Holding Huck's Heart (Marco's MMA Boys #3)

by S. M. Donaldson

  “Hmm. You seem to know a lot about him.”

  “I was his tutor. We spent a lot of time together. That’s all,” I say as if it’s no big deal.

  She looks at me like I’m crazy. “Okay. So the night he saw you stripping and wanted to tear down your dressing room door, then kissed the hell out of you all caveman style, that was all because you tutored him?” She barks out a sarcastic laugh. “I don’t buy it.”

  I reach my car. “Fine, it was a little more back then, but really nothing. He went his way, I went mine. I left here the day after I graduated high school and never looked back,” I say as I unlock my door and climb in.

  She puts her hands up as if she’s surrendering. “All right, I’ll see you at work later this week,” she says as I close my door.

  ~*~*~

  Before I realize it, it’s Wednesday night and I’ve just come off stage. I’m sweaty and tired. Liz meets me beside the stage and follows me to my dressing room. “Great performance.”

  I nod and take a sip of water. “Thanks. I think the damn air is broken in this place tonight.”

  She fans herself. “I think so, too.” I sit down on a stool and begin unsnapping loose the garter belts and wipe inside my thighs. She glances down. “I never noticed your tat before.”

  I glance down and see I’ve wiped my tattoo cover-up off. Shit. “Yeah, just something stupid I did years ago.”

  “Well, it’s really small. I don’t think anyone would notice even if you didn’t cover it up,” she says, trying to act like it’s no big deal. She squints. “What does it say?”

  I sigh. “It’s part of a quote from one of Mark Twain’s books. ‘Trembly and feverish to be so close to freedom.’ It’s just something that stuck with me.” I shrug, trying to avoid further questions.

  She nods. “Hmm, what’s it about?”

  I look up at her. “Wanting freedom, but being scared of it.”

  There is a knock at the door. Tugg, one of our bouncers, steps in. “Hey, Grace.” They are required to call us by our stage names. “There is a guy out here who wants a private dance.”

  I glance over at Liz and she nods. “Tugg, you know I don’t do privates.”

  “Are you sure? This guy is offering a grand.” He shrugs. “I know you said you could use some extra cash or I wouldn’t even let you know. He’s in room five.” He turns and leaves the room.

  I start touching up my make-up. Liz touches my arm. “Hey, you don’t know who this guy is and if he’s offering a grand,” she shrugs, “he may want more than a dance.”

  “Yeah, but the money.”

  She nods softly. “Okay, but make sure Tugg or one of the others is close by.”

  I nod as I gather my things and start toward the VIP area. You would think in a small town like this one that we wouldn’t have the kind of clientele that would merit a club like this one. The thing is we’re so close to UF and several high dollar vacation spots that clients like the privacy and intimacy that our club gives. They aren’t right in the limelight when they enter our doors.

  As I enter the VIP area I see Tugg. He nods as if he’s letting me know he’ll be right outside. I open the door to room five, pressing the button to start the music as I walk in. I start my dance and make my way over to the client. The room is very dim as the music pipes in through the speakers. I start a little different version of what I do on stage when I hear the words that stop me.

  “Krasavitsa.”

  I jolt away from him. “Pavel, what are you doing here?” I reach over and turn up the lights.

  He crosses his arms over his chest. “Came to see what you’d lowered yourself to.”

  “I couldn’t be any lower than when I was your whore. My life is none of your business. I told you to leave me alone.” I back up to the door, “So leave.”

  He stands up and makes his way over to me before I can blink. “Don’t start thinking you will tell me what to do.” He grabs my elbow. “I can help you if you weren’t so stubborn and held on to such foolishness.”

  I snatch my elbow away. “Foolishness? So me having a problem with you being married is foolishness?” I roll my eyes.

  “Funny, you didn’t have a problem with it for all those years.” He backs me into the wall. “You didn’t have a problem screaming my name out when you came or sucking my dick until-.” I slap him before he can finish.

