by Robin Huber
“Yeah.”
“Sam’s coming,” he says, pointing up at the monitors over the ring.
“I know.” I look up and watch him move through the crowd with Joe and the rest of his crew. Except for Tristan, who’s in the hospital again. Thankfully Molly is there with him.
Leon and Mikey hold up two of Sam’s belts, showing them off to the excited crowd, and they shine in the spotlight that’s following them to the ring.
Defending titleholder Sam Cole is making his way to the ring through the excited crowd as his beautiful fiancée, Lucy, cheers him on.
Sebastian nudges me, barely containing his excitement, and I smile over the butterflies that suddenly fill my stomach. I look at Miles and he gives me a wink.
Like Sam, she, too, is a product of the foster care system here in Atlanta…You can definitely hear the excitement in this hometown crowd tonight…Joe Maloney, his longtime coach, encouraged him to take a few months off after he reinjured his ribs during the Phillips fight at the end of the year, but I’ll tell you, he looks stronger than ever…He sure does. Andre Ricci has his work cut out for him tonight.
Sam climbs into the ring and my heart races on cue, like it always does when he’s about to fight.
Lucy, Thirteen Years Old
“What did you say?” Sam says to the boy who just called me a snowflake.
The boy crosses his arms over his chest and leans against the chain-link fence that surrounds the basketball court at our school. “I wasn’t talking to you.” He looks at me and winks, and it ties my stomach into knots.
“Sam, don’t,” I plead when I see his shoulders tense, but he ignores me and lunges toward the boy like an unstoppable freight train.
He grabs his shirt and pulls him off the fence, shoving him back several feet down the sidewalk. When the boy gets his footing, he charges Sam like a bull, but Sam catches him and shoves him off, throwing a right hook at his face that cuts his cheek.
“Sam, stop!” I shout, but he hits him again.
My heart pounds in my chest, but there’s nothing I can do to stop him.
A crowd quickly gathers around us, and they shout with encouragement.
“Stop it!” I scream at them, but I might as well be invisible.
The crowd jumps up and down like heathens, egging them on.
The boy hits Sam in the mouth and a small cut begins to bleed, but Sam doesn’t seem to notice. He hits the boy hard, knocking him to the ground, and grabs his shirt. “Don’t you ever look at her again. You hear me?”
“Hey, hey, hey!” a man shouts, breaking through the crowd, and they all scatter like roaches. He grabs Sam’s arm and pulls him up, but Sam yanks his arm away.
“Get the fuck off me.”
“Hey!” he shouts at Sam, shoving him against the fence. “You don’t know me. Don’t talk to me like that.”
“You don’t know me!”
“Oh, I know you. You’re what, fourteen, fifteen years old? You want to beat everyone up who looks at you or your girl the wrong way. I was you.” Sam tries to move, but the man holds him against the fence. “Listen to me. You like to fight?”
“I don’t like to fight. I have to fight,” Sam grits through his teeth.
“Nah, that’s an excuse. I know you like to fight. I can see it your eyes.”
“So what if I do?”
“Then fight like man, not like some dog on the street.”
“What?” Sam struggles against his hold.
“I own a gym. It’s not far from here. I teach kids how to box. Kids like you, who love to fight.”
Sam stares at him and relaxes a little.
“I can teach you how to fight like a man.”
“Why do you give a fuck about me?”
“Watch your mouth. You want to fight like a man, you have to act like a man.”
“Why do you care?”
“Because I’ve seen what kids like you can be. You want to waste your life away in the Park, getting into street fights, getting into trouble, maybe even going jail…be my guest. Or you can come by my gym and let me teach you how to fight for real, show you how to earn respect for knocking people out.”
Sam stares at him for a few seconds and then nods. “Yeah…okay.”
The man takes a step back. “My name’s Joe. Joe Maloney.” He stretches his hand out in front of Sam and waits for Sam to do the same.
Sam reaches out tentatively and shakes his hand. “I’m Sam.”
“Nice to meet you Sam. You got a mean left hook.”
