The Brawler Read online

  “Questioning me?” Pax growled, and Jackson paused, noting the threads of red in the man’s eyes.

  He’s tired, stressed, and it’s breaking him. Desperate to believe that, he discounted the suspicions his uncle’s anxiety and bloodshot eyes provoked. He rejected the memory of Aly telling him that Pax had been “jumpy” on Christmas. He tried his damnedest to not look at his uncle and see a trace of his mother.

  “Want the money back?”

  “No.” The money Jackson didn’t miss. Pax was a grown man, his elder, his uncle, his trainer. But where was the money? In the gym’s safe? A business account?

  Pax raised you. He saved you. He gave you this life. Don’t doubt him.

  “I manage this gym my way, Jackson.”

  “Okay, I can respect that. Now get out of my way.”

  Jabs, footwork, snapbacks. Stay graceful and merciless. Bar outside distractions—including his trainer—from his head.

  But Pax was too close, interference he couldn’t shut out. Load that left leg going into the hit! Protect your chin! Bring down that elbow or you’re open for the body shot that’s gonna make Brazda champ!

  Pax came around, yanking the heavy bag to the side and hurling the newspaper to the concrete floor. “Anyone at Club Indiscretion that night could’ve gone with Aly.”

  “I was the one standing in front of her when the kid made contact. I was there, I had a car, and I could protect them both.”

  “You’re not that guy, Jackson. The hero, the man to count on. You ain’t built that way.” Pax released the bag and it swayed slowly on the hook. “You’re the reigning champ—the machine.”

  “The machine wouldn’t save an innocent kid from getting murdered on Lagoon Rock Road? The machine wouldn’t protect his woman?”

  “She can’t be yours,” Pax said wearily. “She’s nobody’s woman. In fact, she’s everybody’s woman.”

  Jackson stepped around the bag, ready to defend, ready to damage. “When you talk about Aly like that, you’re no longer my trainer, no longer my uncle.”

  Pax said darkly, “Your fight’s not against me. It’s not even against Brazda. It’s against you.” He bent to sweep up the front page of the newspaper. “You claim Aly now, but after MGM Grand, you can’t give her anything. You’re the champ because this life beats all else. My sons went for the marriage thing, but they’re not champions. C’mon, man, you tried to have that life with India, and it almost fucked your name beyond repair.

  “Aly’s got her heels dug deep in Las Vegas with her family and the football team, and now she’s got a runaway under her roof. You can’t have the strings—not even a beautiful one like her.”

  Can’t have. Restrictions, catches, limitations—he resisted them. A future that didn’t intersect with Aly’s looked hazy, vacant.

  I don’t want to lose her. Or the man I am when I’m with her.

  “I’ll defeat Brazda,” he said, severing the confrontation. “But I’m not the machine.”

  “Then what the hell are you?”

  “A man.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  In the days that followed since Aly had opened her home to Maddie, the praise and criticism and questions ratcheted her annoyance to unimaginable heights.

  The media wanted a piece of her any way they could get it—through family, friends, the Villains, Faith House volunteers, and even celebrities she’d been photographed with at various social functions.

  They wanted the story, the salability of a Las Vegas party-girl washing her reputation clean by rescuing an abused system kid. Critics congratulated her “brilliance” while touting theories that Maddie’s crisis was no more than a damage control tactic to boost the Villains’ team image in light of new allegations of corporate corruption and misconduct.

  Approaching the NFC championship matchup, the game that could usher the team to the Super Bowl, the Villains needed hype and support.

  Sports media outlets incessantly juxtaposed what was at stake for Las Vegas’s pro football team and champion boxer. Potentially, both could claim victory within a week of each other.

  The nation watched her and wanted her to talk. Did she feel a sense of power to be at the core of Las Vegas’s professional sports? Could she describe her relationship with Jackson Batiste? Would she return the child she rescued to Clark County after the NFC championship game and after Jackson’s fight?