  “Where does she think you are this weekend? Huh?” I shove him backward. “She’s home nursing your baby. The baby I thought you’d never have because supposedly you two weren’t sleeping together. The baby I’ll probably never get to have because I wasted so much time of my life on you.” He looks angered but hurt in some way, too. “I hate you, Pavel. Hate you.”

  I snatch the door open and see Tugg. “Make sure he never comes in this club again.” Tugg just nods as I storm by.

  Going into my dressing room, I grab my things and haul ass to my car.

  CHAPTER 8

  HUCK

  Watching Marco hold our business meeting is still surreal to me.

  “So boys, how are the numbers looking for the self-defense classes?” he says, looking at Lox.

  Lox opens our sign up binder. “Well, we’re having a steady flow. The sign up for the Saturday kid’s class is doing very well and since it’s free, it’s bringing in a lot of moms.”

  Marco nods. “Sounds good. Anyone have anything else?” He looks through the notes we’ve been over. “We’ve got all the rooms for Jacksonville, we went over the schedule for the next few weeks and talked about the classes.”

  I sit forward, chewing on my gum. “Well, I’ve been thinking about more ways we could promote business. I was thinking about doing a youth MMA style class. For kids like thirteen to say, eighteen. That’s pretty much what you did for the three of us. It kept us out of trouble and taught us control.”

  Sly looks over at me and then to Marco. “Brother, I’m not saying it’s a bad idea, but we already have so much going on with the other classes. Lox and I have families.”

  I put my hand up. “I’ve already thought of that. This class would be taught by myself, Gibbs and Liz.”

  Marco looks at me confused. “Liz?”

  I nod. “Yes. Liz could be a fighter. She knows the skill inside and out, and she would also be a great model for the females I’m hoping will sign up. We could teach it on Tuesdays and Thursdays, that way it doesn’t interfere with the other classes. Lox and Sly can do self-defense and we will still all rotate the kid’s Saturday class.” I shrug. “We’re training people and building a business here. We can’t expect that we are going to fight for forever and we shouldn’t want to.”

  Lox nods, looking around the room. “Sounds like a pretty solid idea to me. Have you ran it by Liz and Gibbs?”

  “Gibbs, yes. Liz, I’m going to talk to tonight but I think with the youth being involved, she’ll be for it.”

  Everyone looks to Marco. He shrugs. “Get some information together. Get an idea of how many people might be interested. Have the full commitment of the other teachers and we’ll do it. Also, speaking of Gibbs, we need to get that boy certified to teach. He’d be a great backup in the other classes as well. I’m proud of the work you boys have done with him. He’s done a lot of maturing in the past year.” He pats Sly on the back. “I have to say it makes me feel like a proud papa.” He stands up. “Now that we’ve got that stuff out of the way, I have a little girl to go play with in my office.”

  “You better not wake her up, Marco!” Sly yells as Marco’s going down the hall.

  Lox shakes his head. “You know he’s gonna wake her up and say it was an accident. The same way he tells us he forgets that Slick isn’t allowed caffeine at night.”

  I shake my head and laugh at them. “So you guys are cool with this? All the stuff I brought up?”

  Lox slaps me on the back. “Yeah, I mean I’m proud of you. You’ve been involved in all of this, but not the same as us. I was worried you didn’t want to be here anymore.�
��

  I shrug. “Nah, I’m just… Well, I’m…” Fuck it. “Sit down, guys, we need to talk.”

  Sly looks at me. “Is this where you tell us you’ve finally decided to come out of the closet or something? Because I’ll love you and support you in whatever.”

  I pop him in the back of the head. “Shut up and be serious. Look, I’ve had a lot on my mind for the past few months. Also, I know you guys have been wondering what I’ve been so secretive about lately.”

  Lox and Sly both nod. “Yeah, sort of. I mean Kara is so afraid you don’t want to live with us anymore.”

  “Sloan was worried you’d gotten some girl pregnant or that you were gambling,” Lox says jokingly.

  I take a deep breath, I have to do this. I have to. I can’t keep this secret anymore. “Sly, when we were about eight, do you remember mom going missing for about two months? It was one of the last times we stayed with Grandma before she died.”

