Page 36 of Liberty
So honestly, maybe Belle was right. This was dumb on that level, me fighting him for his star status or mine. But I didn't really see it that way. If the man hadn’t grabbed her wrist or insulted her, I wouldn’t be standing here at the garage/gym door.
It looked like a nice sized ring though. I supposed that many here used the ring just to keep sharp. I didn’t believe that there were many differences amongst the troops here. They all had one common enemy, Deacon and his Russian thugs.
There were at least fifteen men or so present. The ones who’d heard about the bout, I’ll bet. The rest were out on night patrol or sleeping if they had already been on watch today.
I grabbed my gloves from my shoulder then sat on a bench and laced them up. Well, one of them. I looked up to see if anyone was nearby.
Fate stood above me. With a smile on his face, he sat down next to me and laced up my second glove. “You gotta have somebody in your corner, man. All these guys are Talon’s buds.”
I laughed. “You liar, you just came to see me get my ass handed to me.”
“Yeah, there is that too.” He chuckled.
I rolled my eyes as I stood to head over to the Everlast bag area.
While there, I saw Redemption and Justice come in. I knew they would come. All my brothers were super curious about this particular matchup.
After going at the bag for about ten minutes, I knew I was as ready as I would ever be.
Fate came over again and he hit my gloves with his fists. “Go get 'em, tiger.”
“Whoop, whoop,” Justice called from the ringside.
Finally, I stepped up the stairs and climbed into the ring.
Talon was already there and he smirked at me. “You ready, fighter boy?”
“Yeah… I’m ready to hear you say,I'm sorry, asshole.”
He shrugged. “I’m not sorry,asshole.”
I laughed dryly. “You will be apologizing, man. It is that simple.”
He smirked at me as we tapped gloves then danced around the ring while assessing each other.
He seemed to think he’d summed me up as he slid in and hit me up the side of the head.
I shook it off. I’d been hit harder by others but I knew he was just feeling me out. Those punches would get much harder and much worse. I decided to allow him enough ground to show me what he had, before I revealed any of my real skills.
Seeming to again assess me, Talon came at me a second time. Instead of a hit, his leg came swinging around.
I ducked and slid, then stood upright. The man was fucking fast, I’d give him that. I also knew he had at least three other kinds of kicks, if he used that one. I’d seen his type before. Maybe not anyone as good as him, but similar.
We again danced around.
Coming at me, his arm shot out and he got me on the side of my head again, effectively ringing my bell as they say.
Despite, bells ringing in my head, I immediately retaliated with a solar plexus shot.
Talon seemed surprised as he grunted and danced back. He then laughed.
Yeah, there was the same gleam in his eyes as I knew he saw in mine. He loved to fight almost as much as he loved to breathe, the same as me. I knew how this went. Addiction to adrenaline. Pump your fist so your heart would beat. Hear the cheers from the raging bloodthirsty crowd and feel your blood run wild.
Conquer and repeat.
I waited for him to come at me again. When he did, I gave him a roundhouse kick.
To my surprise, he ducked it then came up and gave me the same fucking kick.
