American Dream - Book 2

by Z.M. Kage

  **********

  “Long Island, please. And make it strong.”

  He’s at the bar. He caved.

  As the bartender goes to work on his drink Jon notices an attractive brunette sitting a couple stools over from him, on his left. Actually, attractive wouldn’t do her justice. Gorgeous is a better fit.

  Breasts, butt, waist, stomach, eyes, teeth, lips... and any other physical feature he’d ever felt attracted to had somehow converged on one body. And to top it off, she was being very suggestive with that red straw in her glass.

  He shouldn’t have met her gaze.

  If he hadn’t, she wouldn’t have left her stool. She wouldn’t be sitting right next to him, throwing another temptation in his face when he already feels like garbage for giving in to the one that got him here.

  “Never seen you around here before. What’s your name?”

  “Jon.”

  “Hi there, Jon. I’m Heather. I saw the way you were looking at me.”

  Jon isn’t sure what she means. He only glanced at her for a second before she decided to walk over to him. “How was I looking at you?”

  “Like you wanted to have some fun.” She winks. “Do you live close by?”

  Wow. Never in his life had Jon had a woman come on to him this strongly, this quickly.

  Especially a woman this stunning.

  He ignores the growing tightness in his jeans and does his best to clear up her confusion.

  “Look, I don’t know what gave you the impression that I was single, but I’m not. I’m happily taken by a woman who loves me,” he lies (but he wanted it to be true). “Heather, if my brief glance in your direction led you to believe anything different, I’m sorry, because it wasn’t intentional.”

  Jon’s drink is ready. He stirs it, making sure everything is mixed well as he waits for Heather to respond.

  “I should be apologizing to you,” she says, finally. “I didn’t see a wedding ring, so I assumed you were single. I’m so sorry about this... I’m normally not this type of girl, at all, but I just had a nasty fight with my...”

  Heather couldn’t get the last word out before being torn out of her stool from behind and thrown to the floor like a rag doll.

  “Jesus, Danny, you’re such an asshole!”

  “Hey!” Danny confronts Jon, nudging him, but not hard enough to knock him off-balance. “You hittin’ on my girl?”

  “Actually, your girl was hitting on me,” Jon replies, calmly.

  Danny looks at Heather. “You’re such a slut!” he shouts, backhanding her across the face while she’s still on her knees. “One little fight and you go and jump on the first guy you see... unbelievable.”

  Heather sobs, holding her head in her hands.

  “Don’t hit her again,” Jon says, his voice even. He still hadn’t tasted his drink.

  “How ‘bout you shut the hell up? Don’t tell me how to handle my girl.” Danny clenches his fists, his breathing rapid. “You know what, bitch? I think I’d like to take you outside and teach your punk-ass a lesson.”

  Jon sighs. “If that’s what it takes...”

  He leaves his Long Island Iced Tea untouched. He never even tasted it. So much for enjoying a drink at the bar to clear my head, he thinks.

  He follows Danny outside.

  SEVEN

  Danny looked like a fighter.

  Only a true fighter would peel his shirt off and expose his chiseled midsection before engaging in battle. And if he wasn’t a real fighter, he wouldn’t have bothered taking the time to stretch before the big event.

  There was something else that Danny did, though, to really convince Jon that he had some fighting experience. When his cronies circled around behind him, letting Danny know they had his back if things for some reason didn’t go his way, he urged them to back off.

  He didn’t want them to jump in and help him. He believed in a fair fight. He wanted it to be one-on-one all the way, not one-on-one in the beginning and then five-on-one if he started taking a beating.

  Jon respected that small part of Danny, the part of him that wanted to fight fair. But that’s all he respected about him. He didn’t agree with how he’d seen Danny treat Heather, who watched nervously from the side, looking like she was afraid for what Danny might do to him – or what he might do to Danny.

