Royal Stripper

by Sienna Valentine

  “Hey, Killer,” Vic said, “before you go out there, there’s somethin’ we should talk about.”

  I frowned. “What’s that?” This wasn’t about the payout, was it? Or was Vic about to ‘fess up to pitting me against a way bigger and heavier fighter?

  “It’s about your girl and her friend. You know who he is, right? The guy she brought the other night?”

  “Some guy named Thom,” I answered. “Look, Vic, if you’re about to tell me they’re getting cozy, you should know Thom’s not exactly batting for her team—”

  “He’s a reporter, Killer,” Vic said soberly. I’d never seen him look so serious in all my life. “Some sports guy from The Spill. Your girl is bringin’ a fuckin’ reporter to our very illegal fights. Did you know about this?”

  I hesitated. No, I hadn’t known. Parker had never mentioned it. Maybe it wasn’t worth mentioning. Maybe they had some kind of deal where Thom wasn’t allowed to use anything he saw here for work purposes.

  Do you really believe that? I asked myself. My stomach clenched. I sure as hell wanted to.

  “I caught him snoopin’ around last time he was here,” Vic said. “Talkin’ to the fighters. I think he was tryin’ to get a beat on this place, on our operation. I think he’s tryin’ to shut us down.”

  “Parker wouldn’t let that happen,” I said quickly, but damn if it didn’t sound like I was trying to convince myself. The truth was, I didn’t know her well enough to say. I was taking this all at face value, taking Parker at her word. And I had no way of knowing if that was even a good decision.

  “She wouldn’t, huh?” Vic asked, narrowing his beady eyes at me. He shook his head. “Guess that means you don’t know that she’s a reporter, too.”

  I snorted. “What? You’re crazy. She’s not…”

  Oh, fuck. It all made sense now. She’d said she was a writer. She’d even joked about getting to know me better so she could put me in one of her stories. This whole time, I’d just assumed she was a novelist. But Parker Jones was a fucking journalist, and I was her inside scoop.

  “Holy shit,” I muttered. “She is, isn’t she?”

  Vic nodded, looking a little more sympathetic now. “I’m sorry to be the one to tell you, Killer. It should’ve been her. But I thought you needed to know, especially ‘cause if they keep diggin’, you’ll be out of a job.”

  “Are you fucking threatening me, Vic?” I hissed, balling my taped-up hands into fists. “Really? Now?”

  “Hey, hey, hey!” Vic said, holding up his hands and taking a step back. “That’s no threat, Killer. Them’s just the facts. If we get shut down, I’m probably goin’ to jail, or at least crossin’ state lines to avoid that mess. I won’t be able to help you anymore. And hell, you could get arrested, too.”

  I pinched the bridge of my nose. It was all coming together now. They were going to ruin me. Parker and her fucking douche-faced friend were going to goddamn ruin me. And I’d opened the door and let them waltz right in, let them plant the ticking time bomb that would soon explode and take me, and everything I’d worked for, down in flames with it.

  You’re such a fucking moron. You knew this was too good to be true.

  Parker was just using me. Using me like the Marines had. Like my druggie friends before them. Good old Kellan, the guy we can depend on to shoulder the burden. The guy we call to get things done. The guy we leave behind once he’s no longer of any use to us.

  To her, I was just a story. A paycheck. A rung on the ladder of her career aspirations. She was willing to step on me to get what she wanted, and she didn’t even have any qualms about sleeping with me to soften the blow. I didn’t need any pity-fucks from some chick who’d sold her soul, and I sure as hell didn’t need her hanging around so she could ruin my life.

  “Fuck this,” I growled, flinging open the door and storming the ring.

  I didn’t even wait for Vic to come get my robe. I tossed it at Jasmine, letting her make herself useful for a fucking change. She beamed at me as I stalked by, but I didn’t return her hopeful smile. When her face fell, I almost felt good about it. She needed a reality check. Parker or no, I was off the menu.

  Vlad was on the other side of the mat, some big Russian dude who looked like he could’ve been a Bond villain. He had a deep scar over his left eye, extending all the way from above his blond brow to below his cheekbone. Just like The Herminator before him, I could tell Vlad wasn’t in my weight class. I had no idea what the hell Vic was trying to pull with this shit—maybe he was trying to drum up some interest from the crowd?—but in my experience, the bigger they were, the harder they’d fall.

  I didn’t give a rat’s ass how big or mean he was. He was going down.

  I didn’t have fucking time for this.

  We went through the pre-fight ritual all civil and silent, but as soon as that bell rang, I was on him. Dude was slow and a powerhouse just like Herman Gomez had been, only Vlad was kind of clunky, too. He didn’t recover from a blow with the same kind of speed The Herminator had.

  All these fucking stupid names. All these assholes.

  Vlad was still recovering from a blow to his solar-plexus when I swept his feet out from under him and got him on the ground. I didn’t waste any time bashing his stupid fucking face in. I was out for blood today, and knowing that Parker was here didn’t exactly make me feel merciful.

