Never Choose Flight (A Fighter Romance Novel)

by Danielle Forte

  Then there was a smashing noise. And another. I looked to the source of the noise and saw beer-bottle man, breaking the bottles. Holding onto them by the necks as he smashed the bodies. Leaving him with a jagged and dangerous weapon in each hand.

  He got back in the ring.

  “We said no weapons,” said Malcolm, turning to the man who seemed in charge. “But,” he continued, “I don’t actually mind.”

  He turned back and faced the man with the broken bottles. Then they ran at each other.

  I cringed as I watched the first bottle land into his back. I saw the blood start pouring out immediately. So did the rest of the audience. And they all loved it.

  Malcolm stepped back from the guy and delivered a solid blow right to his chin, and the man fell down, out cold. He reached back and removed the bottle, tossing it onto the grass outside of the ring.

  “It’s going to take more than that!” he yelled.

  “You say weapons okay?” yelled the leader.

  “Anything but guns,” responded Malcolm. His eyes were on fire. He wanted this. He wanted the pain. The blood was running all the way down to his feet.

  Then a pair of guys got in. As if they’d been waiting for the okay. Weapons fine. Anything but guns. One of them had a baseball bat. The other had a hammer in each hand.

  Malcolm looked from one to the other. Quickly sizing them up. Making a plan in an instant. For once, he didn’t want the other side to make the first move. He understood how lethal that might have been.

  He lunged for the bat, grabbing it at both ends. He ducked and dodged the first hammer swing, which unfortunately landed on baseball bat man’s face. I saw a tooth fly out. I was certain. That man fell, letting go of the bat.

  And then, with two quick and clean swings, Malcolm knocked each hammer out of the man’s hands. They both landed outside of the ring.

  The man was stunned enough, probably with some broken fingers, that a simple jab to the chest knocked him on the ass.

  Everyone went wild. Cheering. Jeering. Booing. Clapping. Laughing. They’d gotten exactly what they’d hoped for.

  Then a whistle went off. It was the leader. The man in charge. “We can only afford one more of you to get knocked down,” he said.

  The audience got loud once again, as one final man emerged from the house. He held in his hand a golf club. A driver. It looked heavy. It looked strong. And that man stepped into the ring.

  The club was longer than Malcolm’s arm, and the man immediately put it over his shoulder like a baseball bat. If Malcolm made any move towards him, a swing could land on him. A swing that would knock out a normal man, but might kill a man like Malcolm.

  He stood back. Dropped out of his fighter’s pose. The golf club man didn’t seem to be moving forward. Malcolm’s eyes continued to dart around. My heart was racing. I didn’t see any way out of this for him. All I could imagine was him getting hurt. Badly.

  Then he got down low. Bent his knees far. Leaned forward a bit. And then he ran at the man with the golf club.

  The man swung, aiming for Malcolm’s head. As the huge metal drive swung towards him, he stood up straight. There was a sickening smack noise then the club collided with his torso, underneath his raised arm. I still sighed with relief though, as it hadn’t cracked his skull open or anything.

  Once he was close enough to the guy, the golf club became useless. Malcolm tore it out his hands and tossed it away and then grabbed the man, one hand on his knees and the other at his armpit. He lifted the man up, this full-grown man, all the way above his head.

  “Good fight, brothers,” he yelled. Then he dropped the final contender and stepped back. “Better luck next time.”

  Blood was scabbing all the way down his back. A huge bruise was forming on his side where the golf club had hit him. But he didn’t even seem to be in pain. He was smiling, he shook a few hands, collected another huge stack of bills, and then came to meet me at the side of the ring.

  “Well,” he said, “you want to get out of here?”

  “No,” I said, sarcastically, “Let’s hang around with the frat boys some more.”

  He pulled on his shirt as we walked towards the car. I saw a bit of a wince as it fell against his open wound. “That was pretty rough,” I said.

  “Eh,” he said. “Another day on the job, really.”

  We got into the car. “But the hammers,” I said. “The golf club. That stuff is just normal?”

  “You deal with customers and paper. I deal with idiot strong-men and their weapons. It’s just what I do.”

  That rock reappeared in my stomach. That worry about just how dangerous this stuff actually was. How easily he could have been killed. “But that golf club,” I said. “It could have taken your head off. No problem.”

  “In the right hands,” he said. “But that guy had no idea what he was doing. It was easy. Like getting the knife away from Derek.”

  “But what if you had messed up somehow. Just one foot in the wrong place. A little slip. And you could have died. Gotten your jaw broken again, at least.”

  “I managed with a broken jaw as a child,” he said. “I think I could handle it as an adult.”

  “But aren’t you worried?” I asked. “At all? About your health?”

  “Of course,” he said. “I don’t smoke. I rarely drink. I get more exercise than your average ten americans combined.”

  “But what about just your short term health. Broken bones. That kind of thing.”

  “I deal with that stuff as it happens. Every life has ups and downs. My downs just happen to be horrible injuries, whereas yours are, like, a delivery going missing or something.”