  No, no, and no. No, she didn’t feel “power” in her designated role on the Villains’ publicity team, or as someone who’d never watched an entire Jackson Batiste fight. No, couldn’t describe how or why she and Jackson had let themselves become so complicatedly entwined with each other knowing it’d all unravel after his MGM Grand main card event.

  No, she would not return Maddie to circumstances the girl feared, as though she was the publicity stunt cynics suggested.

  Maddie wasn’t a story—she was a child so loving and loyal to her foster mother that she’d never asked for help.

  Watching the girl sit in a treatment cubicle and describe what her foster mother’s son had done—frightening her, throwing out her clothes, laughing at her screams as he raped her—had sickened Aly to the point that she’d rushed to a restroom.

  Then she had seen to it that Maddie could make a choice. That Maddie had chosen her was as surprising as the fact that despite how pissed she’d been at Faith House, the kid had trusted Aly enough to call her for help.

  Giving Maddie a safe harbor was the right action. No matter how dead-set her family was to prove she was wrong. Even Veronica, who’d worked legal wizardry at the hospital, experienced a mini-freak-out when Aly announced plans to become Maddie’s caretaker.

  Primed to tell the next person who tried to control her life to go fuck themselves, she braced herself when Jackson arrived at her gates. She’d been expecting her friend Leigh for dinner—and moral support for her first Big Parenting Moment.

  Maddie’s health teacher had informed Aly that during the girl’s absence from school the class had studied the human reproductive system. Aly imagined a classroom full of cringing and joking teens, but the teacher had implored her to do the responsible thing. Maddie wasn’t just a young teenager. She was a victim of sexual assault.

  Since she’d never explained sex to anyone, Aly had made good use of UNLV’s library and LVCCLD and loaded her Audi with books on the subject. At the last minute, she’d decided it couldn’t hurt to incorporate the sex-talk method her mother had used when Aly was a kid: using dolls as visual aids.

  Agitated that Jackson would choose now to swing by, when she had a BPM to tackle, she opened the door and said, “I decided I’m not a fan of the pop-in.”

  “The what?”

  “Pop-in. Visits with no heads-up.”

  Jackson gave her a steady look. “Aly, a foster kid’s in your place. The county needs to check up on things. You’re going to be getting good and familiar with the ‘pop-in’ as long as she’s here.”

  Good point, damn you. “Well, that should ease up once I complete my training hours. I’m checking everything off my list. Fingerprinting, background check, home inspection—”

  “You’re committed,” he said with enough sincerity to scrape away some of her preloaded grumpiness.

  “I am. I was the minute I agreed to bring Maddie here.”

  “I came here to ask if you’re sure this is right for you.”

  “Please don’t you try to talk me out of this. Everyone else I know has already tried and failed. I’m giving her the chance that Pax gave you when he took you in.” She reached for his hand, and automatically their fingers laced. “C’mon in. I’ve been cleaning and sprucing things up. Maddie tells me the house looks like a catalogue. I’m thinking that’s a serious compliment.”

  In the living room, Jackson paused, dropping her hand. “A Christmas tree? You put up a Christmas tree after Christmas?”

  “A winter tree.” She explained what Maddie had told her about
Christmastime at her foster mother’s place. Aly had bought the frosted artificial pine not to attempt to give the girl the holiday, but to offer the spirit of the season.

  It had remained bare until yesterday when Maddie had written the word kindness on a piece of paper, threaded a ribbon through it and hung it on a branch. Without comment, Aly had followed Maddie’s example, adding forgiveness to the tree.

  Neither had added one today.

  “Did someone make hot wings?” Jackson asked, sniffing the air. “Wait…You cooked?”

  “I did. Why do you sound turned off?”

  “I’ve heard awful stuff about your cooking—” his laughter was low, teasing “—from you.”

  “Recipes, patience, and the chef-in-training who lives here now are making a difference.” Aly sighed when his large, strong hand found hers again. “Sharing my life with this child and Rabbit, it feels right. But I miss us.”

  It’d been too long since he’d kissed her, since he’d inspired her to consider something outside the fairy tale her life had suddenly deviated from anyway.

