Page 23 of Rebel Hawke

Kennedy keeps yammering on, and I try to focus on her words instead of getting lost thinking about Wren again.

“Things are coming along quickly. She has already repainted and has a logo on the wall. Her machines were delivered, and she’s going to build them this week.” She shrugs and grins. “I honestly didn’t know that space could look so damn good. It’s kind of always been a shithole, like the gym.”

Nanatsksand shakes her head. “You children and your potty mouths.” She casts an annoyed glare over the table at her children and their spouses, grandchildren, and adopted family members. “The gym isn’t a ‘shithole.’ Jimmy is an excellent trainer and focuses his efforts there, not on housekeeping.”

Is Nana actually defending Jenkins?

In the years I’ve been training with him, all she has ever done is complain and voice her concerns and displeasure over my choice to take after Grandpa and enter the ring professionally.

I guess I can’t blame her, though. She thinks boxing took him from her, and Jenkins was the man who helped keep Sam “The Savage” Hawke fighting by training him. Which makes her comment even more surprising—and not solely to me.

All eyes at the table cut to her in question.

Dad raises a brow. “You finally coming around?”

Nana scowls at him, crumpling her napkin in her hand beside her plate. “I will never agree with Atlas’ decision to take up boxing, nor your encouragement of it, but I know him”—her old gaze drifts to me, and she offers a tight smile—“and Atlas was never going to do anything else, no matter my or anyone else’s objections. So, if he insists on fighting, Jimmy Jenkins is the best person to keep him safe in the ring.”

Even if he couldn’t keep Sam safe.

Those words aren’t said, but they still ring through the air and settle over everyone at the table.

My chest tightens, and the filled plate of my favorite food on the planet suddenly seems a lot less appetizing.

I’m lying to her.

I’m lying to Jenkins.

I’m lying toallof them.

And while what happened to Grandfather was a freak accident—a one-in-a-million thing that is so highly unlikely to happen again that it isn’t even worth worrying about—there are a hundred ways to get hurt or worse in the ring other than a brain aneurysm bursting.

Me not being at one hundred percent makes that possibility even more of a threat.

Everyone knows it, and all the people seated around this table watching me now who have seen me in action since I was cleared to fight again know that I am not the same Atlas “The Hurricane” Hawke that I was before the shooting.

They just would never tell Nana and worry her even more.

Neither will I.

I have three months.

That’s enough time to figure out a way to fight through the pain and get back to where I need to be for the title match.

It has to be.

WREN

Plastic reformer frames,leather-covered machine beds, bags of straps and ropes, and dozens of boxes of other various equipment for classes clutter the studio. Crammed into corners. Stacked three high in places to try to fit it all into such a tight space.

What a fucking mess…

I release a frustrated groan and shove my hands through my hair, tugging out the tie that has kept it back from my face allmorning. The dull headache forming at the base of my skull ebbs somewhat, and I rub at the spot, considering my situation.

After painting on Friday, receiving all the deliveries, and spending the weekend trying to organize the chaos, it feels like I haven’t gotten anywhere but into a bind I can’t find a way out of.

Literally, nothing is going as planned.

Everything arrived about the same time, giving me zero ability to actually organize any of it, which means I can barely even walk through the studio, let alone get anything unboxed or set up.

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