The Cocky Cage Fighter Six Book Box Set

by Lane Hart

  …

  The summer’s coming to an end and while there’ve been some tough times, there’s been a lot of good ones too. It’s the Saturday before school starts and I’m at the Evolution gym, hopefully soon to be Havoc, getting ready to watch Jude fight a string of guys with a pretty big crowd of locals watching.

  “A kiss for good luck?” Jude asks me after his hands are taped up and ready to go.

  I press my lips to his before asking, “Do you really think you’ll need it?”

  “Hell no. None of these fuckers will make it to the second round,” he says with a wink and cocky smile before he heads into the cage. Josh, the idiot, is up first. Why the boy wants to inflict this unnecessary pain on his scrawny ass is beyond me.

  The bell rings and while the shrimp tries to dance around avoiding Jude, he finally gets cornered against the fence. Jude barely taps Josh's chin with a single jab before he goes down and doesn’t get back up.

  “Like that was even a warm up,” Referee Linc scoffs after Josh is hauled out of the octagon by two guys.

  Next up is Chris, a lightweight who is maybe twenty pounds heavier than Josh. He’s not as fast at running away as the featherweight was and ends up getting knocked out ten seconds sooner.

  Nate is the first real challenge. He was Linc’s sparring partner before Linc's injury, another welterweight. Jude has definitely bulked up over the last few weeks and is the size of Jax, maybe a few pounds heavier.

  The ginger doesn’t get knocked out by Jude’s fist. No, Jude gets Nate’s head in the guillotine hold while both are standing up. Seconds later the other fighter’s entire body goes limp when he passes out.

  Last but not least is Senn, the light heavyweight fighter. Jude hasn’t even worked up a sweat, and has only fought for a total of three minutes after three fights.

  Senn’s somewhat arrogant because of his size, but he’s not that much larger than Jude now. He’s definitely not as fast, and before the first round ends he’s taken one too many hits to his bleeding face so Linc steps in and stops the fight.

  “Is that it?” Jude asks after he climbs up on the top of the cage and straddles it. There’s not a scratch on him. “That’s the best you’ve got? Then we’ve got some serious work to do. Welcome to team Havoc boys.”

  Linc shakes his head and chuckles while Jude climbs down. I head inside the cage to congratulate him, not that I had any doubt.

  “Congrats on your new gym,” I tell Jude with a hug. The owner and Jude had been in talks for the past few weeks, and Jude convinced him to sell it for nothing more than the tax value of the building. Jude was ecstatic, and now that the so-called fight for the facility is over, my dad will be coming down to help Jude get things turned over.

  “So the coaches are wondering what’ll happen to their jobs,” Linc says to Jude, whose arms are still around me.

  “We’ll try to keep them all, unless it’s obvious they don’t have much to offer.”

  “Good,” Linc says. “I’ll let them know.”

  “What about you? You’re gonna help me run this place, right? You know these guys and can help me keep them in line,” Jude tells him.

  “Yeah, I can do that. At least until the doctor clears me to fight again,” Linc agrees with a grin and fist bump with Jude before giving me a one-armed hug. “Take care of our girl,” he says, heading off to check on his injured teammates.

  “You ready to take me home, champ?” I ask.

  “Home,” he repeats with his signature dimpled grin, picking me up by my ass so that my legs are around his waist, neither of us caring who sees. “I really like the sound of that.”

  Epilogue

  Fourth of July, One Year Later

  Macklemore's Can't Hold Us blares over the speakers and Page and I jump to our feet to cheer with the thousands of fans in the arena. Jude's black Havoc sweatshirt is zipped up and the hood's pulled over his head when he steps out of the tunnel. My dad's with him, along with Linc who’s taking his brother's place tonight. The crowd's applause is deafening as he walks toward the cage. I'm waiting for him in his corner, the only corner I'll ever be in. Jude stops next to me and strips out of his hoodie, offering it to me before wrapping me up in his arms and dipping me with a spine-bowing kiss. After Jude gives Page a quick hug, she heads to the other side of the cage while he walks up for the judge's final inspection.

  As soon as Jude enters the octagon his song comes to an ends and the second intro immediately starts up. Sick Puppies' You're Going Down is met with even greater reception.

  Jax, the reigning Middleweight Champion of the World is defending his title for the ninth year in a row. Tonight Jude's gonna try and take it from him!

  The fight has been hyped up for months after Jude moved up a weight class, trying to be the first man to ever officially beat his brother in the cage. The contract didn’t even allow them to fight in the same building for the past six months. A million dollars is on the line for the winner, and even the loser’s purse is enormous.

  Jude's dad and Coach Snyder are with Jax as he walks toward the octagon. He gives Page a passionate kiss before receiving the ref's official clearance to get in the cage with Jude. Xavier’s with a babysitter tonight, still too young to watch his dad and uncle beat the shit out of each other.

  In the middle of the front row I spot Jude’s mom, husband and two kids on their feet like the rest of the crowd. She smiles and waves at me when she notices my attention on her, which I return. No one other than her family knows who she is, but Jude and Jax do and that’s all that matters. Over the past year they’ve both managed to come a long way with letting her back into their lives. It hasn’t been easy, but they’re making the effort.

