by Josie Kerr
Wait, what?
Bridget laughed, a husky, throaty sound that Nolan thought he didn’t hear enough.
“Stop, guys. Just stop. You’ll jinx it. And don’t you all have something to do, like get ready for your own fights? Sheesh.” She sounded a little perturbed, but she had that shy smile back on her face, so he guessed she was okay with whatever they were ribbing her about.
He stood over at a back counter and hoped the other fighters would go away soon. After all, he didn’t need witnesses to his inevitable flameout. He stalled by rearranging the protein containers by flavor profile. Just as he was about ready to scream and prove to everyone he was a deranged nutcase, all the men wandered out, leaving him alone with Bridget, who had no idea he was there.
Excellent beginning, right, Nolan? You are so forgettable that she doesn’t even notice you, even though you’re the size of a teenage bear.
“Sweet Jaysus, this fight is gonna be the end of me before it even becomes official.”
Bridget’s unexpected muttering jolted Nolan from his fussing, sending canisters of protein powder clattering. He succeeded in stopping the skidding jars, but not before causing a lot of racket. He turned and found Bridget with her eyes and mouth popped wide with surprise.
A sheepish “Hey” was all he could manage to say.
“Hey, Nolan. I, uh, didn’t see you come in.”
“Uh, yeah, I just finished my session with C.”
“Good session today?”
“Uh, sure. Yeah.” Breathe, Nolan. You can’t ask her out if you’re passed out on the floor.
“Good. That’s great.” She exhaled noisily and seemed as anxious as Nolan felt.
“So, you got some exciting news, it seems?”
“Oh, oh yeah, potentially. I . . . a big promotion is talking about matching me up with someone for a fight.”
“And that’s good?”
“Yeah, it’s good. It’s what I do, or what I’m trying to do.”
“Yeah, that’s good, I guess.”
She smiled at him and came to stand next to him at the counter. “What? Tell me what you’re thinking, Nolan Harper.”
“I . . . just guess I don’t understand the desire to stand in a ring and get punched in the face for a living.”
“One, I’ll be in a cage, not a ring. And two, I don’t get punched in the face.” She balled her hair on the top of her head into a sloppy bun, which highlighted the graceful curve of her neck and jaw. She wasn’t a delicate thing at all—quite the opposite. Bridget’s arms and back were strong but lean, more like a dancer than anything, and Nolan found himself wondering how tight her muscular thighs could cinch around his waist.
Wait, what?
“I seem to remember you having a black eye and a split lip that first session,” Nolan said by way of deflection.
Bridget waved him off. “Tig got in a lucky hit, though Paddy gave us both hell—him for being too rough and me for letting him get through.”
“Tig? Is he the little one with the blue hair?”
Bridget laughed again, and the urge to move in closer and elicit a different kind of laugh grew stronger.
“So you train with a guy?”
Bridget stopped what she was doing and turned to face him, arms akimbo and eyebrow quirked. “So? Why does everyone think this is an issue?”
“I couldn’t hit a woman.”
“You’re not a fighter.”
“I’m just saying, if you grew up in a home like mine, you’d feel differently.” Nolan snapped his mouth shut. She didn’t need to know about all his dirty laundry.
“And there it is.” Bridget leaned against the countertop and cocked her head to the side, examining him as if she’d never really seen him before.
“What?” He concentrated on straightening the containers in front of him so he wouldn’t have to meet Bridget’s eyes, though he could sense her looking at him.
“You didn’t have a great home life.”
Nolan barked a laugh. What a fucking understatement that was. He generally thought he’d come out pretty unscathed, but every once in a while, something would trigger a flash of emotion that would render him powerless, something like the possibility of Bridget getting her face bashed in, even if she actually invited it.
He didn’t like it at all.
Bridget had moved closer to Nolan, right next to him, and leaned against the counter, resting her weight on her arms, waiting for him to say something.
