Always with You (WIth You Trilogy) (13 page)

Saturday, 3rd August 2013

I shouldn’t have been surprised to see Jake caught in a screaming match with some guy I didn’t really know. I’d seen him at matches and the gym a few times but never spoken to him. He was sort of unpleasant and made crude jokes about everything. I knew he’d made some racist comments to
Grayson and Rab that had alienated him from a lot of the group.

The rest of my family was moving in Jake’s direction, the protective instinct kicking in.

“Say it again, asshole!” Jake yelled to the guy, shoving him back.

“What’s going on, Evan?” Simon pushed forwards and stepped between the two of them, his attentions on the guy Jake was glaring at.

“Say it again!” Jake repeated.

I glanced at my brothers, they were all ready to pounce. I’d recognise their stances anywhere.

“Evan?” Simon demanded, shoving the guy back a little bit as he tried to move closer to Jake with an ugly sneer on his face.

“Kid can’t take a joke, that’s all,” he shrugged, plastering the most insincere smile that I’ve ever seen on his face.

“What happened?” I whispered to Alex, shuffling round to stand by him. Jake had been sparring on the mat next to Rab so Alex had been watching.

“Jake stopped to chat to me and that douche said something. I didn’t really hear what he said but Jake didn’t seem to like it,” Alex blushed.

The crowd started breaking up and returning to their mats, my brothers lingering a few seconds longer just to be sure.

“You okay?” I asked Jake quietly, resting my hand on his still-clenched fist.

He nodded briskly and I handed him a bottle of water. After a few seconds, he broke eye contact with Evan and turned back to look at me, his face still red with anger.

I knew that Jake backing off was actually him taking the high road for once. Unfortunately, Evan didn’t seem to get that and muttered “cock sucker” as he walked past. I wasn’t sure if it was aimed at Jake or Alex but Jak
e wasn’t having it either way. He launched himself at the guy and punched him square in the jaw.

Jake wasn’t really as big on martial arts as my brothers. He was trained because they made him train and he kept in form so that he could keep up with them when at home, b
ut it had never really been a big area of interest for him. For this reason, I didn’t consider it particularly smart for him to launch himself at a guy who outweighed him by a good stone.

Evan slammed his fist into Jake’s ribs and he stumbled backwards. The blow looked harsh and I winced for his sake but I doubted it was even close to what he was used to and he recovered quickly. I was still reluctant for him to get hurt so
, without thinking twice, I put myself in between them.

“I don’t want you to get hurt, Jake,” I whispered, watching my brothers gather round again. “This was meant to be fun.”

“He was being a dick to Alex,” Jake grunted, his eyes locked back on Evan who was smirking, clearly thinking he was winning the physical and mental battle taking place.

“Need your girlfriend to prote
ct you?” Evan laughed, eyeing me viciously.

I suddenly understood why Karl thought my outfit was too tight, his eyes on me made my skin crawl.

“She’s my sister, you asshole,” Jake scowled, testing my strength as he pushed against me, trying to get back to Evan.

“Really?” His eyes lit up. “Wonder if she’ll be as good a shag as your mum.”

My world stood still. I felt sick to my stomach with guilt, anger, and repulsion. The ripple of twisted emotions flowed through me and through almost every other person stood by us. With one single sentence, he’d managed to piss off almost every person in the room. My brothers, Jason, his friends. Every single one of them looked about ready to kill Evan.

In slow motion, they all lunged towards him. I was closest though and I got there first. I was suddenly very grateful to Jason and my brothers for teaching me Krav Maga over the recent months and for very different reasons than I had been previously.

There’s a scene on Big Bang Theory where a girl described Krav Maga as “a hundred different ways to rip a guy’s nuts off.” I must have missed those lessons, but right then I wished I’d learnt every single one. I settled for kicking him in the balls with all my strength and enjoyed immense satisfaction as the guy dropped to the floor.

I’m not sure if I would have been so lucky if I hadn’t caught him off guard. The guy outweighed me at a ratio of two to one but I wasn’t exactly worried about him retaliating because an eager queue was forming to decapitate him.

I contemplated kicking him again, but I really wished I was wearing the pointy high-heeled shoes I’d had on that morning. They would have been great fun to stomp with. I was beaten to the punch though. The twins were already pulling him up from the floor and dragging him towards the back exit, followed by the rest of my brothers.

I lef
t them to it. I felt like I’d had my revenge and it was their turn. Besides, I needed to calm down.

“Jamie,” Jason said cautiously, taking me by the shoulders. “Are you okay?”

I nodded slowly, still feeling a little disorientated. It felt like my body had been temporarily taken over by somebody else.
I don’t do things like this
.

“That was…” he paused and pulled my chin up gently to meet my eyes. “One of the hottest things I have ever seen,” he grinned mischievously and I couldn’t help but laugh a little. He wrapped me in his arms and I took a few deep calming breaths and
a dose of Jason whilst I waited for my pulse to settle.

“Se
riously though, are you okay?” He asked, his brow wrinkled in concern.

“Yeah, I just… I was angry,” I admitted, a little ashamed of my actions.

“I don’t blame you,” Jason nodded, his lips quirking up slightly. “He deserved it.”

“Damn, girl!” Grayson
chuckled, coming over to give me a hug. “Remind me never to piss you off!”

I laughed and returned his hug and then went to make sure Alex was okay.

“I could get used to the Carter family running to my defence,” Alex swooned.

By the time I’d hugged him, I’d cooled off a little and my brothers were filing back into the room looking surprisingly relaxed which meant that Evan was probably lying outside in a bloody mess with a few warnings floating around in his head about staying the fuck away.