  I laughed, but my heart wasn’t in it. He wasn’t being serious about this, even though the seriousness of it was just hitting me hard. He wasn’t joking around when he’d said that he could die in any fight. But now he was joking, now that I was trying to talk seriously about it.

  We pulled up to his house, and both got out of the car. He walked up to the front door, and there was something there.

  I couldn’t tell what it was at first. It was hanging from the doorknob. Then I saw it more clearly. It was a chicken. Or a grouse or something. All of its feathers plucked, like it had been purchased at a butcher.

  It hung from the doorknob on a blue bandana, tied around its neck. Malcolm lifted it up, and something fell from its mouth and clattered to the ground. Something metal.

  He knelt down and picked it up to inspect it. It was clear, suddenly, what it was. A bullet.

  He’d just found a dead bird hanging from his door with a bullet in his mouth. And how does he react?

  “Huh,” he said, and then he went inside. He placed the chicken down on the counter, and then carried on into the bathroom.

  I followed him. “What is that?” I asked.

  “I don’t know.”

  “What does it mean?”

  “Not sure.”

  “Because it sure seems like death to me,” I said. “Hanging. Bullet. Dead chicken.”

  “Well they couldn’t exactly have used a live one now, could they?”

  “I guess not, but that’s not the point.”

  He pulled off his shirt. The bruise ran halfway down his torso and spread almost halfway around him. It was a dark purple in the center, as if the flesh was rotting, and a sickening yellow near the edges.

  He turned and I saw that the round cut in his back was scabbed up mostly, but several of those scabs had been torn off when he took off the shirt. He got into the tub and grabbed the rubbing alcohol. I guess this was going to become a routine of ours now as well.

  Lunch at Joe’s, afternoon treating horrible wounds.

  I leaned against the counter and tried to relax a bit. “Okay,” I said. “So the golf club I get. You needed to get close to him, he was going to hit you, so you decided to take it on the torso instead of to the skull.”

  He nodded while a splash of alcohol ran over his bleeding wound.

&nb
sp; “But the beer bottles. Why did you run at him? Seemed like you could have done that one without getting so hurt.”

  “I didn’t get that hurt,” he said. “I stopped the guy before it was deep enough. A bit deeper and he would have cut a full circle of my skin out. Didn’t want that.”

  “You did want some of it?”

  “Yes,” he said. “It was a show. No one wanted the show to be over without any blood being drawn.”

  I didn’t know what to say.

  “This bit of blood, maybe a scar, that’ll earn me my next bunch of gigs at that place. I bet they’ll have me back at the start of every term. Something like that.”

  “And you want to go back?”

  “Of course I do!” he said. “That was a blast. Did you see me take down three guys at the same time?”

  “Yes,” I said. “I saw.”

  He turned to look at me. “I told you that my job was dangerous. I told you that I might be killed. You knew this already.”

  “I know,” I said. “But watching it almost happen is different than hearing that it might happen.”

  “I guess so,” he said. “But there really isn’t anything I can do about it. What do you think I should do about it?”

  My mind whirled, looking for a good response. If he gave up fighting, he’d need something else. Like becoming a busboy or something. And I could not see any other job working for him. Not even in the short term.

  I guess I’d thought for long enough. “Exactly,” he said. “There’s nothing for me to do. This is my life. I love it. I think you’ll learn to love it too.”

  I wasn’t so sure. “But what will I do if you actually get killed in a fight?”

  “I’m not sure,” he said. “But do you really think that’ll happen?”

  “No,” I said. “I guess not. You’re a good fighter.”

  “And now I even have someone worth fighting for in my life.”

  “Did that help?” I asked.

  He looked up at me.

  “Were you thinking of me while you fought? Trying to stay safe for my sake?”

  “Not exactly,” he said. “But it sure was nice having someone to be next to right when I was done. Someone in the audience who I knew was rooting for me.”

  “Because they didn’t want you to be dead,” I said.

  “Yeah,” he said. “Because they didn’t want me to be dead.”

  The rest of the evening kept that same tone. When he was heading to bed, I knew I was invited. But I just wasn’t in the mood. I didn’t want to lie next to him, worrying about him. Hoping that he wasn’t going to die in the night from some internal injury.

  So I said goodbye and gave him a kiss and drove back to my place.

  I wasn’t mad at him, exactly. He hadn’t done anything to make me angry. But I think it was just finally sinking in. All those things he’d said were true. His life was dangerous. He could die. And I couldn’t stop thinking about that thug at the dinner. Them following him home.

  And the chicken on the doorknob. Malcolm acted as if that wasn’t anything, but I didn’t believe him. That meant something bad, although I had no idea what.

  Chapter 11

  The rest of the week I didn’t feel so good. I met with Malcolm a couple of times for lunch, and he was nice and charming and handsome like always. And I put up a face of feeling fine around him. We’d discussed my worries, and I don’t think he had anything left to contribute.

  I was worried for him; he didn’t care. He wasn’t worried for himself.

  Paranoia also started to keep into my mind. I started to worry. Every car that was behind me on the freeway was following me. If it took the same exit as me, my heart started racing. I crossed the street just so that I didn’t have to walk past people. What if they were thugs? Wanting to mess with me because of who I was dating? Using me to get into his head?