“Thanks,” he says warily.
“You all right, sweetheart?” Joe asks me.
“Yeah.” I inhale a shaky breath. “I’m okay.”
“What’s your name?”
“Lucy.”
“You like seeing him fight like that, Lucy?”
“No,” I say, keeping my eyes off Sam.
“I didn’t think so.”
I glance up at Sam, who’s looking at the ground.
“Boxing isn’t like that. There are rules, protective gear. You come by the gym with him, so you can see, okay?”
“Okay.”
“You come by tomorrow,” he says to Sam. “I open at six a.m. on Saturdays.”
“Okay.” Sam looks up at him.
Joe looks him up and down and nods. “Don’t let me down, Sam. Don’t let her down either,” he says, looking at me.
Sam gives me apologetic eyes. “I won’t.”
* * *
I sit on the couch in Sam’s dressing room with my feet in Sebastian’s lap, watching a live stream of the interview Sam’s doing in the next room.
“You sure you don’t want to make a surprise appearance?” Sebastian asks, straightening his cufflink.
“One appearance tonight was enough,” I say, folding my hands over my tight stomach. “I’ll be shocked if no one noticed the newest member of Sam’s team tonight.”
“The dress should have thrown them off. No respectable woman in her second trimester would wear something that smoking hot.” He cuts his teasing eyes at me and winks.
“Sebastian!” I smack his arm. “You picked this dress out.”
“Yeah, well, your boobs look fantastic in it.”
I glance down at them. “I think they’ve gotten bigger since last week. How is that possible?”
“You’re four months pregnant, it’s normal. So I hear.”
I narrow my eyes at him and smirk. “You’ve been reading the baby books again, haven’t you?”
“Well, Paul asked me to. And I need to know what’s going on with you.” He closes his eyes and shrugs a shoulder. “It’s my job.”
“So, are you and Paul any closer to crossing into baby territory?”
“Well, I’d like to say your unexpected news didn’t spark the baby bug in me, but it did a little,” he says, pinching his fingers together.
“Really?” I ask excitedly.
“Yeah. Now that I’ve gotten used to the idea, I think we might start seriously looking into adopting.”
“Sebastian!” I smile. “That’s great news.”
“Well, it could still take a really long time.”
“Sam, tonight was your twenty-sixth win, but it was another shaky match,” a reporter says to him, and we both turn toward the TV. “You were on the ropes a lot.”
“And he got off them,” Miles says.
“You’ve taken a lot of hits lately, Sam. Have you given any thought to these retirement rumors?”
“They’re just that…rumors,” Miles interjects again. “And they’re gonna stay that way. Sam’s not going anywhere.”
“I’m not giving my title up anytime soon.” Sam smirks.
“But you do have a wedding coming up, right?” the reporter asks.
Sam leans into his microphone again. “We haven’t set a date yet.”
I look over at Sebastian. “Because I’m not going to be able to fit into a wedding dress in the foreseeable future.”
“Which is exactly
why you need to do it sooner rather than later!”
“Bas, I know you want us to have a wedding, but honestly, there’s something about planning two weddings in one year that just feels, I don’t know, wrong.”
He waves his hand at me and rolls his eyes.
“Have you even thought about what that would do to Drew? Or how hard all this must be on him?”
“Um, no, not really…because you’re not with Drew anymore. And for all you know, he’s already got another wife lined up.”
I’d say the thought hasn’t crossed my mind, but when he didn’t reach out to me after my letter, I couldn’t help but wonder if a woman was the reason why. And I couldn’t help but feel a little hurt by his silence. Still, I don’t want to cause Drew any more pain than I already have.
“Seriously, Sebastian. Do you realize the baby is due a week before Drew and I were supposed to get married? That’s going to be a hard enough pill to swallow, don’t you think?”
“I suppose,” he says, swallowing one of his own.
“What did he just say?” I ask Sebastian, after one of the reporters says something about Sam taking another break before his next match.
