Undefeated (Undefeated Series Books 1-4)

by Charity Parkerson

  He’d seen some of her scars but to his shame, he hadn’t paid that close attention in his lust-induced haze. Now she was gone, and he very much feared he would never hear the story from her own lips.

  Jack paced the floor of the small apartment she’d been renting for the past few months, debating on what to do. She spent most days staving off panic attacks at the thought of never seeing Paul again. She just wanted to lay eyes on him. She didn’t even have to speak to him; only see him. There was a way, she knew, but convincing herself was another story. What if he saw her? Would he think she was desperate? She looked at the newspaper spread out on the coffee table again as she circled around it. She would have to make sure she stayed out of sight she decided, but she was definitely going.

  Once the decision was made, she felt her excitement grow. Not only was she going to get to see Paul, she was going to see him fight.

  At first, Paul thought his mind was playing tricks on him when he spotted her in the crowd, but once he was sure it was her, he realized he shouldn’t have been all that surprised to have found her here. It wasn’t a high dollar pot, more like a pissing contest between local fighters, but Bryant was still fighting tonight. He’d known she was a big fan, and he should have expected her. Only when the crowd had parted, showing him a glimpse of her, he’d been floored, and immediately he’d set off in pursuit. It took him longer to catch up with her than he’d thought it would, since several people stopped him, asking for autographs. He tried keeping the fans happy while still keeping her in his sights. He was afraid if she caught sight of him before he was able to catch up, she would sneak away since she had been trying so hard to avoid him. Once he untangled himself from an overzealous blonde, he was able to reach out and snag Jack’s arm before she could slip away. Spinning on her heel, she locked eyes with him and blanched. Paul pressed his lips together to stave off the angry words that surfaced at her reaction. Not giving her a chance to refuse, he tugged on her arm, dragging her behind him to a back parking lot where his Camaro sat parked. He hit the button on his keyless entry to unlock the doors and disarm the alarm. He opened the passenger side door, motioning for her to get in. She obeyed his silent command, both of them still not saying a word. Once he had her settled, he walked around, climbing in behind the wheel, and slamming the door closed behind him. Only then, did he speak, his voice coming out harshly, reflecting his inner anger.

  “What the fuck are you doing here, Jack? I thought you were done here?’

  The questions sounded so cruel coming from him. Those lips that had kissed her so lovingly now had venom dripping from them. It was her own fault, after all, she had been the one to set the rules, and declared it could only be for one night. She had no right at all to feel rejected, except that she did.

  “I wanted to see your fight,” she answered, then added haltingly, “and I missed you.”

  “Don’t tell me you were heartbroken?” he asked mockingly.

  Jack felt a jolt of pain through her abdomen at the cruel remark. She continued to stare straight ahead, refusing to be drawn into an argument while holding her pride tightly to her chest. She had meant so little to him. A part of her had known it, but hearing it with her own ears was truly a lowering experience. She hesitated, unsure of what to say but in the end, she let her pride be damned.

  “You’ll probably laugh and call me a fool, but I was heartbroken.” She turned so that she could finally meet his eyes. “I realize that I was one in a long line of many for you, easily forgotten, but you were special to me. Pretty stupid, huh?”

  Jack leaped from the car and stood staring at the back of the building with unseeing eyes. She wanted to rush back inside, shutting herself away before the memory of their time together could be tainted. Instead, her feet stayed glued to the pavement, refusing to carry her any further.

  Paul sat in a stunned silence; she had been heartbroken. He had only said the words in anger because she seemed like he had meant so little to her, but now he was left with a hollow feeling in the pit of his stomach. She had been his friend. That was the hardest part of it all. Before she had come along, he hadn’t had anything to look forward to. Then she had sent him those e-mails, teasing him with a glimpse of joy, only to snatch it away again. It took him a minute to realize Jack hadn’t moved from her spot on the sidewalk. As he watched, she threw her hands in the air as if admitting defeat and turned on her heel, marching back to the car. Throwing open the door, she cried, “Damn it, Paul, it’s right here.” Placing a hand over her heart, she said, “Right here, there is a tightness that chokes the air from my lungs until I feel like I’m suffocating, and the only time I can breathe is when I’m with you.”

