“That doesn’t explain why his hands are on you.”
“I walked into him…he kept me from falling. Really, it’s fine, it was my fault. He wasn’t bothering me at all.”
I watch his face as he deliberates over the information for a few long seconds, sizing up the man standing in front of him. Relieved when I see his jaw relax slightly, I exhale a long breath I hadn’t even realized I was holding.
Vinny takes a step back, and nods to Jax, “Sorry man, I read it wrong. I see a lot of crazy shit down here.” Pulling me to his side, he wraps his arm around my shoulder possessively.
Jax nods back, and I think maybe we all might walk away unscathed, until he opens his mouth. “No problem. Don’t blame you for being protective of Liv. You’re a lucky guy.” Jax smiles a cocky grin at me.
Is he insane? Or perhaps he has a death wish. Vinny’s grip on me tightens and I brace for his response...concerned it won’t be a verbal one. Luckily, Preach steps out, calling Vinny’s attention away for a few seconds, so he misses Jax’s wink at me.
Seriously?
“Gotta go talk to some reporters. You ready?” Preach catches sight of me on the other side of Vinny and smiles, “Our boy looked good out there, huh, Liv?”
I can’t help but smile at Preach, even though I’m still freaking out inside at the two men standing in front of each other. “That he did.” I smile up at Vinny, and I’m rewarded with a proud smile. His arm slung around my shoulder slides to the back of my neck and he squeezes it lightly, turning me toward him, taking my mouth in an unexpected kiss. He doesn’t care that two men are standing within feet of us, forced to watch as he kisses me senseless, and eventually, I don’t care either.
Releasing my mouth with a low growl, I turn to find Jax still standing there. His cocky grin is gone, replaced by something I can’t read. Jealousy perhaps?
“Alright, alright, you two can celebrate in private later. Let’s get this show on the road, lovebirds,” Preach teases.
Vinny begins to lead us away to follow Preach without so much as a word to Jax. Never one for being rude, I turn my head to say goodbye, “Take care, Jax,” and I feel every hair on my body stand on end when I look past Jax and find Senator Knight stopped at the other end of the hall, eyes locked on Vinny.
Chapter 32
Vince
The exhibition behind me, I need to focus on my upcoming fight. A shot at the belt. And a real shot at it too. Junior Lamaro. He drops his left, leaving himself open to my power right. He’s tough, but wrestling is his strongest discipline. Keeping away from the ground is the key to my winning.
I should be in the gym tonight, practicing my technique, but instead I’m in a f**king bar I haven’t visited in almost a year, looking for dirtbags that helped drag me down. Drug addicts. Dealers. Total f**king losers. Guys I used to consider my friends. Friends that were only too happy to keep me as f**ked up as them when I was footing the bill.
I can’t seem to focus on what I need to with my mom’s shit still hanging over her head. Over both our heads. As usual, when her own self-induced pathetic life drags her down, I grab her and try to pull her out. Most of the time it winds up dragging me down with her.
The first three guys I talk to haven’t seen Jason in weeks. Guys that aren’t tied down to much easily disappear off the grid. But I’m finding this f**ker. Probably beat him till he’s barely breathing for making me waste my time chasing after his ass when I should be training. The last breath I’ll let the two goons keeping tabs on my mother take care of.
A hand reaches around from behind me and grabs my groin. She’s lucky I didn’t respond with a punch, most of the time my reactions are automatic. It’s work for me to stop and redirect against something I’ve spent years training to respond to. Grabbing the hand reaching for me, I turn to find it’s attached to Krissy. Great, just f**king great. Could my night get any worse?
“Where you been, Vince?” She rests her two hands against my chest. I remove them quickly.
“Busy.” Turning my back to Krissy, I find her friend close behind me. Like two pack wolves, they box me in. I’m pretty sure the friend gave me head in the bathroom when I was at my low, getting high every day. I don’t even remember her name. Not that I care to anyway.
“Hi, Vince,” her friend purrs.
“Not interested.” Not here, not now, not ever again.
“I can make you interested.” She reaches up, makes it close to my mouth with her long red fingernail, but I catch her hand in mine before it touches me. Squeezing her little bony hand too hard, I think how easy it would be to f**king crush it, so I force myself to let go. But she gets my point.
“You know, Vince, the two of us could make you forget whatever is bothering you,” Krissy purrs from behind me. It makes me wonder how I ever stomached being with her. “We have enough for the three of us to party.”
Finally, something she says gets my attention. “You know Jason Buttles?”
“Maybe.” Krissy smiles, rocking back and forth. She’s being coy and thinks it’s cute, but it’s not, I find it god damn annoying. But I know how women like her work. I’ll get more from her giving her what she wants.
Turning to give her my full attention, I wrap one hand around the back of her neck and lower my face to hers as if I’m about to kiss her, but I don’t. I smile instead, “Can you get in touch with him?”
“Probably.” The two hands I removed from my chest are back, but this time I leave them be, even though it disgusts me to have them there.
“Do that for me.”
She pouts. “Why should I?”
My other hand snakes around her waist and pulls her close to me. “Because I need to talk to him. And once that’s outta the way, I can party with you ladies,” I lie.
