Finding Perseverance (The Unexpected Love Series Book 3)

by T. E. Black

  “What?” I snap.

  “You said he’s going to make him submit ‘like he always does’.” Mac raises a brow.

  Trent is staring at me in disbelief, and Evan is chuckling but keeping his comments to himself.

  Smart guy.

  “Yeah. So what? You guys are in those damn seats watching his fights every time they are aired. Do you expect me not to watch them too? What’s the big deal?”

  “We didn’t think you paid attention. You hate him,” Trent responds.

  “I don’t hate him.”

  Just as Trent is about to make another smart comment, the announcer’s voice takes over.

  “Ladies and gentlemen! You’re in for the fight of a lifetime!”

  “Tonight, we have the heavyweight title champion for three years running, Rook ‘The Reaper’ Wallace against his toughest contender, Jessie ‘Lethal’ Lucco! This is going to be a fight for the record books!”

  “You’re right, Jim! The fans are in for a real treat. They’ve been anticipating this fight as much as we have, and I’m sure nobody will come out disappointed, except the person who gets KOed,” the second announcer says, laughing at his own joke.

  Both announcers go on to review Rook and his opponent’s stats, as Rook steps into the cage. They close the door behind him, and he moves to a designated corner, his entourage making their way there on the outside of the cage.

  He stands, stoic, as the man I assume is his trainer talks to him through the wire mesh, giving him a pep talk of sorts. Rook nods at the man as he pops his mouth guard in.

  It’s as if his trainer clicks a switch on during their talk, because within seconds, Rook’s body tightens and his expression changes from hollow and defeated to downright deadly. He looks like the man I’ve watched fight on television ten times before.

  “Ry?” Trent questions, waving his hand in front of my face. “You still with me? You blanked out for a minute.”

  “Yeah. Sorry,” I squeeze at my now tense neck. “I was listening to the stats.”

  “I’m sure that’s what was happening,” Evan jokes, taking a pull from his bottle.

  “It was!” The high-pitched squeak in my voice has every set of eyes within hearing distance on me.

  “What the hell is everyone looking at?” I pound my hand on the bar. With the threat in my question, all the patrons turn their eyes back to the fight.

  “The fight is going to start any minute.” One of the announcers says as the screen cuts to a wide angle of the cage and the crowd that surrounds it.

  “Yeah, Jim. We’ve got the ref taking position.” Rook and Jessie Lucco are already bouncing from foot to foot and shaking out their arms.

  “For those of you who are new to the scene, the ref will go over the rules one last time with both opponents and have them verbally agree to have a clean fight.”

  The announcers reminder is timed perfectly, and the ref does indeed call Rook and the other fighter from their corners. As they stand on each side of the ref, he talks to them, but you can’t hear what he’s saying.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, it’s time to fight!” Rook taps gloved fists with the other guy, and the action sends the crowd into a frenzy of cheers and whistles.

  It’s time to fight.

  I hold my breath, and fidget in my chair uncomfortably as Rook and his opponent skirt around each other in a circle. From the looks on both of their faces, their sizing the other up—picking out their strengths and weaknesses.

  Rook makes the first move, kicking the other man’s thigh with a deadly force. Rook grins cockily as the man stumbles backward before he falls to the mat.

  “Come on!” Evan shouts at the television.

  I glance in his direction. Evan looks pissed as he takes a swig from his beer bottle, and sighs heavily.

  “It’s only a fight. Relax.” I raise a brow in amusement.

  Evan focuses intently on the fight while everyone chuckles around him. My guys are serious when it comes to placing bets on a professional fight. Every one of them has to be in constant competition with the other.

  When Evan ignores me, I glance back at the screen just as Rook’s fist connects with his opponent’s jaw. An audible gasp leaves me, and I stand, stunned at what I’ve just seen.

  Rook’s opponent hits the mat, and the ref jogs toward them. Rook takes his time making sure the man doesn’t get up. But the ref motions Rook back.

