by Ashley Hall
Which meant that he would be my next opponent.
I headed back to the locker room to towel off and get ready, and when I wiped Sadie’s decadent musk from me, it was only reluctantly.
One thing was for sure though: my head was clear. I had exactly what I needed.
The next match lasted roughly five minutes and went the full three rounds. When I was next up, I arrived next to the cage just to see Sadie slip back into her seat as discreetly as she could on wobbly legs.
I’d done the best I could not to mess up her hair or makeup, but a man could only do so much. With a final glance, I stepped into the cage and found myself confronted with Wright.
He was fucking massive, and if the rumors about him were true, he wouldn’t go down easily. Especially not if he stood to win my title from this fight.
When he grinned at me, I saw that he had all of his teeth, and I knew this fight wouldn’t be an easy one.
I didn’t even have time to glance at Sadie before we started. The bell rang and Wright rushed at me, all rage and power.
But, I soon realized, little technique. His kicks didn’t have the reach they needed to, and so it was easy to dance around him.
At least until he hit me.
I got cocky, and one of Wright’s mediocre kicks caught me in the chest with enough force to knock the breath from me. Atop that, I was pretty sure he cracked a rib or two. As the crowd groaned, I stumbled backwards into the wall of the cage, narrowly avoiding another blow meant for my head.
As I ducked out from underneath his reach, Wright lashed out, catching my side—right where Vlad had tried to carve me up a week earlier. A hiss of pain escaped me and I turned on him, trying to land a punch.
Wright didn’t really have the speed, but he could block like a motherfucker.
I couldn’t even get a hit in.
I went high, I went low, I tried to go around, but I only really succeeded when I went straight for him—and that didn’t end well for me. I caught one of Wright’s gigantic fists to my face and my nose immediately sprayed blood, almost certainly broken.
Riley’s string of curses sounded from outside the cage as he screamed at me to end it.
Fuck.
I hadn’t had someone break this many of my bones in half an age. It pissed me off enough that I lashed out with everything I had. When I really turned on my speed, Wright couldn’t block fast enough. My punches found his jaw, his neck, his abdomen; ultimately, a jack-knife kick found his face with pinpoint accuracy.
He crumbled to the floor with a groan that echoed around the arena.
There was a single, brief moment of silence before the crowd erupted.
Over the screaming and cheering, I gazed out at them, wondering what they got out of this enterprise. Me, I just liked to hit things. As far as I was concerned, there was a bit of sadism in these people.
As the pain in my nose faded to a dull ache, I turned triumphantly to the VIP section to see what Sadie thought of my knockout. No doubt she’d be pissed as hell that I let my opponent get a few hits in on me but I’d be damned if she wasn’t just a little pro-
Wait.
Where’d she go?
Sadie’s seat was empty.
The announcer was raising my hand and proclaiming me one of the finalists to go on to the tournament the next day, but I heard none of it. Sadie was gone.
It would have been easier to look for her if the tournament hadn’t been breaking up. Hundreds of people were flooding the aisles, but as far as I could tell, none of them were my blonde-haired, honey-eyed goddess.
I took the pack Riley offered me for my nose but waved off the doc in favor of rushing to the locker room to dig my cell phone out. The moment I had it in hand, I dialed Sadie’s number.
I was probably overreacting. She might have gone to the bathroom or something; she might be on her way backstage to meet me even as I made the call.
But my gut told me something was wrong.
At that moment, the phone clicked as Sadie picked up, and relief flooded through me. “Sadie, where are y—”
“Good evening, Griffin.”
My heart dropped into my stomach as my chest tightened, choking off my breath. I’d recognize that smug, oily, superior Russian tone anywhere.
“Ivan.” I barely managed to get the word out past my taut jaw.
“Nice to hear you remember me. I thought you might have forgotten…what with your pretty new toy.”
My stomach turned to ice. Sadie. They had my Sadie.
Rage burned, hot and rancid, in my throat, and I squeezed the phone hard enough to crack the plastic outer coating. “If you lay one fucking finger on her, I swear to God, I’ll gut you like a fish and feed your peons all the caviar in your belly.”
Ivan, holding all the cards, only chuckled amusedly at my threat. “Now, now, Griffin. Calm down. I’m sure we can come to an arrangement. The blonde will come to no harm, as long as you give me the money you owe.”
Money.
It was always about money.
But this time, I couldn’t fight; I couldn’t wheedle my way out. They had Sadie, and unless I paid, they were going to hurt her. I had no doubt about that.
“How much?”
Sadie
I should have been terrified. Mind you, I was very, very afraid, but I couldn’t decide what I feared more: the men holding me at gunpoint or my own thinly veiled rage.
Everything had been going perfectly.