  Hell, Jon didn’t even want to fight him. Fighting just wasn’t his thing. He’d never done it competitively, never watched a fight on TV, and he certainly wasn’t dressed for a fight right now. He was wearing blue jeans, a red tee shirt, and brown work boots... whereas Danny, topless, barefoot, nothing but red shorts... looked like he was ready to climb into the ring.

  “You ready for your lesson, punk?” Danny taunts him with a cocky smile, bouncing quickly from one foot to the other, shadowboxing, exhaling sharply as he delivers each punch into the cool night air.

  “Ready when you are,” Jon replied, standing perfectly still with his arms at his sides, watching Danny dance with his imaginary opponent.

  “You sure you don’t want to stretch first? Maybe warm up a little?” Danny turns to his crew. They share a laugh over Jon’s amateurish lack of preparation.

  “No... no, I’m fine. I’d just like to get this over with.” He doesn’t join the laughter. He looks over at Heather and waves at her, throws her a wink. She returns both of his flirtatious gestures, and it has just the effect on Danny he’d hoped it would have.

  A jealous rage washes over his face. He’s done laughing. He’s ready to fight.

  He advances toward Jon, closing the gap between them quickly. He looks like he’s going to lead with a punch but he switches tactics at the last second and throws a violent kick with his right leg instead.

  Danny’s kick lands, but it doesn’t do any damage. Jon catches it, pinning Danny’s right leg under his left arm. In one swift motion Jon plants his own right leg behind Danny’s left, grabs Danny’s throat with his right hand, sweeps Danny’s grounded leg out from under him and takes him to his back.

  Jon releases his grip, gets to his feet and takes a couple steps back while Danny remains on the ground, stunned, processing what just happened – how quickly Jon was able to read his attack, intercept it, and take him down.

  Danny shakes it off. Within seconds he’s back on the offensive, charging at Jon with a different strategy in mind. He unleashes a fury of quick punches, none of which hit their mark. Jon deflects whatever Danny throws at him. It’s like he can read Danny’s mind, like he can predict what Danny’s going to do next and knows just how to block it.

  The punches don’t stop. Danny throws one after another, determined that one of them will break through Jon’s defenses, one of them will surely connect, but then he slips up. And Jon is right there to take advantage of it. Danny over-extends. He puts just a little too much forward momentum behind a violent right-cross.

  When he does, Jon deflects Danny’s right arm to his left, captures his right wrist with both hands, pivots one hundred and eighty degrees and drops his center of gravity, shoving his butt into Danny like he’s ‘boxing out’ to claim a rebound in a game of basketball, and throws Danny over his right shoulder.

  Danny’s on his back again. Take-down number two. Before Jon releases Danny’s wrist he slaps him on the forehead, very gently... teasing him, playing with him.

  He smacks the ground in disgust and launches himself back to his feet, embarrassed and angry at being made a fool of. Who the hell was this guy? He’d caught Danny’s kick, blocked every one of his punches and laid him out on his back twice in less than two minutes. Danny decides it’s time to take the fight to the ground.

  He shoots in for a double-leg takedown, but again, he makes it easy for Jon. As soon as Jon sees Danny lunge toward him, as soon as he’s over-committed and off-balance, he takes a quick step backward and pushes on Danny’s shoulders so he sprawls himself out on the ground, face-down.

  Danny kissing pavement, Jon circles around, kneels on
Danny’s left shoulder and pries his left arm upward just enough to keep him there, to save him from further embarrassment.

  “Are we done here?” Jon asks. He hadn’t even broken a sweat.

  Danny catches his breath. “Yeah, we’re done.” He was out of ideas.

  Jon lets go of Danny’s arm. They both get to their feet.

  “Where’d you learn to fight like that, man?” Danny asks. “I’ve been fighting competitively for years... and damn, man, I can’t even lay a finger on you.” He wasn’t looking down on Jon anymore. He was looking up to him, like Jon was someone he could learn from, someone he could emulate.

  “I’ve never really fought before,” Jon replies. “But everything I know about self defense and protecting myself, I learned when I was a cop – and when I was in the Marines.”

