by Lily Zante
While I’m at it, I check my emails as well. “Go talk to him now,” Ernesto says, interrupting me with his return.
I swallow, and look up to see the beast beating the punching bag like someone deranged. I’m not so sure I want to go over to him right now.
“Now?” I ask, my voice a whisper. “He looks busy.”
“He’s annoyed that you’re going to take up his time.”
I’m not convinced listening to Ernesto is a good thing. “Go on,” he urges. “He’s finishing off on the punching bag. You can grab him now.”
I don’t want to grab him now or later, but it’s what I’m here for, and I don’t have a choice.
Ernesto leaves, and I waste a few minutes trying to still my heart. I don’t understand this, why I’m feeling nervous, or why my heart is behaving like I’ve run a marathon. Nothing fazes me, and I hate that this does. That he does. So on the count of three, I raise myself, and then walk over to Eli, feeling a complete phony as I try to look confident. He moves from the punching bag to the speedball.
I wait, like a dutiful butler, and watch from behind as he punches the speedball. My eyes take in the wide span of his shoulders and my gaze rolls over the dips and curves of his muscles. Each time he moves, the muscles flex. It’s easy to see because his skin is taut; there are no layers of fat. I hug my arms, feeling self-conscious.
He lifts his hand and effortlessly tap, tap, taps the ball. His left hand slightly raised, his right going at it with a gentle rhythm. I’m mesmerized because he makes it look so easy.
Then he stops and turns around abruptly, as if he’s sensed my presence. It has to be that, because I haven’t said a word, or made a noise. I’ve been too enthralled checking him out and trying not to hyperventilate.
This is not me. I am not that pathetic whimpering little woman whose heart goes to pieces when she sees a man who is to be admired. Eli isn’t drop-dead movie-star gorgeous, and I’m not one to be fixated on a man’s body, and yet, with this man, this feral, raging beast before me, something happens to me that is beyond my control.
His eyes widen and he fixes me with that what-the-fuck-do-you-want look.
I was going to smile but in the face of such resentment, a smile seems weak. “I wanted to ask you a few questions, if I could,” I say, and then realize that he hasn’t said a word; he’s asked no question. He hasn’t even moved a muscle as he faces me. This, I now understand, is his silent threat. It’s how he deals with predators, nosy people, intruders, opponents. Anyone. Or maybe just me. It’s as if he sees me as an opponent. That’s not the way for me to gain his trust.
Then I smile.
And he doesn’t.
It is impossible to remain optimistic, and hopeful, in the face of such adversity.
But I’m a pro.
“Five minutes,” he says, and before I can stumble from the shock, and before it dawns on me that five minutes isn’t enough time, he’s walked away. He heads towards the locker room.
“I can’t go in there,” I mutter to myself, then look over my shoulder. It’s a relatively quiet day, and I don’t care if there’s anyone else inside. Elias Cardoza just gave me five minutes, and I’m going to make the most of them.
Chapter Six
ELI
* * *
She watches my every move and I hate this. How does Lou not see how pointless it is having this journalist snooping around?
I’ve given her five minutes. I wasn’t sure she’d follow me into the locker room, but she has. It’s a sign of how desperate she is.
Somewhere over my shoulder, I can hear the sound of the shower running. I glance at her and she looks at me with those doe-shaped eyes. She already looked out of place in the gym, but in here, she’s full-on like a fish out of water.
I start to take my gloves off, using my mouth on the first glove.
“Do you want me to help you with that?” She stares at me, and then the gloves. I hold back a snort. How does she think I usually manage?
“That’s your first question?” I ask, managing to release my hand. I take the other glove off. I notice she doesn’t have anything on her, no notebook, no pen. Not even a phone. Guess I must have caught her by surprise. “What made you go into boxing?” she asks, folding her arms as she sits down on the bench.
Yawn. Yawn. Yawn. The same old boring question. Boring is good, though. It could be worse. “I like to fight.”
“Why?”
“I’m not an office guy.”
If she’s annoyed by this, she doesn’t let on. Instead, she stares up at me.
Her hands are splayed on the wooden slats on either side of her. I’m itching to strip down and dive into the shower. I’m sweating like a pig, but by the way this woman is staring at me, she doesn’t seem to care. I take a step towards her so that if she looks up at me, her face will be level with my groin. I can see this causes her some unease. It’s not that I’m close. Nowhere near. But I’m close enough. I try not to smile too much, but seeing her squirm turns this into a game. And then she pisses me off with her next question. “Tell me about your early years.”
“Which part?”
“When you were taken away by child protective services at age two, I believe.”
I swallow. She’s done her homework and I hate that she’s bringing this up. I don’t want to talk about that stuff.
I don’t want this out there. I’m trying to forget that part of my life. My story is compelling, I get that, but people don’t know the half of it.
“Things weren’t so great at home,” I reply, poker-faced.
“What happened?”
Before I can answer, I hear a noise behind me. I turn around and Callum’s out of the shower and standing there buck naked except for a towel he’s using to dry the rest of himself with as he’s walking. He stops dead when he sees the journalist in front of me.
“Oh,” he says, but doesn’t bat an eyelid or make any attempt to cover himself up. He simply turns around and heads towards his side of the locker room.
