by Ava Ashley
“Where do you think you’re goin’?” the giant oaf guarding the inside of the front door grunts.
“I have a fight today. I’m going on a training run,” I say. “I’m not running away. Come with for all I care.”
The burly oaf scratches first his head and then his balls. Then, as though he had just thought of it himself, he says, “You know what? I’m gonna come with you. And don’t think I’m not going to love every minute of blowing your head off if you try to make a run for it.” He grins sadistically and pats his pistol holster.
“I’m not running away,” I repeat. “I’m a man. I fight my battles.”
The oaf picks his motorcycle helmet up off of the floor next to him and snaps it on before opening the door. We walk out, and he hops on a Harley by the door, nods at a few other overly juiced guards just hanging out in front of the house, and revs his engine a few times. Then I start running to the park and he follows behind.
Maybe if he trained more and shot up less, he could keep up. ’Roids are for wusses who don’t want to work hard and can’t achieve real strength on their own. Real men fight for what they want and they earn it through their own personal merit.
I speed up. I might as well make the thug’s bike’s engine work a little. I run five minute miles all the way to the park, so when I get there, my shirt is soaked through and I am super pumped up. I see Vlad stretching over by the benches, so I jog over while the Santos oaf parks his bike.
“Cooper, my man,” Vlad greets, thumping me on the shoulder. “I could ask how you get yourself into these kinds of messes, but I’m not in the mood for a dumbass answer or some sappy love shit. We’re in pre-fight mode now and the first thing I am going to need you to do is forget all about all that other drama. Forget about Flint and Savannah and getting shot if things don’t go your way. You’re in the zone now, man.” Vlad has gone full coach mode and it is just what I need. “I need you to visualize the Maneater—”
“I’ve never seen the guy,” I interrupt.
“Eh, he’s a guy with a face,” Vlad groans. “Never mind, never mind—that’s what these new smartphones are for, isn’t it?” He pulls his phone out of his pocket, does a quick google search, and holds the phone up for me to see. I squint at the screen. The Maneater is one of those really big guys whose shoulder muscles pop up over the side of their tank top straps like some cartoon villain. He either fell asleep in a tanning bed or, more likely, hung out on the streets so much that his skin baked into a permanent, overdone salmon color and hardened leather texture. His face has been messed up so many times that it healed back like a two-year-old’s play dough art piece. There isn’t anything left on his face that isn’t crooked, and his nose must have broken and healed back wrong at least three or four times, judging by the many different ways that it zigs and zags. He has gray, almost white, irises, like a blind guy and his upper lip is curled into a snarl in the photo. His hair is buzzed, but he has a messy, red beard of curly, wiry hair. There is a wide, jagged scar through his left eyebrow that kept the hair from healing back, so it looks like he has three eyebrows.
“Nice-looking guy,” I joke.
Vlad gives me a hard look. “You’ll be looking worse than him if we don’t pull this off this afternoon. So we will.”
I nod.
“Okay, visualize the Maneater,” Vlad continues. “Now visualize yourself killing him. I mean killing him. You can’t just visualize a victory, like we normally do, because that’s not going to work with his kind of fighter. It’s all or nothing. He isn’t going to wave a white flag and surrender ’cause he has a boo-boo. It’s either you or him and we are going to make sure that it’s him. Unless he’s unconscious and not recovering, he’s not going to let you leave that ring unless you’re in a fucking body bag.”
I said I would do anything for Savannah. If that means I have to kill a man, I will.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Savannah
The fight is happening back in the stark warehouse where we met with Flint and Salvador yesterday. When I woke up this morning, Cooper was already off to training, his side of the bed cold. He left a note, scrawled on the backside of a small, blue note paper from my high school reminders notepad, on the pillow.
‘I will see you after the fight. I am looking forward to my victory kiss.’
