“Deadbeat?” Melody asks, beating me to the punch.
Stretch just shrugs. “They liked partying more than they liked having a kid. Guess that’s what you get when two college dropouts accidently get pregnant. Unimportant though. You should tell me all about you.” He moves past me to drape his arm across Melody’s shoulders, leading away from us but not too far so she freaks out on him.
It’s bad enough she’s shooting Celia daggers though they don’t like the message is intended to spell out a rescue.
“I’m glad you’re here,” I say after a bit.
“I didn’t exactly have a choice.
I don’t know what Melody’s plan was. I don’t know how she got Cecelia to come here, but I’m thankful for it regardless.
“You didn’t?”
“She said we should have a girl’s night. She said we should check out some new club she heard about from Trey.” Cecelia laughs a bitter laugh. “She said I spend too much time in my own head and it was okay to get out once in a while. I felt bad. I went along to make her happy. I didn’t realize she was bringing me here.”
I inhale a heavy breath. It sucks knowing she’d rather be anywhere else. But I won’t focus on that. I can’t. Not if I want to right the wrongs. “I guess if it’s any consolation, when she asked me where to look for me, she didn’t realize she was bringing you here either.”
For the first time in so long, I hear a laugh leave Cecelia’s lips. It’s like heaven raining down on me. “No, I guess not.” She looks at her friend and then looks at me finally. “I’m sure I’ll have a lot to explain later. Unless Stretch can distract her enough.”
“Delane.” Brees comes to stand beside me, tipping his head slightly toward Cecelia. “You’re fighting in five.”
I nod at him, grateful he didn’t call me out, didn’t ruin this tenuous moment. After he’s walked away, I look back at Celia. “Will you stay?” I can see Melody and Stretch still talking. I know Celia won’t just leave her friend behind, especially knowing how new Melody is to this whole world. I hope I can have that be my advantage. “Please?”
With a sniff, and a squaring of her shoulders, Celia nods. She does step back though. She steps back into the shadows, keeping her presence lost from the other guys. Stretch may have made his way over, but compared to the others, he’s harmless.
Smiling at her, silently conveying my thanks, I head toward my fight.
For the first time in ages, I feel good. I feel loose, relaxed. And it shows. First Danny, then Carlos fall. Then comes Silas and finally Jacko. And I win against each guy. For the first time in ages.
I’m going to the Saturday night fight.
As I pocket my winnings, getting a clap on the back from Brees for a job well-done, I can’t help the high I’m feeling. I won. I won and Cecelia saw me. Because Stretch made sure to monopolize Melody’s time, she saw me win.
I feel on top of the fucking world.
And it’s with that feeling that I rush over to Stretch and Melody, letting them know I’m heading out with a promise from Stretch that Melody will get home safe. Then I rush over to Cecelia, take her hand and rush us away from the fight toward my home.
I don’t feel her resistance. I don’t feel her apprehension. All I feel is euphoric. And I’m going to celebrate. Hopefully all night long.
FIVE
My mind is on replay. Every movement. Every motion. Every breath spent and look shared. A Friday night win. A Friday night fuck to celebrate it. Only in retrospect, things look skewed.
Broken.
“Why are you looking at me like that?”
She’s been uneasy since we finished. Whereas before we’d lie around and, well, cuddle for a bit, catching our breath to go again, she’d jumped up the second I pulled out and started fixing her pants that have barely come off, wiping herself clean with some tissue on my dilapidated night stand. It makes me wonder if she has something, or rather someone, more important waiting for her.
Standing at the edge of the bed, she just stares at me and I can’t figure out what’s going on or what she’s thinking about anything.