  Husband, baby, puppy. She had a bunny, a teenage foster daughter, and a lover who’d be swaggering out of her life in a couple of weeks.

  Edging close, he repeated her words. “I miss us. There wasn’t supposed to be an ‘us.’ But we couldn’t beat this.”

  Send him off when no one could put that kind of need in his voice but her? Let him leave Las Vegas without telling him she loved him? How the hell would she do it?

  “We’re having dinner in the backyard, once my friend Leigh gets here,” she said. “Say hi to Maddie? She’s been wanting to thank you for helping me find her. If she’s super-skittish, don’t take offense. You’re a man. After what she’s been through—”

  “It’s okay. I get it.”

  When she led him into the kitchen and Maddie, who was still managing a sprained wrist, rushed him, Aly’s choices were to leap off to the side or be smashed in the middle of a hug.

  She leaped.

  “Thank you,” Maddie said, squeezing Jackson tight. “You care about people. On TV, they never say that.”

  Jackson met Aly’s gaze, laid a fist against his chest. A goner, just as she’d been the night she traipsed into Faith House with takeout pizza from Soixante Neuf.

  “I think he’s hoping for a free meal,” Aly told Maddie. “Should he stay?”

  Nodding, Maddie pointed to the cooktop. “I’m making the sauce, from a recipe my foster mom—uh, Renata—taught me.” She showed him a page in her worn photo album.

  “Solid recipe,” he commented. “Worcestershire—I respect that. Ever consider adding molasses? If you’re not too worried about spiciness, you could make a decent zesty honey-molasses sauce.”

  Maddie stared. “You can cook? Cook well?”

  “I hold my own.” With a grin for Aly that made her heart flip and flop, he asked Maddie’s permission to check out the rest of her recipe collection.

  And for the first time since Aly had met her, Maddie beamed.

  When Leigh arrived on her Harley, clad in black leather, Aly met her in the foyer with, “Dolls?”

  Leigh feigned a smug smirk. “Def.” She held up a pair of Barbie dolls and a pair of Ken dolls, all new in pink boxes.

  “Why so many?”

  “I assumed you’d cover all bases—hetero, gay, bi, poly…”

  “Great, now put them away. BPM has been postponed until after dinner. We have another guest.”

  “BP what?”

  “BPM. Big Parenting Moment.”

  “Who belongs to the massive SUV?”

  “Jackson Batiste.”

  “Why is America’s sexiest boxer in your house?”

  “He’s a family friend and he wanted to see how Maddie’s holding up.” That was part of the truth, anyway.

  Excited, Leigh let out a tiny fan-girl squeal, stuck the dolls behind throw pillows, and proceeded to nab Jackson’s autograph for her boyfriend.

  Over dinner in the custom-built-for-kickass-entertaining backyard, all had been calm and the conversation light until somehow they swung onto the topic of boxing legends.

  Perhaps it wasn’t entirely coincidental that Aly lost her appetite as she thought about the physical risks Jackson would court in the ring with Czech Republic hero Eliáš Brazda and reminded herself that fight night would end her relationship with Jackson.

  When nausea threatened, she excused herself to a bathroom, retched, and waited until she could pep-talk herself to a more upbeat mood.

  When she reemerged, she found Leigh and Maddie facing Jackson on the terrace, mimicking a boxing stance.

  “Are you teaching them how to fight?”

  Jackson broke his stance to adjust Leigh’s fist. “A few basic moves, a couple of pointers in awareness and confidence. It’ll help them defend themselves.”

  “What about running?” She’d always run, could always count on her legs to take her away. They had before. “Escalating a situation with violence isn’t the way.”

  “What if you can’t run, Aly?”

  Leigh tapped Maddie’s shoulder. “Dessert’s in the kitchen, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Then we should be in there.” Giving Aly a raised-brow look that begged, “What’s wrong with you?” Leigh ushered the girl inside.

  “Maddie ran afterward. He said he’d kill her and she ran…” She leaned against a stone column, resting under the wash of golden light from a sconce. “I ran.”

