Chapter 8
Gunner
Stockyards Station looked like hell had upchucked its best and brightest onto Exchange Avenue and told them to buy some calves while they were at it.
The smell hit first: smoke, cow shit, and cheap beer, all churning under the gold sunrise that made every tin roof shine like the gates of heaven.
You could hear the boots before you saw them, a thumping rhythm of impatience and bad knees as the old hands herded themselves toward the auction barn.
I fit right in, boots scuffed, hat low, the only thing clean about me the white of my teeth when I grinned at someone I wanted to irritate.
Inside the café, the air was already thick with sweat and fryer oil.
You had to fight to get a table, but Arsenal was already there, two plates and a pot of coffee in front of him, scanning the room like someone might try to take his bacon hostage.
He wore his Iron Valor cut, but the shirt underneath was pressed and the jeans dark—always the extra effort with him.
I sat across, folding my arms and letting the chair rock back on two legs.
“Didn’t know you woke up before six if no one was yelling at you,” I said.
Arsenal didn’t look up from his coffee. “Didn’t know you could find a shirt without a stain on it.” He took a sip and then set the cup down with military precision. “You sleep at all?”
I shrugged, pouring cream into my mug until it went from black to the color of river mud. “Enough.” I didn’t mention the two hours of restless tossing, or the way my body had burned after that last text from Brie. My wolf hadn’t shut up since.
A waitress with blonde hair that definitely came from a bottle dropped off a plate the size of a tractor tire: eggs, hash browns, and a chicken-fried steak the size of my head. “Anything else, sugar?” She asked, eyes flicking to Arsenal, who didn’t notice. I tapped her wrist before she left.
“You got any honey for the biscuits?” I asked.
“Course.” She winked and walked off, hips working overtime.
Arsenal smirked, finally meeting my eye. “You ever eat like a normal person?”
“Normal’s not my brand,” I said, slicing off half the steak and shoveling in a forkful. The taste lit up every cell. God, I loved simple food. “You want some, Marine?”
“I’ll stick to my own protein.” He forked up a big bite of omelet and chewed, slow, like he was timing it to a metronome.
“What do you think beef is?” I asked, mouth full of steak and gravy.
He raised an eyebrow. “I prefer my protein minus heart attack inducing extras.”
I continued to saw off pieces of chicken-fried steak. “I’m nothin’ if not full of extras.”
“Uh huh.”
We finished our meal in silence, the way men do when there’s actual business to be handled.
The auction barn outside was already starting to fill.
I could see the new crop of buyers through the window, city cowboys in pressed shirts and polished boots, trying to look like they belonged.
They didn’t. You can’t buy the kind of ugly it takes to work cattle for thirty years.
“Cattle made the trip okay,” I finally said, breaking the silence. “None got antsy, none jumped. That’s a first.”
Arsenal set down his fork and wiped his mouth. “Means you did your job.” Then, softer: “Or you’re distracted enough you didn’t care enough to notice.”
I grunted. “I got this.”
He leaned back, arms crossed, assessing. “I’m not the one you have to convince.”
“You gonna bring it up or just stare holes through my skull?” I asked, but I already knew. He was going to make me say it.
He waited a second, then nodded toward the window, like he didn’t want to embarrass me in public. “You hear from her?”
I let a grin slip. Couldn’t help it. “She’s fine.”
Arsenal smiled, small and private, then shook his head. “You ever gonna admit you like her?”
I stabbed a last chunk of steak. “I admitted it to myself. That’s enough.”
“Not for her, probably,” he said. “Some women like to hear it.” He poured more coffee, watching the stream. “You know, you don’t have to fight everything that feels good. Even Big Papa lets himself have a donut now and then.”
I scoffed. “That’s not the same. He’s got Jesus. I got an art major with unresolved trauma and a renegade heart.”
Arsenal’s brow furrowed. “You saying you’d rather have Jesus?”
I looked at my hands. “I’m saying I don’t know what to do with her.”
He waited, patient as death. Then: “You don’t have to know. You just have to not fuck it up.”
I barked a laugh. “Well, shit. Why didn’t anyone tell me sooner?”
He let that hang, taking another bite of omelet.
The door slammed behind us, and a knot of buyers came in, loud and obnoxious. The noise level spiked, and for a while, all you could do was listen to the clatter of plates and the auctioneer’s early-morning warmups rolling through the open windows. It was almost peaceful if you liked chaos.
I ate until I couldn’t, then sat back, letting the fullness settle in.