  I stare wide eyed like a doe as the ref waves his hands, signaling that the fight is over. Victory by knockout in the first round—something not many fighters are capable of doing.

  I should be cheering in victory since Rook just won his fight, but all I can do is let my eyes trace over his body—his chiseled, tattooed, sweaty body.

  My mouth goes dry, and my panties become wet from lust. Dirty, filthy thoughts of Rook and I bounce around in my mind as I watch his body relax from the fight.

  “Ryleigh?” Trent calls.

  Turning toward him, I answer with a shaky voice. “Yeah?”

  “Are you going to keep drooling over my brother or are you going to get Mac a refill?”

  Fuck.

  Chapter Eight

  Rook

  “Rook! Where are you going?” Luke shouts through the chaos. “You can’t leave!”

  I hear him but pretend I don’t. I just charge through the gate, ignoring the way people reach for me and the myriad of flashes that go off in my face. The crowd parts for me, but if it hadn’t, I would be shoving my way through it. All I want to do is get out of here. I can’t stand to be around cheering people when, fifteen minutes ago, my heart was shattered into a million pieces. Not only my heart, my fucking pride went too.

  I couldn’t care less that I just won the fight. It’s not important. As soon as everyone finds out I almost got played by my competition’s trainer and his wife, I will be a laughing stock in the circuit. Every one of those idiots will throw jabs I can’t dodge, and it’s going to sting.

  Lauren played me like a chess piece, and I had no idea it was happening. I feel like a fool. I don’t know what I was thinking in the first place. She was still living with her husband for fuck’s sake. I should’ve known something didn’t add up there. Now that I think about it, there were signs I missed. Ironic. I find love when I don’t need it. I ignore the warning bells going off in my head and, sure enough, I get fucked.

  “Rook! Wait up!”

  Her voice is like nails on a chalkboard, but I stop walking. I can’t stand to look at her or hear her voice, but I can’t forget everything we were before tonight.

  “Please talk to me! I’m so sorry,” Lauren pleads.

  My eyes squeeze shut, and I pinch the bridge of my nose, praying she doesn’t make my rage worse than it already is. I continue taking deep breaths, but it isn’t working. I’m as worked up as I was in the cage.

  “I’ll keep standing here all night if it’s what it takes. I won’t let you go. I’m sorry for what I did, but I’m not sorry for telling you the truth.” Her voice turns from pleading to full-blown depressed, and for a moment, I want to comfort her.

  Instead, I move my feet toward the back door of the arena, continuing with my original plan of getting out of here. I need to clear my head, and I need to do it somewhere far away from wherever she is.

  “Please say something,” she begs, right on my heels.

  I stop in front of the emergency exit and let my hand grip the push bar to open it. Gritting my teeth to bite back the harshest tone of my voice, I bite out, “Stay the fuck away from me. I’m done with you.” I pause to gather myself. “I don’t love you. I don’t want to hear your apologies, and I sure as shit don’t want to hear your voice.”

  “Rook. Please.” Her words are a whimper as she places her hand on my back.

  My body tenses, every muscle screaming in a pure rage. Before I know what’s happening, I have her pinned against the opposite wall while she scrambles to get free from my grip. My hand is wrapped around her throat, but it’s
not tightened to the point of hurting her. Although my mind is screaming for me to put a little more pressure on it so she can’t speak again, I can’t do it. This isn’t me. I don’t think about hurting women. I don’t fuck married women, and I don’t walk out of a cage after just winning.

  “Please stop,” she chokes out.

  My eyes flick over her face and to her delicate eyes that stare back at me. Those eyes stare right into my soul. I’ve seen them so many damn times and never once did I see what I see now—fear. Lauren has this tiny gold speck in her left eye that seems to gleam when she’s happy. I fell in love with seeing that speckle. I made it my mission to keep it present at all times. But now, I only see the reflection of a monster staring back at me.

  I trace down the rest of her face, my eyes landing on my hand sitting on her throat. It throws me for a loop. Her pink painted fingernails dig into my arm as she tries to keep me from squeezing any harder.

