Her voice hitched and a sob choked out of her. Jami pulled her face into his chest and held her there, needing to feel her, to know she was safe. That bastard! His mind reeled with the new information. Information that made complete sense.
Tony Michaels had broken into Ally’s office, stolen not only Tori and Miles’s information, but Ally’s, too, and then used it to get close to them. All of them. His jaw clenched tight, threatening to crack his teeth.
“Give me your phone.”
***
Alyson’s head snapped up. “What?”
Jami’s eyes were darker than she had ever seen. His body trembled with his anger. “I said give me your phone.”
“Why?” she asked, even as she reached into her pocket to retrieve it.
Jami took it and began scrolling through her recent calls. “Because I have a call to make.”
Alyson sat back, watching Jami’s face as the phone rang. The only outward indication of how upset he was right now was the storm she saw brewing in his eyes. She bit her lip, feeling guilty and beyond stupid. She had let Tony Michaels get close to her, and she hadn’t even known it. She’d put them all in danger.
She wanted to cry, but when she saw Jami stiffen and sit forward, his eyes glued to the open door, she froze. Victoria, who had been watching too, leaned over watching the door. Dozens of people passed by, talking, laughing, excitement over the turnout of the fight still radiating from them. But that wasn’t what they were looking for.
A moment later, she heard it. They all did. The distant sound of a phone ringing. Alyson felt her breath stop short as the sound grew nearer. The three of them exchanged looks. Yes, they all heard it. Then it happened.
Alyson gasped as Tony’s tall, forbidding form appeared. The ringing stopped when he did. Then he pressed his phone to his ear. His eyes found Jami instantly, as if he already knew exactly where to find him. He probably did, considering he had his stalking skills down to an art.
And she’d once thought this man attractive? Now all she could see was the wolf lurking just beneath the sheep’s clothing.
His mouth moved, and Jami released a string of curses that were so vicious, Alyson flinched. Tori huddled in her chair, no longer peering out the door. Alyson knew why. She didn’t want her husband to see her there, but it was no use hiding anymore. Tony had known all along exactly where he could find her.
A thought struck her, and her stomach bottomed out. She looked up, finding Tony’s eyes glued to her. Oh, God. Was he behind the fire at the safe house, too? It made perfect sense—remove her only resource, so she would be forced to return to him, but Alyson had stepped in and ruined all of his plans, hadn’t she?
She wanted to vomit.
Jami was shouting into the phone now, struggling to get to his feet. Tony was wearing a smug smirk, amused, defiant, confident. Challenging. And Jami was buying into it all.
“Sit down, son,” Don commanded, placing firm hands on Jami’s shoulders and forcing him back. Jami struggled, his face screwing up in pain, but he refused to back down. “I said sit down!” Don roared. “God dammit, you’re going to hurt yourself!”
“I’m going to kick your ass!” Jami bellowed, throwing the phone across the room. It bounced off the wall, shattering to pieces. People passing by jumped and looked at Jami as if he were a crazy person.
Alyson experienced a moment of distress at seeing her phone destroyed, but she shook herself. It didn’t matter. She would get a new one.
Looking up at Tony, she hollered, “Get out of here! Haven’t you done enough already?”
The side of his mouth twisted in a crooked smile that made her physically ill. Lifting his head, he wiggled his fingers as if to say see you later, and then he continued walking. Don was in front of Jami now, chest to chest, struggling to hold him back. Miles was pushing against Jami’s right shoulder—she hadn’t even seen him leave his chair—but neither of them were making any headway. Even broken as he was, Jami was just too strong.
Moving closer, she reached out and stroked his left arm. He jerked like a wild stallion. “Hey, hey,” she soothed, “Jami, it’s okay. Calm down. It’s me. It’s okay.”
His head jerked, and then he was looking at her, training all of that dangerous energy on her. “No, it’s not okay. It’s not okay until I teach that asshole a lesson. It’s not okay, Ally!”
