CHAPTER EIGHT
GRAVE
I SIT IN my private locker room at Kingdom, waiting to go out into the ring. I can’t say that I’ve always been a fighter, but I have always needed that adrenaline rush. The need to go faster, harder. I feel alive when I’m closest to death. It’s another thing on my long list of addictions. And bouncing around in a ring getting hit while I knock the shit out of someone else feels good.
Cross stands before me, wrapping my right hand in tape. He throws the roll to the floor, then he sighs, letting me know he’s about to bring it up. “How was your trip to Rio?”
My brother and I returned this afternoon. It was either get fucked up tonight or throw a few punches. “Fine.” I jump off the table and start for the door, exiting the room and walking down the long hallway. I can hear the crowd already wound up. Their shouts and hollers fill the large space. “Bloody Nose” by Hollywood Undead plays through the speakers, announcing my arrival. And I hop from foot to foot.
A hand slaps me on the shoulders and then begins to massage them. “Go out there and kick some ass,” Cross tells me. “Then we’ll go out and celebrate.”
I nod my head. “Sounds like a plan. I wanna forget this fucking week.” It’s only Wednesday.
I bounce down the narrow passage. Kingdom is always hosting fights. Some are televised and a big deal, but tonight is amateur night. Which sucks for whoever my opponent is because I do this all the time.
I come to a stop, remove my black silk robe, and the ref feels around me to make sure I’m not hiding anything that can hurt my opponent. Once he nods, giving the all-clear, I enter the ring, throw up my hands and bounce around in a circle in the center of the event center. I spot my brother at the top of the stairs. He stands there with his eyes narrowed and arms crossed over his chest. I ignore him. We haven’t spoken one word since we identified our father’s body in Rio. He didn’t even fight with me about cremating his body and tossing his ashes.
My eyes find Cross, and he’s nodding his head at me, trying to get me wound up. Letting me know I got this. Not surprising, Titan is nowhere to be found. Emilee and her best friend Jasmine have been ring card girls in the past, but they are both MIA tonight while other women fill in for them.
“Give it up for the one, the only … GRAVE!” The announcer yells out my name, and everyone is up on their feet, shouting my name. I smile at them, soaking it up.
“And in the opposite corner, we have a newcomer who thinks he can take on Grave.” People boo.
I smile. Bring it. I love virgins. Well, the ones I get to beat the shit out of anyway.
“It’s his debut, welcome Marker.”
I spin around to see a kid bouncing his way down his aisle. He has a white zip-up hoodie on that’s covering half of his face. I snort. Kids.
He gets checked and then ushered into the ring. He pushes his hoodie back, then he turns around. His hands drop to his side, and his blue eyes widen on me.
Fuck!
APRIL
I sit in the silent living room with a plate of untouched lasagna on the coffee table in front of me. I couldn’t eat. Derek’s words aren’t sitting well with me the more I think about it.
It’s now past three a.m., and Ethan still hasn’t come home. Calls to his cell have gone unanswered along with my text messages going unseen.
I wrap the blanket around me and lean my head back, yawning. I’m so tired. I gotta be up at six to be at the shop and have it open by seven. He acts like we both wanted this life. Like I didn’t give up college or a life for him. I didn’t have a choice. I did everything I could to make sure he had one, and he still resents me. I don’t think anything I could have done would have been right.
I hear a car pull up outside, and I jump to my feet to look out the window. Ethan exits the passenger door of an old Saturn and begins to walk up the path to the stairs. My anger flares at him as I see he’s looking down at his phone. That ungrateful son of a …
The front door opens, and he leaves the lights off as he starts to walk up the stairs. I flip them on. “Where the hell have you been?” I demand.
He stops midstep but keeps his back to me. “Out.”
“No shit!” I snap. “Where the hell were you, Ethan?”
“None of your business,” he snaps back and begins to crawl up the steps.
I move and yank him around to face me, almost making him fall down the stairs. His eyes meet mine, and mine widen. “What the hell happened to you?”
His right eye is swollen and has a blue and purple bruise. His bottom lip is cut, and he has dried blood on his chin and neck. “Jesus. What did you do?” His mouth clamps shut, and he looks away from me. I dig into the pocket of my robe. “Did you get that here?” I hold up the key card, not sure what a room key would have to do with bruises. Maybe he got into a fight with some kids. That happens at parties. And I wouldn’t be all that surprised because he’s a mouthy fucker.
His eyes widen on it, and he reaches for it, but I pull it away. “Did he give you that?”
“What? Who?” What is he talking about? “I found this in the office. It fell out of your jacket pocket.”
His shoulders slump, and he runs his hands through his shaggy hair. “Keep it,” he says before he gives me his back and walks up the steps, slamming his door shut in the process.
CHAPTER NINE
GRAVE
I STAND INSIDE Roses the following morning. She stands behind the counter in a pair of black yoga pants and a shirt that reads prick me with a rose that has thorns on the stem. It’s adorable. “I hope you like it,” she says nervously.
“I have no doubt.”
She walks away and goes into the side door behind the front counter. While I wait for her to return, I head back to the office. I smirk when I see the kid exit the office. He sees me and immediately turns his back to me, ready to run away.
“Come here,” I order him.
He comes to a stop and turns to face me with a look of annoyance on his face.
“Does she know?”
He shakes his head before dropping his eyes to his feet.
“I don’t wanna see you there again.”
That gets his attention. “But I …”
“I don’t give a fuck! If I see you at Kingdom again, I will throw you out on your ass. After I beat the shit out of it.” Kingdom is no place for a young kid like him. It’s not meant to be a place where kids hang out. It was made for adults, for men who had more money than God and were bored out of their fucking minds, needing a place to spend it. He fits neither of those qualifications.
Of course, we have our customers who get a room for the night, but our hotel is just a front. Our event center brings in major cash along with the Queens service that Titan supplies the city with. Nothing good will come from him hanging out up there.
He opens his mouth to argue again, but April walks out of the cooler. He rolls his eyes and then turns back to enter the office before she sees him. I’m not even sure who he is to her exactly. He could be a brother, or he could be some charity work she’s doing by giving him a job here. Doesn’t matter. He was there to fight last night, but he won’t be doing it again any time soon.