  Danny chuckles. “Shoot, no wonder I couldn’t touch you... you’re a Jarhead AND a Pig.”

  “Was,” Jon corrects him.

  Danny doesn’t question it. He knows he’s serious. But he can’t believe Jon isn’t a trained fighter. “For real, though? You’ve never fought before?”

  “No, I haven’t... not competitively, anyway.”

  “Well you should, bro. I make my living fighting and you just took me to school out here. With your skills you could make a killing. Hell I’m tempted to let you in on what I’m doing, just to see what you can do.”

  Danny had his attention. The ‘you could make a killing’ part put him in a trance.

  “Tell me more,” Jon says without blinking.

  EIGHT

  They’re back inside the bar.

  Danny’s nursing a beer. Jon declined his drink offer.

  “OK, this is how it works,” Danny begins. “I said I fight competitively and that’s how I make my living, right? Well, what I’m involved in... it’s a...” Danny pauses. “It’s a different kind of competitive fighting.”

  “How so?” Jon asks.

  “It’s cage fighting, but there are no refs. There are no rules. Anything goes, and the last man standing wins. Every time I walk into that cage, there’s a very real chance that I won’t walk outta there. That’s what makes it so damn exciting. It’s a rush!” Danny smiles.

  “Where do you fight? How often?”

  “It’s a very secretive thing. Happens once a week, every Thursday night, in a basement underneath the biggest real estate company in the city.”

  “So when you say ‘underneath’, you mean the fights... literally... happen underground. And nobody knows about this? Cops haven’t gotten wind of it?”

  “Cops don’t know a thing, man... and they won’t, either. It’s real hush-hush, everybody keeps their mouth shut about it.”

  “But you opened your mouth about it to me,” Jon points out.

  “You’re the first dude I’ve told about it, bro. You earned your way in by putting me in my place outside. I don’t know how comfortable you are, financially, but I meant what I said out there. You could bank some serious cheddar with your skills.”

  Jon wasn’t comfortable financially. He needed this. “How much can I make?”

  “Five hundred per fight, maybe a thousand... and that’s as a nobody, that’s just walking in, that’s just starting out. If you do well and end up fighting for one of the gamblers with deep pockets, you could make even more.”

  Five hundred, at least, for winning a single fight? With a strong potential for more? Slinging coke on the streets may have been less dangerous, physically, but it hadn’t worked out the way Jon hoped it would. What other choice did Jon have, if he wanted to start bringing in money as soon as possible and prove to Tara that he had what it takes to ‘go somewhere’ financially?

  Fate had stepped in and given Jon a golden opportunity to do something he clearly had a natural talent with, and get paid well to do it. He wasn’t going to let that slip through his fingers.

  “My financial situation is shit right now,” Jon replies. “I’m in.” He double-checks his watch. “It’s Wednesday night. You say these fights happen every Thursday. So what do you think, can I start fighting tomorrow... or should I train first?”

  Danny looks at him like he can’t believe he’s asking him that question. “Bro, you’re good to go as is. Seriously. I mean yeah, you’d benefit from training – you’d be straight-up unstoppable if you took the time to train, and trained hard – but it’s honestly not something I think you need to do. Based on what you’ve shown me tonight I know you could walk in there tomorrow and whoop some ass.”

  Jon breathes a sigh of relief. “Whew, that’s what I was hoping for. I really don’t have the time to train. I need money now. My life depends on it.” By ‘life’ he was referring to Tara. She was his life.

  Danny’s last statement stuck in Jon’s mind for a second. “Now, based on how you’ve described this secretive, underground cage fighting opportunity to me, if I don’t kick ass tomorrow night, then I won’t be walking out of there. Is that right?”

  Danny thinks about it. “Well, not necessarily. But the risk is there. Like I said, no rules and no refs... no one to blow the whistle when things get outta hand. I’m not saying that if you don’t win you will die... but I’ve seen it happen before. I’ve seen a lot of good fighters lose their lives in that cage. I guess that’s why it pays so well.”