She flinched, but pressed ahead. Gently, she touched his face, tracing the hard lines of fury etched between his eyebrows, his tight jaw. Gradually, she stepped closer, replacing Don as some of Jami’s anger began to melt away. The crazed look in his eyes reminded her of a wild beast, caged and abused. One who didn’t know how to handle the presence of a soft, gentle hand.
“I want to kill him,” Jami rasped. He leaned into her touch, and Alyson slid her arms around him and held him to her. His big body shuddered as the tension ebbed away.
“I know you do, but you need to heal first,” she reasoned with him.
His arms went around her, and he squeezed. “I love you, Ally. I won’t let anything happen to you.”
“I know,” she whispered. Over his shoulder, she met Don’s eyes, and saw his frown. He didn’t like what Jami had said, but that was just tough.
Lifting his head from her shoulder, Jami looked her in the eyes. “I’m going to get better, and when I do, I’m going to take that guy out. He’s going to regret the day he looked in your direction.”
Miles, who was standing beside them, took a step back, pain in his eyes. Jami realized what he had said too late. “Miles—”
“No, it’s okay. I get it.” But he didn’t. Alyson knew the hardship of loving a parent who didn’t love you back all too well. It would be a few more years before Miles really got the gravity of the situation. Until then, Jami might have lost a fan.
Miles walked away, resuming his seat next to Tori, who grabbed him up in her arms and hugged him like she hadn’t seen him in years. Alyson’s heart hurt. How many times had she wished her own mother would have held her like that? Too many. And from the look in Jami’s eyes as he watched them, his thoughts weren’t far off from hers.
“Come on,” she told him, folding her hand in his. “Let’s go home. We can worry about this tomorrow. Right now, I just want to climb into bed and hold you.”
“That’s a good idea. I could use some sleep.”
Alyson took a look around the room, seeing everyone’s tired faces. “I think we all could.”
With Don on one side, and her on the other, they helped Jami limp from the room. He was a champion tonight, her champion. He’d proven himself to everyone, but most of all, he’d proven himself to her. He was the man she always knew him to be—her friend, her confidant, her lover, and most of all, her protector.
Trouble lay ahead. She didn’t know how much, or what the extent of it would be, but she knew that whatever it was, they would face it together, because that was what you did when you loved someone. And she loved Jami.
Keep reading for an excerpt from the next Wayward Fighters book
Tapout
Tentative release date is September 2014
ONE
“Is it over? Can I look yet?” Alyson had her head down and turned to the side with her hands shielding her eyes from what was happening in front of her. How did she keep allowing herself to get talked into this? Oh, yeah. She was in love with the jerk in the ring. Sometimes she thought he used that knowledge to play her, like that morning when she’d tried to claim she had a lot of unfinished work to do at the office. He called her bluff, reminding her that she still had a week left of her vacation. In the shadow of a looming fight, it’d slipped her mind. Now, here she was, front and center, and Jami was kicking ass. Only this time, he had some new tricks up his sleeve. One in particular flipped her squeamish, I’m-gonna-be-sick switch, and he was using it now.
“It’s over, right?” Alyson asked, taking the rising roar of the crowd as the celebratory indicator that it was. Cautiously, she began to lower her hand
s.
“Not yet!” Liv shrieked, her voice carrying easily over the clamor, and smashed both hands over Alyson’s eyes. She couldn’t have chosen her timing better. Since Alyson’s hands hand been in the process of lowering, she’d ended up jabbing the tips of her fingers into her own eyes, but they were closed. A little physical pain had to be better than witnessing the horrific site she knew she would have seen if she possessed a little more gumption. “Oh, Jesus. Oh, that’s gotta hurt,” Liv moaned sympathetically.
Alyson sat up taller, her ears pricking. It was chaos all around her, and she felt the tight knot of worry in her gut begin to shift with natural curiosity. She knew she shouldn’t look. Since she and Jami sealed the deal in the relationship department, she’d been spending a lot of time at the gym, and she had first-hand knowledge of just what he and Don had been working on. Some of the techniques she had seen before, but the new ones? They kicked up the Ew Factor quite a bit. It pushed her limits just watching in the gym where the environment was controlled and she knew logically that no one was going to get hurt. Put into play in real life, and she just couldn’t do it. She couldn’t watch Jami inflict that kind of bodily injury. Otherwise, she really would need that bucket.
