Brawler's Baby: An MMA Mob Romance (Mob City Book 1)

by Holly Hart

  "Hey." He said, looking round the room with a bemused expression on his face. "What the hell did you do with my sparring partner? Where is everyone?"

  "Oh," I said, embarrassed. "About that – I think I scared them off."

  "You?" He laughed out loud. "All hundred pounds of you? I don't believe it – you must've done something to frighten them off!"

  I jerked my head toward the door, where my two bodyguards had adopted leaning poses, resting against the door frame, heads down and eyes locked on their phones. It was almost comical watching as their oversized thumbs did battle on the small black rectangular screens. I had to admit, they weren't exactly the most intimidating men my father could've picked, but it was who they represented that really mattered.

  "Okay, maybe it was them."

  Conor looked up, and seconds later the mischievous smile tickling the corners of his mouth was wiped away by a tidal wave of disappointment crossing his face. "Oh…"

  "Oh?"

  "I thought we might be… alone."

  I shook my head, and then looked down, noticing what looked like an insulin pump strapped to Conor's waist.

  "Uh, Conor?"

  "Yeah?"

  "Is that…" I said wordlessly, pointing at the archaic gray plastic device clipped to Conor's waist.

  He looked down and grinned. "A cassette player? Sure is."

  "Conor," I stammered, flabbergasted. "You're twenty-two years old. Don't you have, like, an iPod or a smartphone or something?"

  "Why the hell would I want one of those?" He smirked. "I don't want anyone texting me, or sending me one of those snap chat things –." He stopped, mid-sentence, and looked me up and down hungrily.

  "Except for you, that is…" He said suggestively.

  I ignored him, wary that my bodyguards could be watching. They weren't my father's best men, or I'd have seen them around the house before. The likelihood was they were just two warm bodies picked at random from one of the cafés down in the Russian quarter – spots where bar owners and mob under-bosses alike when recruiting when they needed a bouncer for the night, or a bit of muscle…

  Still, there was no need to arouse their suspicions.

  "Cut that out," I ordered.

  "Do they speak English?" Conor asked, pointing at my father's men.

  "You mean can we talk?" I grinned, speaking softly. "Quietly. I don't think they're the most intelligent men men my father could have sent."

  "How many does he have?" Conor asked.

  "Men?"

  "Yeah."

  "Oh, I dunno, a couple of hundred? It's hard to know really. There are probably more, but he doesn't order all of them around directly. Some of them are my uncle's men, others are controlled by my father's avtos."

  "Avtos?"

  "Sorry," I replied. "It's short for avtoritet. They’re kind of like…" I paused, searching for the right word. "Captains, I guess. They're responsible for fifty or sixty men and a section of the city. They report to my father, but get to keep some of the take."

  Conor scratched his beard thoughtfully. "Seems like a house of cards," he said. "What's stopping a couple of them from banding together and taking your dad on?"

  "Shhh," I hissed, glancing toward my bodyguards warily.

  "Oh, it's fine," Conor laughed. "Either those two deserve Oscars, or they have absolutely no idea what were talking about. My money's on the latter. Not that I have much left."

  "It's not your money I'm worried about," I sniped angrily under my breath. Or mine, for that matter. I just need to get Eamon out of here without dad noticing.

  Conor raised his hands apologetically. "Sorry, your city, your rules."

  I sighed, letting the tension drain out of my shoulders. "No, it's not your fault. I'm just –."

  "On edge?" Conor interrupted. "What's going on? You can tell me. Who am I going to tell…"

  Can I?

  "Nothing, honestly," I lied. "You were talking about why it doesn't all just fall apart," I continued, trying to steer the conversation back on to safer ground. "It's because of my father. He's a killer, plain and simple. He's got eyes and ears everywhere, and the second he thinks that someone's plotting against him…"

  Does dad already know my plan? Is he just waiting for the right time to close the trap around me?

  Conor finished my sentence for me. "They die."

