can do. I’m a hell of a fighter.”

She sighed. “You waited your whole life to be a part of a club, to find your family. I’m not going to stand in the way of that. That’s not what love is about.”

“I honestly have no idea what love is about,” he said. “I’ve never done this before. All I know for sure is that I didn’t need anything from our room. I was just hoping to run into you before you left. I had this fantasy…”

Tammy smiled. “A fantasy, huh?”

“Not that kind…well, yeah, it turned into that at the end, but I just imagined you’d see me and realize you couldn’t live without me either and we’d figure this out. Then we’d have a lot of sex.”

She laughed. “We could have the sex first, and figure the rest out later.”

“No…Jesus, what am I saying…? OK, yeah, we can have sex whenever you want it…but seriously, baby, can’t we please work this out? I don’t want to go anywhere without you.”

She reached up and put her hand on the side of his face. “I don’t want to go anywhere without you either.” He was about to bend down and kiss her when he suddenly looked over her shoulder and raised an eyebrow. She looked over her shoulder to see Zack and Nicole coming out of his room. Zack was holding the baby.

“Is that a baby?”

“I think so,” she said.

“Is it his?”

“He says no.”

“Hmm, seeing him with a baby is…”

“Weird.”

“I was going to say different, but weird works.”

Tammy smiled and said, “I think you were about to kiss me.”

“I was.” Gunner found her lips with his. Zack and the woman and the baby walked by about that time and Zack said:

“About time you two got your shit together.” Gunner pulled out of the kiss and watched him hurry down the hallway with a baby covered up with a blanket in one hand, and a blue teething ring in the other. Chuckling, he said:

“Look who’s talking.”