  “When?” Jackson was in front of her, his expression grave yet pleading. “What happened?”

  “New York.” The words fell on a sigh. “Freshman year of college. I was at a bar with some friends. We flirted for drinks, but we weren’t there to fuck.” She reached out to trace a button on his shirt. Concentrating on that button, she let herself speak again. “A man kept sending me drinks. I got bored, and since my friends weren’t ready to take off, I split. He followed me outside, tried to charm and guilt and threaten me into having sex with him.”

  Aly gripped the button. “All I could think was, ‘No, he’s not my choice. This isn’t my choice.’ When he hit me and forced my panties down, I just knew he’d rape me. The violence was so terrifying. I ran, though. I got away.”

  “Name? Did you get the name?”

  “So you can hunt him down?” She shook her head. “I didn’t get his name. The girls I was with convinced me to shut up about it. If the university or our families had found out we were at a bar underage, if we’d admitted to flirting for drinks… Can you imagine? People would’ve said the slut got what she asked for.”

  “You didn’t ask to be assaulted.”

  “It was a while before that really sank in. I promised myself no one would take away my choices. When I came home for Christmas, I chose you. I wanted you.”

  Only her attempt at seducing him had splintered like crystal.

  “The media says I’m out of control, but I’m out of everyone else’s control—not mine. Because I make my own choices. Sometimes they’re not the best, sometimes they are.” She shrugged, felt herself smile thoughtfully. “But they’re my choices.”

  “Did you ever tell J.T. or Joan—”

  “God, no.”

  “Aly—”

  “It’s a choice, to not know what they’d say. To not know if they’d—if they would blame me.” She rocked forward, gearing up to walk away, but his arms opened and she found herself walking into his embrace instead.

  “I don’t blame you,” he said.

  “I know.” I’m not simple to understand and you’re not afraid to try. It’s a reason I love you.

  “Gotta get back to the gym, but think about this. Fight or flight is a choice. Fighting’s violent, but it’s another way to protect yourself. If your friend and Maddie want to see it that way, it’s their choice.”

  As much as she craved to resist it, it was another good point. He seemed to have an endless
supply of those.

  After he left, Aly turned away from the door to see Maddie behind her holding up the doll boxes.

  “If these are for me, you should know that no one in my grade plays with these unless they want to be laughed at.”

  “Aly, problem. I can’t find Barbie and Ken and their partners,” Leigh called out before she stopped in the foyer. “Oh. Cancel that SOS.”

  “Please tell me you guys don’t play with dolls.”

  Hell’s bells. Aly took a Barbie and handed Leigh a Ken, and they opened the boxes. “Okay, here’s the thing, Maddie. Your health teacher let me know you missed the sex ed lesson. And considering that Patrick—”

  “Don’t call him by his name,” the girl protested sharply, her eyes large and dark with a rage that seemed bottomless as she threw the doll boxes onto the floor. Would she heal, even in time?

  “What should I call him?”

  “Douchebag. Monster. Nothing at all.”

  “Okay,” Aly said. “Considering your safety, your space, and your body were violated, I thought I’d clarify things. Answer questions. The dolls are props.”

  “Props?”

  “It’s how I learned about sex.”

  Maddie scratched her head. She was sporting a wrap while her sprain wrist healed, but Band-Aids no longer covered her cuticles. “It’s too late to tell me about sex. Been there, hated it.”

  “Stop, Maddie. You did not have sex. Not willingly. It was assault, an act of evil.”

  “You stop. Can you and the police and counselors and the kids at school please stop forcing me to remember over and over?”

  Words fled Aly and she could only nod.

  “You’re only trying to help, I get it. But everything he did, the trauma the doctors talked about …” She shook her head. “Instead of fighting him off, I passed out. I woke up naked and bleeding and sticky. I was so scared. I hate that I didn’t fight him. And the stuff I do remember, I don’t want to remember. It hurts. I’m exhausted hurting all the time. I just want to hang out and watch TV and laugh.”