I turn around and find myself looking at the princess. Her face has turned red.
“So, uh… your… uh… your home life?” She struggles to stay calm. I watch her, finding it amusing, and, given that this isn’t a topic I want to talk about, I tell her, “Your time’s up.”
“But we’ve barely had—”
“I told you, five minutes.”
“How am I supposed to get any information out of you if you won’t cooperate?”
I raise an eyebrow. “Cooperate?” She’s talking like a cop. I walk over to the locker on her right and open it.
“What can you tell me about growing up?” she asks, sounding indignant. She was calm, chilled and mellow a few moments ago, but seeing Callum naked has thrown her off course. This suits me perfectly because I have zero interest in telling her my life story. I owe her nothing, and whatever deal she and Lou had, I don’t give a shit. “How else am I going to write anything about you?” she asks, when I don’t answer.
I don’t care, seeing that it’s not my problem.
“I need to take a shower,” I tell her, throwing her a glance over my shoulder. She’s furious. Her cheeks are still red, and I wonder if it’s because I’m being a real dick to her, or because she had a chance to look at Callum’s dick. I snicker inwardly at my own joke.
“What’s so funny?” she asks, not losing it, not raising her voice, but I can detect her internal struggle because her voice is shaky.
“Lady, I gotta shower, and if you don’t leave, I’m gonna strip in front of you. It doesn’t bother me.”
She’s fuming now. “You were in a children’s home from a young age,” she says, ignoring me.
“I was.” And if that’s how she’s going to play, I can do the same. I peel off my boxing shorts, then my training pants and groin protector. I have my back to her as I do this, so I imagine she’s staring at my butt cheeks right about now.
She won’t follow me into the shower, because I’m
certain she can’t be that desperate for a story. Still, I’m well aware of what women can be like. There’s something about a boxer, and a winner at that, that gets their panties wet.
“Tell me about that time?”
The hell I will.
There is only one way to shut her up. I turn around and face her, in my full naked glory.
Her gaze dips.
Then she blushes, and I see it, her gaze softens. Her lips part, and though I don’t really hear it, I know she’s exhaled by the way her chest dips. And even though I’m not inside her head, I can see how long it takes for her gaze to shift upwards to my face again.
She stands up. Narrows her eyes. “I’m not following you into the shower,” she announces in a tone that makes me realize she might have interpreted this as a move.
Screw you. That’s the last thing I would ever do, make a move on someone like her.
I grab my towel and head into the shower.
Chapter Seven
HARPER
* * *
I walk out of the locker room thinking of all the many awkward situations I’ve been in, and Elias Cardoza stripping in front of me and not batting an eyelid has to be up there at the top.
I don’t have him down for being a sleazebag. He’s not a player. I can tell because I’ve been around guys who think they’re God’s gift to women. Elias isn’t one of those guys, so the fact that he stripped off like that can only mean one thing; he doesn’t like me poking around in his business. The guy doesn’t want me here. Nobody thinks he’s going to win and I can see the steely determination in his eyes. He wants to prove everyone wrong. If he loses, he’s going to pin that on me.
This assignment is getting worse with each day, and I feel deflated.
“Any luck?” Ernesto asks me, as I sit back down at my small table. It’s not even a proper desk, and it wobbles, and this adds to my frustration, but I manage to smile at Ernesto and tell him, “Yes, thanks.” It’s enough to have him go about his business, this time with a toolkit in his hands. He seems to be the handyman around here, fixing everything that’s broken. There’s not a day that I’ve seen him not fixing anything. On closer inspection, the gym is falling to pieces. Paint is peeling from the walls, and the wooden floors and doors look as if they’ve seen better days. Even the equipment is old and shabby. It is nothing compared to the high-tech bright and shiny gym that’s around the corner from my apartment. Hard to see a place like this spawning a world champion, but Ernesto told me that Lou had trained another champion, a middleweight, many years ago. He reckons he can do it all over again but with Eli, and this time for the heavyweight title.
A few days later, Gerry wants to meet up to see how I’m getting along. Ernesto recommended a place which is a stone’s throw from the gym, so that’s where we decide to meet.
It’s lunchtime and the place is busy. It takes a while for us to place our order and in the meantime Gerry wants to know what it’s like being at the gym. I play down the friction I’m feeling from Eli, but hint that it’s not easy.
“You can’t get him to open up?” Gerry asks, as if this is a big surprise.
“He’s a stubborn little shit.”
“Shit?” Gerry raises an eyebrow. “You’re not supposed to say that about the person you’re interviewing.”
I shrug and place my hand around my glass of lemonade. “Well, he is.”
“Merv and I thought you’d be in awe of him.”
I shoot my gaze up at him. “Why?”
He gives me an isn’t-it-obvious look. “Look at him. He’s a boxer. Isn’t that appealing to you young ladies?”
I shake my head. “Not really.” Gerry doesn’t need to know that Eli’s physical appearance makes me go weak at the knees.
I suppose I should be grateful that the guy is stone cold towards me. It helps keep me grounded. And a one-way attraction helps. Even if my attraction to him is steeped in hate most of the time.
