“And Tommy wasn’t?”
That made him shift his glare from the street to her face. “That isn’t what I meant, and you know it. But if you want to go there, no, he wasn’t. Not if he got in the cage knowing he might have a head injury he didn’t get checked out or either didn’t fucking tell anyone about. He set himself up, he set me up, for some bad shit to happen to him, and it did.”
She sucked in a breath and shot out of the chair, but going back inside meant squeezing by him. For a second she hoped he would grab her and take those awful words back, but he didn’t. He let her go, and he didn’t follow. Savannah fled to her bedroom, slammed the door, and burst into sobs so violent they gagged her.
Well, he’d made a royal fuckery out of that. A mere few hours after vowing to her brother that she was taken care of, he’d said something that cut her to the heart.
Maybe it was for the best. This coming month was going to be hell on him; the last thing she needed was to suffer through it with him. The press, the speculation, some lauding him for coming back so soon, some saying he was a piece of shit, and of course, Tommy’s name being revived in countless articles and sportscasts. She wouldn’t be able to handle it. He hoped he would.
Sighing, heartsick, he pushed to his feet and gripped the iron railing around her charming little balcony, watching the people stroll by. They’d planned to scarf down their sandwiches and go out again, so they should be among them right now, walking hand in hand, contemplating their plans for the evening and anticipating the night ahead. All he had to do was say the word and it could be reality—if he hadn’t already fucked everything up beyond all repair with careless words.
Careless, he realized, but true, one of those many instances when he hadn’t admitted his real feelings about a subject until they flew unbidden from his mouth. That habit had served him well in his fighting career, but would eventually wreck every relationship he ever tried to have.
True or not, she hadn’t deserved to hear it.
He left the balcony and went to her closed bedroom door, hearing her sobs beyond it as easily as she must have heard him talking to Brad and Jon. Pressing a hand to it when he wanted to rip it from its fucking hinges to get to her, he uttered a prayer. As if that would help. “Savannah, baby, can I come in?”
Her answer was immediate. “No. Please don’t.”
He knew her breakdowns always embarrassed her, as if she wasn’t allowed to express them. He’d tried to give her a safe place to do that, and now he’d fucked it all up.
This wasn’t working. It was never going to work as long as he kept giving in to her.
Leaning his forehead against her door, he asked, “What do you want me to do?”
This time, she was a long time answering. “Just . . . go home. I’m sorry I asked you to come all this way.”
“Like hell I’m going home and leaving you this way.”
“You’re the reason I am this way.”
“Savannah. I’m coming in.”
Her door was locked, but the knob was old and flimsy. He broke the fucker with a violent twist and shoved his way inside to see her sitting on the bed, staring at him in disbelief. “You—”
“I’ll buy you a new one.” Stalking over to her, he grabbed her left hand and showed her the little tattoo on her ring finger. “Found it.”
Her streaming eyes were furious and her mascara had smudged around them, making her look half crazed too. “When?”
“This morning.”
“You didn’t say anything.”
“Did you want me to?”
“I don’t . . .”
“Considering what you told me about it. That it was there for the man you’re going to marry. Where did you really see us going, Savannah?”
“I didn’t know! But I was willing to find out, before this.”
“Before this? So you’d be willing to be with me when I’m not a fighter, but not if I am. It doesn’t make any sense. I can’t change what happened to your brother. I can’t change what I am. So you either want to be with me knowing it all, or you don’t.”
“It’s that life I don’t want!” she burst out. “I’ve seen what Rowan went through with Tommy. I know what it entails. Even if you win the title, what then? A rematch. Defenses. It’ll just go on and on until you lose, or you get hurt, and then you’re done. I can’t take it, Michael, I really can’t. I can’t watch it.”
“Savannah—”
“What if I asked you just to take some more time? Would you do that?”
“This is it. If I back down from this, I’m as good as done. In this business, there is no tomorrow.”
She threw her hands up. “Oh, Jesus. Stop quoting Rocky.”
“That was Creed.”
“I know who it was! I’ve seen it a thousand times.”
“Look, you said when we first met that Tommy wouldn’t quit, but that’s what you would want from me? You would want to see me as a quitter?”
“I don’t want to see you as someone who has to fight for survival. Because you’re still doing it, you know. It’s no different than when you were a kid.”
“It’s completely different,” he practically hissed, and she drew back from his sudden vitriol, though it tore at his heart to see her do so. “Don’t ever say that to me. I didn’t have a choice back then. I do now.”
“And you’ve made it!” she yelled, shooting to her feet and showing him that she could fight, too, when she needed to. “To hell with me and what I want for you, to hell with everyone, you only care about your pride and fucking glory and a belt around your waist. You don’t have anything to prove to anyone!”
“I have to prove it to myself.” The louder she grew, the quieter he became. “And I have to prove it to Meyers, who knew exactly who he might be talking to at that press conference in there.”
“See? Your pride.”
“You want me to fucking back down? To tell Meyers and the world that he’s right, I’ve been hiding, I’m done, that’s it, I’ll never come back from what happened to Tommy? That’s not how I’m made, Savannah. It’s not in my blood. If that’s what you want from your man, you picked the wrong motherfucker.”