  “Not exactly the reassurance I was looking for, but I like your honesty.”

  “Hey, no problem.” Danny scribbles the address of the real estate company on the napkin in front of him and slides it over to Jon. “That’s where it goes down, my man. I put my cell number on there, too... in case you need anything or have any other questions. Meet me there tomorrow night, eleven o’clock... and be ready to fight, stud.”

  “You got it, I’ll see you there.” Jon gets up to leave but stops and turns around before he gets to the door. “Just a couple more things, Danny...”

  “Yeah?”

  “First, I really appreciate the opportunity. It means a lot to me. If I’m as good as you think I am, if I don’t get beaten to death in that cage tomorrow night, you may have just singlehandedly saved my relationship with my girlfriend.”

  “No problem at all, bro, happy to help.” Danny gives him a little nod to signify that the pleasure is all his, that it’s no big deal. “And second?”

  “Secondly, I want to apologize for what happened earlier. I really wasn’t hitting on Heather. I wasn’t. I’m having issues with my girl right now, that’s why I came here at all, but I wanted to make it clear that I had no intention of coming between you two and that I wish you guys the best at working things out.”

  “Oh, Heather and I will be just fine,” Danny says, confidently. “We’ll work it out. We fight all the damn time. You should see us get into it when we’re both drunk!” He laughs.

  Jon drives back home from the bar. He walks into his house. Passing through the kitchen, the dining room, the living room... pictures of him and Tara, happy pictures, everywhere he looks... he can’t help but think about her, can’t help but miss her.

  He picks up his phone. He calls her again. It’s late. He doesn’t expect her to pick up. In fact, he knows she won’t... but he calls her anyway.

  It rings. Once, twice... three times.

  As he gets closer and closer to her recorded voicemail greeting, Jon contemplates leaving a message this time. He considers telling her what’s happened since she walked out.

  Her sweet, cheerful greeting begins. He’s only got a second or two to decide. Tell her, or don’t tell her? Leave a message, or don’t leave a message?

  Jon decides it’s enough to hear her voice. Having Tara talk into his ear, those few seconds of her voice recording... it was the only reason he picked up the phone.

  He ends the call before the beep. Before he’s put on the spot.

  She’ll know tomorrow that he called her twice tonight. That he said nothing both times. Maybe she’d call him back, maybe not. Jon was done worrying about it.

&nbs
p; Because he finally had a plan. A plan to start bringing in money, start turning his life around... a plan that would – hopefully – draw Tara back into his life.

  He was half excited and half scared to death.

  But at least he had a plan.

  NINE

  The next morning.

  A knock at the door. A loud knock. A desperate knock.

  A wake your ass up because this is an emergency kind of knock.

  Jon jolts to life. He looks at his alarm clock. Seven-thirty. Good grief, who in the name of all that is holy would be so hell-bent on talking to him in person at this hour?

  He groans and rolls over onto his stomach, letting his right arm dangle off the bed. Maybe he’s just hearing things.

  But the knocking returns. Sounding louder, more desperate, more urgent. Jon throws on a tee shirt and a pair of shorts and zombies his way across the house.

  Groggy and annoyed by his premature awakening, he’s ready to give whoever’s responsible for all this racket a piece of his mind. He unlocks the front door and rips it open to find the last person he’d expect to see.

  It’s Tara, her eyes burning with lust.

  Jon is speechless. He wants to say a million things, but nothing is coming out. All he can do is stand there like a goon and absorb the beauty standing before him. Tara is wearing the short, revealing white skirt she knows drives Jon crazy.

  And it certainly wasn’t an accident that she’d neglected to wear a bra underneath her skin-tight, teal tank-top. To top it off, she’d done up her hair in braided pigtails. She wasn’t here to wake him up. She wasn’t here to argue. She’d come over to rustle up the pervert inside of him.

  Tara closes the distance between them and wraps her arms around Jon before he can say anything. “Follow me,” she whispers into his ear before pinching the lobe in her teeth, ever so gently. Chills dance down Jon’s spine as she takes him by the hand.