Well, perfectly unless you counted the fact that Griffin had ruined my underwear and I probably wouldn’t walk straight for a week because he just had to scratch his itch mid MMA tournament. I was all settled in to watch him participate in his final fight with a particularly gruesome-looking opponent when I’d been called backstage. Assuming that it was Griffin, I’d hurried back—leaving my undercover cop bodyguard far behind.
That was when they’d snatched me, fucking cowards.
I was grabbed, roughly fondled, and dragged the entire way through a series of hidden back hallways until I emerged in the alley behind the arena.
My captors—both of them large, pot-bellied, and lascivious—had all but thrust me towards the waiting limo.
Where I met the infamous Ivan.
He was every bit as disgusting as Griffin had warned me, and he spared me no more respect than his henchmen. The moment they had me inside the limo, my hands were tied with zip tie—not a thought was given when I protested the angle on my injured arm.
“You are not here to be comfortable. You’re here to be the bait. And what sweet, sweet bait you are,” the small, black-haired Russian reminded me, giving me a lingering once over that made me physically ill
When he reached for me, I must have momentarily lost my mind, because I tried to bite the fucker.
Almost got him too.
While I got a momentary rush of adrenaline from my little stunt, Ivan didn’t seem too pleased. On the contrary, he drew a small pistol from his belt and pointed it at me, making my insides turn to water. “Do not toy with me, kukla,” he warned me, shaking his head with a shark-like grin. “If, for one moment, I think you will cost me more than I will gain, I will not hesitate to blow your pretty brains all over the pavement.”
At that moment, my phone started to buzz in the small bag I’d bought. In my struggles against Ivan’s henchman, the bag had fallen to the floor of the limo, and I stared at it in horror. There was only one person I knew would be calling. The match must be over, and Griffin was looking for me.
Ivan’s grin was cruel. “You’re not going to get that?”
What a complete asshole.
“No problem. I get it for you.”
Reaching down, he emptied the contents of my purse onto the floor to extract my cell phone. Ivan answered it with the press of a button and my heart sank.
“Good evening, Griffin.”
Though I couldn’t make out the fighter’s exact words, Griffin’s rage was palpable over the line. Ivan, however, took it al
l with a grain of salt. “Now, now, Griffin. Calm down. I’m sure we can come to an arrangement. The blonde will come to no harm, as long as you give me the money you owe.”
All this for money. Money that wasn’t even his!
“Five million and not a penny less.” My eyes widened at Ivan’s demand. “You have ten minutes to bring the money to the back alley of the arena or you will find quite the messy surprise.” With that, he hung up, and I stared at him in horror as he tossed my phone out the window.
When Ivan next spoke, his tone practically oozed self-satisfaction. “There is Griffin Webb for you. The world’s ultimate fighter and the world’s ultimate pussy.”
At the insult, my newfound temper took hold of me again. I spat in Ivan’s face without hesitation, struggling against my bonds. “You could never be half the man he is,” I hissed vehemently, all but shaking in anger.
To my shock and revulsion, Ivan only reached up to rub his fingers through my saliva on his cheek before inserting them into his mouth to suck clean.
His desirous smile was sickening. “We’ll just see about that, kukla.”
He reached for me, and since I was bound, there was little I could do to prevent it. While a man on either side of me held me still, Ivan ran his fingers indulgently over the swells of my breasts before creeping further and further southward. My breath came in harsh pants and I trembled in terror.
A harsh bark in Russian distracted all three of them.
We all looked forward to see the driver indicating a figure striding towards the limo with grim determination. When I saw that it was Griffin, clutching a large duffel bag, my heart leapt.
Ivan laughed loudly. “Right on time, your lover boy.”
Taking my arm in a bruising grip, Ivan shoved open the door, using me as a shield as he pressed the cold steel of the gun to my temple. The feel of it made me shudder as he urged me forward. “Nice to see you again, Griffin. We never get to spend much time alone, just me and you.”
I didn’t think I’d ever seen Griffin look so murderous in my life. His green eyes glittered with malicious intent as he stopped a mere three feet away from where Ivan held me hostage. His nose, I noticed, was swollen and stuffed with tissues—probably broken. Despite the grievousness of the situation, my heart went out to him. I hated to see him hurt.
“Here.” He tossed the bag he held across the space that separated him from Ivan. “Take your money and give me Sadie.”
Without letting go of me, Ivan knelt, unzipping the bag with one hand to reveal more cash then I’d ever seen altogether in my entire life. At the sight of it, my eyes widened and Ivan laughed harshly. “Griffin, Griffin! If I had known this was the way to get you to pay, I’d have taken your little toy sooner!”
A dangerous growl escaped the dark-haired fighter. “Let. Her. Go.”
“I don’t know…” I gasped as Ivan suddenly pulled me closer, his tongue sliding slimily over my ear. “Perhaps I keep her…to ensure your good behavior for the future.”
