by H.T. Night
~~~~~
Also available:
Vampire Love Story
Book #1
by H.T. Night
(read on for a sample)
I rolled over in my bed and looked at the time on my cell phone. It was 9:30 p.m. and my twenty-minute power nap had turned into a two-hour snooze. Oops.
I glanced out my bedroom window to check the weather conditions. It was completely dark with a lot of wind. Definitely not ideal jogging conditions, but it would have to do. I needed to get in a workout or Tommy was going to kill me for slacking off. My best friend, Tommy, often got on my case, which was ironic, because the guy was always getting into trouble himself.
I threw off my blankets and pushed myself out of bed. I gave one good yawn with a long stretch then plopped back on my bed. I knew if I didn’t run at this very moment, there was no way I’d run at any other point in the night. It was now or never.
I am a professional mixed martial arts fighter, and training to be the best has many drawbacks. The worst one, by far, is working out when my body is dead tired. The last thing I wanted to do tonight was exercise, but I knew I had to push past my desire to be lazy. Because right about now, grabbing a bowl of Cap’n Crunch cereal and flipping on an episode of CSI sounded a whole lot better than running the streets of San Bernardino in the dark of night.
There was a knock at my bedroom door.
“Come in,” I called out.
“You decent?” It was Tommy, and he was just outside my door. Not only was the guy my best friend, he was also my housemate.
“Would I say ‘Come in’ if I wasn’t decent?” I laughed.
The door swung open slowly, and there stood Tommy, wearing nothing more than a tiny towel, showing off his perfectly chiseled body. He motioned to his abs and said, “Maybe because you are secretly in love with this.” He flexed his stomach muscles and popped a sexy pose.
Damn, he was a clown.
“Save it for your girl groupies, bro. What do you want, Tommy?”
“I want to borrow some cologne. Is that cool with you?”
“Go ahead. They’re on top of the dresser.”
He clapped his hands and strode into my room over to my dresser where I had a collection of cologne. I had everything from Old Spice to high-end brands that cost a plenty penny in the nicer stores.
I watched as Tommy looked for his favorite. He was like a kid in a grocery store, trying to pick out a favorite cereal.
“So, what’s with the cologne?” I asked.
“I got a date with that box girl at the supermarket, and I want to smell real nice, if you know what I’m saying.”
“You finally got the nerve to ask her out?”
“It had nothing to do with nerve, brother. I finally wanted to ask her out. She’s been eye-balling me for years.”
I rolled my eyes and started to get dressed for my run. “So, it took you two years to want to ask her out? That’s the story you’re going to stick with?”
“You know me, Josiah. I like to take things slow before I go in for the kill.”
“That sounds very romantic,” I said.
“Kid, when are you going to realize that romance only gets you hurt in the end?” he replied. “I’m done trying to Don Juan my way around girls. I’m taking a cue from the wild animal kingdom.”
“You’re just going to jump on top of women and not even say hello?” I laughed.
“No. I’m just not going to waste unnecessary time making beds in a burning house.”
“Okay, that analogy makes no sense. Which is the burning house? The women or the romance?”
Tommy thought about it and then laughed. “It made a lot more sense in my head than it did out loud.”
“I bet it did. Where are you taking her?”
“I’m taking her to Murphy’s.”
“Wow, classy.” Murphy’s was the fanciest place to eat in San Bernardino. It had it all: ambiance, location, and hot female clientele. “You sure you’re not trying to romance this girl? I only take a girl to Murphy’s if she earned it.”
“She will,” Tommy replied.
“All I’m saying is you better keep your eyes on your date and not the waitresses.”
Tommy picked the cologne he wanted from the top dresser. Of course, the guy picked my favorite cologne, Drakkar Noir. He sprayed his upper body and both his legs and even lifted his towel to do a meticulous squirt inside the towel.
“That’s enough. You wear the cologne. Don’t let the cologne wear you.” I walked over and grabbed the bottle from Tommy’s hand. “Like I said, you’re all class.” I pushed Tommy out of my room. “Now get out, so I can get ready for my run.”