Bas shakes his head, but Miles chimes in again. “Champions don’t take breaks. As soon as that eye heals, he’ll be training for his next match.”
I roll my eyes and exhale a worried breath. “Two more matches. And then this contract is up, the baby will be born, and Sam will have to take another break. I don’t care what Miles says.”
“Don’t worry about Miles, Lucy,” Joe says, joining us in the dressing room. “Sam will do what’s right for his family. There’s nothing more important to him than you and the baby.”
I sit up and nod.
“He asked me to take you back to the hotel. He’s going to be at least another hour. You ready?”
“Are you sure you don’t want to stay for the rest of the interview?”
Joe gives me a knowing glance. “I just want to be his coach. I’m not interested in his PR. I leave that up to Miles.”
I smile and yawn. “I am pretty tired.”
Sebastian looks at his watch. “I should get going too. It’s almost midnight.”
“Wouldn’t want you to turn into a pumpkin,” I tease.
“It’s a good thing the match was in Atlanta. I’ll be home before the clock strikes twelve.”
I laugh and give him a kiss on the cheek. “Drive safe, okay? Call me when you’re home.”
“Will do.”
“Give Paul my love. Tell him I hope he feels better.”
* * *
I yawn and slouch against the passenger door in Joe’s car as he pulls out of the arena parking lot.
“How ya doing?” he asks me.
“Just tired.”
“That’s not what I mean.” He glances over at me. “How are you, Luc? How are you handling everything?”
“Great,” I say, giving him a small smile.
He laughs softly. “I’ve known you for over half your life. Now you’re going to lie to me?”
I pull my eyebrows together and look at him. “I’m not lying.”
“I’ve seen that look before. Not since you were a kid, but you’re scared. I just can’t figure out if it’s because of the baby or Sam.”
I nod slowly and admit, “At the moment, Sam.”
He exhales a heavy breath. “Yeah, I’m worried about him too. I don’t like what I saw tonight. I don’t like what I’ve seen the last few fights.”
“You have to talk to him, Joe. I can’t be the only one. I’ve tried that before, but…I can’t be the wedge between Sam and his career. Even if he won’t admit it, he’ll resent me. I know it.”
He looks over at me and smirks. “So you want me to be the one he resents?”
“Of course not. It’s just…he thinks of you like a father. He’ll listen to you. He’s always listened to you.”
He stares at the road in front of us. “I watched that kid grow into a man. And then become a champion. I can’t imagine a father more proud of his son that I am of Sam.” He shakes his head and smiles softly. “Now he’s going to have a kid of his own.” He glances over at me. “He has a family to support now. It’s not just about the fight anymore, Lucy.”
I put my hand on my stomach. “What good is money going to do us if he’s punch-drunk?”
“I won’t let that happen.” He looks over at me again. “You have my word.”
I bob my head and watch the headlights of the car behind us grow closer in the side mirror. “Who is that?” I ask, looking back out of the rear window of his SUV. “I can barely see their headlights, they’re so close.”
We stop at a red light and another car pulls up beside us. The driver gets out with a camera.
“Joe.”
“Damn paparazzi. That’s who you should be afraid of.”
I grip my phone and shrink in my seat, trying to ignore the man outside my tinted window.
When the light turns green Joe floors it. “I can lose them.”
“Joe, you don’t have to. Jimmy won’t let them inside the parking garage,” I say, tightening my seat belt down around my hips.
“You really want them to know where you live?”
“No.”
“We’ll go around the next block a couple of times. There’s a one-way street I think I can lose them on.”
“Just please be careful,” I say, griping the door handle.
Joe turns left at the next block and speeds down the street between rows of parked cars. I call Sam, but like I expected, he doesn’t answer. He’s still talking to the press.
Hey, this is Sam. Leave a message.
“Hey, call me when you’re done. There’s stupid paparazzi following us home. Joe’s trying to lose them, but at this rate, you’ll get there before we do. I just wanted you to know. Love you, bye.”
Joe takes a sharp right that shoves me into my door. “Joe!”