  I nodded sadly. It was the dirty little secret that kept me up at night. Alexandria, officially anyway, had a completely unremarkable murder rate. If you looked at a list of American cities, it would fall right there in the boring middle. But I knew better – the statistics didn't tell the whole story.

  Not even close.

  I'd seen my father's captains spirited away in the night, never spoken of again after disobeying him, or even just slighting him accidentally. I'd read the stories in the Herald about dad's business rivals who went to work one morning, like they did every day, and were never heard from again.

  It didn't take a genius to notice the connection between the two. And that's what dad relied on – the fear, and the whispers, the sense that even in bed late at night with the curtains drawn and the door locked, even then you weren't alone.

  Was I going to be just another statistic, another obituary in the paper? Would I get a well-attended funeral where dad would get to play the grieving, loving father? Or else would my broken body just be wrapped in chains and dumped thirty miles offshore, to sleep with the fish until the end of time.

  "Maya?" Conor asked curiously. "You there?"

  "Yeah, sorry," I said, pulling myself back to the present. "I must have drifted off…"

  "Uh huh." He replied, not looking completely convinced by my explanation. "I was saying, what are we going to do about my sparring partner?"

  "Sparring partner?" I repeated back to him, vaguely remembering that he'd mentioned the term when I'd first walked into the gym.

  "Yeah," he said, with the same expression on his face that a long-suffering parent might unconsciously adopt when talking to a slightly dim-witted child. "You scared him off. I'm supposed to be practicing for this fight, aren't I?"

  I could tell from the way Conor's demeanor shifted as he mentioned the fight that he was still angry about what my father was planning on making him do. And even with that knowledge, I still managed to insert my foot so deeply into my mouth that I needed a tractor to get it out. "Well," I said dumbly. "Will missing a practice fight just for today be so bad? I mean –."

  "You mean," Conor repeated bitterly. "That I'm throwing the fight anyway, so why the hell do I need to train?"

  That was exactly what I'd meant.

  "No! I didn't mean it like that." I lied, aghast. I could tell just how much my callous dismissal of his training had hurt him.

  Conor punched the weight bench in frustration and sighed aggressively, letting his head hang back. "You did," he groaned. "It's not your fault. I'm just –," he paused. "I'm just pissed off about this whole thing. I'm going to throw away my career, and for what? To make your dad a few hundred grand?"

  "More than that," I replied. "He'll make millions. But yeah, that's about it."

  "Millions?" Conor said interestedly. There was another expression on his face, too that I couldn't decipher. "It'll be that big?"

  "You kidding? He's already promoting it all over town, and it's only been a couple of weeks. By the time this fight rolls around, the arena will be packed – and you've got the title fight. Trust me, he's going to make millions."

  "How, exactly? Conor asked curiously. "From the gambling, right?"

  "Yeah," I agreed. "Alcohol and merchandise sales as well, but you're right, it's mainly the gambling. How it's not been shut down by the gaming authority I have no idea – you should see how much cash goes through the counting room in that place on fight night." That wasn't exactly true – I had a very good idea. Dad had paid someone to turn a blind eye, and they were doing their job very well.

  Conor's eyes glinted. "Can I?"

  I glanc
ed nervously at my bodyguards, not liking the sound of where this conversation was going. "Can you what?"

  "See it," he said. "You can get me in the arena, right? We can say it's just so I can check the place out before the fight."

  "Why?" I asked nervously. "Why do you want to get in there?"

  "Why do you think?" He said. "We're going to rob the place."

  My stomach did three kinds of somersaults – and not the good ones, either. Everything I'd ever said about my father, about how he had eyes and ears everywhere, and about what he did to people he even suspected of trying to rip him off – Conor hadn't listened to any of it.

  And worse, he was actually trying to get on my father's radar. There was only one explanation – he was crazy.

  He's going to get himself killed.

  Before I had a second to respond, Conor jumped to his feet as though he'd had a brainwave. "Hey, Boris," he yelled. "Or whatever the fuck your name is. Yeah, you," he said, pointing at the guy on the right.

  "What you want?" My bodyguard grunted.

