Shadowboxer: Tapped Out Book 1

by Quinn, Cari

  “You smell the same.” The choked sob in her voice had me tightening my hold.

  I lowered my face to her hair. “So do you.”

  “Yeah, like sweat.” She gave a little hitching laugh and gripped a handful of my hoodie as she peered up at my face. “Your jacket…”

  “Slater told me it got bloody. It doesn’t matter,” I said gruffly, giving in to the urge to rub my thumb over her cheekbone. She looked so fragile and so strong at the same time. I didn’t know how both could exist in her simultaneously, but they did.

  “He took it somewhere and they tried to get it clean. They didn’t do a great job, so I went to another place. Then another.” Another hitching laugh, softer now. “Finally, the third guy tried this experimental spray and it’s almost like new.” She shocked the hell out of me by stepping back and offering me her hand. “Want to see?”

  Don’t fuck this up. Be cool. “Sure.”

  She led me down the hall to the locker room and bit her lip. “Wait here.”

  I propped my foot against the wall and waited until she came back out, coat and backpack in hand. She handed over my jacket without a word.

  I checked it over, surprised to see only faint questionable smudges on the front of the jacket. I didn’t know how bad it had been, but this just looked a bit more weathered than when I’d given it to Mia. “Seems like they did a good job.”

  “Yeah. They really did.” She fiddled with her wet braid. “I want you to take it back. It’s yours.”

  “It’s not mine anymore.”

  “Tray—”

  I laid my finger over her lips. “You didn’t call me Fox.”

  Rather than toss back some retort, she kissed the tip of my finger. The jolt reverberated through my entire body.

  “Your name is Tray.” She swallowed hard. “Just like mine is Amelia.”

  My standard response nearly sprang to my lips.

  No, it isn’t. You remade yourself into Mia. She’s who you are now.

  But unless I was prepared to tell her what I knew, I had no right to do anything other than listen. And since this was the first time we’d had anything remotely close to a breakthrough, you can bet your sweet ass I wasn’t saying jack shit. Maybe that made me a coward.

  Fine. I’d admit it. It definitely made me a coward.

  “I like Mia,” I said instead of everything else I should have.

  She gave me a hesitant smile. “You never knew Amelia. She was a cheerleader.”

  I gasped. “No.”

  “Yeah. Even worse, she was co-captain her freshman year. My school had the middle school and the high school in one building so I got on varsity early.”

  I caressed her cheek with my thumb. “This entirely changes my opinion about you.” Words poured from me, ones I couldn’t stop. “I don’t want you to fight Costas.”

  Her smile faded, blinking out like a light. “It’s not your call.”

  I disagreed with that with every fiber of my being, but I’d tried insisting before. Tried demanding. In the end, the only way I’d find a place in her life was by letting her live it, her way. No matter how much I hated imagining her in the ring with that asshole, it was her choice to make.

  Swallowing hard, I circled my thumb over her velvety skin once more. “I could argue the point up and down, but I’m not going to change your mind, am I?”

  “No. You’re not.”

  “Then I guess I’m going to have to live with it.”

  She gazed down at the jacket she clutched to her chest. She’d gone from holding it carefully to fisting the material. I doubt she even realized. “Can we go somewhere private?”

  I’d come down to the gym partially to light into her for fighting Costas. Now that was the least of my concerns. If she insisted on fighting him, I’d make sure she was ready. I’d will her to beat him if I had to. But this…

  This was so much more important right now.

  “Anywhere.” I covered her hands with mine.

  “There’s something…” She blew out a breath. Took another. Shut her eyes. “I need to tell someone. I need to tell you.”

  The tremor that went through me made her eyes pop open. I hadn’t expected this day to come for a very long time, if ever. Our accelerated timeline was holding true.

  What if I couldn’t be the man she deserved? Christ, I hated the “what ifs” and they just kept coming.

  “Tray?” Already she was retreating, that cool mask of indifference slipping over her features. I hated that mask. I wanted her—the real her—so badly.

  I could do this. I’d be whoever she needed. I’d love her that much.