  Sly nods and Lox speaks. “Yeah, I remember my mom helping your grandma with stuff. I mean my gran was still alive then, too, so the three of them juggled all of us.”

  Sly and I both nod in agreement. I fold my hands together, trying to figure out how I’ll tell them what I now know. “Well, I’ve been doing a lot of research.” I take another deep breath. “I had a girl come to me a few months ago and she started asking me questions. She’s eighteen and she told me she’s our sister. As it turns out, our mom went away to have another set of twins, only this time it was a boy and a girl.”

  Sly’s mouth is just hanging open. Lox reaches over to me. “Man, are you sure?”

  I sigh. “Why do you think I’m bringing this up now? I took them to get DNA tests done. They are our half siblings. Gia and Eli. Mom gave them up for adoption when they were born, so at least she had the sense to do that. They did end up in a nice home but when they were fourteen, the mom died from a brain aneurism and the dad turned into a drunk. In a class for school, they started researching their family trees and they got curious about their real parents. They found their real dad and he was in prison. He led them to Mom. Mom wouldn’t even address them, but she mentioned us. Her brother wanted to drop it. The girl came in here one day and I was the only one here. She started making her case and parts of it I could totally believe. So I started my own recon mission.”

  Sly holds up his hand. “Wait. Why did it take so long to get the DNA stuff back? You can get that in like a day or less now.”

  “At the time, they hadn’t turned eighteen yet. Their dad wouldn’t sign for them to get it done so we waited. They turned eighteen a couple of weeks ago.”

  Sly stands up. “Why did you keep this from me?”

  “Man, you’ve had a lot going on. When she first showed up, Kara was still pregnant then all hell broke loose. I didn’t want to stress you out if there was nothing to it,” I say, trying to calm him down.

  “So what now?” he asks, clearly irritated.

  “They would like to meet you. They’re both starting community college in the fall and managed to get scholarships and housing in the dorms. Gia is getting a softball scholarship, Eli is getting an academic scholarship. They’re both pretty great kids considering.”

  Sly looks at me hard. “Considering what? That they had two parents a hell of a lot longer than we did?”

  “Considering they grew up with two parents and had it all fall apart at once. We never had that so suck it up, Sly. Do you want to meet them?” I say, angered.

  “Fine. When?” he says, arms crossed like he always does when he’s sulking.

  “How about we do a cookout tomorrow night at our place? Come on, Sly. I never figured you’d act like this. I’m always the hard ass. That’s the reason I wanted no doubts before I talked to you. I knew it’d break your heart if it was all a lie or something,” I say as I walk over to him and put my arms on his shoulders. “You’re the one who helped me start to accept Liz and now I can honestly say she’s a very good friend.”

  He sighs and looks at the floor. “I know. It’s not really directed at them. It’s just I thought we were the only lives our mom screwed up. Turns out she didn’t stop at us.”

  I pull him in for a hug. “Dude, at least she had the sense to find someone for them. Even if they’ve had a few rough years, they still had a mom.” I sigh. “If it makes you feel better, she had her tubes tied so there aren’t any more after them. I asked her.”

  I pull out of our hug. “So mom knows you know and she never said a word?”

  I nod and roll my eyes. “Yeah. She knows I know and she’s pissed that I’m even talking to them.”

  Lox throws his arm around us. “Come on, Sly. This is awesome. Our family is weird and dysfunctional anyway, but it functions just fine for us. You’re the one who always says that. We have room for more people.”

  He finally nods and wipes a stray tear. “Yeah, we do, and we need to make sure they get the opportunities we didn’t. So yeah, we’ll cook out tomorrow, I’ll talk to Kara when I get home. “

  I slap him on the back. “Good. I’ll let them know.”

  Sly turns to the door. “I’m going home now to talk to her. I gotta grab the princess and I’ll be on my way.”

  Lox looks at me after he walks out of the room. “So you’re good, man?”

  I nod. “Yeah, I am, actually. It was really a shock to start with, I was really pissed, but I saw the look on Gia’s face. It looked so much like mine or Sly’s, I just couldn’t be pissed anymore. I realized that I couldn’t take it out on those kids.”

