“Move it, we have to go.”
I blink my eyes open, only to see it’s definitely still dark. I shove the blankets off and reach up, rubbing my eyes. Why am I being woken in the middle of the night? At least, I think it’s the middle of the night. For all I know, I might have only been asleep for an hour or thirty minutes.
“Go?” I croak.
A hand curls around my upper arm and pulls me up.
“Everything I do, you’ll do with me. I don’t trust anyone as much as I trust myself. Something has come up, and I have to attend. You need to come with me.”
“What time is it?” I groan, rubbing my head as Dimitri pulls me from the bed.
“It’s three a.m.”
I sigh. Well, at least I slept for longer than I thought.
“What could be so important at three a.m.?” I ask groggily as he leads me down the hall.
“None of your business.”
“Of course it isn’t,” I mutter.
Dimitri leads me quickly through the house, taking hold of a coat just before we exit the front door. He tosses it at me, and I wrap it around myself. There’s a cool breeze out tonight, and it causes a shiver to rush through my body. I hurry quickly to Dimitri’s SUV and there I see the two guards are waiting.
Don’t they ever sleep?
The dark-skinned one opens the door for Dimitri. “Are you ready?”
“Ready. Let’s go,” Dimitri says sternly, before slipping into the driver’s seat.
I am shoved into the back and my body protests angrily. I’m tired, my knees are wobbly, and my eyes are drooping. I rest my cheek on the glass window, and my eyes drop closed as the car jerks to life. I very vaguely hear the discussion going on between the men, but I don’t care to figure out what it is they’re talking about.
I’m exhausted.
It’s not okay to be dragged out of bed this early.
We drive for about an hour before coming to a stop at an old warehouse. This particular warehouse is at the end of an alley and is crawling with people. Who in their right mind is awake at this time willingly? Dimitri stops the car and leaps out, bouncing side to side like he’s hyped up full of energy. I stare at him with a look of confusion.
“You stay by my side,” the guard says. “If you try to run, it won’t end well.”
“So I hear,” I mumble, following him as he moves inside behind Dimitri.
Dimitri is let inside as though he’s a VIP. I stare around the massive warehouse as we jostle our way through the people, and I’m quite surprised. It’s in good condition. There are lights on the ceiling that are so bright I have to squint. The smell of sweat, alcohol, and something quite pungent fills the air. People are yelling, throwing cash around, and bellowing names toward something I can’t see.
Dimitri shoves through the crowd until we reach a rear door. He pushes it open and we step inside. I glance around, taking in the small room. It’s got a row of long benches and lockers. It seems darker in here after standing in the intense lights outside. Dimitri turns and uses his fist to hit one of the lockers. It pops open and he rifles through it, pulling out a couple of bandages.
“What is this place?” I ask, still quite fascinated.
“It’s a fight club,” Dimitri answers, unraveling the bandage and then proceeding to wind it back up over his knuckles.
“A fight club?” I dare to say, not really wanting to know the answer.
“People come, they pay, they watch a fight.”
“And you’re here because . . .”
He turns to me, his eyes deadly. “Because I’m going to fight.”
“What?” I gasp, feeling my eyes widen. “Why?”
“I need information. I’m an exceptional fighter. It works.”
“How does fighting get you information?”
He grins, but it’s not pleasant. “I don’t take the money; instead I use the resources of the clubs. The money they gain from me winning my fights is enough for them to tell me what I need to know. It’s a win–win.”
I stare at him, completely shocked. “You fight for information?”
He shrugs. “Basically.”
“Why? It clearly hasn’t worked for you or you would have found Hendrix sooner.”
His eyes harden. “I never said all the information I get is reliable.”
“And you’ve been doing this for how long?”
He shrugs. “Five years.”
I shake my head. “How does one get into a fight club?”
“I was angry, I liked to take it out on things that were getting me into trouble. A friend told me about these fight clubs. I came to one, loved it, got out my frustrations, and decided to keep coming back. I had a talent for it. Then I gained contacts and found out that I could not only relieve my anger, but also get any information I needed. It became my way of tracking down Hendrix.”
I frown. “Why?”
He grunts. “Sit down, stop asking questions, and behave while I do this.”
Behave?
Seriously?
“What do you think I’ll do,” I mutter. “Fight my way out?”
He ignores me as he reaches down, lifting his shirt and removing it in one swift movement. My mouth drops open. It takes me a solid three seconds to convince my brain to close it again. Dimitri’s body is huge. No, wait, that just doesn’t seem like the right way to describe it. It’s . . . epic. He’s a mass of muscle and bronze skin. His shoulders are wide, narrowing down to a set of well-defined and sculpted hips and a killer ass. I bite my lip and look away.