  “Yeah.” Gently, I tugged the jacket out of her hands and held it open for her to slip on. She hesitated, either because she didn’t understand the gesture or maybe she was surprised I didn’t expect her to shower first.

  Considering what she was about to tell me, I figured the shower could wait until later. I’d probably need one too.

  “It’s cold out. You’ll catch a chill.”

  She slid her arms into the sleeves, still smiling faintly. She’d smiled more in the past few minutes than ever before in my presence. “You already did.”

  “Hospital crud.” Right on cue, I sneezed.

  She winced when I cupped my eye. God, that mothereffer hurt.

  “Carly’s at the gym tonight so if you want to come over, I can hook you up with some chest rub.” She blushed as if she’d offered me a blowjob. “I mean, if you want. You don’t have to. We can just go to a coffee shop. Or somewhere else.”

  “Mia.” Her nerves would’ve been adorable if I hadn’t been caught between a migraine and a wave of nausea myself. And only one of those things had a physical basis. The other was purely for her and what I knew she’d relive in order to tell me something I’d so selfishly unearthed on my own. “Let’s go to your place. I’ll just pick up Vey on the way if it’s all right. If I’m going to stay over…” I shifted my feet uncomfortably.

  Way to go. She hands you an olive branch, you offer to screw her. Stay classy, dude.

  Although that wasn’t what I’d meant at all, I knew how it sounded. I wouldn’t have blamed her for telling me off.

  But she only murmured her agreement and took my hand. Her fingers were so soft and cool around mine. Her trust, no matter how tentative, made my breath stutter.

  Just like that, she went from borrowing my heart to flat out owning it. It was hers to do with what she wished. Hers to stomp on or hold.

  Hers to break.

  Twenty-Eight

  We were both quiet on the train ride to Tray’s house to get Vey.

  As soon as we arrived, the puppy tried to scale my legs. We’d bonded over the weekend. I loved dogs. Loved this dog already.

  “Hey there, boy.” I knelt to plant kisses all over Vey’s soft gray and black cheeks. “You want to go on a sleepover?”

  Tray came to a halt. “It was you.”

  “Hmm?”

  “You came here while I was in the hospital. You cleaned.”

  Since he said it almost accusingly, I pressed my face into Vey’s fur to give myself an extra moment. “Yeah. I didn’t go through your stuff, if that’s what you’re worried about. I just had some extra energy, and I wanted to do something. So I fed the dog.”

  “You didn’t go through my rainbow condom collection? It’s impressive.”

  “Nope, sorry.” I couldn’t help but snort. “I didn’t look in any drawers.”

  “I don’t keep them in drawers. I tack them up next to my bed like this rockstar dude I like. Easier access.”

  I wasn’t sure if he was kidding or not. He was good at faking me out when he wasn’t wearing an eye patch. With it on, he was practically inscrutable. “Oh, really. What rockstar?”

  “Lead singer of Oblivion. Simon Kagan. He’s kinda crazy.”

  “I don’t really pay much attention to music.” When had that happened, anyway? I’d once loved listening to my favorite groups, but I’d lost track
of that along with so much else.

  “They’re pretty new. They’re on their first tour right now. I’m hoping to get tickets when they swing through here.”

  “Awesome.” Since I’d never been to a concert and didn’t have much to say on the topic, I went back to nuzzling Vey.

  He headed into the kitchen and returned holding a pair of beers. “Are you sure you didn’t sniff my boxers?”

  “Ugh.” I giggled then bit my lip.

  What was wrong with me tonight? Ever since he’d walked into Mark’s, I’d been acting completely abnormal. Yes, I was happy to see him. Yes, I’d missed him. I’d been worried since the fight, and having him show up strong and whole had been the best kind of shock.

  Between that sorta sexy, sorta sad eye patch and his cold, I couldn’t help wanting to take care of him. But this was all too much. First, wanting to tell him something I’d never spoken about to anyone other than the cops. Now laughing and holding his hand and pretending I was a normal girl. Not a fighter willing to sacrifice anything to reach some arbitrary goal. Just a girl who liked being with a guy.

  I took the beer he held out. Maybe I could be that girl, just for tonight.