  He struggled at first, put up a good fight, but he was too slow and bulky to stop me, and I was too determined to make this end. I hit him and hit him and hit him again until the ref came over and tried to pull me away. And then I kept hitting him, until suddenly Vic was on one side of me and the ref was on the other, and security was behind me pulling me off The Impaler, whose face had become unrecognizable.

  “Twenty-three seconds,” Vic breathed in my ear. “Twenty-three fucking seconds. Are you kiddin’ me, Killer? Holy shit! Do you know how much money we just won?”

  I flung him off me and stared into the crowd. They were going nuts, absolutely wild, screaming for me with their hands in the air as security dragged Vlad’s limp body off the mat. I was covered in his blood, my face spattered with it, a vermilion veil that dripped off of me like sweat. I felt like a fucking monster, like the weapon everyone always told me I was.

  And when I locked eyes with Parker, still standing out like a sore thumb amongst all the other patrons, I saw that she was proud of me. Proud of the animal I’d shown her I could be. But like everyone else, that pride soon turned to fear when she realized she was next on my shit list.

  I thought you were different. I thought you’d be the one woman in all the world who’d never look at me that way. I guess I was wrong.

  No shit, I reminded myself. How the hell could you be right about her when you never really knew her at all?

  Chapter 12

  Parker

  For the second time, I was in the winner’s room with Kellan, and he was pissed at me.

  He was pacing the room like a tiger in a cage, muscles tight and teeth clenched, snarling at me in a tone that was just barely intelligible. Vic, his manager, had told him who Thom and I were. Who we worked for. What we did for a living. All the things I’d been planning on telling Kellan myself tonight, face-to-face. I thought he deserved that, rather than a phone call.

  I hadn’t been able to get a word in edgewise since we’d made it to the room, otherwise he’d have known all that already. Right now, I was just enduring the shit he threw my way. After all, it wasn’t like I didn’t deserve it.

  “You fucking lied to me, Parker,” he said, stopping at last. He stared at me, blood still sprayed across his face, turning the color of rust. “Right from the start. You fucking lied to me. What the fuck?”

  “I didn’t lie to you at the bar,” I countered, but it was a shitty cop-out, and I knew it before the words even left my mouth. “I told you I was a writer. I just didn’t tell you who for. Besides, you weren’t exactly forthcoming with the details of your profession. I had to hunt you down!�
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  “And for what?” Kellan raged. “You made me think it was because you saw something in me, something you liked, maybe even could love someday. You fucking came home with me, Parker, and slept in my fucking bed, just so you could figure me out for some fucking story that’s gonna ruin my life, if it ever gets out! Did you even think about that when you were sitting on my couch, drinking my beer? Huh?” He drilled his finger into the side of his head, getting in my face. “Did you think about that when you were sucking my cock?”

  I took a step back and held up my hands. “I know you’re pissed, Kellan. And I know you have every right to be. But let’s not say things we’ll regret.” Honestly, he was starting to piss me off.

  “Oh, right, I forgot: I’m supposed to respect you, even though you lied right to my fucking face! Is that how this works, Parker? You’re right, I’m wrong, ‘cause you’ve got the ‘greater good’ in mind?” He sneered. “Fuck you, and fuck the high horse you rode in on!”

  “Kellan, if you’d just shut the hell up, I can explain!” I hissed, my frustration starting to get the better of me. He wasn’t even giving me the chance to tell him what Thom and I had found, or how I planned to get him the help he needed while taking Vic and his underground fighting scam down. For good, this time, if I had anything to say about it. “Yes, I’m a reporter, and yes, I’m writing a story about this—and you—but it’s not because I want to ruin your life. In fact, if everything goes according to plan, I’m hoping I can make your life better.”

  “Better for who, Parker?” he asked. “For me? Or for you?”

  I stared at him. “What are you talking about?”

  “Oh, come on. You’re not stupid, and neither am I. The whole thing looks great on your résumé, doesn’t it? And hey, if you get this thing shut down, you won’t have to live through the embarrassment of telling your friends you’re dating an underground MMA fighter.”

  “Embarrassment?” I blinked at Kellan, genuinely hurt. “I never thought of you as an embarrassment, Kellan. Never. Not once.”

  He snorted and turned away from me, hands on his hips. “Yeah, well, stick around, sweetheart. ‘Cause you will. Just like everyone else.”

  “Kellan…” I began, but he shook his head and cut me off.

  “You don’t think things through, do you? That’s the problem with you do-gooders. You go around looking for charity cases whose lives you think you can ‘make better’ by making them just like yours. You always think you know what’s best for everyone. Well, you don’t know shit. You don’t know how this is all gonna go down, or if I’ll end up in jail when it does. The way I see it, you’re trying to shut down the only gig I can get where I actually make some money. You’d rather see me out on the streets than doing something that’s against the law.” He folded his arms across his chest, obscuring most of his tattoo. “When it comes to making a living, though, the law’s never helped me.”

  “That’s not it at all,” I said softly. “Look, just hear me out. I’m working on pressuring this senator. Senator MacFarlane. You remember those guys in the suits? One of them was him. He was the reason I was at The Sly Fox that day. I was trying to corner him, trying to make him support this bill that’ll give preference to veterans seeking jobs. That story, combined with this one, will light the flame under his ass that I need to make this happen. For you, Kellan. For us.”

