Alpha Fighter

by Ava Ashley

  That just makes me want him even more. And so I do the only logical thing that I can do.

  I set about doing all that I can to move out of the apartment, and get far, far away from Cooper, as soon as possible. Finding a second job that would accommodate my job at the tattoo parlor, with its variable shift end times, proves impossible. I don't give up, though, since I know that this place was an absolute steal and I can't afford another place, or to move back into motels, unless I make more money. Luckily, Tamryn talks a lot and I have an ear for business.

  The parlor is almost empty one evening, except for a last client getting some body work in the back room, and I'm washing tools while Tamryn is going through the appointment book.

  By which I really mean, spinning around in her wheeled office chair and gossiping.

  "Karma's a bitch," she starts.

  "Oh?" I say.

  "Uh huh," she nods, vindictively. "My cuz, Julie, is such a little slut. Do you know what that skank did to me?"

  Of course not. "No, but I would love to hear all about it." I smile. Tamryn and I have developed a fun, joking relationship.

  "You're damn right, you would!" Tamryn's eyes light up, the way they do only when she has a particularly juicy piece of gossip. "Well, I was dating this guy in high school, Bobby. He was cute enough, but not my best-looking boyfriend, and he was such a slacker that I eventually dumped him. He'd just drink beer and game on his computer all day. I'd have to practically climb in his lap with my boobs out to even get his attention!" Tamryn definitely wasn't the most delicate or prudish of girls, as I had quickly learned. "Anyway, I cut the loser loose when I realized that I'd be taking myself to prom if I didn't. I needed someone who wanted to do something. Anything!"

  "Okay, so Julie is involved how...?" I have to prompt her, if I want to get to the meat of the story before the parlor closes. Tamryn also has a tendency of going off on tangents—and long ones.

  "Well, lo and behold, my cousin starts dating him a few years later. Dating my boyfriend!"

  "Your ex-boyfriend," I point out.

  "Girl code!" Tamryn wags a finger at me. "Once a boyfriend, always off limits. Anyway, after Julie starts dating him, Bobby decides to clean up, grab his life by the nuts, and go off to medical school. Who knew the guy had the brains for that? I sure didn't!"

  "Mmm." I nod, agreeably.

  "Now Julie's the yoga-doing, soap opera-watching, stay at home wife of a doctor in a big ol' house with over three hundred channels on her cable plan, a big mutt, and the kind of fancy wine that you can't even get in a box." That last part seems to really irk her.

  "It sounds like it worked out well for her," I say, staying neutral in tone.

  "Ha!" Tamryn snorts. "I'm telling you that Bobby was always a two minute flop in the sack. Anyway, here's the best part—Julie's now almost eight months pregnant, huge as a whale, and has such high blood pressure that she's on bed rest. She says it's from the baby, but my money says it's all the Ho-Ho's and Ding-Dongs she must have been eating lately. Ha, good luck getting that little wasp waist she was so proud of back!"

  Suddenly, I have an idea.

  "You said she has a dog?" I ask.

  "Yeah, so?" asks Tamryn, popping her gum.

  I've always been good with animals, especially dogs. I always wanted one, but Dad didn't have the time and, since the only kind of dog he would consider acceptable for him to own would be a rottweiler, didn't think I was up to the task of handling the dog by myself. If Tamryn's cousin is on bed rest and her husband works all the time as a doctor, that means there's no one to walk her dog.

  "Can I ask you for a favor?" I ask.

  "What?" Tamryn looks at me suspiciously.

  "I really need some more money and I love dogs. Can you ask your cousin if she needs a dog walker and recommend me for the job? Please?"

  Tamryn brushes the question off with a wave of her hand. "The skank owes me that much. Consider it done."

  "Aw, thank you!"

  Sure enough, the very next day I get a call from Julie asking when I can start. And just like that, I have a daily morning jog with Maxie, her slightly overweight mutt, lined up.