  She leads him to the bedroom, releases Jon’s hand and turns around to face him. Their eyes connect again. Tara bites her lower lip. “I’ll be right back,” she says, letting herself into the master bathroom.

  Jon didn’t even have enough time to pace back and forth next to the bed and wonder what this was all about. Under a minute later Tara’s back, wearing nothing but her birthday suit. She focuses her attention south of the border and smiles ear to ear as she watches Jon’s favorite body part grow right before her eyes.

  Shedding his own clothing as if it were on fire, Jon hoists Tara into the air and gives himself the most pleasurable arm workout ever. As she hugs him and hooks her legs around his waist Jon puts his hands on her butt and squeezes her, lifts her, pulls her down as he thrusts up and picks her up as he pulls out – fast, slow, all speeds in between as they tag-team Orgasm Mountain and reach the summit just seconds apart.

  “You are... amazing,” Jon manages to say as he catches his breath and starts coming down from his natural high.

  “Me? What about YOU?” Tara replies. She loved that position, loved when Jon held her in his arms and made love to her... but never had he taken her from start to finish with her whole body off the ground – and off the bed. “That was like having sex on a cloud! Hang on, let me make sure my legs still work,” she giggles.

  Jon laughs with her. “Whew, my arms are toast. Who needs dumbbells?”

  They re-clothe themselves and share breakfast in satisfied silence. When they’d finished eating, Tara wishes Jon a wonderful day and starts heading toward the door like she’s going to leave.

  “Hold on,” Jon says, catching up to her before she can let herself out of the house. What he couldn’t say when he’d first answered her knocking, he had the words to say now. “Does all of this... you showing up outta the blue, what we just did, all of it... does this mean you don’t want to take a break anymore?”

  Tara looks at him like she thought he would come to this conclusion on his own, like she didn’t think it would require an explanation from her. “No, I still think a break will do us good. You know, so we can learn to be happy with ourselves, without each other. This morning was my way of apologizing for my abrupt exit last night. I’m sorry about that, and I’m also sorry I didn’t let you know that this separation is a ‘break’ – as in, temporary. Not a ‘breakup’ – I don’t want to breakup with you, Jon, but I really do believe some time apart will be good for both of us. Do you agree?”

  “Actually, I do.” Jon couldn’t believe how much he’d changed his mind on this. Just yesterday he’d been freaking out inside, not wanting the break at all, but with everything that had happened between last night and this morning, he realized that time away from Tara was a good thing for him.

  His most frustrating, scariest question was answered. The break wasn’t going to be permanent. So with that massive weight off his shoulders, he could relax and focus on himself without worrying about Tara moving on and forgetting about him.

  “Great,” Tara replies. “So what’s on your agenda for today? Working on your computer?”

  “Nope, not today,” Jon says. “You were right, babe, I’m not getting anywhere with what I’ve been doing. I decided it’s time to let go of that and get back to the real world. You would’ve been proud of me last night. I got my ass out of the house and I’ve already got a very promising lead on a job.”

  “Aww, you do? That’s awesome! I’m so proud of you!” Tara was beaming. “What kind of work is it? When do you start?”

  “Well it’s not ‘for sure’ just yet. I gotta go see a guy later on today... you know, to learn a little more about it, and see if it’s as good of a fit for me as he thinks it’ll be. But I feel good about it.”

  “That’s the most important thing.” Tara smiles. “That you feel good about it, I mean. So are you going to tell me what it is that you might be doing, or are you gonna be a punk and keep it a secret?”

  Jon gives her a smirk. “I’m gonna be a ‘punk’ – for now... just because I don’t wanna get your hopes up when I don’t know if it’s a sure thing. But I’ll keep you posted, and if it works out, you’ll know about it very soon.”

  He walks Tara to her car, opens her door for her, hugs her tight and kisses her like it was the only thing he got out of bed to do that morning. They say their goodbyes and promise to keep in touch with each other periodically as they resume their ‘break’...