  “Yeah?” Kellan said. “And when will that bill go into effect, Parker? This year? Next? Five years from now, after its soul has been sucked out by a bunch of politicians who wanna make sure their campaign contributors get a piece of the pie? What am I supposed to do until then, huh?”

  I realized I didn’t have a good answer for him. Maybe he was right. Maybe I hadn’t thought this all the way through.

  “You deserve better, Kellan,” I told him. It wasn’t an explanation, but it was still true. “I just want to make sure you get it.”

  He looked away, like he couldn’t even stand the sight of me. “That doesn’t mean much of anything when this is the only thing I know how to do.”

  “I can help you,” I said. “Kellan, we can get through this. I know I lied to you before, but trust me when I say that I’ll make this right. I’ll do whatever it takes.”

  “It won’t be enough!” he yelled, throwing up his hands. “Parker, this is my fucking livelihood! This is all I have! You’re being unrealistic. Stop looking at the world with these rose-tinted glasses you have on and for once see it for the way it really is. I’m living hand-to-mouth. So are the rest of these guys. You are literally going to put us on the fucking streets again, if not in a jail cell!”

  “You can’t keep living like this, Kellan. None of you can. It’s not sustainable. This job, it’s not what you think it is—”

  I shrieked as Kellan drove his fist just inches from my head and into the wall behind me. My heart leapt into my throat and I stared at him, wide-eyed, as he brought his face close to my own. I could actually feel the rage radiating off of him in waves, piercing my heart and soul. I’d never been on the receiving end of his fury before. It shook me to my very core.

  “Don’t tell me what I can and can’t do,” he said softly. “And don’t you dare act like you know the first fucking thing about my job, or the world I live in. Or me.”

  I couldn’t form a reply. My whole body was trembling and my throat wouldn’t unclench. After a few moments of silence, Kellan’s expression sharpened, like he was coming out of some kind of fog. He looked at his hand buried in the drywall, then at my face. He pulled away.

  “See, Parker?” he whispered, drawing his hand back. He’d ripped through the tape and torn open his knuckles again. He was covered in blood, only this time, it was his own. He held it up for me to see. “I’m dangerous. And you shouldn’t be around me. You’re just gonna get hurt.”

  “Kellan,” I finally managed to say, but he was already at the door, flinging it open.

  “Go the fuck away,” he said over his shoulder. “And don’t you ever think about coming back.”

  And then he was gone. Just like that. Kellan Jarvis had walked out of my life, and something told me that unless I could show him that he was wrong about me—and himself—he was gone for good.

  Chapter 13

  Kellan

  I was pissed. Royally pissed. And when I was pissed, there was only one thing that ever helped: pounding my fist into something I could smash.

  Thankfully, Vic had access to a makeshift training room that me and the other guys used from time to time. It was meant to keep us sharp, but usually, it was my very own anger management session. It had kept me from going crazy and getting into some real deep shit more than once.

  I couldn’t believe the bullshit that had come to pass in the past few days, how my whole life had gotten turned upside-down because of Parker fucking Jones. Vic had warned me she was trouble. He’d said things were changing too fast, and it was gonna be a problem. But did I listen to him? No. I thought I knew myself well enough that I wouldn’t fall victim to exactly the kind of ploy Parker had tried to trap me with. Apparently, I knew nothing at all.

  How much of it was a lie? I wondered, torturing myself as I beat the shit out of a dusty old punching bag hanging in the corner of the room. The things I felt with her. The things I thought she felt with me. Was that all bullshit, too?

  For all I knew, it was. Parker had been hiding shit from me from day one. Maybe I hadn’t been upfront with her about everything in my life, but at least I had an excuse. What I was doing was illegal, and getting her involved could have gotten her hurt. Shit, I’d spent so much time and effort trying to protect her, and it turned out I should’ve been protecting myself all along. Now that was irony.

  Keep your hands up, I reminded myself. Nobody’s gonna protect you but you. That was the real truth, right there. Inconvenient? Sure. Hurtful? Hell yeah. But the truth often was. That was why nobody liked hearing it, why people went to such incredible lengths to cover it up with a heap of lies. If Parker
had told me she was a reporter from day one, I never would have told her about what I did for a living, never would have let her into my heart, my home, my history. And she knew it, too, which was why she’d lied to me about it. She knew she was doing something wrong from the start.

  Okay, so she had good intentions. Fine. But wasn’t that what the road to Hell was paved with? That was what I was going through now, because of her—Hell.

  I heard the training room door shut and looked up briefly from the bag I was terrorizing. It was Vic, headed toward me with a big envelope. That must be my winnings from last night. I pulled the hood off my head and ran a hand through my sweaty hair, giving him a curt nod of greeting.

  “Hey there, Killer. What’s up?”

  “What’s it look like, Vic?” I asked. I didn’t mean to be rude, but fuck, what did he think was going on after that bombshell he’d dropped on me the night before?