  Good. The sooner I get out of the apartment and away from Cooper, and temptation, the better. I don't know how much more I can take.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Cooper

  I'm interested in getting to know this girl. She feels it, too, but she's scared of accepting it. I have decided that I want to pursue this, I want to pursue her, and see where this goes. She has decided that she wants to run.

  That just makes my job a little more challenging. But there's nothing I like more than a challenge.

  I came home late the other night and found her asleep on the sofa, curled up with a thin blanket and as cute as can be. Spread out on her stomach was the newspaper, folded open to the housing ads. So my job is to get in and get close before she has the chance to get out.

  That's fine. I didn't feel like taking my time anyway.

  "Where are you off to?" I'm finishing my protein shake in the kitchen when Savannah walks through the door in a pair of tight yoga shorts and a sporty t-shirt. Her hair is up in a ponytail, she's wearing a pair of running shoes, and she's not wearing a smidge of makeup. She's beautiful.

  "Oh, I'm dog-walking on the side." She rolls her eyes and corrects herself. "Well, dog jogging. The pup has a few pounds to lose, so I'm trying to get him some quality exercise."

  "Cool, I'll join you," I say. I'm still wearing my gym clothes from earlier, so I just drink the last dregs of my protein shake and go over to her.

  "Oh, um, I..." she stammers, clearly searching for a reason that I shouldn't come with her. I don't give her time to come up with something.

  “I was just heading out on a run myself. we may as well go together. I'll show you the good routes, since you're new in town." I give her a wink.

  "I, uh..." She looks up, like she expects to find a good excuse to avoid me written on the ceiling.

  "Are you coming?" I'm already halfway out the door, bouncing on the balls of my feet.

  "I..." she sighs. "Yeah, I'm coming."

  I smile. We make idle conversation, just pretty basic small talk, on our way over to the big house where she picks up a fat dog with droopy eyes and a jiggling belly that hangs down further than it should. Poor thing really could use a run. I don't know when he last got some movement. Looking at the size of the bump on that woman, I'd guess it's probably been a while.

  "Think we'll have to carry him home?" I joke, after we jog a few blocks.

  "He'll be fine." Her answer is as short as they've been on the whole run, even though I can tell it's not because she's at all out of breath. The girl is fit. She probably runs regularly to keep that perfect ass of hers in the top form that it's in. Short as her answer is, though, I know that she's having trouble keeping her cold act up. The sides of her mouth twitch a bit and she's struggling to keep the smile out of her eyes.

  "It's okay. We're running uphill for this first part anyway." I shrug. "Worse comes to worst, we'll just roll him back."

  Now she cracks a smile. "Shut up," she says, trying to force some seriousness.

  "Too late!" I cheer. "She smiles!"

  "Sorry," she says, smiling again. "I'm just not looking for...friends. Not right

  now. I have a lot going on, you know?"

  "I get it," I say, "Busy girl, good for you. I like to see a girl with ambition. But ambition doesn't mean you have to isolate yourself, you know."

  "Yeah..." She looks at me briefly, then looks away. She's definitely hiding something, but that's okay. I'll figure it out.

  I give her a little nudge. "And who said I want to be your friend, pretty girl?"

  She gives me a wide-eyed stare for a second, then an unwilling grin—and then, looking like she has no idea what she's supposed to feel, sprints off with the dog.

  I charge after her. This spirited, sporty girl is worth the chase. I feel exhilarated running after her l
ike I haven't in the longest time.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Savannah

  I'm still on cloud nine all through my shower, and as I get dressed before my evening shift. I try to tell myself that it's the endorphins from my run, which was great. But I know it's not Cooper's pace challenging me to push myself on those hills that has me in such a good mood. As much as I try to keep my guard up and be as off-putting and cold around that man as conceivable within the bounds of basic interpersonal decency, I can't keep myself from feeling at ease. There's something about Cooper that makes me want to open up. There's something about him that makes me feel safe and comfortable and just plain happy.

  But it's when you become content that you find yourself in trouble. Happiness is dangerous.