“You ever wonder why we haven’t heard from Maltraz?” I asked, voice low.
Arsenal’s face went flat. “Every day.”
“It’s not right,” I said, pushing my plate away. “That demon bastard doesn’t go silent unless he’s plotting.”
Arsenal nodded, gaze flicking to every face in the diner. “He’s not the type to just walk away after we humiliated him. He’ll wait, then he’ll hit back.”
“We need to talk to Bronc,” I said. “Soon as we get back.”
“Agreed,” Arsenal said, eyes never stopping. “You think he’s coming after the pack, or after Brie?”
“Both, if he can manage it. But I bet he comes for the weakest link first.”
Arsenal set his cup down, then leaned in, elbows on the table. “That puts you in the crosshairs, buddy.”
I wanted to argue, but he wasn’t wrong.
I rolled my shoulders, trying to shake it off. “I’ll be ready.”
He gave me a hard look. “I believe it. Just don’t let your dick override your instincts. You’re better than that.”
“Thanks, coach,” I said. “Now eat your protein and let’s go make some money.”
He grinned, just a little, and we finished breakfast like we always did: fast, focused, and ready for whatever kind of trouble waited outside.
The sun was all the way up when we walked out, the heat building off the asphalt. The crowd had doubled, maybe tripled, and the smell of burnt coffee was almost drowned out by the diesel and old leather.
Arsenal clapped me on the back, hard enough to rattle my teeth. “Let’s go,” he said.
I looked over my shoulder once, searching for something I wasn’t sure was there. A sign, maybe, or just a reason to hope.
All I saw was a sky so blue it almost hurt.
They say you never forget your first auction—the press of bodies, the perfume of hot steel and parched earth, the way men’s voices cut through the din like they were sharpening knives on hope.
Most of the world figured stockyards belonged in another century, but step into the Exchange and you’d see: Texas ran on the blood and sweat that soaked these old planks, and the men who called it home never grew tired, just grew meaner.
The barn was a cathedral of noise and dust. Cowboys stacked five deep around the gates, arguing the merits of Brangus versus Hereford, and every other hand held a Styrofoam cup of coffee or a can of cheap domestic that nobody was old enough to admit to drinking.
The auctioneer stood on a dais that looked salvaged from a failed high school musical, microphone cord coiled around his fist like a bullwhip.
His voice rolled through the rafters, rising and falling, a river of numbers and nonsense that carried every man with it.
Arsenal kept to my shoulder, quiet, scanning for threats but not expecting any. This wasn’t our kind of war, just a marketplace with higher stakes. The only real violence here was the way men’s egos bruised when they lost a bid.
We drove the trailer up just after seven, in line with three other rigs. Two belonged to outfits from the Hill Country, fancy names and fancier paint jobs, a third was from outside of Waco. Arsenal caught the name—R. Ponderosa—and gave me a nod, like he’d already clocked the whole family tree.
I walked the pens with him, checking every head, fingers trailing along hides slick as blacktop.
My steers looked good. Better than good.
They were cut glass, all muscle and low mean eyes cool as pond water.
I caught two buyers watching from the catwalk, trying to look casual.
They wore city boots, probably out of Dallas, and one already had his phone out to snap a photo of my lead steer.
I winked at them, just to see if they’d blush. One did.
Arsenal grunted. “Told you, Walsh. You breed ‘em mean, people notice.”
I shrugged, but the pride buzzed warm in my gut. “Mean’s all they know.”
He started to say something else, but that’s when the auctioneer’s call rolled out, and the barn went dead quiet.
First lot up was a run of Charolais—decent, but not mine.
I watched the action anyway, paying attention to which hands went up and who had the deep pockets.
You learn quick in this business that most men are cheap, but when they want to win, the checkbook opens faster than a lawyer’s zipper.
They got to my steers just before ten. The auctioneer read off the notes—“Champion stock, Iron Valor breeding, guaranteed weight and vaccinated up the wazoo.” The pen gate swung open, and my boys swaggered out, hooves clicking like they owned the place. The crowd shifted, interested.
“Who’ll start me at fifteen?” the auctioneer barked, and three paddles went up at once. He didn’t even pause, just rolled right into the chant, numbers flowing like water off a tin roof.
I didn’t watch the bidders; I watched the cattle. They paced the ring slow, tails flicking, ears alert, sizing up the men as much as the men sized them. My wolf bristled with satisfaction. This was our territory, even here.