She leans into me, bringing her mouth even closer to mine, she expects me to kiss her. No f**king way I’m touching that with what I got now. I pull my head back. “Call him.”
“He doesn’t have a phone.”
Who doesn’t have a god damn phone? Yesterday I saw the f**king homeless guy that lives on the north side of Nico’s gym talking on a cell. “How do you get in touch with him?”
“Beeper.”
Beeper? What is it, nineteen eighty-two? “Beep him.”
Pulling out her phone, she spends a minute pressing buttons and then smiles back at me. “Done”
Great, now I have to wait with these two.
An hour passes and Jason never calls back. I’ve kept the two of them strung along enough to keep them close, but far enough away not to have to actually spend time talking to them. Luckily for me, a few guys from the gym come in, helping to pass the time.
But I’ve had enough waiting around. The loser is probably passed out somewhere or doesn’t have a damn quarter to use a payphone and call her back. “Listen, I have to run. If you hear from Jason, call me, okay?”
“What about our party?” Krissy pouts.
“I’m gonna have to take a rain check until I hear from Jason.” I’m out the door before either of them can respond.
Chapter 33
Liv
After work today, I finally unload my whole story on Ally over a glass, no a bottle, of wine.
“So do you think it was a coincidence that they were at the exhibition match?”
“I don’t know…Jax is a fighter, not professionally, but he sounded pretty passionate about it. It wouldn’t surprise me if he had tickets. The arena was just outside of D.C., so when I first saw him, I thought it was a coincidence.”
“What changed your mind?”
“The look on the Senator’s face. He was just staring at Vinny.”
“Maybe he’s a fan?”
I take another sip of my wine and close my eyes, remembering the look on Senator Knight’s face. “It was more than that. Something just tells me he knows.”
“So what are you going to do?”
Collapsing back onto the couch, I look at my best friend. “I don’t know Al, if I give the water bottle to the paper to test, they’ll know the results and it won’t matter what I decide. They won’t wait for me to write a story.”
“So have the results tested yourself. Take something of Vinny’s and put the two samples into a lab under a fake name. Find out for sure before you go crazy trying to decide what to do.”
“I guess I can do that.”
“Do it. You never know…maybe it really is all one big coincidence. The blue eyes, the fighting…everything. Stranger things have happened.”
I attempt to smile at my best friend. “Thanks Ally. I feel so guilty keeping it from Vinny. But I don’t want to hurt him. He loves the memory of his father. I can’t explain it…he just believes that’s where the good comes from in him. I can’t tarnish that memory if I’m not absolutely sure.” And I’m not even sure I can do it if it turns out to be absolutely true.
“Look at it this way. If it is true, at least it’s you, and you can protect him from what the paper would do if it was someone else writing the story.”
***
I get little sleep, tossing and turning half the night, guilt wreaking havoc on my brain’s ability to power down. Trudging into the office, barely making it on time, even though I’ve been up for hours, I’m greeted by an overly zealous fake smile from Summer.
“Morning, Olivia.” Summer’s smile is full of sugar, yet far from sweet.
“Hello, Summer.” Taking the high road, I respond professionally, as if she hasn’t spent the last three weeks ignoring me and slamming things every time I was near.
“How’s Vince?”
What the hell is she up to? “He’s great, thank you.” I somehow manage to maintain my professional demeanor.
Sitting on the edge of my desk, she folds her arms over her chest and crosses her long skinny legs. “Had dinner with Daddy last night.”
“That’s nice.” I pull out a file and power up my laptop, trying hard not to feed into whatever game she’s playing.
Leaning down to me, she whispers through her smile. “Can’t wait to see how much he likes your little story.”
Feeling the sting of tears behind my eyes, I stand, blinking them back before allowing Summer to see them. The thought of yet another person knowing such a powerful secret about Vinny crushing my spirit, I force anger to replace the sadness I’m truly feeling. “I’ll admit, when I first met you, I was a bit jealous. Such a beautiful girl, with all the right connections. But after getting to know you, jealousy has turned to pity. Why don’t you stop worrying about my life and get your own, Summer. I’m sure there are plenty of men that are into skinny, self-loathing, and desperate.”
I pack the laptop I was just firing up back into my bag, no way I can sit here all day and look at her. Catching sight of Sleezeball out of the corner of my eye, I plaster on a cheery face as I continue quietly. Venom bleeding out from beneath my smiling lips, I warn, “Keep the hell away from Vinny.”
Smiling back, looking thoroughly satisfied for ruffling my feathers, she responds through gritted, perfect, white teeth, “I’m a patient woman. Someone’s going to need to help him pick up the pieces when you tear him apart. Might as well be me.”
***
I spend the day working back at my apartment, finishing off a story that I owe and researching labs that do DNA testing. Printing off a list, I decide the first few are too close. Maybe putting some miles between my life and the lab will make it feel less risky.
My phone rings and Vinny’s voice calms me, even though he’s the subject of everything else in my life that brings tension these days. “Hey.”
“Hey, Beautiful.” His voice warms me after a long day of feeling cold.