“I think I lost them,” he says, glancing in his rearview mirror as we near the end of a narrow tree-lined street that’s lit by a glowing green traffic light. “You okay?”
“Yeah, I’m fine. But I’ve never seen you drive like this.” I laugh nervously.
“Yeah, well, I’m not usually being tailed.” He keeps his foot on the gas. “I can make the light.”
I look over at him and nod, but as we approach the intersection, I’m blinded by headlights that are glaring through his window. I barely have time squeeze my eyes shut and wrap my arms around my stomach before I’m pulled by a force unlike anything I’ve felt before. It shatters the windows and bends the steel in a crescendo of screeches and cracks that resonate through my elastic bones, which no longer feel a part of me, until—just as suddenly as it began—everything falls silent and still.
There’s no noise. No motion. Just the putrid smell of burning rubber and the blinding pain that’s radiating down my leg and wrapping around my torso.
I cry out, but when I breathe in, my lungs fight against me and my chest screams like it’s on fire. I lift my heavy head and see the glowing blue lights on the dashboard flickering on and off through the powdery smoke that fills my nose and blurs my vision. “Joe,” I whisper, without enough air in my lungs to speak any louder. But there’s only silence.
Something buzzes on the dashboard, lighting the cracks that stretch across the windshield, and I see Sebastian’s face reflected in the broken glass.
I lift my arm over the deflated airbag and reach for my phone, but my seat belt is pinning me to the seat. I try to unbuckle it, but it’s locked in place. I stretch my arm out as far my seat belt will allow, and scream with frustration when I can’t reach it.
I fall back against the seat and close my eyes and tears leak onto my cheeks. “Joe?” I croak, but he doesn’t answer. I look over and see his head hanging. I lift my arm again and reach for his shoulder. “Joe,” I cry, shaking him gently, and he groans. “Joe,” I say, relieved, and cry softly. “You’re okay. We’re go
ing to be okay.” I pull my hand back and put it on my tight stomach. “We’re okay,” I whisper, trying to move my seat belt down, but it’s squeezing me so tight. I wiggle my hips a little, but the pain is excruciating. “Ahh,” I cry, and it takes my breath away.
“Stay…still…” Joe mumbles, and I cry harder.
My phone buzzes again and I see Sam’s face reflected in the cracked windshield. “Sam,” I cry, desperately trying to reach my phone, but the pain is excruciating.
“Tell him…I love him,” Joe says, and the tears run in rivers down my cheeks.
“Don’t say that. You’re fine.”
“I love you…too.”
“You’re fine!” I shout at him.
“Tell…Tristan.”
“Joe, no…just talk to me. Just keep talking to me.” I hear sirens echoing down the street. “Do you hear that? Help’s coming. You’re going to be fine. Joe, do you hear me? Joe?” My head pounds and my heart feels like it’s going to beat through my chest. I inhale a shallow breath, but it does little to ease the dizziness inside my head. I close my eyes, but I can’t fight against it.
Lucy, Sixteen Years Old
“Do you really have to practice on your birthday?” I ask Sam, following him into the gym.
“I have a match next week, Luc. I have to be prepared. And it’s training, not practice,” he says, narrowing his eyes.
“Is there a difference?”
“You practice to win a game. You train to be a warrior.” He winks and throws his gym bag over his shoulder.
“Okay, Maximus.” I purse my lips together over a smile as we head to Joe’s office in the back.
“Where is everybody?” Sam asks, looking around the empty gym, which is usually buzzing with energy and dripping with testosterone.
“I don’t know,” I say coyly, spotting Joe and Tristan over his shoulder.
“Happy birthday,” they shout in unison, charging toward him.
I squeal and jump out of the way as they tackle him to the floor.
Joe gets to his feet and reaches for Sam’s hand. “Come on, we’re going out for pizza.”
“Pizza? What about training?”
Tristan wraps his arm around Sam’s shoulder and pats him on the chest. “You want me to kick your ass around the ring, or you want to go get some pizza?”