  ...which, unlike before, is now completely mutual.

  TEN

  “You almost here?”

  It was Danny, making sure Jon was still planning on showing up to fight.

  “Yup, I’m on the way right now. I’ll be there in five minutes, tops.”

  “Cool, I’ll meet you outside,” Danny replies.

  Jon hangs up.

  After Tara had left that morning, he had spent the rest of the day wondering if he should’ve told her more about what he was doing. He’d thought about it right up until Danny called, and then he wondered about something else: whether he’d lost his damn mind. He knew there was a fine line between brave and stupid. Which side of that line he was on... that was the question.

  Jon leaves his truck in a parking garage and walks the remaining couple blocks to find Danny waiting for him on the sidewalk, just as he’d said he would.

  “He shows up,” Danny says, playfully nudging Jon on the shoulder. “Dressed to impress, are we? Nice! Marine in the house!”

  Jon didn’t have any fighting trunks, so he went old-school and threw on his Marine Corps issued combat boots and desert digital camouflage pants for his cage fighting debut. A zippered black hoodie completed the outfit.

  He laughs at Danny’s comments. “I gotta make do with what I’ve got, man... these clothes make me wanna fight. Is there some dress code you forgot to tell me about?”

  “Nah, you’re cool with what you’ve got on, bro. You can wear whatever you want, but you gotta lose the shirt and boots when it’s your turn to brawl.”

  “Gotcha,” Jon says.

 
“C’mon, Marine, let’s get you registered and see who they’re gonna throw at you first.” Danny corrects himself. “Ahem... I mean: let’s see who you get to pulverize first.”

  They enter the building through a door that’s hardly even visible from the street, make their way down three flights of stairs and arrive in the basement. Danny leads Jon through another door, and there’s the cage... surrounded by a mob of fans cheering and hollering as they watch the action unfold in front of them.

  “This is a secret?” Jon asks Danny as he scans the miniature-warehouse-sized room. “There are hundreds of people in here.”

  “I know! It’s crazy, right?!?!” Danny replies directly into Jon’s ear, competing with the crowd. He has to scream for Jon to hear him. “Wait here, I’ll get you signed up!”

  “OK!” Jon shouts back.

  Sound-proofing, Jon thinks. That’s why this place is still a secret, that’s the only possible explanation. A senior citizen with a hearing aid could pick up on this ruckus from blocks away... yup, somebody must’ve sound-proofed the heck out of this place.

  Danny returns with a disappointed look on his face; disappointed bordering on scared.

  “What’s up?” Jon asks. “Problem getting me in?”

  “No, bro... you’re in. I tried to negotiate for a thousand, if you win tonight, but they wouldn’t go higher than five hundred.”

  Jon didn’t care. Five hundred dollars was more than he’d made in the past month, and he’d only have to ‘work’ a few minutes to claim it. “OK, that explains why you seem disappointed, but why so worried? You look terrified.”

  “Because of who you’re up against tonight: Victor Vasquez. I didn’t think they’d throw you in the cage with him... especially not for your first fight.”

  “Good fighter is he?”

  “He’s better than good,” Danny replies. “He’s never lost. He’s never even been knocked down. And he’s got a reputation around here for not knowing when to call it quits once he’s won the fight. He’s killed five fighters, Jon... five that I know of.”

  Before Jon could react the crowd roared in unison, redirecting his and Danny’s attention to the cage. The fight they’d walked in on was over. Jon and Victor were up next.

  “Take him down quick,” Danny says. “That’s your best option. C’mon, let’s get you in there.”

  Jon enters the cage and takes his corner, grateful to see Danny standing on the other side of the steel grating. “Remember,” Danny reminds him, “take him quick. Don’t waste any time dancin’ around in there.”

  “Got it,” Jon says with a nod. “No rules, right?”

  “That’s right,” Danny confirms. “Anything goes.”

  Jon turns his back to Danny and leans against the metal as Victor enters the cage. If this was a legit fight, they would’ve never been matched up; Victor looked to be at least thirty pounds heavier than Jon – all muscle – and about six inches taller.