It’s intentional. He didn’t want a goodbye or a ‘what if.’ He wanted to leave for his pre-match prep just like this was any other fight, just as if the very real danger of him not making it to the end of the fight wasn’t a real thing. I don’t know how to feel. On the one hand, I would want to say goodbye if I was going to lose him. But I can’t imagine any way that I would rather say it than last night. Would I want our last memory to be a tearful one? No. But, if I am honest with myself, there really is no way of saying goodbye that would make it okay. So, in a way, I am grateful for the way that he handled it. I could not bear to say goodbye to Cooper. Not now and not ever. I fold the note up and tuck it into the left cup of my bra, right over my heart. I do not really know why I do it, because I am not a very superstitious person, but somehow I hope it brings him good luck anyway. Or hopefully it will bring me good luck, to bring my love back to me, whole and victorious.
They had transformed the warehouse from a bland, empty industrial space into a glorious coliseum overnight, ancient Roman style. Black market money is no joke and you can get anyone to do anything for you if you come knocking at their business’s door with a group of muscle-bound motorcycle club thugs to help convince them that they do actually want to be helpful, after all. Some of the best carpenters in town have been working since yesterday afternoon, through the night, to build the ring in the middle of the warehouse and put up bleachers all around it. There is even an elevated viewing box for Flint and Salvador. There were posters promoting the fight up all around the local bike stores, bars, and dives by yesterday evening and all the publicity sure paid off. The arena is packed, with even more hopeful viewers waiting outside for the chance to get in if someone leaves early or the bouncers decide to screw the logical capacity restraints and oversell.
True to form, my dad has turned this into a big money-maker. He isn’t the king of the Santoses for nothing. He can even turn a nice dime on the public beating, and potential murder, of the love of my life.
No! I have to not think of it like that. I can’t let myself think of this as some sort of losing battle. Sure, I see the fearsome face of the Maneater glowering down at me from the posters that are hanging on every wall, whichever way I turn, but I must not allow myself to think that Cooper may not win this fight.
Cooper needs my support and confidence now. I owe Cooper my trust, and that includes my trust in his ability to win this fight. For us.
One of my dad’s right-hand men steps into the ring. He’s somewhere in his fifties, with a beer paunch to offset his huge biceps, but apparently he was quite the fighter back when he was in his prime. I’m not surprised to see him announcing the fight. Nonetheless, I hate every inch of him, from the top of his balding head to the bottom of his dusty motorcycle boots, for enjoying the spectacle so much. He is clearly not at all upset by the idea of my lover dying in the ring today.
“Welcome, my friends!” he booms into the microphone. The crowd roars in response. My throat feels like it is closing up and my palms become clammy and cold where they grasp the hard metal of the bleacher seat. “Are you reeeeaaaaady?”
The crowd goes wild and the announcer pumps with his hands, signaling them to bring the volume up even further.
“Are you ready to see Cooper ‘Veni Vidi Vici’ Quin fight for the chance to make it to tomorrow alive?” More roars erupt from the bloodthirsty crowd and I hate every single one of them. How can they not care that Cooper is a real person, with other real people who care about him? How can they watch his persecution as sport? “Are you ready to see Cooper ‘Veni Vidi Vici’ Quin die a gory death TODAY? Are you ready to see his blood smeared across THIS VERY ring? Let me hear
some noise?” The announcer pumps his hands in the air again and the crowd gets even louder. There are a few ‘boos’ from Cooper fans, but the overwhelming majority of the noise is cheer. It’s a stacked crowd, with Sid “Maneater” Johnson pulling a distinct home-court advantage, and most of the fans here aren’t rooting for Cooper to make it. All the Santos motorcycle club members, and all of their friends and significant others, are rooting for their gang brother, the Maneater. And even among those who have no reason to root for the Maneater over Cooper, they are just extra bloodthirsty or eager to see the Maneater take a bite out of a famous fighter, so they are all for Cooper losing.
I will just have to cheer all the louder, like I have never cheered before.
“That’s what I want to hear! Let’s see some BLOOD!” The announcer cheers, pumping his fist victoriously. He is prancing and preening and feeding the crowd the excitement of watching a live slaughter, as though Cooper had already lost. I seethe with fury. “That’s enough, folks—let’s get this show on the road! Welcome today’s clear crowd favorite, SID ‘MANEATER’ JOHNSON!” The announcer sweeps his muscle-bound arm to the right, where the Maneater approaches the ring.