“Tell me what’s happening,” she asked Liv, torn between wanting to hear the details, and covering her ears. She had too good of an imagination sometimes.
“Are you sure?” Liv questioned warily. She knew her friend well enough to know that just being here was a stretch.
Hell, no, she wasn’t sure! Sucking her lip between her teeth, Alyson bit down. Then, she said quickly, “Yes, tell me.” Lord Almighty, she knew she was going to regret those words the second they left her mouth, but she couldn’t take them back now.
The skin between Liv’s hands and hers was growing clammy with sweat, and the air beneath her palms where Alyson’s nose pressed flush up against them was slick with condensation, but Alyson set aside the mild discomfort as she listened to Liv relay what she couldn’t see for herself.
“Jami has him on his stomach, and he’s on top of him,” Live began her voice sounding mechanical, which helped some with keeping Alyson’s own emotions under control. “Jami has the guy’s arm twisted behind his back, and he’s twisting his hand up between his shoulder blades.”
Alyson cringed, knowing what was coming next and praying that the poor guy had enough sense to tap out now, before this got too far. “What’s he doing now?”
“He just pinning him, I think…No, wait. Jami’s pushing his arm higher, straight up at the ceiling.”
“Does the guy look like he’s going to give up?” Alyson gritted her teeth, feeling a ribbon of dread twisting its way through her sternum.
“Not a chance,” Liv reported back, and Alyson felt all hope take flight like a flock of birds heading south for the winter. “God, you should see his face. This guy has balls of steel or something. That’s got to hurt!” The crowd started chanting then. “Judge, Judge, Judge, Judge…” Liv made a squeeing noise through her teeth that steadily rose with the cacophony of the rest of the people, and Alyson didn’t have to ask what was coming. Liv made sure to fill her in.
“He’s twisting his arm higher. Jami isn’t letting go. The guy’s face…oh, man, I think he’s going to cry, or pass out. Or both. Can an arm go that far back?” And then it happened. The stunned, excited thrill of the masses exploded into a symphony of shouts that blended together, creating a press of noise so loud, that Alyson’s eardrums braced themselves before shrinking in and hunkering down.
“Holy…I’ve never seen an arm at that angle before.”
Nausea rolled her stomach and Alyson gently pushed Liv’s hands away, letting her own fall into her lap in an exhausted heap. “It’s dislocated,” Alyson said distantly. Don had spent a lot of time teaching Jami how to twist the arm just so, until it popped free of the socket. He did it by twisting the arm behind the guy’s back, bringing him into submission first, and then he kept going. A normal, sane person would have tapped out the second the pressure became too much, but some of these guys were too macho and hard-headed to give in even when they had to know they’d already lost. Then, just as easily as if he were cranking the bolts off a car with a tire iron, he pressed the arm back until the elbow was flush with the floor.
“That’s awesome.” As usual, Liv’s response was a-typical. She wasn’t like most girls. She didn’t cringe away from blood and gore. She didn’t want kids. She didn’t plan to get married. And the only time she wore anything that could be considered girlie was when she was putting on a show for a man. Today, she wasn’t dressed in her slutty-chic clothes as she always had been before when attending past events. Tonight she wore black leggings beneath a long, midnight blue sweater dress that hit just above her knees, and a pair of boots that stopped just below. She was as covered as Alyson had ever seen her, and she wondered if that had anything to do with the way she purposefully seemed to be avoiding Spencer at all costs.
A few nights ago, Alyson got a call from Liv. It was after eight o’clock and she and Jami had just settled in for the night, but the sound of her friend’s voice made her sit up and take notice. It was strained and a little raspy, as if she had been crying. When she asked Alyson to come hang out and keep her company for a while, she couldn’t say no.