Tommy stopped himself and turned around. He looked at me seriously, which he rarely did. “Don’t run too far tonight. I’ve got a weird feeling.”
“You do?” I asked, legitimately concerned. Tommy’s feelings were eerie. I shrugged. “Okay, I’ll be careful. I’ll run to the college and back.”
“Get back in an hour and you’ll be fine.” Tommy thought for a second and then added, “Yeah, an hour will be fine. One more thing, Josiah, the Commission is going to let us know tomorrow who we’ll fight next month.”
Tommy was also a professional fighter, and good enough to be a contender for the title.
“I hope the Commission will give me a real fight this time, I said. “Maybe I’ll have a shot to move up in the rankings.” The Commission tended to think I was still a cherry, and they were taking me along a lot slower than I wanted.
“Maybe if you didn’t wait till 10:00 o’clock at night to get in a workout, you would be ready to have better fights.”
I sighed. Tommy always brought up my workout regimen. Tommy and I couldn’t be more different when it came to our workout routines. Tommy’s workouts were epic. They made pro boxers’ workouts look tame. I, on the hand, have always gotten by on pure talent. I have an insane ability to fight and my instincts are off the charts. I got away with hardly working out, and finally, it has caught up with me.
“You know you and I will never agree on how I should be working out, Tommy. You should be pleased that I want to run tonight.” I paused, and then I asked, “What kind of fight are you looking for with the Commission?”
“I just need a tune-up before my title fight. I need to work out some kinks.” Tommy was fighting for the title in four months.
“You’d better hope the Commission gives you just a tune-up fight and nothing more. The last thing you need is to get hurt before your title bout.”
“I’m not going to get hurt; I’m 18-0! Remember that.” Here Tommy went again with his undefeated record. He wears his record like a badge of honor, even a braggart. It was quite amusing, especially when he brought it up in bars and tried to impress girls. Usually, they had never even heard of mixed martial arts.
Tommy seemed to forget I was undefeated, too, even though I didn’t work out nearly as hard as him. “You aren’t the only one who is undefeated,” I reminded him.
He stood at my doorway. “Yup, you sure are. Your little 4-0 record is very cute, Josiah.”
“I only have four wins because the Commission takes forever to give me a fight, unlike you, who they throw on the card every month.”
“What can I say? I’m an excellent draw. Chicks dig themselves some of the ‘Tom Man’.” Tommy was now starting to get full of himself, and that was my cue to kick him out of my room. Again.
“For the love of God, Tommy, just go on your date!” I shut the door in his face.
“Not cool, Josiah.”
“And neither is wasting all my favorite cologne.”
“Touché.”
I grinned at the exchange I just had with Tommy. I enjoyed his company. Having him around made my life easier. In our friendship, we took turns on who was the responsible one. Even though, Tommy is ‘a good’ five years older than me, people wouldn’t know it by how he behaved sometimes.
I peeled off my shirt, an
d I looked at myself in the mirror. I needed to lose around ten pounds before my next fight. Did I even have ten pounds to lose? I was six feet tall with very little body fat. I pinched my belly and grabbed as much fat as I could get. I got a decent handful.
Okay, maybe I did have ten pounds to lose.
I studied my face. It was clean, with few marks and scars, not like some of the other professional fighters I knew. The ones who had been in it for a while usually sported knots, bumps, scars, broken noses, busted cheekbones, and more. My own face was remarkably unmarred, considering I had never said ‘no’ to a fight in my life. In fact, I had been fighting off bullies since I was seven years old. My shiny blonde hair, as pretty as any girl’s, had made me a target for bullies who called me names and took their shots at me, thinking that my angelic appearance translated into an easy target for beatings. In those years, me, the pretty boy, had to fight my way into Respectville by pummeling the never-ending parade of bullies. I got so good at defending myself on the street that I turned it into my lifework. I was a natural, really, growing from a much picked-on kid into professional fighter.