The Maneater’s hood is already down when he jumps into the ring, cape tied haphazardly around his freakishly oversized shoulders. This man makes Arnold Schwarzenegger look like he needs to bulk up a bit. His monstrously disfigured face matches his monstrously enormous body, but the most terrifying, off-putting thing about his appearance is his expression. His snarl doesn’t look the least bit affected, but as though he is honestly some gore-hungry psychopath who would rather do nothing more than slaughter an innocent man. My lover. The Maneater bares his teeth like a rabid Rottweiler and tears at the air, as though he were tearing apart an imaginary cut of raw steak with his canines. My blood runs cold.
“Give it up for the Maneater, ladies and gents,” the announcer hollers. He is loud enough without his microphone, but the added volume from it makes his voice really boom. I can feel the vibrations through my seat. When he is satisfied that the cheering has gone on long enough, he sweeps his arm to the left. “And now, give it up for today’s challenger, Cooper ‘Veni Vidi Vici’ Quin! The ladies love him, guys want to be him—he’s the king of his league, but we’re on a different level in here, AREN’T WE?”
Cooper approaches the ring, wearing a black silk cape with his silver-edged hood pulled down low over his face. He leaps gracefully into the ring and lands with his feet just over shoulder-width apart, knees slightly bent, and arms up in the air. Like a winner. Standing up there, he doesn’t look worried in the slightest. He is shirtless, and when he turns around, I see the now-familiar tattoo etched boldly over his shoulder blade, a promising reminder of the bond we share and the hope that we have. We can do this, he can do this. The cheers for Cooper are largely female, as is to be expected, but my cheer is by far the loudest. Cooper turns back around to face me and looks straight at me. He blows me a kiss and I blow him one back, which he catches and pulls to his heart. The movement makes his biceps flex even more, causing his ink sleeves to dance, and the female cheers pick up in octave a bit.
“Veni! Vidi! Vici!” I cheer, cupping my hands around my mouth.
“I am going to get out of here,” says the announcer, walking over to the edge of the ring. “I know what you guys want just as much as I do and it isn’t to hear me talk some more. Let’s watch someone get HURT!” The screams of the crowd rise in volume as Cooper and the Maneater face each other. The two edge around the ring, fists up and knees bent in fighting stance. The crowd goes quiet as the tension picks up. Who will throw the first punch? Who will gain the upper hand? What is going to happen next?
My heart feels like it is going to pound straight out of my chest.
With a roar, the Maneater launches himself at Cooper. Cooper deflects, twisting a burly arm behind the Maneater’s back and spinning him around.
“Go, baby!” I cheer, so loudly that my voice cracks at the end. But instead of twisting in pain, the Maneater’s face contorts into a guise of sheer fury. He seems offended, not hurt, by Cooper’s counterattack, and what should have slowed him down from pain seems to be nothing more than a bother. With the frightening roar of an enraged wild beast, the Maneater unfurls his arm with such force that he flings Cooper over his head and slams him onto the floor of the ring with a sickening thud. There’s a breathless moment when Cooper hits the ground and I wonder if he’s badly hurt, but Cooper jumps to his feet almost as soon as he is down, his fighter training keeping him from staying down and giving the Maneater more immediate opportunity to hurt him. As he comes up, he catches the Maneater under the chin with a mean upper hook that slams the Maneater’s teeth into his bottom lip. Blood dripping down his chin, the Maneater spins around to Cooper with another ground-shaking roar.
I can’t watch, I am too terrified. But I also cannot look away.
The Maneater throws a cross and Cooper blocks it, but the impact of the blocked cross on Cooper’s arm is still strong enough that I hear the sickening thud of the Maneater’s blow on Cooper’s flesh and wince in empathetic pain. Cooper throws a jab and the Maneater is too slow to block it. Cooper gets him right in the center of the abdomen and you can see that it is the kind of jab that really hurts. I wait with bated breath for just a moment, hoping against hope that it would have gotten him in the gut or something. But, just as before, the Maneater seems to be fueled by the pain instead of allowing it to slow him down. He lets out the most terrifyingly gruesome roar and springs back into fighting stance like a wind-up toy. How can you possibly defeat an opponent who only seems to get stronger with every attack you manage to get in?