  I’m trying to follow their example to do the same with my own sea turtle mother. She's actually here in the crowd tonight, although I'm pretty sure it's not really because of me or Jude. No, ever since they met a few months ago my mom's new obsession has been Jude's dad. Martin Malone seems to be just as smitten with her. Will it be weird if Jude ends up becoming my step-brother? Hell yes, but seeing the two of them happy and finally having my mom stick around is worth it.

  My attention goes back to the cage when the door is locked by the ref and the announcer starts going over both Malones' stats and records before the ref allows them a chance to touch gloves. With matching wide grins they meet and bump the fronts, tops, and then bottoms of their blue and red gloves before hugging each other in the center of the octagon and returning to their corners. The bell rings and then history is made. This is the first time a brother has ever challenged his sibling's title.

  Jax has the heaviest hands in mixed martial arts, and his punches fly faster than the eye can follow. Jude lives up to his nickname, The Matrix, dodging Jax's powerful swings while executing some painful kicks. It’s obvious Jude plans to test his older brother’s cardio, as he slaps away furious punches and weaves away from him constantly. That goes on for three rounds, and everyone in the arena can see that Jax is wearing himself out. This is the very first time in Jax's long career that he's had to keep fighting past the first round.

  Knowing that he doesn’t have much left in the tank, Jax begins getting sloppy in the fourth round, swinging for the fences with every punch and leaving huge openings in his guard. Jude ducks under a wild haymaker, and using Jax’s momentum, trips him and throws him down to the canvas. Pouncing on top of Jax, Jude wraps his arms around Jax’s neck, putting him in an anaconda choke hold within seconds. Jax tries to squirms his way out of Jude's grip but doesn't get anywhere. He finally taps out before he passes out, making the crowd roar.

  He did it! Jude won! I jump to my feet and cup my hands around my mouth, cheering for Jude.

  In the cage Jude offers his brother a hand up which he accepts. The two hug again before the ref raises Jude's arm as the new Middleweight Champion of the World. The shiny gold belt is fastened around his waist and he’s named the second ever, King of the Cage.

  Jude still holds the we
lterweight belt too but I know that now that he’s bumped up a weight class, he won’t stand in Linc’s way of reclaiming his title.

  The announcer puts the mic in front of Jax's face first. "What a fight! That was hands down one of the best match-ups the IFC’s ever seen! But how does it feel to be defeated for the first time in your career?"

  "Wow," Jax says with a shake of his head, his chest still heaving from his struggle for breath. "If someone had to beat me I can't think of anyone I'd rather lose to. Jude kicked my ass and he earned this win and this title fair and square. I can’t deny that he’s the better fighter."

  "Will there be a rematch?" the man asks Jax.

  "No, I don't think so. I had already decided that I'm officially retiring today, so that was my last fight. No regrets going out. I’ll leave it up to my baby brother to keep the title in our family."

  A shocking gasp fills the arena at Jax's career ending declaration. Even I didn’t know that he was planning to give up fighting.

  "Jude, how does it feel to make history tonight?" the announcer shoves the mic in his face and asks.

  "It feels amazing, and I'm still in shock,” he responds, smiling broadly and shaking his head. “My brother's the best damn fighter in the world and I never dreamed I could even try to give him a run for his money. It's incredible to think that I've actually come this far, but without Jax's support and confidence in me, I never would've made it here tonight. Jax has always been my best friend and role model, and not even kicking his ass will ever change that."

  "You've been training in a new Havoc facility in North Carolina for the past year, correct?" the man asks.

  "I have, since last year's win, so that I could be close to my girlfriend, Sadie, while she's in school. When I asked, her father was kind enough to agree to let me open the facility for him down in the south. But now I have another important question for him. A favor he owes me," Jude says. Looking around for my dad, he motions for him to step up beside him. "Coach, you know I love your daughter more than anything, and I plan to spend the rest of my life with her. So do I have your blessing to ask Sadie to marry me?"

  Jude's gaze lands on me in the crowd while all I can do is stand frozen with my hand over my surprised, gaping mouth.

  "As I’ve told you before, Jude, I couldn’t have picked a better man for her, so I'd be proud to have you as a son-in-law," my dad says, making even more tears fall from my eyes.

  Jude turns around and holds out his palm. His dad who’s in the cage with them places what looks like a small box in the center of his hand and says loud enough for the microphone to catch it, "You’ve found her, now go and get her."

  An instant later, Jude climbs over the side of the cage and goes down to his knee in front of me, bloody and sweaty, half beaten to death, but smiling up at me while holding out a diamond ring.

  "Sadie Briggs, my heart and soul knew I was yours from the very beginning, and now I’m asking you to be mine forever. If you’ll be my wife I promise to always love you more today than yesterday, but not as much as tomorrow. So sweetheart, will you please marry me?"

  "Yes," I say with a tearful smile, wrapping my arms around his neck. With a laugh, Jude picks me up in a bear hug that's greeted with deafening hoots and hollers before his lips crash down on mine.