  Not if you tell him. If you say those words—that you were raped and used, that you killed a man in cold blood—it ends here. He’ll never want to touch you again.

  Could I even blame him if that ended up being true?

  “One for the road.” He tipped back his beer and drank, and I followed suit.

  “C’mon, Vey.” He reached for the red leash clipped near the door, and Vey’s tail thumped on the floor. “We’re going on a sleepover camping trip.”

  “I’ve never been camping.” I had so many nevers in my life.

  I flicked my nail under the edge of the beer label, pausing at the silence that greeted my reply.

  When I looked up, he shook his head. “You haven’t lived until you’ve sat by a campfire and roasted marshmallows.”

  Like a tape on fast rewind in my mind, I remembered how things had been after my mom died. How my dad had tried so hard to keep things together but drank alone at night when he thought Carly and I didn’t know. The coupons I’d cut from the newspaper because he’d been too out of sorts to remember to get groceries. Those years of raiding my piggybank to scrape up enough cash for Carly to buy school supplies since Dad drank any extra money away in his misery.

  When I’d climbed in that car with Darren, for a moment I’d fantasized he was taking me away from all the responsibilities I’d dealt with too young. I just wanted to escape. He was so good-looking, and I’d been flattered by his attention, despite how much older he was.

  He’d taken me away, all right. Until I fought like a wild animal to get back to my life. To Carly and Dad.

  When Dad died of a heart attack weeks after my return, I clung to my sister. She was my touchstone. My safety net. The one who helped me believe I could still be normal if I tried hard enough.

  “Maybe I’ll get to go camping someday,” I whispered, staring into my bottle.

  “You will.”

  I glanced up and he knelt at my side, his gorgeous aqua eye trained on me. The sight of that silly eye patch should’ve broken the moment, but it didn’t. “How do you know?”

  “I’ll take you. I promise.”

  What did it say about me that I wanted to believe his promises? Was I as gullible as my sister?

  He snapped on Vey’s leash then rose and held out his hand. “Come on. You said you’d VapoRub me until I fell asleep.”

  I smiled. How could I not? Somehow this amazing man was still a part of my life though I’d tried repeatedly to shove him out. “Sounds kinky.”

  He gave me a sideways grin. The whole pirate thing he had going made him even hotter. “A guy can hope.”

  We took an Uber to my place and walked into a blessedly quiet apartment. Carly had developed a habit of leaving the TV on when she went out, but tonight, all was silent and dark. I bumped into the end table and laughed as a wet nose ran up the back of my leg. My freezing leg, since I hadn’t changed into my pants after the gym. Forty degrees and bare skin didn’t mix.

  “You okay?” Tray gripped my waist before tracing the hem of my shorts, then my thigh. “Jesus. You need to warm up.”

  I flipped on the lights. “I will in a few minutes.”

  He rubbed his chilly nose along the back of my neck, nudging aside my braid. “Let’s take a hot shower.”

  His words acted as kerosene, and his warm breath sifting through my hair became the match. I shivered. My nipples pebbled to hard points, and this time, the cold wasn’t to blame.

  As I remembered Carly’s similar reaction to Giovanni the other day, I started to laugh. Who was I to judge? Clearly, I was no better.

  “Laughing at me?” Rather than getting offended at my reaction, he tugged me back against his firm chest—firm everything, I discovered quickly enough—and licked my earlobe. “C’mon, you know you’ve always wanted to do it with a pirate.”

  I attempted a smile, well aware it fell short. His easy references to sex brought me out of the moment and turned it into something big and scary. Exciting too, but fear always rode shotgun. To him, sex was just a way to relieve stress or have fun or pass the time. It took so much out of me to try to seem relaxed.

  “What girl hasn’t?” I replied, hoping he couldn’t hear the quaver in my voice.

  He circled his hips and brought his semi-erection flush against my ass. “Don’t forget the VapoRub. My sinuses are on the verge of weeping with joy.”

  Vey leaped up on the couch and stretched out, making himself at home. Within a minute, he was snoring.

  “I actually have a homemade form of the stuff that Car makes.” Cold remedies were a safe topic. Those I could discuss without worrying about an imminent panic attack. “It’s a natural holistic blend.”