  Lox nods his head. “Good, man. Do you want help tomorrow or what’s your plan?”

  “Just show up. I think we’ll do something simple like burgers and dogs. I plan on inviting everyone, they might as well jump in the deep end with us.” I chuckle.

  Lox smiles. “All right. Well, I’ll let Sloan know and we’ll be over tomorrow.”

  I slap him on the shoulder. “Thanks, man.”

  CHAPTER 9

  CHELSEA

  How did I let Liz talk me into coming to this cookout? But here I am, riding with her to it. I have to be the dumbest, most idiotic woman on this planet.

  “So did he try to say anything else to you?” She’s referring to Pavel coming to the club the other night.

  “No, he’s been texting me like crazy though. I just keep ignoring them,” I say, staring out the window.

  The radio breaks in on our conversation.

  “An Okeechobee man was found dead in a local canal this morning. He’s been identified as Richard Markov, police are investigating this as it looks like there was foul play. We’ll keep you updated as there are breaks in this case.”

  My breath catches. Liz looks over at me. “What’s wrong?”

  “He was the manager at the dealership in Okeechobee. I’d just found evidence that he might be embezzling from the company. Now they say that he might have died from foul play?”

  She puts her hands up. “Wait, why would you think that?”

  “Look, I’m sure you picked up on the fact that Pavel’s Russian. Well, I always had suspicions that things weren’t exactly on the up and up there. Now, just as soon as I tell him that I think his manager is skimming, that same manager turns up dead.” I sigh. “It’s a little scary and concerning.”

  “You don’t know anything else that could worry him? Do you?” She says nervously.

  “No. I don’t think so.” I look back out the window. “It just makes me a little nervous. I keep turning him down, what if-.”

  “Oh, hell no. The boys will never let something happen to you. I’ll make sure of it,” she blurts out.

  I shake my head. “This is crazy. Let’s just go get through this cookout.” I let out an obnoxiously long breath. “Let’s just not talk about it.”

  She nods as we pull in a driveway. It’s a cute little ranch style house. I know that Huck lives here with Sly and his family. Kara must’ve been busy in this yard, it’s gorgeous.

  Liz taps on the door and w
alks on in. “Hey, guys, we’re here.”

  Kara comes running to the living room. “Hey! I’m so glad you guys could make it.” She jumps up and down. “Ooohhh, what did you bring?” she says, pointing to the tray in my hands.

  “I brought death by chocolate. I hope you don’t mind, I just hate coming to a cookout empty handed.” I sigh. “Liz invited me and I just, well, you guys weren’t the ones to invite me.”

  She places a hand on my forearm. “Honey, it’s okay. Everyone is welcome at our house, with the exception of the twins’ mom.” She laughs. “Trust me, you brought dessert, the boys will welcome you with open arms. Come on, everyone is out back.”

  Yeah, I know one that probably won’t.

  I try to make conversation as we walk through the house. “This is a really nice place. Your yard is so pretty.”

  “Oh, that’s all Huck. He’s our cook most of the time and our master gardener.” She laughs. “Now the inside was a total bachelor pad until I moved in and then the ‘Princess’ came along.” She shakes her head, actually using the air quotes. “Then the boys went into over drive. They baby-proofed the house when I was four months pregnant.” She laughs and pulls me into a hug. “How is your mom doing?”

  I give a half smile. “Well, the chemo is taking all of her energy, but she seems to be doing okay.”

  She nods softly. “I’m glad.” She looks like she wants to say more but doesn’t.

  As we walk out back on the patio, I see several people. She pulls us over close to the grill where a young guy and girl are standing close to Huck. She points to them. “This is Gia and Eli Moxen. They’re Sly and Huck’s siblings. They’re twins also.” She turns to them. “Guys, this is Elizabeth, or Liz, she’s Marco’s daughter. This is our friend Chelsea, she works at the hospital, she went to school with the boys and her dad was my hero.” She quickly wipes a tear from her eye.