Page 117 of The Wrecked One

The virtual ref on the wall gave us the five-minutes-to-start warning, and I was glad to see he was actually a real human, not some Wii Fit AI creation.

I looked away from the screen, taking in what felt more like a middle school gymnasium. Basketball goals were on each end and bleachers lined the walls. Nicholas had a water station prepped for us, and I was slightly shocked he’d done that.

Aside from the octagon at the center of the beat-up wood floors, there was a two-way drop screen displaying video from the overhead cameras as well as those from each corner of the room.

Redirecting my attention to Mya on the bench about twenty feet away from where I stood inside the cage, she gave me a nod, and mouthed, “I love you.”

I’d already kissed her, despite the fuckery about to happen and those there to witness the moment, but like hell was I getting into the octagon without one.

“Love you, too,” I mouthed back, my hands resting above the waistband of my black shorts as I tried to grapple with the fact she’d have a front-row seat to my throwdown with Hugo. I’d joked about it back in Thailand, threatening to do just this if he’d so much as checked out her ass in the meeting. That meeting never happened, yet here we were anyway. Did I manifest this? It was Mya who believed in that stuff, but damn.

Standing on the bleachers, Jesse held up a fist. His way of letting me know, You’ve got this.

Yeah, I wasn’t sure.

Only in my shorts, with no protection allowed of any kind, not gloves, a cup, or a mouthpiece, I finally faced the man in my corner. I had to refrain from looking out at the other side of the gym where Mya’s parents sat.

There was hating your future-in-laws, and then there was wanting to murder them. I had every intention of one day marrying Mya, but before then, I had to figure out how to deal with her father without personally getting his blood on my hands. No plans to ask him for Mya’s hand in marriage, but I was pretty sure it’d be bad luck to kill the father of the bride.

“You can do this.” My dad set his hands on my shoulders, eyes on my chest, which reminded me there was one more thing I needed to remove.

“Will you hold this for me?” I carefully took off Tucker’s dog tags from around my neck and waited for him to open his hand. “Maybe keep them forever after tonight. Put them in a safe or something.”

I wasn’t so sure I could continue carrying the weight of the tags around with me. There was a reason I’d made Julia stop wearing them. She couldn’t move on if she brought her guilt about losing Tucker with her everywhere. I supposed the same held true for me.

“I’ll keep them safe.” He closed his hand around the tags, and like Carter had done outside, gave me a quick one-arm hug, cleared his throat, then choked out, “Now go warm up. Get this done.” Was my father blinking back tears?

Am I now?

One more glance Mya’s way to calm my racing thoughts and heart, then my dad left the cage, and I turned toward my opponent.

Hugo locked eyes with me, rolling his shoulders, bouncing from left foot to right. From what I knew about him, he was a master in Krav Maga, Judo, Brazilian Jiu-jitsu, and?—

Muay Thai. Aka, Thai boxing, originating from Thailand. And I had a feeling this prick would default to that style just to try and fuck with me after what happened in Bangkok.

“Surprised you actually showed up.” Was that Hugo’s attempt at trash talking? Nah, he’d have to do better than that.

I rotated my neck, not feeling remotely loose at all. Nope, pretty much strung the fuck tight. Closing my eyes, I counted backward from ten, then tried to latch on to some of the advice Jesse had given me over the last few days. Then I thought about Adam’s words, his thick Irish accent solid in my head as I remembered the specific details he’d taught me about Thai boxing.

“Thai combat is about using eight points of contact of the body like weapons,” Adam had said. “The hands are the sword. An elbow to your opposition is the hammer. The leg is the ax . . .”

His words slipped free from my mind, and I opened my eyes when the ref announced we were down to two minutes.

“How’s that shoulder of yours?” Hugo lasered in on my messed-up tattoo. How the hell did he know about that?

It clicked a few seconds later. He’d studied the video footage from the room in Bangkok like game tape. He’d seen me reset my shoulder after partially dislocating it. Throw in the fact there was still the signature imprint of a GSW there, and it didn’t take a genius to figure out my shoulder was a problem for me.

I ignored his taunt and gave him back a jab of my own, keeping on my side of the ring. “I see your father chose not to be in your corner.”

His lip hitched at the side. “I don’t need anyone to have my six, unlike you.”

“Guess not even your brother. Looks like trouble in paradise in the Soren household.” I did a few arm swings, doing my best to remain casual despite how fast my heart was pounding right up into my ears. “Was he the prelim fight? Your warmup to tonight?”

Hugo cracked his neck, seemingly unbothered by my words about his brother. “You know, I was in Thailand that day, fully prepared to meet Little Miss Lois Lane. I wasn’t convinced she needed to be ‘handled’ just because you two saw those pigeons. I was hoping to pull her in, but I had to know for certain where her loyalty lay. I assumed there was a reason the Vanzettis hadn’t pulled her into the fold yet.”

The listening device changed your mind, then?

“The Vanzettis began pushing for a union between us once she joined FYVM, though.” The grin on his face was about to be removed when the ref started the fight. “It wouldn’t be a horrible idea. Her family is important to our organization. And Mya, well,” he said with a menacing laugh, glancing her direction, “the woman’s ass more than makes up for her tits not being as big as I’d prefer. I was willing to sacrifice being a bachelor for that one.”

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