There were no obvious signs that anything was wrong once she’d shown up at Liv’s condo, but the stack of Jane Austen DVDs and the box of extra-large pizza next to it suggested a different story. These were Liv’s break-up remedies. A quick look around revealed no signs of Spencer having ever been there, and Alyson folded herself into a corner of the couch. No words were needed. Spencer and Liv were over. It was time to move on.
“Do you think he likes blondes?”
Alyson glanced at Olivia, realizing she had mentally checked out for a moment there. She rushed to catch up. “Who?”
Liv rolled her eyes. “Have you been listening at all?” She lifted her arm and pointed at the guy lying on the floor of the ring with medics surrounding him. “Him. Do you think he likes blondes?”
“You mean Mister Dislocated? Sure.” Alyson shrugged. “Doesn’t every guy like blondes?”
“Yours doesn’t.” The smile Liv turned on Alyson was wicked with a hint of longing.
“Not anymore. I beat that out of him a long time ago.” Alyson grinned and, catching Jami’s eye, smiled wider and waved. His smile was full-watt, but she still caught the slight, questioning tilt of his head, as if he sensed there was more behind her gesture than pure innocence.
He would be right.
“You are bad,” Liv roared, nudging Alyson’s ribs with her knobby elbow.
Not nearly as bad as she intended to be later. Seeing Jami up there, every muscle in his body swollen and pulled tight beneath sweaty skin that shinned exquisitely under the hot lights, the mile-wide smile, absolute happiness and triumph making his eyes burn like hot coals. All of it put Alyson on edge, heightening her awareness to a pinpoint, all of it centered on him. Her lover. Her fighter. Her man.
“Let’s get out of here,” she told Olivia, nudging her out of her seat. They would meet up with Jami and the rest of the guys in his room as per usual. After he got cleaned up, they were heading out. Spencer promised Jami a party, and Jami promised Alyson he would show her a good time. And Jami never broke his promises.
They were the first ones in the room. The total peace and quiet they found felt out of place after having been amongst the insanity of the arena, but it was a welcomed one. It was also very short-lived. No sooner had Alyson and Olivia settled onto a short, hard couch pressed against the wall opposite the door, the door flew open and the men spilled in.
Jami’s eyes flew straight to Alyson’s. The smile he wore for her was stunning. It was one that held promises, and Alyson felt her stomach flutter. Her lips curled up and she lowered her head. Theirs was a quiet romance. Although they showed affection in public, they didn’t maul each other. She found that anticipation was half the th
rill. One look and they said all they needed to say. Right now, Jami’s dark eyes were locked on her. It always caught her off guard how strongly he could affect her with just one look, but he did.
Don’s gruff command broke their connection. “Head back.” Jami complied. With his face tipped toward the ceiling, Alyson was given a mouth-watering view of the corded muscles lining his thick neck. It was one of her favorite parts of his body, second only to his broad back. She watched closely as Don patched him up, tending first to the split in his eyebrow.
“You need to bring your guard up more. Anymore damage to this and you’re going to have a hell of a scar.”
“Ladies love scars,” Jami said smoothly, glancing her way. He caught her staring and winked.
Beside her, Olivia snorted. “The last guy I dated with a scar turned out to be a giant turd.” Her eyes lifted from her cell phone to look pointedly at Spencer. He was standing at Don’s side, arms crossed over his chest, watching attentively.
“Have you two talked since…?” Alyson let the words die off. Why was she even asking? They’d just broken up, and as far as she was concerned, it was the best news she ever heard. But she could feel Olivia’s heartbreak like a physical thing between them and she hated it. She wanted her to be happy. It was about time they both were.
“Since I told him to hit the curb? Hell. No.” Her words were slow and vicious and aimed directly at Spencer. As if he knew they were talking about him, his gaze snapped up, landing directly on Liv. For just a second, Alyson thought she glimpsed something soft in them, but whatever it was, it was already gone. Everything about Spencer, from his beat up Chucks to the new ring in his right eyebrow, was hard, cold, and detached. Beside her, Alyson heard Olivia say in a low voice, “Eat. Shit. And. Die.”