by Lane Hart
“Progress?” she huffs. “Does progress mean you’re screwing him?”
“No,” I say with a shake of my head. “We haven’t done that yet.”
“And what if he decides to do that with another skank?” she asks.
“Then I’m done with him,” I assure her. “I’m not insane. But I’m pretty sure that he won’t.”
“I hope not,” she says on a sigh before quietly eating a few more fries. “So what have you done?” she asks.
“Well…” I start. “He’s given me a few orgasms,” I say in a whisper.
“And?”
“And that’s it. He won’t even fucking kiss me,” I reply.
“Why not?”
“No clue,” I answer. “So, have you ever had one before?”
“No,” she answers. “I’m surprised my father lets me leave the house to come to school. Otherwise, he doesn’t allow guys to even look at me.”
“Then you have no idea what you’re missing,” I tell her with a grin.
“So it feels good?” she asks.
“Oh, my God, yes,” I reply.
“And have you…done anything to him?”
“Ah, no. Not yet,” I say, instantly deflating with that reminder. “He says he can’t, but I’m starting to think that’s just an excuse.”
“Why does he tell you he can’t then?” Maylin asks.
“So, fighters have these rules about when they can have sex or whatever during training,” I explain. “Their coach only allows it the night they win a fight, because he claims it hurts their performance or something.”
“Oh,” she mutters. “That sucks for them.”
“Yeah, it does,” I agree. “Cain has another fight coming up in a few weeks. Maybe we’ll, you know, do it then. That slutty stripper says she’s slept with him after every win, but that was before we were together, before I moved in with him...”
“Maybe you’ll finally get lucky,” she says. “I still can’t believe you live with three guys. My dad would lose his shit.”
“My brother isn’t too happy about it either,” I tell her, remembering Robbie showing up at the house last night with a cake for my birthday, days late. Although, as he reminded me, I forgot to tell him where I was going to be staying.
Robbie has never liked Cain, but he just doesn’t know him like I do. And Cain despises my brother. Hopefully, both of them will get over their shit soon, because they’re the two most important people in my life. I don’t know what I would do if I lost either of them.
Chapter Twenty-One
Cain
I’m still awake Friday night, waiting for Gabby to get home from the club when Ivan walks through the door looking like a beaten dog.
“Rough fight tonight?” I ask him, rather than if he won when he sits down on the opposite end of the sofa. Ivan never wins, and now I know it’s most likely by his own choice.
“Yeah,” he replies. “I won.”
“Huh?” I ask, pulling my eyes away from the television to face him just to make sure I heard him right. “You won?”
“Yep,” he answers with a nod.
“On purpose?”
“Nope,” he says, shaking his head. “The shit was set up.”
“What do you mean?” I ask.
“I fought that blond kid from Havoc. And you saw how good he was, right?” Ivan asks, rather than remind me the fucker kicked my ass.
“Yeah, I remember,” I mutter.
“Well, he laid off of me the whole time and then faked a knockout.”
“You’re sure?” I ask. “Maybe you nailed him good.”
“No, I didn’t. I was pulling my punches like always,” Ivan replies. “And when I went to see him after the fight, he looked fine, not the least bit like his brains had been rocked.”
“You really think Mario would fix fights?” I say in disbelief.
“If it makes him money, then, yeah, I think he would,” he answers. “’Cause you know everyone was betting on the Havoc guy to beat me, a loser with zero wins. If Mario put his money on me, then he’s rolling in the dough.”
“God, you may be right,” I tell him, worried about what this new development could mean for me. “So you didn’t go to Escapades?” I ask curiously.
“What do you think?” Ivan responds.
“Right.”
Ivan’s a closed book. I guess I’m not the only one in our house who had a fucked up childhood.
He loses every fight, well, at least until now, and I’ve never seen him with a woman. Since unlike me he’s not abstaining to try to win, I don’t really know what his deal is. But I do know that, if Mario is fixing fights, it doesn’t bode well for me or Gabby. Especially when, just a few weeks later, he arranges for me to fight the kid from Havoc.
There’s no doubt in my mind after the round the other day that the bastard could beat me fair and square. So, I plan to spend every waking minute preparing to take him down because losing isn’t an option. Hell would have to freeze over before I let anything happen to Gabby, but that doesn’t mean I’m not scared shitless going into the fight.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Cain
The night of my fight with the Havoc fucker I puke my guts out before I head to the ring, trying to pretend like I don’t have a care in the goddamn world when, in fact, everything is riding on me winning. The asshole might be better than me, but there’s no way I’m going to let him beat me tonight! I’ll die before I let that happen to Gabby.
So when the rich prick ducks underneath the ropes to climb in the ring, I lunge for him. The ref has to stop me with a hand on my chest.
“Fighters ready?” the ref asks, and I give a stiff nod.
“Fight!”
I charge him right off the bat, but the blond bastard sidesteps me and then lands a fist to the side of my head, pissing me the fuck off. So I spin around and come at him even harder. When the dickhead tries to sweep my legs out from underneath me, I’m prepared for it, unlike our first go-round a few weeks ago.
