Page 22 of Excess

“So is Leo,” I replied, shooting Landon a sharp smile.

“True,” Landon conceded, tipping his head in acknowledgement, though he seemed oddly uneasy. He’d worked here for as long as we’d been coming to Leviathan, and was pretty hard to rattle.

“You’re not convinced?” I asked over the rim of my drink before taking a sip.

Landon shrugged. “Ronnie has been a bit… hasty lately.”

“In what way?”

He was clearly uncomfortable talking out of school, and I did my best to look casual and less threatening than Landon probably perceived me as. Unfortunately, there was only so much I could do, by virtue of my size alone. My face probably didn’t help, though I didn’t mean to look like such an angry fucker all the time.

“Ronnie has been making a lot of business choices that feel a little…” Landon trailed off, absently wiping the same spot in front of him as he mulled it over. “Desperate,” he decided on eventually.

I nodded slowly, giving the idea some consideration as Landon was called away to serve another customer.

Rents were up everywhere. This area of London—formerly a grimy shithole—had become something of a trendy hotspot recently, for reasons I would never understand. The underground fight scene had been splintering in recent years, both as the authorities cracked down on it, and legitimate fighting became a more lucrative option.

The writing was probably on the wall for Leviathan, and perhaps it had been for a long time, but I hadn’t been paying close enough attention. And if I hadn’t, then Leo definitely hadn’t, because his attention span was basically nonexistent.

Could I convince Leo to go legit? He was a bit long in the tooth for it, but maybe he could still get a few years out of it. It would be safer and a steadier source of income than this, at least.

Leo and his competitor climbed into the cage just as I was finishing my beer, and I made my way through the still-forming crowd to speak to my brother.

It wasn’t until I climbed onto the narrow lip of the raised cage, holding on to the chain link to keep myself steady, that I got a good look at Leo’s opponent.

Landon had been underselling when he’d called him a big bastard. This guy was a beast, with a bald head and raised veins everywhere beneath tomato-red skin. His teeth were bared already, gaze fixed wholly on Leo, who wasn’t backing down in the slightest.

At this rate, they were going to have to start the fight early, given the aggression that was pouring off these two.

This had bad idea written all over it.

“Don’t be an idiot, Leo,” I murmured, speaking to the back of his head through the fence. “That guy looks practically feral.”

Leo grunted in acknowledgement, playing with his mouth guard, but that was all he gave me. I should have known he wouldn’t even consider forfeiting, but I was irritated regardless.

He wasn’t going to concede, which meant he’d get his ass kicked. Then I’d have to lug him home where he’d be half dead for a week, and entirely useless to Freya. By the time he recovered, he’d be demanding to come back here and do it all over again.

With a huff, I jumped down from the raised cage edge, pushing my way through the throng of people who were now pressing as close as they could to the action, drawn in by the temptation of violence in the air. Ronnie had stationed himself behind the betting table, though he was merely supervising as his staff managed the books.

“Oi, Ronnie. Where’d you find this joker?” I asked, jabbing my thumb over my shoulder at the ring.

“New bloke. Rytis.” Ronnie grinned, flashing me a mouthful of gold-capped teeth. “He’s from up north somewhere. Domas is vouching for him.”

Domas was a weaselly little fuck and all, so that lined up.

“You sure he’s good to fight? He looks a little feral.”

Ronnie waved his hand dismissively. “That’s just his face. You know me, Blake. I’d never put a feral alpha in the ring.”

It was because I knew Ronnie—on top of what Landon had said—that I didn’t believe those words for a second. I elbowed my way back to the ring to where Leo was warming up, wondering if I could talk reason into my idiot brother.

Would Ronnie even know what a feral alpha looked like? Considering it was a side effect of unchecked aggression—which was in large supply here—I hoped he would know the signs. But Leviathan was always packed with drunk and happy betas, who had a neutralising effect on all heightened alpha responses.

I was familiar with feral alphas because there sure as fuck weren’t any happy betas in the army—not in my platoon, at least. Alphas were usually stationed together and sent to more challenging locations, since we tended to be hardier.

I’d seen plenty of those alphas go feral over the years, and I’d battled hard to keep Leo away from his own brushes with it. Once that dam broke, it could never be pieced back together in quite the same way.

By the time I got back to the ring, the two of them were already touching gloves as the beta ref muttered some low words of warning. He directed them back to their corners before climbing out of the cage himself, wisely avoiding being in an enclosed space with two such clearly aggressive alphas.

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