  "You're going to get in the ring with me," Conor grinned, as though it was the best idea he'd ever had. "We're going to have some fun, you and me."

  The bodyguard turned and stared at me pleadingly. I could tell the last thing he wanted to do was fight a guy the size of Conor. "I'm not sure this is a good idea," I said doubtfully.

  "What are you talking about?" Conor laughed. "I think it's a great idea – and besides, you owe me."

  "What are you talking about?" I shot back quickly. "How'd you figure that one?"

  Conor dropped his hands to his sides theatrically and looked around the room. "Oh," he spluttered with laughter, "I don't know. Maybe because you scared everyone else off?"

  "Is not good idea." My bodyguard said, backing away nervously. "Nobody said I had to fight." He looked at me, as though desperately hoping I would step in Conor's way – but I said nothing. It might not have been fair to the guy, who as far as I knew wasn't exactly a dyed in the wool gangster, but I couldn't have cared less.

  I was fed up of my two guardians following me around everywhere I went, and besides, I thought, maybe it'll make him think twice about exactly what kind of business he’s getting into by working for my father.

  Conor clapped the man on the shoulder. "Ah, don't be a girl, now. Don't worry, I won’t rough you up." He turned to face me. "Hey, Miss Antonov – you mind holding onto this?"

  My mind was still trying to process why exactly he was addressing me so formally when he tossed his Walkman at me. My hands flailed wildly in the air, and luckily the cord tangled around my left arm as I brought it haphazardly into my chest.

  "Thanks," he smirked. "I'm glad you didn't break it, it's an antique."

  It should be in a museum.

  Conor walked over to the empty boxing ring, his arm still slung over my bodyguard's thick shoulders. The man protested the entire way, casting worried glances at both me and his companion, who I noticed was being very careful not to get involved. I couldn't blame him – the last thing I'd ever want to do would be to climb into the ring with a man like Conor.

  A bed, on the other hand…

  "Here you go, Boris, put these on," Conor said, tossing the man pair of dark blue martial arts gloves.

  "Not called Boris," the man protested feebly. It didn't really sound like his heart was in it anymore, though. He looked like a man who knew his fate was inevitable, no matter what he said.

  "Sorry," Conor apologized, without the faintest hint of seriousness in his voice. He strode to the center of the ring, raised his gloves and said, "ready?"

  Boris – even I was calling him that now – walked much less enthusiastically to meet him and tapped his gloves against Conor's.

  "Don't worry," Conor said. "I'll go easy."

  My eyes were fixed on my lover’s torso – entranced by the crisscross of gashes, tattoos and the slightly discolored scar tissue of a body that had clearly experienced more than its fair share of fights. But more than anything, more than sympathy, more than worry, I was excited. I wanted to see him in action again. I had a taste for it.

  The contrast of styles was unmistakable. Boris was amateurish, at best. He was a strong man who clearly spent many hours lifting weights, but his undoing was that he matched that time and more in the cafés, restaurants and bars that lined the narrow streets of the Russian quarter.

  In short, he had a gut, and it didn't do much to help his technique. His shoulders were thick and powerful, but if Conor was a quick, streamlined Ferrari, Boris was a Lamborghini – but one from back when they still made tractors.

  I had no doubts about who would win this fight. It was a foregone conclusion. My only question was why. Why was Conor doing it? Was he trying to prove something to me, or to my father?

  If he was, I didn't know what it was.

  They circled each other like two predators. Conor was light on his feet, and stood on the balls of his feet, almost on the tips of his toes, ready to rock back or lunge forward at any time. If I'd shaded my eyes, I could have mistaken him for a dancer.

  A very violent dancer…

  There was no way I could make a mistake like that with Boris. As he turned, he dragged his rearmost leg in such a way that someone like me, with an untrained eye, could tell that if Conor attacked, Boris wouldn’t have a chance of dodging or dancing away.

  He seemed like the kind of man who tried to win his fights the old-fashioned way – ducking and rolling, and absorbing the punches until his opponent finally tired himself out.