“He must have given you something?”
An eyeful. The locker room scene is still vivid in my head. Eli’s body is beautiful; every inch of it and it’s an image I can’t seem to shake from my head.
I could get carried away with my fantasies if he showed me even a molecule of niceness. Instead, I’ve gotten only a few short sentences from the guy. “Not a lot,” I reply, gritting my teeth together.
This isn’t working out, really it isn’t. Merv is going to come down on me like a ton of bricks. Maybe that’s why he put me here in the first place.
And then I see him. He’s sitting a few stalls down on the across the aisle, and he’s with someone. A woman. I catch her staring at me staring at Eli, and I look away. Is she his girlfriend? And I don’t know why that annoys me a little.
* * *
ELI
* * *
I noticed her dirty blonde hair first when I walked in. She had her back to me and didn’t see me, but she was sitting with a ginger-haired dude. I can’t imagine he’s her boyfriend, he looks way too old, but he’s smartly dressed, and money talks.
I sit down a few tables ahead and across the aisle. Nina waits for me, if she knows I’m coming, so that we can eat together. It’s a thing we have. It’s not fixed, but she knows I’ll come by around noon—if I’m going to eat—and she’ll wait for me. It’s one of the few times we get to catch up. Sometimes she’ll invite me over in the evening, and eat early just so that it fits around my timetable.
“Who are you staring at?” she asks, when I glance over my shoulder. I assumed I was being discreet, but I forget how observant my sister can be.
I turn back around. “No one,” I state, but Nina’s gaze flicks over my shoulder.
“The blonde? You’re checking out the blonde?”
“She’s not blonde,” I say quickly. “Wheat colored, more like.”
“But you were checking her out.”
I don’t want to explain that I know Harper, so I move the conversation back to Nina.
“Have you decided on your next course?” She’s recently finished a bookkeeping course and now wants to try her hand at something else. She attends a lot of night school classes and is always trying new things, but she hasn’t yet settled on any one area of expertise. I see how we’re similar in wanting to better ourselves. I chose boxing but Nina’s still trying to find her vocation. For now, she’s happy to waitress at Frankie’s Kitchen until she can turn things around.
“Not yet. I need to save up, but I’m thinking maybe I’ll try theoretical physics.”
I chortle. “What the hell is that?”
“Don’t know yet. I’ll find out when I take the course.”
“It sounds painful. And shouldn’t you be doing courses in stuff you can get a job in?”
“It sounds interesting. Besides, it’s not as if I’m giving up the waitressing.”
I wish I could lend her money. I wish I could make things easier for her, but I don’t have much myself. Even after this fight, I don’t imagine that the winnings will be super huge, especially when everyone else has had their cut. But at least I’ll get something.
She won’t need to worry about money too much once I hit the big leagues, and Trent Garrison is my ticket into that world.
“I can help you out after the fight,” I tell her. “After I win.”
She grins. “Of course you’ll win, and I will ask you then.”
Nina looks at me and nods proudly. I love her for that. She always looks at me as if she’s immensely proud of me. Most people don’t see much when they look at me, actually, that’s not so true now, especially when people find out I’m in this fight, but before it was always the case. Nina was always the sweet, quiet one, and I was always the troublemaker. I was disruptive at school. We came close to being adopted a few times, but the foster families always backed off. Many couldn’t believe we were brother and sister. I couldn’t help it. Rage can’t be contained. It needs an outlet.
“Come and watch,” I say, because it would mean a lot to me.
I’m not scared about going to New York, or stepping into that ring at The Garden with the whole world watching. It doesn’t faze me that ninety-nine percent of the audience will be on Garrison’s side. What will faze me is not having anyone there. Lou and Santos and Jake will be, they’re my entourage and they’re the only family I have, aside from Nina, but to have her there would mean the world to me.
She winces, and it’s obvious that I’ll never be able to convince her. She shakes her head. “I can’t, Elias. I can’t watch you get hit.”
I note she didn’t say ‘beat’. She believes in me, and that’s all I need.
I avoid looking at her and mash up my baked potato. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll call you as soon as it’s over.”
She won’t even watch the fight on TV and refuses to go to her friends’ places or go out and watch it on the big screen. It can’t be easy, I understand that. We only have each other, and she can’t watch another man beat the crap out of me. It was bad enough when my aunt’s boyfriend used to do that.
Nobody understands how big this is for me—to be given this chance, a fluke chance at that—and for me to end up in this fight against the heavyweight champion of the world. It would never have happened had the two fighters before not messed up. One failed a drug test, and the other threw his shoulder out in an injury. I was the third choice. They reckon I don’t have a chance, that I’ll be a pushover for Garrison, but time will tell what a big mistake he made getting into the ring with me.
We change the subject quickly. My sister doesn’t like that I’m a boxer, but it’s the only way I can earn money. It’s the only thing I’m good at.
I glance over my shoulder again. Harper is so engrossed in her conversation with the ginger dude that she still hasn’t seen me.
“She’s new,” Nina replies, when I turn back.
When I raise my eyebrow, questioning, she elaborates. “I know everybody who comes in here. She’s new. I haven’t seen her here before.”