  As Jon watches Victor take his corner he sees an older man in an expensive-looking burgundy colored suit and an attractive young blonde right next to him, half the guy’s age, if that.

  Jon cranes his neck to the side so Danny will be able to hear him. “Who are those two, standing over in Victor’s corner?”

  “The guy in the suit is Rich Payne,” Danny answers. “No idea what he does for a living, but I know the dude’s loaded. He’s here a lot, always gambling on the fights. The girl next to him, I don’t know... probably his trophy wife. Hope you’re ready, man, the bell’s about to ring.”

  Outside the cage and just in front of the crowd, a heavyset man with glasses as thick as antique Coke bottles sits at the desk with the bell on it. He looks at Victor. He looks at Jon. He grabs his microphone. “Fighters... are you ready?”

  Victor waves. Jon nods.

  DING – DING – DING!

  “Look alive, Marine, here he comes!” Danny screams as Victor stomps toward Jon, murder in his eyes. “Get him!”

  Jon leaves his corner in a hurry to lock horns with him in the middle. He lands a sharp kick on the front of Victor’s thigh, temporarily stopping his forward momentum. Victor didn’t expect it. He’s stunned.

  Wasting no time Jon stuns him even further with a quick jab to the throat, leaving his alleged badass of an opponent gasping for air. When Victor’s hands instinctively move to his neck, Jon sees another opportunity and pounces on it by kicking him square in the crotch.

  Victor’s hands follow the pain as he crumbles to his knees. Adrenaline pumping and knowing he’s got this in the bag, Jon plants both hands on the back of Victor’s head and drives his right knee into his face. One time. Two times. Three times.

  Jon drives his knee, and resets. Drives his knee, and resets. Faster and faster, over and over, the desert camouflage fabric on his leg growing redder and redder with each successive strike. On number ten, he stops. He lets go of Victor’s head and watches him crash to the mat like a freshly-chain-sawed tree in the woods.

  He’d estimated his ‘work time’ incorrectly.

  He hadn’t needed a few minutes to make five hundred dollars.

  He’d needed less than one.

  ELEVEN

  Jon’s phone rings early the next day.

  It’s a number he doesn’t recognize. Normally he ignores calls like these, calls from people he doesn’t have saved as a contact, but he decides to answer this one.

  “Jon?” A voice he’d never heard before asks.

  “Uh, yeah... this is Jon. Who’s this?”

  “Hell of a fight last night. I lost a lot of money because of you.”

  “That’s too bad,” Jon replies, faking a tone of concern. “Did you not hear my question, douche bag? Who are you?” Jon had very little patience for this type of thing and what little patience he did have was just about used up already.

  “Rich Payne,” the man on the other end replies, entitled, like he expects Jon to sit up straight with respect and change his tone at once. “I was behind Victor outside the cage last night. You probably didn’t notice me.”

  “Oh I saw you,” Jon replies. “I asked Danny who you were. He told me your name. How’d you happen to get this number, Rich?”

  “Don’t you worry about that. I have my ways. Listen, Jon, if you’ve got a minute I’ve got just two questions for you.”

  “My favorite color is blue,” Jon says. He laughs. No response on the other end. “I’m kidding, Rich,” Jon continues. “I’ve got time for a couple questions. Fire away.”

  Rich finally gets the joke. He chuckles. “OK, first question: how much money did you walk away with after your victory last night?”

  “Well that’s a very personal question, Rich, but I suppose I can let it slide this time – just this once. Five hundred. It was my first fight.”

  Rich ignores Jon’s continued attempts at being funny. “Excellent. OK, second question: would you like to make more?”

  Jon pauses before answering. “I’m happy with five hundred, considering how long it took me to earn it... but absolutely, I’d love to make more.”

  Rich responds before Jon can ask him how. “Perfect,” he says, “meet up with me this afternoon and we’ll talk about it.” He gives him an address and a time.