“You met my dad. He’s a righteous asshole and a violent drunk to boot. I generally avoided his wrath if only because he didn’t think I was worth the energy, but my mother and brothers . . .” Cal cleared his throat, and with a crack of the vertebrae in his neck, dismissed the subject. “Yeah, he’s just a bad person, but there’s no reason to get torqued up about bad shit from thirty years ago, right?”
“Right.”
“And there it is,” Nolan said, turning Bridget’s words back on her. “I guess we’re even, then.”
“Nolan.” Bridget laid her hand on his forearm, and electricity from the contact zinged straight to his balls. “Nolan, look at me.”
He did.
“I’m sorry. I know there’s nothing for me to be sorry for, but I’m sorry. I had friends who grew up like that, and either they got over it or it broke them. I’m thinking you got over it.”
“Most days I think I did, but sometimes . . .”
Bridget nodded. “I get it.”
Just do it, Harper. “So, you wanna go out sometime? You know, since you’re not really my trainer?” Nolan blurted.
Bridget blinked. “Go out? Like on a date?”
Nolan nodded tentatively. “Yeah, like on a date.”
“Oh, um. Yeah. That’s . . . not gonna be possible.”
Nolan nodded. “Sure. Okay.”
“No, Nolan. Wait.” Another little touch, more electricity. “When we go into camp for a fight, it’s highly regimented. What we put into our bodies, when we train, everything. Some of the guys even move back into the fight club dormitory to stay focused.”
“Oh.” Nolan scrubbed his face with his hand. “Sorry, Bridget. That was inappropriate. I . . .”
Both of Bridget’s hands clasped his forearm, and she leaned in close, so close that her scent of lemons and mint enveloped him. “Not inappropriate. Inopportune. Eight weeks, okay? Let’s revisit this in eight weeks.”
“Sure.”
“Gimme your phone.”
He handed it over, and she quickly called her phone from his. She tapped on the keys and showed him and held her phone up.
“See? All in and ready to call you.” Another gorgeous smile erupted from her face.
“Okay. Then, I guess the ball’s in your court, Bridget Doherty. But now, I gotta head home and bake a bunch of cakes.”
“Cakes?”
“It’s a long story.”
“Oh, okay.”
He shuffled his feet. “So, I’m going. Uh, thanks for giving me your number. I’ll see you around.”
Nolan practically ran out of the fight club. She probably wouldn’t call him, but she had his number, had given him her number. That was something, right?
Chapter Sixteen
Bridget watched Nolan’s fast-retreating back as he fled the break room. What in the world was his deal? You’d think he’d never asked a woman out before. Bridget paused but then dismissed the errant thought. Nolan was just nervous.
What a freaking day. No sooner had she started her afternoon sparring session with Tig, than Tommy, the matchmaker from Southland Promotions, called, indeed expressing interest in a local match. Ten minutes later, the fight club was buzzing and Bridget was more excited than she had been in years, about anything.
Three days. Well, two and a half, really, until her camp started. In sixty hours she was going to be eating, sweating, and sleeping mixed martial arts, but until then, she had a lot of little stuff to get done. She set off to her little house, mentally making a list of tasks.
Three loads of laundry later, Bridget was lying flat on her back in the middle of the sofa, avoiding doing the chore she liked least: folding clothes. She detested folding clothes and putting them away, and she had the half-empty drawers and closet to prove it.
“I need a house elf,” she grumbled to herself as she sorted socks from underwear.
Generally, the two nights before training were spent not necessarily in full-blown debauchery, but in some sort of indulgence, especially of the carnal sort, and here she was, combing through her unmentionables. She held up a particularly threadbare pair of panties—she needed to do some shopping. She gathered up clothing and wandered into the bedroom to put things away, finally.
She pulled open the top drawer, and the last set of fancy lingerie she’d purchased stared her in the face. She’d literally burned the set she’d gotten for that disastrous weekend rendezvous—put the expensive set in a metal garbage pail and set it on fire.
This set was a pair she’d gotten right after she moved home. Funnily enough, her mother suggested she get some new things. Bridget had thought she just meant clothes, but her mother had taken her to an upscale lingerie shop in Copley Place and told her to pick out something she liked. She and her mother had both cried when she’d tried on the set, and then the sales attendant had wrapped it up. Bridget had taken it home and not looked at it again until that moment. She took the top off the box and ran her fingers over the soft lace. The delicate items were the girliest things she’d ever owned.