  “Jack, get in the car.”

  “Why? Do you think that I want your pity?”

  “Get in the car,” he told her again, amazed at how steady his voice sounded. Something in his tone must have given his mood away because she scrambled to do as he said. Leaning across her, he pulled the door closed then pulled away from the curb. He could feel a muscle ticking in his jaw as he clenched his teeth against his growing rage. His pity? What the fuck?

  “Do you think that any of those people know me?” he exploded in anger. “Do you think that any of them are my friends?”

  “I don’t know.” Her answer came out as a whisper, leaving him deflated and tired. All his time spent looking for her, wondering where she was, and the whole time she had been right here. Signaling his intent, Paul checked his mirrors before making a U-turn.

  “Where are we going?’

  “I’m taking you back. I should’ve never pulled you out of there. I’ll take you in through the back so you won’t have to pay a cover charge again, and we’ll go our separate ways.”

  When the car came to rest in the same spot it had occupied only a few minutes before, neither one of them moved. The silence fell heavy around them, until Jack broke it by saying, “I know you, Paul, but you don’t know me.”

  Reaching behind him, he grabbed a stack of papers off the back seat tossing them into her lap. “I know you, Jacquelyn Jakes.” At the sound of that last name, she sucked in a breath so hard, she nearly choked, but he didn’t give her a chance to respond before he stepped out of the car.

  She stared down at the papers in her lap, unbelieving.

  Local fighter arrested on Attempted Murder charges

  Manuel Jakes, 32, was arrested Thursday night on charges of

  attempted murder and domestic assault after police were called to

  the fighter’s Baton Rouge home on a noise complaint. When

  police arrived on the scene, Jakes’ wife, Jacquelyn, was found

  unresponsive, having suffered from several stab wounds.

  Underneath the newspaper clipping was a back ground check on Mannie, listing all of his many domestic assault charges along with the dates of his arrest, and the sentence he received for each one. She flipped through the rest of the pages, seeing her life laid bare. He knew it all, then. She straightened the pile into a perfect stack, putting them back where they had been. She should’ve been angry over the invasion. She should’ve run after him railing, at his back like a fishwife, but instead she calmly let herself out of his car, making sure to lock the doors. He intended to keep his word, she saw. He was leaning against the wall next to the back door waiting for her. At her approach, he reached for the door handle, but she put out a stopping hand.

  “You are a fake,” she told him. “All that charm, fake. Every time you smile and laugh, it’s all fake. Maybe nobody else has ever noticed besides me because you are so very good at being a fake.”

  “Not when I’m with you. Then it’s all very real.”

  “Paul, you deserve so much more out of this life than this half life you live. You deserve someone who is undamaged. Someone who will bring the happiness and the laughter back into your life.”

  “And you think that’s not you?”

  “There is nothing remotely undamaged or funny about me,” she answ
ered.

  Paul snorted “Nothing funny? You sent me a picture of your feet and hands the second time you had ever e-mailed me. From what I can tell there’s nothing remotely normal about you.” At her look of outrage, he smothered a laugh. “I don’t want someone normal. Someone normal wouldn’t know what to do with me, and someone perfect would hate me.”

  When she stayed stubbornly quiet, he rubbed a frustrated hand over his freshly shaved head. “Look, can we talk? That’s all, just talk?”

  Jack stared down at her toes. What could it hurt to talk? Sighing, she nodded.

  Jack eyed the swing with mistrust. “It’s perfectly sound!” When she still hesitated to sit, he added, “I swear.”