Cooper is my everything. He is my sun, my stars, the light of my life. Without him, every moment of the rest of my life would be spent bemoaning the fact that I am here alone to suffer a miserable existence without my love. I have not been able to open up with someone the way that I could with Cooper since the death of my mother and sister. I had closed myself off from emotion for the longest time, for years and years, and I didn’t think that I could ever be open to letting someone in again. But somehow, in the most unlikely of all circumstances, Cooper managed to not only break down my defenses and emotional barriers, but become more important to me than anything else in the world.
And now he is up in that ring, essentially being fed to the wolves in front of hundreds of people, all for me. If anything happens to him, it is my fault. If he dies in the ring today, all of my greatest fears will have been realized. I didn’t want to let anyone get close to me for the fear of what that could do to them. I was afraid that if someone got close to me, they would get hurt and it would be all my fault. And it would not be worth it. But with Cooper, I know that he thinks even dying for me is worth it. I know that even if he knew that he would die in the ring today, he would still do it all over again. Knowing that makes the possibility of losing him hurt all the more, because that kind of love and loyalty is rare. Most people never find that kind of love, not in their entire lives, but I have found it. And now I might lose it.
The Maneater catches Cooper in a half-bind and starts just pounding on him, like he is a human punching bag. The crowd is eating it up. “MANEATER! MAN-EATER! KILL HIM!”
I think I am going to be sick.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Cooper
I ignore the pain searing through my shoulder and twist with all my force, freeing myself from the half-bind and knocking the Maneater in the back of the head with my balled fist on the way up. There is an ‘oof’ of pain, but I know that the punch didn’t do much. At this point of the match, it is concuss him or nothing and since he is not spinning, the blow didn’t rattle his brain enough to be worth shit.
The Maneater is, hands down, the best fighter that I have ever been up against in my life. We are so closely matched that, in any other situation, I would say it is a toss-up as far as which one of us will win. Sure, I have made him bleed and he will probably not be wanting to
get out of bed tomorrow morning, but I am feeling pretty beat-up, too. We have been at it for twenty minutes and, at this point, both of us are staggering. I sock him in the gut. He slugs me in the jaw. I deliver a swift roundhouse kick to the back of his knees and he wraps his arms around me as he goes down, slamming me under him on the ground. We both stagger to our feet, bloody and disoriented.
I am not one for false humility, so I mean it when I say that either one of us could win in any other situation.
But in this situation, where my losing would mean abandoning Savannah, there is no question. I am going to win. I have to. The thought gives me new steam and I slug him hard, pairing it with a hard knee in the stomach in quick succession. I hear the crowd picking up in volume a little, but the only voice that matters to me at all is Savannah’s. And, just as it has been for all of the fight so far, her voice rises above the cheers of the crowd at a volume I would have thought impossible before today.
I am going to win this for my love.
The Maneater retaliates, getting me hard in the eye socket. I can feel the blood welling up behind my eyeball and my vision goes blurry. After that point, I can’t even keep track of the moves. The fuzziness in my head and ringing in my ears suggests a concussion, but rattling my brain isn’t my concern at the moment. My concern is staying alive.
My body goes on autopilot, years of Navy SEAL and mixed martial arts fighting experience combining to keep me blocking and counterattacking even when I am too hurt to focus on strategy anymore. My body fights on its own and whenever that isn’t enough, the push from Savannah’s voice echoing in the fuzzy recesses of my mind drives me forward to carry out the next move. My love is counting on me. I am not going to let her down, no matter what.
But then the Maneater has his meaty paws around my neck and starts to shake. The drop in my oxygen levels shocks me back into clarity and I realize that this is it. This is the moment of all or nothing and, for Savannah, the answer has to be all. I have let a comrade down before, but I will not let my love down now. With everything left in me, and then some extra oomph from who knows where, I go full he-man on the Maneater. I elbow his arms apart, prying them off of my neck. I fish hook him, hard, in the mouth and use it to spin him around a hundred and eighty degrees. Then I pile-drive him into the ground and he’s lying there, two hundred fifty pounds of steroids and muscle, as I am pounding him, over and over and over, in the back of the head.