“Jellybean!” Danny laughed. “We’ve taught you well.”

“I’ve never been so proud,” Rick agreed. “Seriously, you could graduate with a first and it still wouldn’t beat that!”

“Thanks,” I grinned, turning to face Jake. “Sorry, Jake. I should have just let you kick his ass.”

“No worries,” he laughed. “It was way more entertaining watching you do it.”

I grinned back and Karl called everyone in.

“That solves one problem,” Matt announced to the group. “At least we’re even numbers now.”

A couple of the guys laughed, seemingly relaxed. Nobody appeared to be bothered and I got the sense that most of them had thought he’d had it coming.

There were twenty fighters in total, so the winnings were £200 and a few of the guys seemed eager to start. I thought it was a pretty dastardly plan since my brothers probably already suspected that one of them would be the one to win.

Since there were no judges, the rule was that the match was over when one player tapped out. After five minutes, if neither fighter was obviously dominating, then they’d get a one-minute break and start again.

“What’s Jason’s secret
weapon?” I asked Ben.

“He didn’t tell you?” Ben looked up at me with apparent amusement.

“No,” I shook my head and pouted a little.

Ben just grinned back and I recognised the glimmer of mischief that was so like his brother’s. It was then that I remembered Ben and Jason’s history with fighting.

“It’s you!” I exclaimed excitedly. “You’re gonna use your math voodoo on him.”

“Shh!” He grinned. “Don’t give away
our trade secrets,” he winked.

I giggled and set myself up for an amusing afternoon. The guys all put their names in a hat and then ten of them drew names to select who they would be fighting first. One person from each of the first ten fights would be eliminated straight away. The same would be true for the second round, leaving us with five fighters and a total of ten fights to establish a first, second
, and third place winner.

Any tension left from the unpleasantness seemed to have disappeared and the room buzzed with an excited energy. There were two training cages, so for the first round, there would be two fights fought simultaneously. Elise and Hannah were keeping track on a large whiteboard whilst Grace slept happily, blissfully unaware of the testosterone filled atmosphere.

The difference between some of the fighters was staggering, they’d never usually have been put up against each other. However, these fights would be over quickly and rely heavily on luck. If you were paired with a much stronger fighter in the beginning then you’d have no chance, but you could face the same fighter in the final round and he might have exhausted his energy and put up little resistance. It would be interesting to see.

As the fights started, I
could see Ben studying each of them with a curious interest, his eyes following each fighter’s movements. Jason watched as well, just as intently.

My brothers were doing the same. They were fans of the ‘know your enemy’ philosophy and weren’t about to pass up a chance to lear
n what they were up against.

Some of the fights were over pretty quickly. Simon had picked Tony’s name out of the hat and I swear he’d ha
d him tapping out in less than thirty seconds. It was impressive to see. Craig had picked Danny’s name out which lead to an interesting fight. They sparred with each other often enough that they knew each other’s styles. The twins had been instrumental in teaching Craig a lot of what he knew, but Craig had picked up quickly and I suspected that, one-on-one, he could win. It took the full five minutes, but eventually he got Danny to tap out.

They were fine about it afterwards, Danny only seemed bothered by the fact that Rick had progressed to round two and he hadn’t. By the third round, only five fighters remained: Rab, Josh, Simon, Karl and Jason.
This will be interesting
.

The last nine matches were some of the best yet. Unfortunately for Rab, he wasn’t so lucky. He lost all four of his matches, but Alex looked eager to console him and he just seemed happy to have gotten to the final round. Simon won one, Josh won two, and Karl and Jason had each won three matches, leaving them alone in the final match to decide a winner.

“Third place,” I beamed at Josh, giving him a hug. “Not bad, big guy.”

“Thanks, Jamie,” he smiled happily back and joined us, ready to watch the final.

“Come on, Gracie, let’s watch Daddy kick some ass,” Elise grinned, rousing Grace from her nap.

“What if he loses?” I teased.

“Then Grace will learn a valuable lesson about being humble,” she grinned. “But he won’t.”

I smiled, kissed my beautiful ni
ece, and went off to talk to Jason before the final fight.

“You’re kicking ass today, birthday boy,” I grinned.

“Thank you, beautiful,” he smiled, scooping me up in his arms to kiss me.

I noticed Ben was at his side and seemed anxious to talk so I left the two of them together to do their voodoo thing. Whatever it was, it was working so far, but I wasn’t sure how much of it was down to
Ben, and how much of it was down to Jason’s impressive training routines.

“You alright?” I asked Craig, joining him next to the cage. He’d been paired with Karl in the second round and he’d been eliminated
after a very close fight.

“Yeah,” he smiled a genuine smile. “I wasn’t expecting it to go any differently.”

I nodded in understanding. Karl worked training the best of the best in the UK and abroad, there was no shame in being beaten by him. I just hoped Jason would understand that.

“Jason’s been holding back so far,” Craig nodded his head towards where my boyfriend was still chatting with Ben.

“I think he has a plan,” I grinned.

“I hope he doesn’t expect it to work,” Craig
shook his head with a wry smile.

“We’ll see,” I laughed.

I’d love it for Jason’s sake if he managed to win, but I knew Karl was incredibly talented. He’d not gotten his job through pure chance. He was the best of the best in hand-to-hand combat and he was no stranger to cage fighting.

There was an excited buzz in the hall as the two of them entered the cage. They bumped fists happily and Rick announced the start of the fight. Neither seemed prepared to m
ake the first move. I knew their styles well; both were much more inclined to let their opponent make the first move.

They circl
ed each other for a few seconds before Jason’s eyes met mine and I swear to god he winked at me just before he made his move