When I was in the hospital and Griffin told me what happened in the beach house, it frightened me. He said he snapped with such cold conviction, with such certainty. I could never really fathom that kind of violence, and so I had to trust what he told me.
This time, when Griffin lost his rein on his temper, I watched it happen. Watched the fire consume his gaze as he moved forward with lightning speed.
Ivan panicked. He pointed the gun at Griffin and it went off once before the larger man kicked it from his hand. Griffin’s foot struck Ivan’s chest with enough raw force that several somethings cracked and the man dropped like a ten-pound bag of potatoes.
And he let me go.
I hit the pavement hard on my hands and knees, skinning them.
But that was nothing compared to what was happening to Ivan.
Griffin was on top of him, and a polite word for what he was doing might have been pulverizing the man’s face. After five or six punches, not much remained of his cheeks and jaw, and I felt my stomach roil even as a strange sort of satisfaction suffused me.
Somehow, I forced myself to look back at the limo, where Ivan’s friends looked like they were about to take action.
“Griffin!” But he didn’t hear me. He was too busy beating the stuffing out of Ivan.
And then, just like that, the air filled with sirens. Cops burst from the arena and before anyone in the limo could get away, they were extracting every Russian and putting them in cuffs. Four more police cars arrived and two cops leapt on Griffin in an attempt to pry him from on top of Ivan.
By the time they did, the Russian mobster’s face had been permanently rearranged. He was taken away to an ambulance, cuffed to a stretcher, barely breathing.
“Fuck!” I watched Griffin rake his hands through his hair before he repeated the curse, louder. “Fuck!”
And then he seemed to realize I was lying there on the pavement, and all the fight drained from his gaze. “Sadie!” He rushed to my side, pulling me up and into his arms as he all but crushed me. “Fucking God, Sadie, are you okay?” He pulled back just long enough to cup my face, looking it over, before he kissed me long and hard, almost drawing blood. “Tell me you’re okay.”
I smiled weakly. “Just a few bumps and bruises. I’ll be alright.”
And surprisingly enough, I was. The momentary terror was over. All the tension that had built up in me over the past weak dissipated at the sight of cops swarming over the scene, putting those who had it in for Griffin away where they belonged.
If this was the way Griffin rolled—moment-to-moment, unexpected—then I supposed I was going to have to get used to it. If I wanted him, I had to take the whole package.
Even if it meant a bit of danger.
“Good job, Webb.” At the familiar voice of Detective Addison, my eyes widened. He stepped up to Griffin, nodding in greeting to me. “Ivan Ishnakoff was no small fish. When he sings, he should give us more than enough information to drop any murder charges against you. Hell, we might solve half the drug crimes in the city. You did good.” Glancing toward Ivan’s body, the detective grimaced slightly. “Though he’ll be lucky if he can talk anytime soon.”
Griffin snorted. “You going to arrest me?”
Holding up his hands defensively, Addison shook his head. “Hell no. You’d probably kill me.”
His comment made Griffin’s lips quirk slightly. “I don’t hurt cops.”
I couldn’t help it; a breathless laugh escaped me.
Jesus, this was insanity. Utter insanity—and I chose it. I chose Griffin Webb.
Griffin
To say it was a long day was a fucking understatement.
By the time we finished wrapping up with detectives, I spoke with Riley, and the details of the tournament were ironed out, I was bone tired.
Though I had never let a woman drive any of my cars, I let Sadie drive the Jag back to my penthouse, and I could find nothing to say about her skills.
“At least,” she pointed out as she glided into my parking space, “I don’t go zero to fucking two hundred within the city limits.”
I grinned at her snark. “You should try it some time. You might like it.”
She rolled her eyes, stepping out of the car. “Bite me.”
“Just tell me where, sweet thing.”
I wanted to kiss her. To hold her and touch her now that everything was over, but more than that I just wanted to sleep. My nose hurt like a motherfucker and I was sure Riley would be on my case the next day about an explanation for all this. Him and the media.
When I let us into the penthouse, Sadie sighed, glancing around.
“What?” My brow shot up at the sound and she merely made a face.
“It’s huge, and it’s gorgeous, but you have to admit, Griffin, this place screams bachelor pad.”
I chuckled as I sank down on the nearest couch.
“Well, since your fine little ass is here so much, why don’t you move in and redecorate?”
That look of shock never got old. Never.
“You’re joking.”
I smiled, shaking my head. “Definitely not.” And I wasn’t. I didn’t like the idea of spending less time with Sadie than I did without her, and the best way to rectify that situation was to always have her by my side; especially now, without the threat of Russian mob assassination.
“Well…” She slid onto the couch beside me, pressing that lithe form against me in her killer black dress. “Maybe you could use a bit of a woman’s touch.”