  Melting in his arms, I feel like I’m living a fairytale romance as all around us thousands of voices start singing in unison "Nah nah nah nah nah nah, nah nah nah, hey Jude!” for the most incredible man in the world. And in this perfect moment I realize that although we might be at the end of the story of how we fell in love, it’s just the beginning of my happily ever after with Jude Malone.

  The End

  LINC

  A Cocky Cage Fighter Novel

  By Lane Hart

  COPYRIGHT

  This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue were created from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual people or events is coincidental.

  The author acknowledges the copyrighted and trademarked status of various products within this work of fiction.

  © 2016 Editor's Choice Publishing

  All Rights Reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  For permission requests, write to the publisher, addressed “Attention: Permissions Coordinator” at the address below.

  Editor’s Choice Publishing

  P.O. Box 10024

  Greensboro, NC 27404

  Edited by Wendy Ely and Angela Snyder

  Cover by vocaldesign

  https://www.fiverr.com/vocaldesign

  Photo ©canstockphoto.com

  WARNING: THIS BOOK IS INTENDED FOR MATURE AUDIENCES 18+ ONLY AND CONTAINS EXPLICIT SEX SCENES, ADULT LANGUAGE, AND SOME VIOLENCE!

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Epilogue

  ALSO AVAILABLE FROM LANE HART

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Chapter One

  Lincoln “Linc” Abrams

  "Hi, my name's Linc, and I'm in love with a porn star."

  I'm standin' in front of bulging-eyed strangers, about to tell them shit I've never told another soul, not even my boys. I admit, I got the idea from watchin’ Fight Club.

  "Well, maybe I'm not in love with her," I amend before a tidal wave of candor comes pourin' out of my mouth. "But I'm completely fuckin' obsessed with Eve Kelly. Ever since the first time I saw her spread her long, lean legs on camera I've been addicted. I own a copy of all ten of her videos and subscribe to this overpriced, twenty-four hour a day production network that occasionally shows never before seen footage. So yeah, I'm a really sick bastard because there's nothin' in this world I'd rather be doing than watchin’ Eve get fucked every which way possible. Well, there's one thing I'd rather being doin'..." I can't help but grin even as I feel the warmth of embarrassment floodin’ my cheeks. Did I really just say all that shit out loud?

  Clearin’ his throat, the bald, overweight man standin' at the podium in the front of the room takes advantage of my pause to put an end to my ramblin’ monologue. "Admitting you have a problem is a great first step toward recovery. However, this is actually the weekly Alcoholics Anonymous meeting."

  "Well, yeah I figured as much based on the Alcoholics Anonymous sign on the door," I finally respond to the guy callin’ me out. The lucky bastard. He can pour his alcohol down the sink or throw it in the trash to get rid of it. But my long, hard cock? Yeah, it goes with me everywhere, usually leadin’ the way, demandin’ that I imagine how hot it would be to fuck Eve Kelly in order to relieve the achin’ pressure. "I couldn't find any porn addiction groups," I explain. "So I just figured that one addiction is pretty much like any other, right?"

  I shift my weight forward and back, rockin' nervously on the soles of my black Vans while everyone in the room continues to gawk at me. Not tryin’ to sound cocky, but there's no "anonymous" about me bein' here today since I'm somewhat of the town's celebrity mixed martial arts fighter, and Linc is not a very common name. Did my parents name me after one of the greatest Presidents of the United States? Hell no. They went with Lincoln because Link would've been a dead giveaway of their epic geekiness and lifetime addiction to gaming. If addictions are supposedly genetic, then why the fuck couldn
't I have been cursed with spendin’ my days and nights with a game controller in my hand instead of my dick? So yeah, I'm here because I'm tired of my rapidly increasin’ social withdrawal. Damn it, I want to get back to bein’ normal again. Before I watched the first Eve Kelly naughty school girl scene. Back to the good ole days when I occasionally fucked real beautiful, curvy women instead of imaginin’ I was fuckin’ a porn star.

  "Anyone else?" The group leader looks away from me, indicatin’ he wants me to shut the fuck up and sit down. I do, and then I listen to the other members in the classroom, a Chex Mix of ages, races and genders, discussin' their addiction, how many days since their last drink, how alcohol took over their lives, ruinin' their relationships. Amen to that one. I've tried to date, I really have, especially with all the free time I've had since I got nailed with my first serious injury, breakin’ my fuckin’ arm in a championship fight with Jude Malone. Losin’ my title, and then not bein’ able to get back in the cage to train in over two months sucks ass. There are too many hours in the day, and not enough shit for me to be doin’.

  Knowin’ I’ve been bored out of my mind, and watchin’ too much porn, my good friend Sadie took pity on me, settin’ me up on a few blind dates with her hot friends from Duke. Despite how beautiful, smart, and funny they were, it’s always the same by the end of the night. I can't fuckin' wait to leave the college chicks at their dorms and get back home to Eve.

  "I hit rock bottom the day I bought a fifth of liquor instead of food with my last five dollars, even though I hadn't had anything to eat in days," a young blonde woman says sadly from across the room. "That was when I realized how bad my addiction was. I knew it was time for me to finally face my demons before they consume me."