The problem is that while I’m concentrating on dodging his feet, his right fist blows into the side of my face just before his left jab nails me in the stomach, causing me to double over.
Fuck that hurt!
Instead of coming for me while I’m injured, the fucker backs off instead, which doesn’t make any sense.
As soon as I can, I pull myself up and lunge for him again. This time we end up in a clinch, trying to take each other down. As he lifts his right knee to ram it my already aching stomach, I take out his left leg from under him. On the ground, the fucker is on his back with me straddling him, nailing him in the face with alternating fists.
Then he does the stupidest thing ever.
He rolls over, giving up his back to me, practically sending me an invitation to put him in the rear-naked chokehold. I slip my arm around the front of his neck and use my other hand to pull back tight.
The fucker makes a half-ass attempt to pull my arm away from his throat, but it’s useless. He’s done.
I feel the taps of his gloved palm on my arm, signifying his surrender, but the ref didn’t see them, so he doesn’t stop the fight.
I’ll be damned if I let him go and lose this opportunity to end him on a technicality. So I choke the asshole out until his body goes limp and the ref finally blows the whistle.
“Luke. Luke!” Vaughan kneels down next to the boy and slaps at his face trying to bring him around. Finally, he weakly lifts his hand to bat Vaughan away.
“Luke!” our coach yells again before dousing his face with water from a rag.
That’s when his eyes finally open, the embarrassment on his face obvious when he realizes exactly what happened. The asshole’s jaw is clenched tight, and I can just imagine that he’s already wishing for a rematch.
Vaughan and the ref help him to his feet, but he continues to avoid eye contact with me as my arm is raised as the winner and the crowd of serious gamblers cheer.
God, I’m so glad t
his fight is over and that Gabby gets to keep her clothes on at least for a few more weeks. There’s no time for me to even relax, because I have to immediately start training for my next fight.
While I would like nothing more than to go home tonight and finally take Gabby the way I’ve been obsessing about for years, I know that I can’t. There’s too much on the line for me to let up for even one night of selfish pleasure.
And, fuck, do I hate not being able to give in and sink deep into my girl’s hot, tight pussy where my fingers have been spending lots of time.
After cooling off and rehydrating with a Gatorade, I get a few slaps on the back for my win and finally head to the locker room to shower and go home.
When I walk in, I find the loser sitting on one of the benches with a cell phone in his hand.
“Sleep good, pussy?” I taunt him, but he ignores me, going back to his phone instead. I need to make sure this asshole doesn’t keep coming back here for more. He doesn’t belong on this side of the train tracks, so I want to urge him to take his rich ass back to where he came from. “Aww, are you butthurt that you couldn’t last a single round against me in a real fight?”
“It wasn’t a real fight,” he mutters, tossing the phone into a duffle and zipping it up.
“No, it was too one-sided to be called a fight. Easiest win of my life,” I brag as I swagger closer. “Now that you’ve lost against Ivan and me, it’s probably time to stop embarrassing yourself and call it quits.”
“Tell yourself whatever you want, but you know that I could take you any day in a fair fight,” he replies when he stands up and gets in my face, just inches separating us. “Remember how fast you went down the other day? I would’ve knocked your ass out in another thirty seconds.”
“Bullshit,” I spit, giving him a shove to the chest that pushes him backward and into the bench. “It’s time for you to go crawling back to Havoc with the rest of those cocksuckers. Rumor has it that shit also runs in your family –”
That’s the last word I get out of my mouth before a fist nails me in it.
While I land a few hits, none are with the force of this bastard’s rage. Guess my comment hit a nerve, and now I’m definitely paying for it.
Blood gushes and splatters from my nose, and my eye is pounding as he keeps hitting me on the ground until someone drags him away.
I know I deserve every ounce of pain I’m in, that’s why I welcome it until Ivan and Knox help me up and get me home.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Gabby
Cain’s stretched out on the bed, face bloody and looking like shit when I get home. After I wet a warm washcloth, I sit on the edge of the mattress next to him to start cleaning him up.
“So, just a wild guess here, but did you lose tonight?” I ask Cain as I blot away the blood around his nose instead of scrubbing and making it worse.
“I won,” he groans.
“Must have been some fight,” I remark.
“I think it was fixed…for me to win. At least…that’s what the asshole said.”
“Who? The guy who lost to you?” I ask. “Of course he would say that.”
“I think he…may have been…telling the truth.”
“Mario is fixing fights? Not really surprised.”
“I can’t lose,” Cain mumbles. “I fucking can’t.”
“You won’t,” I assure him as I brush the sweaty curls back from his forehead with the rag. “You and my brother are two of the best fighters they have.”
“They could find someone better than me.”
“Well, don’t worry about that tonight,” I tell him while running the rag over his busted, bleeding bottom lip. “And I guess you hate being too bad off to fuck Cass or whatever her name is tonight, right?”
Grabbing my wrist to still my hand on his face, he looks up at me through swollen eyes and says, “I’ve never fucked Cass, Gabby.”
“How do you expect me to believe that when I saw her here in your bed!” I shout at him. “She told me she’s been with you after every fight!”