“I want my man to give some consideration to his woman’s worst nightmare, and do his damnedest to not make it a reality for her, starting by not doing the one thing she asks him not to do.”
“Except that one damn thing is everything I’m about.”
“No, it’s not. I’ve seen what you’re about. It isn’t that. It has nothing to do with that.”
“Then you haven’t gotten to know me at all. You only see the side you want to see.”
She straightened, drawing herself up to her already considerable height. And the slow inhale she took was probably the most dangerous thing he’d seen her do since he’d known her. “I guess I’m seeing that now,” she said icily. “All right. What are you standing here arguing with me for? Go home, get started. Good luck and Godspeed and all that. Forget about my brother, forget about me. Go do you.”
“That isn’t what I want.”
She brushed past him and headed for her living room, only speaking when her back was to him. “Well, you know what I want.”
Chapter Twenty-One
The wipers squealed across the windshield, the sound grating on Mike’s already frazzled nerves. New York City was as damp and rainy as New Orleans had been, but it wasn’t so miserably humid. Mike stared blindly through the tinted backseat window of the SUV taking him over to the press conference to announce his name being added to the main card at Mayhem. The street was clogged with yellow cabs, the bleak gray world interrupted by splashes of color from open umbrellas.
He would rather go twenty rounds with Meyers tap-dancing on his face than sit through this.
“You did the right thing,” Brad said at his side, and Mike wondered if he was trying to convince himself as well as his client. “I think you need this.”
He grunted some form of response and cracked his knuc
kles, twitchy as fuck in slacks and a black long-sleeved shirt. If he had to do this, he preferred to be comfortable and himself in jeans and a T-shirt, but Brad was all about appearances and respect for the audience. This was about as dressed up as he was willing to manage.
Though he’d been happy enough to do it for Savannah when they’d gone out to dinner.
Jon turned to look at him from the passenger seat. “How ya feelin’? You don’t seem like yourself.”
Neither of the guys knew he’d left his heart in Louisiana, that particular organ that was going to be so crucial to getting him through the next few weeks. He hadn’t spoken to Savannah since he packed his bag and left her apartment five days ago for the long drive back to Houston. It had rained almost the entire way.
“Play it cool,” Brad was saying. “Frank’s gonna take every opportunity to get under your skin, and something tells me it isn’t going to be very hard for him today. But we don’t need to let him see it.”
“I got this,” Mike said, finally looking away from the clusterfuck of traffic. Frank Meyers had been under his skin for years, and he knew it, and nothing was going to change about that.
Jon and Brad exchanged a look. Mike tried to pretend he didn’t see it.
It was the usual sideshow when they arrived, tables set up on the stage with his name on a card, sponsorship plastered everywhere on the backdrop along with a huge image of his face beside his opponent’s. MEYERS VS. LARSON ON PPV. Always a trip to see that. Cheers went up from the crowd when he entered from the side of the stage, and he stopped to wave and bask a moment in the adulation as flashbulbs went off. It was basically his first public appearance since the aftermath of the shit hitting the fan, and the reception amazed him. He’d expected to be a pariah of sorts, and the acceptance and welcome from the press hit him hard for a moment. He patted his chest and pointed out at the crowd, their whooping and applause swelling louder.
He wished Savannah could be here. But she would probably feel insulted on her brother’s behalf that he was getting any love at all from the AF fans and press after what happened. He glanced over at Brad and Jon, who grinned encouragingly. Jon flashed him a thumbs up, then he took his seat at his table as Meyers came in.
Well, that dude hadn’t changed a bit. Big and dog-ass ugly. Mike didn’t look forward to the fucking face-off, that was for sure. He’d rather get hit by Meyers than see him that close up.
He was sure eager to show that fucking belt off, hoisting it above his head to way more catcalls and jeers than Mike had received. Yeah, he took some pleasure in that.
Reid Downing took his place at the podium between the tables and gave an opening statement, going on about how grateful they were for Mike stepping in so this fight could go forward, how it was going to be a great matchup and he was looking forward to seeing it. Then he opened it up for questions, and it was showtime.
“Mike,” the first reporter asked, a stocky fellow with glasses, and Mike figured he could have asked the question right along with him; it was what everyone would want to know. It was also the worst fucking thing they could ask him. “When the match gets here, it will have been around three months since the death of Tommy Dugas shortly after your fight. Has that had an effect on you, and if so, do you think you’ve taken enough time away to deal with that mentally?”
What the fuck do you think? Mike blew out the breath he was holding before he picked up the mic lying on his table. “Of course it had an effect on me, it was the worst thing I’ve been through in a long time, and I wasn’t planning on coming back anytime soon. But this opportunity presented itself, and after talking it over with my team, getting their input and thinking it over, we’re here and we’re ready.” And he put the mic down. Brad and Aaron, his publicist, had coached him to take the Forrest Gump “And that’s all I have to say about that” approach with that question. He was worried about coming off too callous, but they didn’t want to expose any weakness that Meyers could exploit.