“I just don’t understand. Why’d you do it? We had such a good thing going. What the hell happened? Why’d you end us?” A shake of her head and a scoff tells me Celia clearly doesn’t agree with me. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“A good thing? I ended us? Are you serious?” Her arms cross over her bare middle, her posture defensive against my presence. I almost regret asking, especially since we’ve been having such a good time prior to my mouth letting loose the words. But I can’t take them back. I won’t take them back. It doesn’t matter that we’ve just fucked. It doesn’t matter that I’ve let my lust, my dick, my need for her overrun my senses. These are important thoughts and I need to say them. Cecelia clearly doesn’t agree. “You told me to stay away. You took that… that manipulative whore’s side, believing everything she fucking said to you without question. Even when you asked me about what she’d told you, you didn’t even hear me. It didn’t matter what I tried to say to you. It didn’t matter what I tried to explain to you. You were too busy having your mind made up about me.”
“That’s not true, Celia,” I argue, rising to my feet and yanking my boxers up, ignoring the sticky wet surrounding my dick. “Yes, she told me some things but I still saw your actions.”
“What actions? You keep saying this, saying you saw me do this or that but when did I ever do anything?”
Images of the way she’d smiled at Stretch and let him touch her arm or give her hugs whenever she appeared. The way she let Fife tease her, even knowing how much of a dick he really was. The things he said about her tattoo and my work schedule and fucking her behind my back ring in my ears. The way some of the guys saw her at Coco, and claimed to talk with her without my presence while planning meet-ups.
And then images of her walking to the fight under Frankie’s arm flash through my head. Images of her atop Frankie, riding him, letting him have her, blind me.
I shake my head, trying to rid my mind of that last image especially. “You know what you’ve done,” is all I say because saying anything more will make me want to punch the wall.
“You are a real piece of work, you know that?” she asks as she pulls her shirt over her head. “I can’t believe I let myself…you know what, never mind.”
“No, what were you going to say?”
“I know I’m not important. You don’t have to be so fucking loud about it.”
Her voice carries through the stagnant air of my apartment, bouncing off the walls before slamming me hard against the chest. I exhale heavily, wondering how we got to this point.
“This was a mistake. I don’t know what I was thinking.” She rushes from my room toward the door and my heart seizes in panic. Hurrying after, I call for her to stop. I barely catch her before she has the front door open. “What? Huh? What more do you want to say to me?”
I open my mouth to tell her I’m sorry for how I treated her. I open my mouth to say all of the things I thought about saying to her during my search for her, when I was so worried I’d never see her again, because I thought she was gone forever, and not just gone out of Chicago. I open my mouth to tell her I’m sorry I let Hayley get inside my head to the point I trusted the devil herself. I open my mouth to tell her I want to fix things, us, and that if she’d just tell me the truth, we could move forward.
I open my mouth and meant to say all of these things. Instead, the only thing that comes out is, “I want to see you again. Will you let me?”
I honestly can’t decipher the look that crosses Cecelia’s face, or the flash I see pass through her eyes before she lowers her head stealing my view. I honestly don’t know what any of it means. And before I can ask, she responds, “We’ll see.”
As my front door opens and slams with her exit, I swear I hear her say something else, but it is too low and too rushed for me to hear so I contend myself with knowing maybe next time we can resolve thi
ngs.
Next time. It’s an interesting though to carry.
It’s been so long since I’ve reached the Saturday fight that I’m a nervous wreck. There’s a whole new group of guys fighting now. Fighters have come and gone, moving on into “retirement” from the ring, or just moving on from getting the shit kicked out of them every week. Some hang around, but as I look around at the group gathered, I realize how many more haven’t. I realize how many have been replaced by newer blood.
I wonder idly how many feel I’ve been replaced.
It’s been months, too many months since I managed to win Friday night to have a shot at the pot on Saturday. I hardly know anyone. But funnily enough, they all seem to know me.
It’s disconcerting. Disheartening. And to be honest, intimidating. That’s probably the worst part. Because I’ve never allowed myself to be intimidated during a fight before. Not even for my first match. But of course everything is different now. I’m different. My circumstances, my whole life and the people in it are vastly different. If I thought I was alone before, I realize it is nothing compared to now.