  I'm a little early for work and decide to grab a slice from Bennie's Pizza before work for dinner. In my floating-on-air state of peace, I'm less on guard and less aware of my surroundings. That's why it takes me a minute to realize that the voice in the booth behind me is a familiar one. It has been weeks—since I ran away, in fact—since I last heard a familiar voice. But when I finally realize that the woman's voice in the booth behind me belongs to someone I knew in my life as Savannah Santos, I quickly slouch down in my booth and pull the hood of my sweatshirt up way over my face.

  "Are you close?" The voice is hushed, like the woman doesn't want to attract attention to herself, either, but it's distinct. "Okay, please hurry. I'm waiting here for you already."

  It's Lily. Lily Moreno, Nate's sister.

  Fuck.

  Luckily, her booth is closer to the back of the pizza place, and further from the door, than mine. That means that I don't have to pass her to leave.

  Pulling my hood down as far over my face as I can, I quietly get up and walk as quickly as I can out of Bennie's Pizza without attracting attention to myself.

  This is bad. This is very bad. What is Lily doing all the way down here? This is way out of our usual range; we never wander this far. No one from the clubs comes to this part of town, just because it's far away and there's not really anything here to come all this way for. That is why I chose to come here. So why is Lily here? Bennie's Pizza is definitely not that good.

  Is she looking for me?

  I can't wipe that thought from my mind through my whole shift and I'm quiet and distracted. Even Tamryn notices something is wrong and keeps asking me how I'm feeling and if I'm okay.

  I am somewhat calmer by the end of the night, but this is just a reminder of why I can't afford to let down my guard. This is why I can't afford to start something with Cooper.

  I grab the newspaper off the kitchen counter when I get home, even though it's late, because I need out. I need out fast, before it's too late.

  Chapter Twenty

  Savannah

  I wake up in tears the next morning. I can't do anything but lie there, sobbing, body shaking. I can't think straight enough to think through it and convince myself that everything is going to be okay.

  I'm just so confused and so unhappy. Seeing Lily brought everything I'd been trying not think about up to the forefront and rubbed raw a few wounds I didn't even realize that I had.

  Why did I have to meet Cooper? Why did I have to pick this particular fucking apartment and meet this particular man who, in an alternate world where I'm not the prisoner of my identity, could be someone really special to me?

  The worst part is that he already is becoming someone really special to me, and it hurts like a dagger through my heart to realize it. I'm breathing in short gasps. Even though I'm just lying on my bed, I cannot manage to catch my breath. The pain is so deep and so intense that it's a physical pain. I curl into the fetal position, like folding in on myself will make my feelings smaller, too—but, of course, it doesn't work.

  With every smile, every kind word, every casual, incidental touch—none of which are casual to me, since every accidental brush sends shocks through my body and fills me to overflowing with longing—he makes me fall for him that little bit more. And he doesn't know that being with me would be a death sentence. I can't do that to him.

  I can't do that to anyone. But I definitely can't do that to him.

  It just hurts.

  There's a knock at my door. "I picked up some fresh OJ," Cooper says through the door. "You're welcome to it."

  I try to stifle my sobs and pull myself together so he doesn't get that something is wrong, but I can't. My attempt to hold my breath in and be quiet ends up in a choked gasp. It's loud in my otherwise empty room.

  "Savannah?" He sounds worried, knocking again. "Savannah, are you okay?"

  I can't trust my voice. I know that if I try to say anything, it will betray me. Instead, I use all of my self-control to pull myself together enough for a reasonably okay-sounding, “Mm-hmm.”

  But Cooper knows better. He rips the door open and is at my bed in three big steps, his face filled with concern.

  "Savannah," he says. "Savannah, what's wrong?" The care in his voice makes me lose it entirely and I'm a bawling mess in moments. Before I can even comprehend what's going on, he's sitting on my bed, taking me in his strong arms and shifting my head onto his lap. One arm is over my body, an approximation of a hug, and he strokes my hair with the other. "It's okay, Savannah. I'm here. It's okay."

