Page 26 of In Her Shadow

I try calling Katelyn, but she doesn’t answer. She’ll be at work, and when I flick through my contacts to the number Ren stored for me last night, my thumb hovers over the call button. It would be so easy to call him right now. He’d come, he’d make me feel better, I know he would. But then I’d have to explain. I think about the way he acted this morning, how sure I was that he knew something, and just for a second, I wonder if maybe what happened to Mr. Connor could have something to do with him.

The fact I’m even considering that confirms that I need to learn more about Ren before I jump in, feet first.

REN

“You feeling up to this?” Franco grips me by the shoulders.

“Do I look fuckin’ up to it?” I ask him, breathing through my nostrils and staring across the ring at my next opponent. I’ve already kicked the ass out of two men tonight, might as well make it a third.

“You know there’s 50k in the prize pot,” he reminds me, moving behind me and starting to massage below my neck. I’m not here for the fuckin’ prize pot. I’m here because I need to unleash all the frustration inside me. I’m fucking things up with Eloise, coming on to strong, scaring her exactly how I knew I would. She wanted me to give her space, and this is how I’m handling it. I usually come to The Pit when things start feeling out of my control. I don’t work for anyone, and I don’t kneel to commands like some of the other fighters do. I come here to cause pain and to try to feel it.

I watched Eloise walk home earlier. I watched her crawl back into bed when she got home, and all I wanted to do was cross the street and crawl into it beside her. I wanted to hold her in my arms and promise her that the man who scared her last night could never hurt her again. I wanted to tell her how he begged for his life, and how he pissed himself when I put the plasticbag over his head and tied it tight around his neck with a cable tie. I want her to know how he sucked that plastic back into his airways each time he tried to take a breath, and how the panic in his eyes looked when he realized I wasn’t there to make a threat.

But I don’t think it’s what she’d want to hear.

She wouldn’t want to know how good killing him made me feel. She’d probably blame herself for the fact that I’d done it. Eloise is a good person; she doesn’t get off on other people's suffering the way I do, which is just one of the many reasons why we shouldn’t be together.

I came here tonight to numb the pain that those kinds of thoughts bring with them. To forget that I’m selfish enough to ignore them just so I can have what I want…what I’ve always wanted. Eloise keeps telling me that I make her feel different, but what ifIwas the reason for what happened last night?

What if she dropped all her defenses because of me?

“You hear me, Ren? 50k!” Franco shouts in my ear, checking that my hands are wrapped.

“You make sure the ref checks him for blades when you step up. O’Driscoll doesn’t like his fighters to lose,” he warns, and when I take my phone out of my pocket and make a final check on Eloise. I see that she isn’t in bed anymore.

“Think I'd better take that.” Franco goes to take my phone out of my hand, but I shove him away when I check another camera’s angle and see that she’s moving toward her front door. I have no idea where she’s heading, or who she’s going with, but I want to find out.

“I’m out,” I tell him, lifting up my hoodie from the chair beside me.

“What do you mean, you’re fucking out?” He stares back at me as if I’ve lost my mind.

“I mean, I’m out. I got somewhere I need to be.” I don’t give him any other explanation, but I hear the boos and jeers from the crowd gathered around the ring as I head out toward the exit.

“Where ya going. I got a lot of money on this fight.” O’Driscoll steps in front of me.

“I need to be somewhere.” I go to move past him, but he blocks me again.

“Yeah, ya do son, in that feckin’ ring.” He looks back over my shoulder.

“Move outta my way,” I warn him, starting to lose my patience.

“I’m goin' nowhere until we get the fight.”

“Well, you ain’t getting the fight. Now move outta my way before I drop you the same way I have each and every fighter you’ve ever put up against me.”

O’Driscoll looks over his shoulder and laughs at his man. “There isn’t a man in New York who's brave enough todropme,” he smirks sarcastically, and as he turns his head back round to face me, I prove his theory wrong with a blow to his temple. He stumbles back, and when his man steps forward, I punch him straight between the ribs, knocking the wind out of him and treating him to an uppercut when he leans forward. Then, before O’Driscoll has the chance to straighten himself up, I grip the back of his head and slam him face-first into the wall.

“You may own a lot of people in this room, Ivan, but you don’t fuckin’ own me,” I remind him, letting his drop to the floor before I rush out the door and pull my phone back out my pocket. I flick to the tracking app that I programmed into her phone while she was sleeping yesterday morning, and when I see she’s at the restaurant just up the street from her apartment, I wonder if she’s just popped out to get herself some food. Still, I decide to check. It might have been only a few hours since I last saw her, but the emptiness inside me seems bigger than ever,and I guess just checking she’s okay, isn’t gonna do any harm. She won’t even know I was there, and like so many other things, what Eloise doesn’t know can’t hurt her.

ELOISE

“Eloise, I’m glad you came.” Lance is already sitting at a table when I arrive at the restaurant dead on eight-thirty, and I can tell from the worried look on his face that this isn’t going to be good. The afternoon has dragged, and although I’m dreading hearing what he has to say, I want to get it over with. Lance has clearly made an effort after work, and looks handsome in a pair of chinos and a polo necked sweater he’s wearing. Handsome, in an average guy kind of way. Nothing like Ren, just thinking about Ren and what he might be doing makes my pulse beat faster. I’m already regretting giving him the cold shoulder this morning.

“I take it you didn’t bring me here to tell me good news.” I get to the reason I’m here before I let myself become too distracted.

“Like I said on the phone, I shouldn’t be here.” He smiles politely at the server as she hands us both a menu. “A colleague of mine was one of the officers sent to Connor’s house this morning. I’d mentioned some things to him about you when we were dating.” He looks down at his glass awkwardly. “Soon as he found out our victim worked for the magazine, he texted me and, naturally, I looked into the case.”

“Naturally?” I stare back at him, confused.

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