She sighed, replaced the lid, and then slid the box back into its place in the top drawer. Maybe she’d have somewhere worthy to wear the set soon. Grabbing the laundry basket, she went back into the living to tackle the pile of T-shirts. She’d just hauled the giant pile into her lap when a knock and Annie’s voice calling, “Hello!” granted her a reprieve. Bridget leapt from the couch and opened the door so quickly that Annie still had her fist raised to knock.
“Oh! Hi! I didn’t know if you were here, but I thought you might want to come over tonight for dinner. Pierce filled in last minute at Foley’s, and we have way too much to eat. So, please?” She pressed her hands together, and Bridget laughed. How could she say no to that?
Annie and Bridget lazed on the back porch of Annie’s house after dinner, enjoying the cooler early evening air. Bridget was very thankful that they ate outside, because she didn’t know if she could handle sitting at that dining room table.
“Pierce told me you have a fight, Bridget. Are you excited?”
“It’s not for sure yet. The matchmaker’s doing his thing, but we have to deal with Jett Raptor.”
“Oh no. Oh, I don’t like that Raptor guy at all. He’s a jerk.” Annie’s pretty face darkened in a frown. “He’s always causing issues for DS Fight Club.”
“Right? So who knows if it will actually come through. We’ll see. I hope it does.”
“I don’t see how you do it, Bridget.”
“Do what?”
“Fight. I don’t like getting punched.”
Bridget barked a laugh. “I don’t like getting punched, either. That’s why I try to do the punching.” Annie was gazing out over the yard at the Atlanta skyline that peeked over the top of the trees. “But you didn’t mean that kind of punching or fighting, did you, Annie?”
Annie chuckled but didn’t look at Bridget. “No, I suppose not. But that hasn’t happened in a long time, thank goodness. Pierce would never, ever lay a finger on me. Ever.”
“I’m glad to hear that.”
Annie looked at Bridget. “You never had to deal with any of that, did you?”
“Physical stuff? No. Kevin knew I wasn’t afraid to defend myself, and I would have won if physical push came to shove. No, Kevin’s bullshit was much more insidious. Lots of little things that added up, and then the whole affair thing. That was big, but it wasn’t insurmountable, at least until the end.”
“What’s he like?”
“Kevin?” Annie nodded, and Bridget huffed a breath and thought about what she was going to say for a moment before she continued. “Kevin Donahue is a little banty rooster who is always looking for the next big thing. There’s always some business opportunity that he absolutely has to take advantage of right now, and it never, ever pans out.”
“He sounds like Nanda’s ex, but maybe smarter.” Annie clapped her hand over her mouth in surprise, and Bridget laughed. “Don’t tell her I said that. Oh, goodness.”
Bridget continued chuckling. She and Nanda had had discussions about their exes, and yes, Kevin and Nanda’s Gino were of a similar breed.
“So you said that Kevin was a ‘banty rooster,’ huh?”
“Yeah, he is. He’s about Tig’s build, but shorter. I can look him right in the eye.” Bridget snorted. “Not that it mattered or kept him honest, you know. Why?”
“He’s very different from Nolan, then.”
Nolan?
“Nolan? What?”
Annie’s eyes popped again. “You two aren’t . . . you know?”
“What do you mean, ‘you know’?”
Annie raised her brows up comically high and did a hilarious two two-lidded wink. “You know you know.”
Bridget guffawed. “No!” But then she sighed. “No, we’re not ‘you know.’ But he did ask me out today.”
“Oh, you should go. He seems like a sweetheart. And he can move that big body of his around a dance floor.”
“He can, can’t he? I was kind of surprised.” Bridget watched the fireflies dance around the yard. “I told him that we’d see in eight weeks.”
“You’re scared, aren’t you?”