  I cry harder. This physical contact is what I so missed just a few weeks ago, when I had my lonely eighteenth birthday in that dingy old motel. I sat by myself on a moth-eaten bedspread from the 1970s, trying to pretend that there was something helpful or positive about that birthday. I had picked up a stale cupcake from the day-old section of the nearby grocery store's bakery that morning, because it was half-off, but the frosting had hardened into a fossilized swirl of unnatural blue. The only birthday-themed cupcake left was for a little boy, so there was a plastic green dinosaur with a nine on its chest on the top of the frosting mound. I sat there on my bed, a birthday cupcake in my hand that was fit only for a pre-teen boy who had gone taste-blind, and felt like I was the only person in my world. Each dry bite of day-old cupcake tasted like sawdust sticking in my throat and no matter how hard I swallowed, I couldn't get the lump to go down. I gave up on the cupcake three bites in, but I had to drink a tall glass of water before I realized that the lump in my throat wasn't from the sub-par baked goods, but from the emotion I was trying to swallow down with my lonely birthday treat. But here I am now, suddenly not alone anymore.

  I'm not sure how long we stay like that, but I feel simultaneously very safe and unbearably, unendingly sad. I finally understand heartbreak.

  But better that I feel heartbreak without having gotten to love at all, than that I destroy the man I love by letting myself love him.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Cooper

  I have had an easier time getting heavily-trained, grown men to crack during military interrogations, completely without violation of the Geneva Convention, than I have had getting Savannah to open up about her past and her story. I'm getting to know Savannah, and she's the most beautiful girl I've known in a long time, inside and out, but I still know no more about what's haunting her. I still don't know what her personal demons are, but I know they're big.

  I'm really starting to feel for this girl, though, and I know that whatever her deal is, she's already hurting enough. She doesn't need me to add to that by prying into her business and pushing her to tell me more. So when I find her in a heap on her bed, crying like her world just ended, I don't try to get her to tell me what's wrong. I want to know more than anything, because I feel this need to fix it and make everything better for her. But I know she just needs some comfort. Instead of pushing her, I just hold her in my arms.

  She's this beautiful, strong woman with this beautiful, strong body, but at that moment, she felt so frail, so vulnerable. She felt as delicate as a china doll and looked infinitely more beautiful, even with the tears streaming and her face flushed from crying. Even though I was sitting there, on a passable bed with a half
way decent mattress and a beautiful girl's head in my lap, her shiny black hair splayed out over my legs, I didn't want to fuck her.

  Any other girl, I'd either fuck or send home. But not Savannah. She's the kind of girl that's so beautiful you just want to stare at her, and so special you don't even want to fuck her— you just want to hold her, instead. And, when she's ready, make love to her slowly and gently and missionary style, just so that you can look her in the eyes the whole time.

  When Savannah stops crying, I let her have some time alone to calm down a bit and clean herself up. She comes out of her room fifteen minutes later, looking a little sheepish but otherwise normal. I figure the best thing to do is not to say anything about earlier and let her bring it up if she wants to. As I guessed, she doesn't. But she seems grateful that I don't, either, and even invites me along to jog the pregnant lady's fat dog again.

  "What?" I tease, "You actually want me to come?"

  "Nah," she teases me right back, grinning, "I just know you'll come along either way, so I may as well get the good roomie points by inviting you."

  God, how I love to see that woman smile.

  "Smart girl," I say, "What, do I owe you dinner now?"

  "Do you?" She raises an eyebrow.

  "I've exhausted my cooking skills already," I say, lifting my hands in surrender, "But there's this great sandwich place that I have to show you."

  "I don't know," she says.

  She looks a little conflicted again. "Come on," I say. "The tuna will knock your socks clear off."

  "Oh, really?" She is smiling again.

  "Really," I say.

  "Okay." She bites her bottom lip and smiles.

  Every time I think she can't get any cuter, she does.