The same guy had a question for his opponent. “Frank, what are your thoughts about the switch and does the sudden change of opponent have any bearing on the way you train or your strategy for the fight?”
Frank put his mic to his lips for what was sure to be a tirade of bullshit. “Everyone in this room knows that Anderson didn’t have a chance, so whether I was beating his ass or beating Mike Larson’s ass, it makes no matter to me, just another day. I’ve beat him twice already so there’s no reason to change up strategy, I already know what works. It’s the same as it’s always been because he’s predictable. I gotta say, though,” he added loudly over the sudden eruption of voices, “it’s a little sweeter this way, I think Dugas deserves some vengeance after what happened to him and I’m gonna get it for him.”
Oh, give me a fucking break. Mike snatched up his microphone, though he saw Brad and Aaron shaking their heads frantically from side stage. He didn’t care. “Tommy Dugas wouldn’t ask for shit from you, man.”
“Yeah, well, he can’t, cuz you killed him. You killed him. You killed him.” He kept chanting the hateful words into his microphone as an uproar went up from the press and Mike stood up from his chair, every one of his muscles tensed for attack. Meyers lumbered out of his own seat. Reid took up his peacemaker stance and security began inching in from the sidelines. Mike barely saw any of it, hyper-focused as he was on the vile words spilling from Meyers’s mouth. God, if Savannah hears this . . .
“Everyone knows it was an accident, Frank. You know it too.”
“Tell it to his family that’s left behind.”
“I did, asshole.”
“You know I hear his wife is pregnant? I bet they can’t wait to see you bleeding on the mat and I’m going to see to it that it happens. You’ll see. You’ll see!”
“You didn’t fucking know him, so who the fuck are you to get vengeance for anyone?”
“Tommy Dugas was a brother fighter, a fellow warrior who gave his life for this sport, gone too soon and—”
“You piece of shit. You’re not worthy to mention his name.”
“You’d like his name to never be mentioned, wouldn’t you? So you can forget what you did and what you inflicted on his family.”
Another word and he was going to climb over Reid if he had to. “Let’s get back on track,” the president was saying, and security came in to add some authority to the situation. Mike put his hands up, reclaiming his seat and wrenching the cap off the water bottle sitting on his table before turning it upside down and guzzling. It needed to be alcohol. Brad and Aaron were both repeatedly slashing their hands across their throats. Cut it the hell out, he interpreted. So much for not exposing his weakness.
All this and only two questions in. It was going to be a long day.
Rowan answered Savannah’s knock with surprise written across her face. At the sight of her little sister-in-law, so adorable with a bandana headband wrapped around her hair and already wearing a maternity shirt even though she was barely showing, Savannah’s eyes filled with tears.
“Oh, God, Savvy!” Rowan cried and, with all hostilities apparently forgotten, rushed forward to wrap Savannah in her arms. “Are you okay? What’s the matter?”
“Can I come in?” Savannah sniffled, clutching her tight, her warm and familiar scent a comfort she’d nearly forgotten.
“Of course you can. Get in here. I’m making cookies; I had a sudden craving. Don’t make me eat them all by myself.”
Chuckling, Savannah allowed herself to be herded in through the front door and fussed over while Rowan got her tea and tissues and settled her at the kitchen table where they’d first made plans to meet Zane and Mike in Houston. The memory squeezed out a few more drops of moisture and she wiped at them in frustration.
Rowan shoved a batch of cookies in the oven, set the digital timer, then sat down across from her. “Tell me all.”
“It isn’t going to work with Mike. I know you don’t want to hear about him, and I don’t blame you, but I see it now, so y
ou don’t have to worry anymore. He’s already set another fight. It’ll barely be three months since Tommy died, and he’s already fighting again.”
To her surprise, Rowan didn’t erupt in peals of joy. With solemn deliberation, she folded her hands on the table and stared at them for several seconds. “I know. I saw it on the news. I wondered how you were taking it.”
“Not well at all.”
“It was just a chance thing that came up though, right? I mean . . . it wasn’t his plan all along.”
“Yeah, he got an unexpected title shot. He wanted to take it. I tried so hard to talk him out of it. We both . . . said a lot of bad stuff, I guess.”
She remembered his face, almost unrecognizable in his determination and . . . bloodlust, with ice glittering in his eyes that she hadn’t seen since his match with Tommy. It had brought back nightmares. It had frozen her blood in her veins. This is him, she’d thought. He was in the mind-set. There was an opponent already in his cage, trying to take what was his, and at the end of the argument he’d settled into a dangerous quiet, like that of a snake lying in wait for some hapless prey to wander by.
He’d scared her. Not that she thought he would hurt her in a million years, but he would easily hurt someone else, or else get hurt trying.
“Savannah . . . and I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I have to. I’ve never in my life had anyone look at me the way he looked at you in the cemetery the other day. Not even Tommy. He drove all night to get there for you. It made me think. It made me think a lot. Hell, it almost made me jealous.” Rowan chuckled sadly. “Your mom was impressed too.”
“And I’ve never felt the way he made me feel,” Savannah admitted, fiddling with the tissue in her hand.
“You deserve that. I’ve always wanted that for you.”