We’re in the Pig district tonight. I see guys younger than me, around the age I was when I started fighting, lined up to draw their match. I feel panicked. I feel uncertain I can do this. I feel like last night was a fluke, a mistake, perhaps.
Seeing Cecelia, knowing she was watching me, I wanted to win. I needed to win. If not for her than definitely for my pride. For her pride. After all, the only thing I’d ever wanted before was for her to feel proud of me.
I’m lucky now if she feels anything positive toward me.
I didn’t get to ask her to come tonight. She knows I’m fighting. She saw my win, heard Brees tell me where to head tonight. But I didn’t get a chance to include an invitation to her for this match. And with the way we left things as she walked out my door, I don’t want to think too far ahead of just being able to see her a next time. I won’t even be picky on the when and where.
But knowing how good I fought last night, knowing I won in her presence, knowing I won because of her presence, well, I definitely want her here tonight.
“You gonna draw or what?” A voice I don’t recognize asks me from my left side. I turn to look and see some kid with a Mohawk, stretched out earlobes at least an inch wide, with tattoos all over his face. I wonder his story. Where does he fight, how many times has he won. How old he is and how much has he heard about me. I wonder all of these things because his face gives nothing away to indicate disdain or smugness toward me.
I don’t respond as I place my name in the pile, waiting to find out who I will be fighting against. After a few minutes of grandstanding with mixing up our names, the moderator for the night, Vaughn, a tall Native American guy I’ve never seen before, begins pulling names out. I have to hold back my shock when his voice, which I expect to be low and deep in comparison to his build, comes out soft and with a light French accent.
“Sifter and Tran. Bolson and Adams. Franco and Mitchell. Roach and Chace. Those are the pairings for the first round, in that order. We begin in five, gentleman.”
Mohawk guy walks away without another word to me. I try to scope out who exactly Roach is, wondering how formidable of an opponent I’m due to have. I’m at such a disadvantage tonight. Once upon a time, at my first Saturday engagement, I was just thrilled to make it that it didn’t matter who I fought or even really if I won. I was just happy I had made it at all. Tonight is different though. I feel I have something to prove.
Lost in my thoughts, I am only able to partially pay attention to the fights that begin in front of me. Sifter, a Goth looking guy beats Tran, a Bruce Lee built Asian guy in ten minutes surprising apparently everyone in its quickness. Though I didn’t really see the fight, I can tell both guys are strong, challenging, and definitely worthy of their appearance here tonight.
Next to go is Bolson and Adams. This fight lasts nearly a half hour before Adams hits Bolson just right knocking him down. Once more, I can see how capable the two are. Following them is Franco and Mitchell. Mohawk guy is in this fight, and apparently goes by the name Franco. He’s scrappy, and in a way, he reminds me of Stretch. Though where Stretch will tease that he’s an inferior fighter while actually being far from it, Franco seems to have something to prove too. In the end, it works. He beats Mitchell with a hard hit to the cheek.
After another five minute break, Vaughn calls for Roach and I to take our places. Stepping into the “ring,” I listen only barely to Vaughn explain the rules of the night. I’ve heard the spiel enough that I practically have it memorized. Instead I focus on my opponent. With pale white skin, and buzzed reddish-brown hair, he’s nearly as tall as me, but he’s bulkier. He almost looks like a gym rat, like Frankie and Brock did, especially with his bulging veins lining his arms. I don’t see any tattoos or piercings on Roach. I do see a scowl. I do see him sizing me up. And in that scrutiny, I see him believe this will be an easy win for him. That I won’t even put up a real fight and he’ll be moving on to the next round in no time.
Out of everyone here, I have the least to lose. Roach doesn’t realize it, but that makes me more dangerous.