Nowadays, I looked more like a surfer than a mixed martial arts fighter. People often misread my casual beach bum look and underestimated me. That was a good thing. Interestingly, there’s something about the way I look that makes most guys want to start a fight with me. I don’t know if it’s the fact that I look as if I should be singing lead in a boy band or that I’m extremely confident. Anyway, there’s something about me that makes random strangers want to mix it up with me—constantly!
Too bad for them.
An ex-girlfriend once asked me why I love to fight. My answer was simple: Some guys were born to fix cars or play football. Some guys were born to be astronauts or to hit a fastball. I was born to fight. It’s the only thing in this world that ever made perfect sense to me. When I’m in a fight, time stands still. I see everything in slow motion. My brain goes into Good Will Hunting mode, and I’m able to quickly determine what I want to do to inflict the most damage to my opponent.
Anyway, I put on a pair of sweats, a t-shirt, and my running shoes. Once done, I headed outside the house that Tommy and I shared, and did some stretching next to the tall sycamore tree in the front yard.
I was still stretching when I heard a familiar kee-eeeee-arr cry from above. I looked up, and there was Daphne. Daphne was a beautiful red hawk that seems to have developed a fondness for me over the past couple of years. She made herself known each day by crying her distinctive call or sometimes a shrill chwirk sound while flying low enough, so I could see her. I still have no idea where she came from or why she seemed so interested in me. I named her Daphne one day after watching an episode of Scooby-Doo. They were both redheads, so the name seemed to fit her. I have been known to be partial to redheaded women.
“I’m off for a run, Daphne; try to keep up with me.”
I gave Daphne a wink and took off running. The beautiful bird let out an amicable loud chwirk as I headed down the street. At first, I went fairly slow with my run. Daphne followed me for about a block or two and then pulled back. I kicked up my heels and began to run at a faster pace. I quickly ran out of the neighborhood and headed for the main street that led up to Cal State San Bernardino. I liked running at the college. It was peaceful at night and, as long as I avoided campus police, I usually had no problems.
I turned left and headed down University Way toward the college. I could hear loud music, which meant that I was approaching the Gamma Phi Beta frat house. They always had a party going on, and this Thursday night was no different. Their frat house was a massive two-story white house that stood out like a sore thumb in a neighborhood that was filled with smaller houses.
As I ran toward the house, I noticed that the party was in full swing. Animal House style, there were a lot of cars parked out front, and people milling around outside in various stages of dress, undress, and loudness, depending on how much alcohol they had consumed. Music thumped from the open front door, with the bass so loud that the people inside were sure to go deaf for a couple of days. I hurried past the house, so I wouldn’t have to hear drunk frat boys yelling out things like “Run, Forrest, run!”
As I was about to pass the house without incident, underneath the thumping hip-hop, I heard a chilling scream. The scream was so distinctive and piercing that it made me stop in my tracks.
I turned around, and as I did so, I heard it again. It was coming from behind the house. The gate was open, so I walked toward it. I thought it could just be college girls having a good time, but then I heard it for a third time. This time, it was louder and more uneasy.
As I neared the back gate, I saw movement in a window. A young, dark-haired woman wearing a black dress was desperately opening a window. I picked up my pace, running now. She wrenched up the window, looked over her shoulder, and then jumped from the upstairs window.
Holy shit.
She dropped behind some hedges, where I heard her scream and crash through something wooden. She reappeared a moment later, limping badly and bleeding from fresh scratches along her face and elbows.
She and I reached the side gate about the same time. Amazingly, I recognized the girl. In fact, we had gone to high school together at Eisenhower. She was one of those girls who had been into Goth and had kept to herself in an emo way. I saw that she was barefoot, and her black dress was torn at the right shoulder. Blood oozed from the opening. Her jet-black hair was messy, and she appeared to have been crying.
I would be crying, too, if I had just jumped from the second floor.
I failed to dredge up her name from my memory bank. “Hey, Eisenhower girl!” I shouted, joyful that I remembered her at all. And then I demanded to know, “What the hell is going on?”