  “What the fuck are you doing to me?”

  My arm drops, her hands falling with it as I back away slowly. Lauren collapses to the tile floor as sobs rack through her body. Her cries echo in the silence, begging for me to hear them, but I shut them out. I leave her sitting in a mess of hysterics and sprint for the door.

  The cool night air hits my face, and I throw my hood up, walking at a steady pace until I find a way out of the gated parking lot. A janitor dumping trash notices me and gives me a silent nod as I walk past him.

  I need to get out of here—away from everything. I can’t be happy about my win because it’s tainted. Every time I think about winning this fight, I’ll think about the pain that came with it. I’ll think about Lauren. The things she’s done will forever haunt me.

  I slide through the streets of Boston like a ghost. No one gives me a second glance. I prefer it. I need to blend in for once, and that won’t happen at the arena.

  I love who I am, but sometimes I can't help but feel fake. My promotional team and manager have painted this picture of the fighter who comes from a poverty-infested part of Boston, but that's not the case. I wasn't wealthy growing up, but I had a family.

  The persona my team created was partially my request. I didn't want the paparazzi hounding my family. I didn’t want my career to be a nuisance for them. I did it for my mom, Trent, and Leigh. I signed my real life away on the dotted line for them, and so far it's worked. They haven't been discovered. Although, I was sure one of my fans would've dug them up by now.

  My fans are the backbone of my career. I wouldn't be a damn thing without them. I'm not one of those people who think success is done alone. I measure my success by the amount of people who smile and cheer as I walk out of the tunnel before a fight. They are the ones who made me who I am today. They've shouted my name from the fucking rooftops.

  Nicholas Brink, a boy who got dealt an unfair hand in life but always stayed positive gave me the name “Reaper” just after I started my career out in California. I met Nicholas after reading an article on his parent supervised sports blog. Luke found it on social media after it went viral with almost sixteen thousand views. I still have the printed copy I had him sign when I met him. I had it matted and framed by a professional to make sure it never got so much as a scratch on it.

  That day molded me.

  It keeps me humble in this business.

  It keeps me grounded.

  He keeps me grounded.

  Cancer controlled his body but not his soul.

  I’m different now than I was when I started on this path. When my plane touched down, I had dollar signs in my eyes. There was an endless list of agents and sponsors throwing countless digits at me, begging me to sign with them. My ego was so inflated I’m surprised I didn’t float away.

  Luckily, my egotistical bullshit got squashed the first time I got punched square in the mouth during a fight. It wasn’t a little love tap. It taught me a lesson. Actually, it taught me many lessons, but the biggest being don’t let people’s compliments and praise go to your head.

  I learned the hard way.

  Chapter Nine

  Ryleigh

  Mac needs to hire an accountant who isn’t me. I’ve been keeping his books for as long as I can remember, which hasn’t changed even though I own my own business now. All I ask is that he and Trent put their receipts from the garage into a simple manila envelope, yet I still have to dig through their piles of paperwork to match shit up. It’s not like I’m asking them to perform miracles here. Hell, I don’t even ask them to sort them. All the two bozos have to do is keep papers together until I get here at the end of the month. It almost makes helping out more of a hassle than anything.

  “Did someone order coffee?”

  I lift my eyes from the paperwork in front of me to find the two bozo’s in question standing there. Mac, in all his muscular and tattooed glory, leans against the doorframe to the office while Trent stands a few steps inside the room, holding out a coffee.

  “That better be some good java,” I joke.

  Trent chuckles, taking a step toward the desk. “Even better, it's the peace offering brew.”

  “Is that a new one? I didn’t know Dunkies got new flavors.”

  With a raised brow and a laugh, Trent hands me the cup.

  “So, why’s this coffee an apology?”

  “We … ah …” Trent stutters.

  “You what?”

  “You left your phone on the front counter, and we answered it,” Mac admits.