  “Whatever.” He helped me take off his jacket then turned his head away to sneeze. “Slather it on.”

  I tossed the coat on the arm of the sofa. “Do you have any allergies? Eucalyptus, peppermint, rosemary?”

  “Nope.”

  “Cinnamon? Coconut oil?”

  “No. But I do have an allergy to long-term hard-on-itis, which is when you turn me on then leave me hanging forever.” Walking backward, he tugged me toward the bathroom. “When will your sister be back?”

  I looked at my watch. Just past ten. Carly had said she was catching a movie with friends after the gym so we had a little time. “Within the next hour, probably.”

  “We’ll work fast.” He stopped and his smile faded. “If you, you know, want to work at all. I didn’t mean to assume.”

  “Go get undressed.” Trying to smile, I gave him a gentle push and detoured to the kitchen. “I’ll be in soon.”

  “Promise?”

  God, he sounded so sexy when he pouted. “Promise. I might even bring you a treat.”

  “I like treats.” After giving me an eyebrow waggle that didn’t work quite to the same effect with the eye patch, he headed into the bathroom.

  Humming. Like he was happy. He’d just gotten out of the hospital and needed surgery soon, but he was as perky as could be.

  And me? I walked around like a living thundercloud. Always gloomy and seething.

  What the hell did he see in me?

  I fixed him a drink and carried it into the bathroom, expecting him to be naked and in the shower. It was small, but I figured he could fold himself in if he got creative with his position. Something I bet he had plenty of experience with.

  Which didn’t make me jealous. At all.

  But he sat on the edge of the vanity, swinging his legs. Still fully dressed and patched.

  “Why aren’t you naked?”

  “Now there’s a question I wish I got more often.” He snatched the mug of hot cocoa before I could offer it and took a greedy sip. Froth coated his upper lip, making me laugh until he leaned forward and caught my lower one, transferring the flavor of mint and chocol
ate and Tray.

  I’d missed that taste. Him. That sharp bite of his teeth, the slow, languid slide of his tongue over mine. Exploring without any rush. I’d thrown in little marshmallows too, and he slipped one between my lips in a playfully sexy move that made my nerves vanish.

  He wound his fingers through my braid, freeing my hair so it tumbled around my face. Sipping slowly, he studied me, causing me to squirm. “You’re so beautiful.”

  His tone, soft and reverent, was my undoing. Hell, he was my undoing. I was so tired of denying it.

  After a moment, he smiled. “You didn’t argue with me.”

  “No.” I took a shaky breath and toyed with the strap of my tank top. “I think you’re beautiful too.”

  “I’ll accept that. But feel free to change that to macho or suave or outrageously handsome at any time.” When I laughed, he set aside his mug. “Are you wearing my bra and panties?”

  “Why, Tray Knox, I didn’t realize you had a bra and panties.” Was that really my voice that sounded so…flirty? It must be, because he cupped my hip and drew me between his spread legs.

  “You know what I mean. When you wear them, you think of me.” As if he were daring me to say no, he set aside my mug too and lowered his mouth to my nipple through my tank. That one perceptive aqua eye stayed riveted on my face while he pulled the tip between his teeth, slow and sure.

  “You think so, huh?” But he was right. I’d had no reason to wear them tonight, other than my desire to feel closer to him. Just like when I wore his coat.

  “Know so. You imagine me taking them off of you, like I’m about to do right now.” His hot, mesmerizing gaze seared my skin through my shirt as he lifted it, inch by maddening inch.

  God, I’d have to go lingerie shopping with Carly again. Voluntarily. Soon.

  “Beautiful Mia.” He whispered it against my skin, over and over, imprinting me with his breath and the shape of his lips and his kisses. First through the bra then beneath it after he peeled the material away. Down my stomach, lower and lower. He eased to his knees in front of me, wordlessly asking permission.

  I pushed off the workout shorts and the boy shorts beneath, my throat turning dry at the way he slowly, deliberately breathed in. So sexy. Sweat turned me on, and he obviously felt the same since I hadn’t yet showered after my workout.