  Deciding to trust him, she sat gingerly in the porch swing that had betrayed her once already. Paul sat down next to her and when not so much as a creak sounded, she let out the breath she had been holding. It was a cloudy night without so much as a star in the sky, which made things easier on Jack. Paul’s face was cast in shadow and she kept her gaze averted to make it easier to tell her story.

  “When I was eighteen, I went with one of my friends to this little redneck saloon right outside of Baton Rouge. I wasn’t old enough to drink yet, but I was reveling in the freedom of actually being able to go to a bar. I’d planned on dancing the night away but when we got there, we realized that they were hosting a mixed martial arts tournament. Instead of going home and coming back another night, we decided to stay and watch.” A small smile played on her mouth as she remembered that night “I saw Mannie as soon as I came through the door. His fight had just ended and he looked like some sort of God. He was coming off the high of winning, people were scrambling to get his autograph, but he looked right at me, and that was it. Love at first sight. We were married six months later, and it was golden. Until we had our first big argument.” She looked down to where she had been twisting the hem of her shirt and she forced herself to stop. “I left, the very first time he ever hit me. I left. I didn’t want to be one of those stupid women who stayed, but then he got help. You have to understand that I loved him so much. He was all flowers and phone calls. I even found myself picking arguments with him just to see if I could push him into hitting me again, but every time, he would tell me he had found God. Every time we made it through a fight without him laying a hand on me, I’d remember one more good thing about when we were together, and I’d start to wonder if he was telling the truth about having changed. I started thinking that maybe it had been me; maybe I had pushed him too far that one time. Eventually he wore me down and I took him back.”

  “And things started right back up again?” Paul asked curiously.

  “No, not the physical abuse. It became more of a mind game designed to undercut my confidence. Little comments about my hair, my weight, the cleanliness of our home. This one night he had a sparring match scheduled and I went to watch. This trainer, Teddy, started talking to me during the match. He leaned over to talk closer to my ear because it was so loud in there, you had to practically scream at each other to be heard. As soon as he leaned towards me I looked over his shoulder and Mannie was watching us.” She began twisting the hem of her shirt again. “The look on his face, Paul, I can still picture it even after all this time. I knew...” Her voice broke and she had to clear her throat before continuing “I knew I was dead. It was like I had set something in motion that I couldn’t stop. I didn’t try to run or beg his forgiveness. I just plastered this fake smile on my face and I waited.”

  They sat in silence, both of them lost in their own thoughts. Then as if it had been choreographed, they reached for each other’s hand and pushed with their feet, setting the swing into motion.

  “Six months ago, out of the blue, he showed up at my door. I didn’t even realize he had been released. I had filed for divorce as soon as physically possible and I hadn’t looked back. Three months ago, he attacked me while I was walking home from work one night so I came here.” Jack purposely left out the fact that she had been coming home late from working on Paul’s car. He raised her fingers to his mouth brushing a kiss across her knuckles. “Why didn’t you tell me all of this right away?”

  Jack let out a humorless laugh. “Because I feel stupid and you shouldn’t have to be burdened with my shit.”

  “But I want to be burdened with your shit.”

  “Why?”

  “I would think it was obvious.” When Jack only looked confused, he added, “Because I’m in love with you.”

  “You love me?” she sounded mystified. “But, why? You could have any woman you wanted. Why would you want me?”

  Paul shrugged carelessly. “Because you’re you. You were willing to go out with me when all you thought you’d be getting out of it was Huck-a-Bucks. You never even asked my friends for an autograph even though I know you’re a huge fan.”

  “It never occurred to me to ask,” she told him truthfully.

  “Exactly! It never even occurred to you. That’s what makes you so unique. You wanted to be with me simply because you wanted to spend time with me. That’s why it was so hard for me to accept that you didn’t want anything else to do with me. I thought that you cared about me at least a little.”