“Cass comes over here to get paid Mario’s fighter bonus…but we only sleep. That’s it, I swear, angel. She has a little girl and needs the money…”
“Do you really expect me to believe that?” I huff.
“Yes, because it’s the truth,” he replies. “I swear on our friendship, which is more important to me than anything in the world.”
“Our friendship,” I repeat with a sigh. “Right, it’s so important that you barely touch me and refuse to kiss me…”
My sentence cuts off when Cain grabs the back of my neck and pulls my mouth down to his. When his tongue slips past my lips, his fingers tighten in my hair, holding me in place so I have no choice but to open for him. His kiss is all it takes for my body to go completely lax and drape over his upper body, clutching his shoulders. A needy moan escapes before I finally snap out of my stupor to reciprocate, letting my tongue stroke Cain’s in the same desperate way.
In the back of my mind, I keep thinking, I can’t believe he’s kissing me for the very first time. I’m afraid to move even an inch of the rest of my body for fear Cain will come to his senses and stop. And I never want him to stop. The tingles shooting off like rockets deep inside my soul are too good, too right, making me hate that he waited this long.
When he eventually releases my hair and pulls back, I tell him, “If we never do that again, I’ll kick your ass.”
“I’ve wanted to do that for so long,” Cain says breathlessly.
“Then why didn’t you?” I ask.
“Plenty of reasons.”
“Oh yeah? Let’s hear them,” I reply.
“I…I can’t take things any further because, well, you’re too young and…innocent. But mostly, I just didn’t want to ruin what we have.”
“We won’t ruin anything. Everything will stay the same except for what we do when you climb in bed with me every night,” I assure him.
“Maybe,” he replies with a half-grin.
“Maybe? What does that mean?”
“We’re not gonna rush into anything, and I can’t fool around before a fight,” he says, reaching down to adjust the bulge in his shorts.
“You won tonight, and you need some relief,” I tell him, nodding to his hard cock, the thick outline of which is clearly visible.
“I’m not gonna fuck you,” Cain replies through clenched teeth.
“I know,” I say. “I just want to kiss you…here,” I say, running my index finger over the bulge.
When Cain throws his head back and groans, I take advantage of his temporary distraction and pull the front of his elastic shorts down, freeing his hard length.
“Fuck,” he mutters as I wrap my hands around his shaft and give it a squeeze. I lower my lips and brush a kiss over the tip.
Wanting to taste more of him, I run my tongue over the small slit. The salty flavor on his hard, velvety flesh is even better than I imagined.
Cain shudders before releasing a string of profanities.
“I shouldn’t,” he says, threading his fingers in both sides of my hair to pull me off. So I seal my lips around his cock and apply suction to prevent him from stopping me. I need to make him feel good for once.
“Aww, fuck, yes,” he groans at the same time his hips punch upward, shoving him deeper into my mouth, so far, I almost gag. I don’t, and as I get used to his length, I open wide as Cain finds a rhythm fucking my mouth.
Peeking up at his face, his jaw is clenched tight and his dark eyes are heavy-lidded watching my mouth work him over. I’ve never done this before, but I’m pretty sure he’s enjoying it.
“I can’t,” he grumbles even as he throws his head back and lifts his hips. His fingers in my hair tighten, holding my mouth down on him rather than trying to pull me away. “Stop, baby, I can’t. Gotta fight for you…I…I can’t,” he says, his voice straining before he shouts, “Oh fuck! I’m coming!”
Cain’s cock swells in my mouth before th
e jets of his salty liquid hit my tongue. I swallow everything he gives me too, so turned on I could almost come without being touched between my legs.
“Goddammit,” he grumbles as he pulls my mouth off of him. “You shouldn’t have fucking done that!” he yells at me.
“What the hell, Cain?” I ask in confusion as I use my hand to wipe the remnants of his release from my mouth. “I’m pretty sure you coming meant you liked it, right?”
“Fuck!” he exclaims, covering his face with his hands. “I needed the aggression, the edge, and now you’ve made me weak.”
I can’t believe he’s upset. I thought he would be happy after that…
“What’s the big deal?” I ask him. “All the other guys get off on the nights they win.”
“Because it doesn’t fucking matter if they lose!” Cain yells.
“It doesn’t matter if you lose either,” I point out to him.
“You don’t have a goddamn clue,” he tells me as he jerks his shorts up and gets to his feet. “I’m sleeping in my own damn bed from now on and so are you.”
My jaw drops at his attitude and his hateful words when he leaves the room. My eyes begin to water as I get off my knees, still wondering what the fuck just happened.
…
Cain
“Goddamn it!”
I grab the half-full Gatorade bottle from beside the bed and throw it against the wall after I barked at Gabby and left her in her room.
Right now, I have no fucking idea what’s going on in my damn head.
Over the years, I may have bullshitted with guys about getting blowjobs and shit, but the truth is, Gabby just gave me my very first one. And fuck if it wasn’t the most incredible thing I’ve ever felt.
So now I’m asking myself why the hell I yelled at her afterward and ran away instead of thanking her for the hottest moments of my life.