“Terrified.” Bridget swallowed hard. Her inadvertent admission caused all sorts of feelings to percolate within her, emotions she’d kept tamped down hard. Her divorce freed her from all the crap that had been weighing her down for the past few years. And Nolan Harper made her want to maybe dip her big toe in the pool again.
“What are you afraid of?”
“I’m afraid that I’ll want to dive in headfirst, only it’ll be in the shallow end and I’ll end up bloodied and bruised.”
“But what if it’s in the deep end and there’s someone with a life preserver waiting for you, though?” Annie scooted to the end of her chair and put her hands on Bridget’s knees. “I think you should do it, Bridget. Take a chance. My gosh, woman, you kick people in the liver for a living. You’re brave! That big bear of a man has nothing on you.”
Bridget laughed through her sniffles and nodded. She owed it to herself to take a chance. How bad could it be, right?
Chapter Seventeen
Nolan coasted to a stop in front of one of the small Craftsman houses situated directly across from the fight club. Okay, Nolan. You’ve got this. He blew out a breath because even though he really didn’t know if he had this or not, he was doing it. When Bridget called, he’d been up to his elbows in chocolate cream, having just put the final layer on top of a chocolate hazelnut crepe cake. She’d babbled at him and then informed him that he was picking her up at seven that evening. Then she hung up, and Nolan stared at the phone for a few minutes before whooping.
And now he was here, in front of her house, with six cakes in the backseat. He got out of the car and made his way up the sidewalk to the neat porch, where he knocked on the door instead of ringing the doorbell. The rapping of his knuckles on the heavy wood door calmed his nerves.
Bridget opened the door and greeted him with a blinding smile.
“Hey,” Bridget said as she slipped out the front door and locked it behind her. “You look nice.”
Dressed in a pair of slim black trousers and a blouse that left one shoulder enticingly bare, she looked tidy and cool. Nolan wore the same thing he had worn on his previous outing—a pair of dark jeans and a guayabera-style dress shirt. The day was warm, and Nolan had the A/C in his truck cranked up as high as it would go because of the cakes, which left him looking a bit windblown. He felt ungainly and disheveled compared to the
trim woman at his side.
After opening the passenger door and helping her into the tall truck, Nolan carefully drove the short distance to Pickett & Spence, where he could see Cal practically hanging out the door, awaiting the arrival of the cakes.
Nolan pulled into a space at the front of the building, and Cal burst out to the parking lot. Bridget shrieked when he pulled open the truck’s door unexpectedly.
“I’m Cal. Sorry, darlin’—gotta get these beauties inside,” he said before grabbing two of the boxes off of the floorboard.
“They’re in a bit of a crisis. He’ll calm down once he gets the cakes in the case.”
“Sure.” Bridget had been smiling nonstop since she got into the car. “Can I help you?”
“You can take that green box if you wouldn’t mind.”
She nodded, slipped out of the truck, and carefully picked up the designated box. Nolan scooped up the remaining three boxes, and they walked together into the gastropub.
“This was really nice,” Bridget whispered when they finished their small plates at Pickett & Spence. “Nolan, we didn’t have to—”
“Remember, I’ve got an in, so don’t even, okay?”
She looked skeptical but grinned as she settled back in the seat of Nolan’s truck. “Fine. I won’t. But thank you. It was all fantastic.”
“Yeah, the selections are decent.” Nolan held his opinions back because he knew Bridget wouldn’t want to hear him blather on about pairings and seasonal food, but really, Alphonse should be able to put together a more exciting menu than what Pickett & Spence currently offered.
“You loved working in a restaurant, didn’t you?”
“Yes, but it wasn’t good for me at the time.”
Bridget leaned closer to him. “Is dealing with claims any better for you?”
He chuckled. “Probably not. There’s less temptation, though.”
“I suppose.”
“What did you do when you weren’t fighting full-time? Or have you always been a pro?”
Bridget laughed. “Oh no, it’s only been since I came to DS Fight Club that I’ve been training full-time. Now, I’ve done a little bit of everything. Waited tables, office jobs. I used to do a lot of booking for my dad’s band and for Kevin, but that wasn’t really for pay.”