Page 48 of The Explorer
For a moment our gazes were locked, and I had the crazy feeling she was holding something back.
“Yeeeess!”
Banni’s loud outburst broke my prolonged eye contact with Aubri. “What is it?”
“I just tripled my savings.” His eyes were wide with disbelief as he looked to Alex and Val. “What the hell, it says here that no one else bet on Aubri other than me.”
Alex gave an apologetic shrug. “Our mistake.”
“You’re splitting your wins with me,” I told him, but Aubri smacked my shoulder.
“Let the man enjoy his win. He believed in me.”
“So did I.”
“That’s not the same. You knew the outcome before the fight started. Banni had never seen me fight.”
“I’m happy to split it,” Banni said.
“Then tell you what, if you tripled your investment, then give us a third. Indiana and I will split the money between us and that way you still doubled your investment.”
When I raised my brow at Aubri, she told me, “Don’t look at me like that. I’m the one who fought him, it’s fair that I get a share of the money.”
“You hardly broke a sweat out there,” I teased.
“Nor did you, sitting here,” she retorted and reached for her jacket and shirt behind me. “Now can we get out of this claustrophobic sauna already?”
Walking through the old survival bunker, Aubri and I were being stared at from all directions.
The man with the large ears stepped in front of us and rumbled something in French. Expecting problems, Aubri and I squared our shoulders and looked around to assess how many we had to potentially fight to get out of here.
Alex was doing the talking and turned to us. “He wants to know if you’ll come back and fight again.”
Aubri eased her stance. “Does he have someone who can actually fight?”
The man with the large ears seemed to understand her because he pushed out air forcefully and threw his hands up in a theatrical way.
People were gathering around us to listen in on the conversation that continued between Alex and the man. Aubri and I exchanged a glance when the crowd made an “oohhh” sound and got excited.
“He says that the Gorilla is one of his best fighters but that if you’re up for it, you could go up against two fighters at once.”
“Maybe that will make you use your hands,” I said dryly.
“What’s in it for me?” Aubri asked the man and since he answered right away, it was clear that he understood English.
“Money,” he said in a strong accent and pointed to his wristband.
It was fun to see Aubri look thoughtful as if she wouldn’t do it for free. She loved fighting and even if they had told her to fight five at once, she would have been up for the challenge.
When she nodded in agreement, he smiled and then his eyes shifted to me. “You combat?”
With my height I was looking down on the man when I answered. “Yes, I can fight, but you’ll need more than two of his kind to match me.” I threw a nod to the Gorilla, who sat against the wall where someone was cleaning his slit lip.
“You fighttrois?” He held up three fingers.
“Sure, sounds fun.”
It seemed settled and we were just about to go when out of nowhere a woman came up from behind and placed her hand on my shoulder.