  Jack’s eyes fell closed in defeat at the hurt that sounded in his voice. “I wanted to walk away. I really did, but I couldn’t stay away from you.” Turning, she caught Paul’s gaze for the first time. “Why can’t I stay away?” she asked hopelessly.

  “Maybe you love me too?”

  “I very much fear that I do,” she admitted.

  “Will you stay with me?’

  She nodded, unable to form the words past the lump that had formed in her throat. Standing, Paul tugged lightly on her hand, pulling her to her feet. He led her into the house and she followed willing, all the while keeping her eyes glued to his back, wondering what she was getting herself into. When he turned, catching her eye, she decided she didn’t care. As scary as it all was, she knew deep down that there was nothing she wouldn’t do in order to be with him. He had no idea the power he held over women. She would gladly stalk him to the ends of the Earth.

  The look in Jack’s eyes made his temperature skyrocket. He knew that when he’d asked her to stay, she’d only been agreeing for the night, but he intended to convince her to stay for good. He pulled her closer, wrapping his arms around her waist as he went. Holding her gaze so she would know the honesty in his words, he told her, “I love you.”

  She reached up, framing his face with her hands. “I love you too,” she breathed before capturing his lips with her own. His heart soared at her words and when she opened for him, he took everything she was willing to give. Pulling away slightly, he touched his forehead against hers. “I like this shirt you’re wearing.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Can I have it?”

  She giggled like a little girl. “I don’t think it’ll fit you.”

  “Just the same,” he told her as he tugged the shirt over her head. He checked the shirt's size in an exaggerated gesture, then with a shrug of his shoulders, he admitted, “You’re right,” before tossing it across the room. He could see the laughter in her eyes. “What about the pants?’

  “I don’t think they’ll fit, either,” she teased, but she stripped out of them, handing them over. This time he didn’t even pretend to look at the label, tossing them in the general direction of her shirt.

  “Nope, that doesn’t fit either, too bad.”

  Scooping her up, he tossed her onto the bed while she squealed with laughter. She stretched her arms above her head and he watched the motion while openly admiring her body. She was left wearing only her bra and panties, but she was still overdressed.

  “You look hot in those clothes.”

  “What clothes?” she asked dryly. “You took them.”

  “Well, I’m burning up,” he said as he tugged his shirt over his head. He heard her indrawn breath and he was forced to hide a smile as he shed the rest of his clothes. Once he s
tood completely bared before her, she agreed, “You’re right, it is burning up in here.”

  “Maybe you should let me have these then,” he told her, pulling off what was left of her clothing. His own breathing was ragged at the sight of her naked and in his bed.

  “I’ve missed you so much,” she admitted, causing a tightness to begin in his chest.

  “Please don’t leave me again,” he heard himself saying the words before he was able to call them back. He had wanted her panting before he tried to talk her into staying, but Jack surprised him by saying, “Just try and make me leave.”

  He smiled at her fierce tone.

  “Paul, I’m getting cold now.”

  “We can’t have that,” he told her, covering her body with his. “I’ll keep you warm.”

  He sucked her nipple into his mouth. Her back arched, pressing it further into his mouth. He loved the flavor of her skin. She was like an exotic fruit to him. He couldn’t get enough of tasting her. Jack wrapped her legs around his waist and he tilted her hips for a better angle before he entered her. Once their bodies were molded together, they stared into each other’s eyes as he began rocking slowly inside of her. His eyes tried to fall closed as the pleasure rolled down his spine, but he refused to let them close against the sight of her. He wanted to watch as the pleasure ripped through her. When the moment came, he wasn’t disappointed. He knew he’d always remember her exactly like this. Her eyes opened and her lust-glazed look caused his own orgasm to slam into him, catching him by surprise. He let his weight fall on her, being careful not to crush her. They laid in the dark, listening to the sound of each other’s breathing. They linked their fingers and Paul twisted them gently from side to side, looking at their clasped hands. “You know, I’ve been thinking about expanding my shop to include body repair.”