  Malcolm told me that we should try to spend plenty of time together, but I just couldn’t. Seeing him topless used to be great, but the huge bruise definitely took away from the experience.

  But Saturday we spent together, and things felt a bit better. We were just hanging out again. In bed for a while, and on the couch. Eating our meals together. The bruise was fading, and the wound had started to scar. I was feeling okay. Not wonderful, but okay.

  And then it was Sunday. Time for another fight. I drove him. I went to the side of the building with him and watched him warm up. That same scene where he’d first turned me on. Watching him work that bag like a wild animal. Destroying it. Seeing his strength and his stamina. I had a good time again.

  Then we were inside, for the fight. I stood near the front. The place reeked. A smell that I guessed it had always had, but this time I couldn’t get my mind off of it. The floor was sticky with booze and piss. Everyone standing around me were criminals.

  The announcer said that they were doing something special today. The contender going up against Malcolm was young, but buff. He hadn’t had much practice though so they were going to let him fight with a two by four.

  I couldn’t stand it. Malcolm had clearly agreed to this. And because it was all so illegal in the first place, even if he hadn’t he probably could have been forced into it anyway.

  I looked as the two men stood facing each other. My man, and a man with a two by four. All ready to beat the shit out of each other for money.

  The crowd began to count down, but I couldn’t count with them. I was panicking. I had this sickening feeling roll over me. He was going to be beat to death. Right there. Right in front of my eyes. I started tearing up.

  The countdown ended, and the two man began circling each other. I watched closely, but it was too much. I walked out of there before the first hit landed. Got away so that I didn’t have to watch anything happen. I wanted to be as far away as possible.

  I left the building, past the body guards. I could hear the whooping and hollering from the audience as the fight got started. I could hear the loud cracking noises as I walked to my car.

  I sat down, but I didn’t turn the car on. I was just going to wait for him. There. In my car.

  I folded down the mirror and looked at myself. “Keep it together,” I said to myself.

  My emotions were just running high. Before hand I really thought that I could handle this. I never thought it would be a problem.

  A few minutes later, maybe twenty or so, there’s a knock at my window. I jump in my seat, and then look over and see Malcolm standing there. Still alive. For now.

  I reached over and unlocked his door. He had a concerned look on his face as he got into the car.

  “Rough fight?” I asked.

  “It was easy,” he said. “That man knew absolutely nothing about wielding a two by four.”

  I laughed. But then I stopped myself. I was scared that if I let the laughter come, I’d be opening the floodgates to all sorts of emotions.

  “You didn’t stay and watch?” he said.

  “No, I couldn’t. Let’s just go home, okay?”

  “Sure,” he said.

  We drove in silence for a few minutes. And then he spoke again. “So they told me who I’m fighting next week.”

  “Oh yeah?” I asked. Suddenly worried again. Was this why he looked concerned?

  “Yeah. A guy from the east coast. Basically as undefeated as me. And he has a reputation for some bad shit.”

  “Who is it?” I asked.

  “He has basically the most narcissistic name out there. He goes by ‘The God’.”

  I was about to react when a car jutted out in front of us. I slammed as hard as I could on my breaks. We managed, just barely, to come to a stop before slamming into them, t-boning them.

  Then four guys got out of the car. All of them in suits. Two of them went to Malcolm’s side of the car. He didn’t have time to say anything before he was dragged out. He was thrown down to his knees and held there by one guy as the other just punched him in the face again and again.

  I locked my door,
having no idea what to do. The other two guys circled around the car. One of them tried my door, but gave up when he saw it was locked. Clearly they weren’t coming for me. Not yet.

  There was nothing for me to do. Nothing that I could do. It’s not like I could get out and scare them away. I could try calling the cops, but I knew what Malcolm did was illegal in the first place so they probably wouldn’t help him.

  Of course, the first day I left a fight of his because I didn’t want to watch, I have to watch him getting beat up the street. Just my luck.

  The two men circled my car a few times and then got back into theirs. Once Malcolm was sufficiently destroyed, they tossed him down on the road and took off. I tried to see their license plate but it was obstructed. Not that it would have been any help anyway.

  I looked over and saw Malcolm lying on the ground. I thought he was dead for a second, but then my eyes observed the steady rhythm of his breathing. A moment later, his arms moved. He pushed himself up the with them, and then stood up. He got back in the car.

  He face was already starting to swell. I don’t know how you can tell if a face has broken bones, but if I had to guess I’d say his cheeks were quite probably broken.

  “Back to my place?” he said.

  “Sure.”

  We drove in silence for a while. Then I had to ask. “The God?”

  “Basically,” said Malcolm threw swollen lips, “he is to New York City what I am to Los Angeles. When it comes to his fighting record. Never knocked out. Never lost a fight.”

  “And he’s coming here?” I asked.

  “That’s what they told me. We’ll be fighting next Sunday. A week from tonight.”

  I paused. Then I asked that all important question. “Do you think that you can beat him?”

  Then it was his turn to pause. “I have no idea. But he does use one tactic that I’ve never resorted to.”