  “So?” I laugh. “Why would I be pissed about that?”

  Looking over Trent and Mac, they seem more nervous than the situation calls for. Neither of them make eye contact with me.

  It isn’t the first time they picked up my phone, and it isn’t the first time I didn’t care. They’re more than welcome to answer my calls. Hell, they can even look through my texts if they want. They’re my best friends, and I have nothing to hide.

  “We didn’t look at who was calling before we answered,” Trent defends without reason.

  “Who called that’s making the two of you act like pussies?”

  Trent hands over my phone with the call log staring at me on the screen. I flick my eyes over the incoming and outgoing calls, and the one at the top of the list makes me cringe.

  My mother.

  Jesus Christ.

  “My mother called and you two idiots answered it?” I scream.

  “Ry, we’re sorry! We didn’t realize it was her calling. We tried to hang up, but she kept asking questions.”

  Shooting them both a glare, I ask. “What kind of questions? Did she want to know if her daughter was still a bisexual and an embarrassment?”

  Even after all this time, my mother gets under my skin. I don’t even have to talk to her personally to get pissed off.

  “No. It was weird. She wasn’t asking about you at all,” Mac says.

  “Then what did she want?”

  “She was asking questions about Rook,” Trent says, taking a step away from me.

  I swing my head toward him, narrowing my eyes as I try to figure out what the hell is going on. Why would my mom be asking about Rook?

  “Rook?”

  “Yeah,” Trent confirms, looking nervous.

  “Why the fuck was she asking about him? That doesn’t make sense.”

  “Ryleigh, we have to tell you something. We didn’t know about it until she called. We’re so sorry.” Mac takes a step toward me.

  The moment his arms open to embrace me in a hug, I shove at his chest and knock him back a step. “Don’t comfort me until you tell me what the hell is going on, Mac.”

  “Rook’s in trouble, Ry.”

  “Trouble?”

  “Something bad happened,” Mac says this time.

  “Bad how? Is he okay? Did he get … hurt?”

  My heart slows to a near death pace while everything moves in slow motion. My worst fear is coming to life—Rook getting hurt. It’s something I’ve always worried about with him fighting for a living.


  Anything could happen without a moment’s notice in that damn cage. It's dangerous. It's not as if that shit is staged like those bullshit wrestling shows from when we were little. What Rook does is very real. But I watched his fight last night. He won and then walked off into the crowd, which was strange, but he was fine. Well, he was fine as he could have been.

  “Someone answer me,” I whisper.

  When neither answer right away, I know they’re not over exaggerating. Something bad did happen, and the two of them are too chicken shit to tell me.

  “Ryleigh, Rook is under investigation for a murder. It’s all over the news. Your mom saw it and called in a panic. We didn’t know until she told us.”

  “W-w-what?” I barely get out.

  My eyes go wide while my mouth hangs open. Every hair on my body stands straight, as if I’m a cat in water. My mouth becomes dry while my heart aches in my chest. Looking between Trent and Mac, I can’t come up with a single thing to say.

  “I-I don’t understand.”

  “Ry—”

  “You’re wrong.” I mumble in shock. “You have to be wrong.”

  “He’s telling the truth, Ry. We saw it. It’s all over television. We’re so sorry,” Mac apologizes.

  Trent moves to kneel in front of me, but before his knees can touch the hardwood floor, I’m jumping from my seat. Darting across the room, I snatch the remote from a stack of papers, my abruptness sending them all to the floor.

  “Ryleigh, stop.”

  I ignore him. I need to see it for myself.

  A murder investigation? How is that possible? Rook Wallace is a good man—a stand-up guy, not a murderer. He’s not capable of it.

  Mac goes to grab the remote, but I’m already pressing buttons.

  “Lauren Roche was the wife of Marcus Roche, a trainer for the MMA league. At only twenty-eight years old, she was a major supporter of the league and loved by all who knew her. We’ve spoken to many of the fighters she surrounded herself with, and to say she’ll be missed is an understatement.”