He has a crew here rooting for him, so I already know he’s a douche. At least five guys standing off to the side, all sporting the same haircuts, the same scowl. I wonder off-handedly if they’re related. There’s also a woman with them. She’s pretty in a girl-next-door kind of way. Nothing that stands out to me, though. Wearing jeans and a t-shirt, with her arms wrapped around her middle, I can see she’d rather be anywhere else. She’s blond too, which makes me think of Hayley and instantly my hackles rise. But I tamper that down when I look more closely at her. She’s not looking at me. She’s not like the other girls who come to these fights. This girl is giving off the vibe of repulsion for everything around her. Especially when I watch Roach walk to her dipping in for a kiss.
She flinches and I know immediately she does not want to be here. More to the point, I realize she probably doesn’t realize she doesn’t have to be here. Figuring this man, trying to be menacing toward me has probably hurt this girl – I mean who recoils from a kiss? – has me seeing red. And it’s with that in mind that I own him during our match.
As soon as Vaughn signals us to begin, I’m on Roach. Throwing punches left and right, hitting all the important spots I know will slow a man down, I pummel Roach until he’s on his knees trying to block his face from any more of my damage. He barely gets any hits off before he’s tapping out, done, conceding.
As he stumbles away, his crew helping him along, I wonder if I’ve actually just made things worse for the girl. Many guys who hit their women tend to take everything out on them. I hope that won’t be the case this time. And just before they all disappear from view, I see her turn back, a small smile on her face for the first time tonight.
“You probably just saved her life you know,” Mohawk, or rather Franco, tells me.
“Why’s that?”
“Since you’ve been…away, Roach has been dominating these matches. You just showed Mara he’s not invincible.”
“Glad to hear that,” I murmur as I look back toward where the group disappeared to and notice someone new standing there. My breath catches in a painful seize that I almost choke on. I let out a rough cough as my eyes water a bit.
“Who the delicious hell is that,” Franco practically moans out and I roll my eyes and check my jealousy. Now is not the time.
With slow, but deliberate steps, Cecelia is making her way toward me and I can’t help taking inventory of her look. Starting at her feet, she’s got white converse sneakers on, skin tight acid-washed jeans covering her legs, and a soft white pea coat that molds to her curves gloriously. It’s really no wonder Franco is drooling over the sight, I am too.
“No one you need to concern yourself with,” I tell him as I walk to meet her halfway.
I ignore his “we’ll see” comment as I step before Celia. Her light brown eyes are wildly glancing a
round, taking in the Saturday night scene. Last night was uncomfortable for her, even with Melody there as a shield. While some guys have moved on, the main ones, the ones involved in all the shit are still around. Thankfully they left her alone last night, but I know if she keeps coming around, it won’t last.
Tonight, with all the new faces, I’m sure she’s wondering, like me, who knows the story about us. I’m sure she’s wondering what people know about her.
“Hey,” I breathe out, unable to stand it a moment longer, the silence separating us.
“Hi.” Her eyes flit to mine quickly, before darting back around at the guys gathered. The weather isn’t as warm so there are less groupies hanging about, but there are still some. None I recognize, but girls do talk. And they no doubt know who she is.
I want to reach out and take her hand, feel her smooth skin. It’s been less than a day since I last saw her, last got to touch her, but it feels like a lifetime. I suppose after being away from her for so many months has starved me.
“I didn’t think you’d come,” I say honestly. It’s the first time I’ve admitted it too. While I wanted so badly for her to show, my mind has done nothing but replay our parting this morning. It hadn’t gone how I’d hoped. To be honest, none of this has.
Between the surprise of Melody tricking Cecelia into attending the fight, to Cecelia letting me take her home and the two of us having sex, well, I didn’t expect any of it. Especially the sex, since it’s been so long and there was so much left to say between us, still is, but the adrenaline from my win last night made thinking about anything other than being with her impossible of a task.
As if that wasn’t enough to think about, the look that crossed Celia’s face this morning as she was leaving my apartment has left me antsy too. It happened so quick that I couldn’t get a good grip on it, but after replaying it over and over, I accepted it wasn’t necessarily a positive reaction and I couldn’t figure out what made it appear.
“I’m glad you did though.”
And the Sweet (Addiction Series Book 2) Page 4