Gunter never speaks a word the whole way—he doesn’t have to.

The tears running over his cheeks say it all for him.

KARMA

Ryan

The front door flies open, slamming in to the wall with such force the stopper snaps off and the handle leaves a hole in the plaster. Gunter storms through, marching past me as though I’m not even here. Were those tears on his face? I break away from watching where he’s storming to, confused as fuck, to find Bronson coming in with Tommy in his arms.

There’s blood fucking everywhere.

Everywhere.

The deafening whoosh of my heartbeat in my ears muffles the sound of my words. “What the fuck happened?”

“What the fuck does it look like?” Gunter hollers from the kitchen where he’s presently ripping drawers from their slides.

Utensils scatter as one of the drawers splinters on impact with the floor, a spatula skidding to a halt against my foot. “What the fuck are you doing that for?” I scream at him. What the hell could be in here that he’d need?

“Argh!” he growls triumphantly, raising his clenched fist to shake a piece of card in the air. Gunter pulls his phone from the pocket of his jeans, glancing between the card and it as he slams a number into the keypad.

I turn away, blood pounding so hard that my hands and feet feel fat with each pulse. Bronson isn’t in the living room, or anywhere near the kitchen end of the house for that matter. I dash up the hallway and into the bathroom, finding him where I figured he’d be. He has Tommy laid out on the floor, kneeling beside him and pressing a towel to his neck.

“Could you get me some more towels to put under his head?” he asks.

I nod, backing into the hallway while I stare at him on the floor beside Tommy, so calm. Within seconds, I’ve returned with two fresh towels, and I push them under Tommy’s head while Bronson lifts him clear.

“He’s still alive?” I whisper, eyeing Tommy’s body as he lies there motionless.

“Just.” He places two fingers to Tommy’s pulse point and counts under his breath. “His pulse is gettin’ weaker, but slowly. He’s fightin’ it, but I won’t lie, he’s lost a hell of a lot of blood.”

“He needs a hospital, medical attention. Why the fuck did you bring him here?” I ask, my voice rising to near hysteria as I get the question out.

“And tell them what when they call the cops in? That your boy here was shot in a drug-related gunfight in suburbia? What you think they’d make of that, huh? Where you think Tommy would end up when he got better? Gunter, for that matter?”

I stare at him as he eyes Tommy, a frown setting in. He’s right, but it doesn’t make me any less determined to get appropriate care for the guy I love like a little brother.

Gunter appears in the doorway, a looming force over our moment of resignation. “I’ve got a doc on the way. He said to keep up what you’ve been doing, Bronson.”

“Yeah,” he says on a sigh. “I know what to do with a bullet wound.”

Gunter and I both stare at him, but for vastly different reasons. The look on Gunter’s face as he eyes Bronson looking after his little brother is something akin to admiration mixed with apprehension. It’s as though the idiot appreciates what this man is doing for his family, but can’t understand why.

Me, on the other hand? I look at him with nothing but sheer curiosity. What’s his history? Why is this scenario so damn familiar to him that he’s sitting here, calm as fuck, while we’re quietly freaking the hell out around him?

Who the hell was he before he settled here?

“You had a house call before?” Bronson asks Gunter, settling back on his haunches with the towel still in place.

He shakes his head. “In all the years, all the shit our old man got us in to, I’ve never had to use the number.” Disbelief that one of them finally has been hurt bad enough for him to haunts his eyes.

“They’re not cheap, house calls. You got enough cash to cover it?”

“I think so.” Something snaps, and the Gunter we all know and tolerate returns. “You just keep pressure on that wound and let me worry about it, yeah? Tommy dies, you’re following him.”

Bronson shakes his head and sighs, disappointment clear with the frown on his face. He returns his attention to Tommy, twisting his body so his back is to Gunter. I slap a hand to my face and sigh also. Now’s not the time for a game of ‘who’s the bigger man.’ We need to pull together, stand together, and be what Tommy needs to pull through this—to live.

“Can I have a word with you?” I ask Gunter, forcing him from the room with my body as I try to leave.

He steps back and nods.

“Bedroom.” I point to our door. “You can get your cash out of the safe while we talk.”

Giving Bronson one last look, Gunter heads towards our room.

I follow him in, shutting the door behind us. I lean against it, my hands pinned behind my back. “You don’t like him, I get it, and I’m pretty sure he doesn’t like you. But fuck, Gunter, that’s Tommy dying on our God damn bathroom floor right now.” Tears crest my cheeks. “Put this bullshit aside and do what he’s doing back there—being a human being doing everything he fucking can to save another human being.”

His hands run over his bald head, his boots treading the carpet as he paces. “I’m trying. Ryan. I’m really fucking trying.”

I expected rage, disdain that I’m questioning him, and arrogance, the same as I’ve been given any other time I’ve spoken my mind. I expect Gunter to swing around any second and close the space between us with his hand raised. I brace for it.

What I don’t expect is for him to fall to the floor and tuck his knees to his chest, his body shaking with deep, hiccupping sobs. The action takes me so much by surprise that I literally stand for a full minute, eyes wide while I figure out what the fuck I’m supposed to do. Do what you’re telling him to—act like a basic human being.

He refuses to show his face, stiffening when I try to coax him out of his ball. So I do what I can to comfort him, trying to make my hands connect around his huge frame, and pull him to my chest while I rest my head on his. “I’m scared, too.”

Gunter shifts, an arm moving to snake around my waist. His embrace is so damn tight that my ribs ache, but I give him this moment, offer what he needs. I give him everything I’ve never had.

We sit like that for minutes, a damn hour—who would know? It’s long enough for me to run through every possible scenario in my head of what may happen to Tommy. He could make a full recovery, he could lose the ability to talk . . . he could die.

He’s too young to die. The kid’s only just made it into his twenties. Nothing’s right about a death so young.

A pounding at the front door echoes through the otherwise still house. Bronson calls out for somebody to get it from the bathroom, and as though nothing were ever amiss with him, Gunter rises to stand, again becoming the intimidating force he is as he marches from the room to let the doctor in.

I hang behind, sitting Indian-style on the carpet of our bedroom, staring down the hall as an elderly man in a three-piece suit follows Gunter to the bathroom with a large leather bag in his hand. There’s discussion, silence, more talking, and then Gunter brushes past me as he heads to get money from the safe. The doctor wants payment up front—of course he does. I remain where I am, afraid to go see what they’re doing, and aware that if I did I’d just end up in the way anyway.

They need space, and I need to re-evaluate my direction in life.

Gunter breezes past again, stoic, silent, and a whole lot scary in his focused state. I watch as he hands the cash over and the old man counts it out, finally nodding before he pockets it in the breast pocket of his suit jacket. The doctor disappears into the bathroom, closely followed by Gunter, and then Bronson emerges, hanging about in the doorway for a moment while he watches what’s going on. His head turns right, finding me watching, and with a sigh he pushes off the doorframe and walks my way.