  I couldn't see that happening with Conor. He was in far too good a shape for that, and the difference between the physical condition of the two men in the ring together was stark.

  I think Boris recognized that too, because he went on the offensive from the off.

  "Nice hit!" Conor said, after Boris tapped him lightly, at full stretch, on the side. The bruiser almost toppled over as he followed through with the punch, but Conor simply ducked away from the incoming fist. I watched with stunned admiration as I realized that Conor had let his opponent hit him… on purpose. He was playing with him, like a cat with a mouse.

  Conor danced around the ring, almost catlike in his movements, with a gentle grace and elegance that belied a man of his size.

  "That's right." He cheered as Boris raised his guard. "Keep it up!" It was almost as though Conor was Boris's coach, leading him through the motions and training him.

  But Conor was no teacher. The man I loved was a natural born predator, and he had a predator’s instincts.

  I covered my mouth as Conor let loose with a final flurry of punches that all landed in the same spot – Boris's right eyebrow. The first punch landed flush against his forehead and split the man's slug-like eyebrow with unyielding force. A crimson red fountain burst forth from Boris's skull, spattering the ring with blood, but Conor didn't stop until he'd landed the final two punches, pulverizing the right-hand side of Boris's face.

  He ducked away from the fountain of blood and swore. "Shit, Boris – sorry, buddy. I didn't think I was hitting you that hard…"

  Boris slumped to the floor, desperately trying to staunch the flow of blood from above his right eye lid, but failing as his fighting gloves slipped against the slick red liquid. Within seconds, his face looked like a scene from a low-budget horror movie.

  "I need to go hospital! He cried out. "I need to go hospital, now!"

  "Ah, don't be a girl about it," Conor said. "This kind of thing happens all the time. They've got bandages downstairs, go get your buddy to patch you up."

  "No," Boris insisted, injecting a hint of panic into his voice. "I need to go to the hospital, now. He will take me!"

  He pointed to his companion with a bloodsoaked hand, and my eyes followed in the direction of his outstretched finger and came to rest on my other bodyguard's face. He looked terrified, and was nodding along dumbly with every word, completely forgetting that he was only here in the first place to guard me.

&nb
sp; Definitely not professionals…

  Conor turned at me and winked surreptitiously. "Okay then," he said in a faux-doubtful tone of voice. "I guess it is bleeding pretty hard now. Maybe you should go after all."

  "Yes, yes," Boris agreed, nodding vigorously and looking desperate to be absolutely anywhere in the world other than in the same room as Conor Reagan.

  I turned to Boris's companion. "Go on then, take him."

  "You must come with us, Miss Antonov." The other bodyguard insisted. "Your father –."

  "Like hell I will," I said, finally understanding why Conor had winked at me. "I'll stay here with Conor and call for another couple of men to come pick me up."

  The man looked torn. I knew he would have been instructed never to leave me alone – but I also knew that he was low enough in my father's organization to not just be terrified of dad, but also to still actually think that I might have some kind of power.

  I decided to nudge him along. "Trust me," I said. "I'll be safe here. Conor won't let anyone hurt me, will you?"

  "Safe with me," Conor replied, playing along. "Go on, get your friend to the hospital."

  It was all the encouragement either of them needed, and they left the room in a panicked rush, casting terrified looks over their shoulders like they were worries Conor might change his mind and drag them back in.

  "Was that your plan all along?" I asked.

  "What plan?" Conor replied innocently.

  "To get me alone. Couldn't you have done it without beating the poor guy up?"

  "How could you think something like that?" Conor smirked. "But now I come to think about it, I guess we are alone. Fancy that…"Conor

  I didn't want to play games anymore. I knew what I wanted – Maya back in my life. I was going to get it, whatever it took. And if I had to beat up some half wit Russian punk just to spend a little bit of time with her, then so be it.

  I'd have felt guilty for splitting the guy's eyebrow open, but Boris, or whoever the hell he actually was made his choice the moment he threw his hat in Mikhail Antonov's ring.