Beat (The Beat and The Pulse #1) (16 page)

“Ren Miller.”

He tapped his chin
and said, “Ren the Reign of Terror Miller. Sounds fuckin’ awesome.”

My eyebrows rose.

“Everyone gets a name
in these parts. Not everyone wants their real one flung about.”

That sounded like a peachy
keen idea. “Drop it, then.”

“Reign of Terror?”

I began to laugh, not
really believing that I was going to go through with it. Ash was going to blow
a gasket. “Sounds fucking stupid, but that’ll do it.”

“Done. I’ll come get
you when you’re up. Make sure you’re out here.”

“Got it.”

I turned on my heel
and froze when I caught Ash staring at me. I sauntered over to him, staring at
his naked chest, reading the words of his tattoo again. Rage. Heart. Rebirth.
The sentiment echoed deep in my heart.

“What are you doing
talking to him?” he asked, eyes dark.

“What, I can’t talk
to anyone?”

“No.”

“Eat shit,” I said.
“I had some questions.”

“Fuller,” a loud
voice called out. “You’re up in two.”

I glanced at the
referee who I’d spoken to and he was waving Ash forward. My stomach started to
squirm knowing I was about to see my Maverick loose in the cage.

Ash sighed heavily
and wrapped an arm around my waist, dipping his head to the crook of my neck.
He breathed deeply, the flat of his palm against my stomach. He’d wrapped his
hands in white bandages and the only thing I could think of was the fact that
in a few minutes they’d be stained red.

He practically hauled
me back out into the arena and sat me on the bleachers before he entered the
cage. I understood that he was ‘the man’ here, but the moment he crossed the
threshold of chain link, he seemed to transform into something else.

The crowd screamed
his name, but he didn’t even acknowledge them. For the first time, I began to
really understand what he meant about letting himself go. About getting the
thing he needed from this place. It was the only way he could sate the anger
that lived in his heart.

When his opponent
entered the cage, my heart began to hammer erratically in my chest. The guy was
a monster, just as ripped as Ash, but he looked a hell of a lot meaner. How
could Ash fell that guy? He had skills, but I wasn’t sure about this.

I couldn’t pick who
would be hauled out of there in a stretcher and uncertainty prickled all over
my skin.

I didn’t have time to
throw up, because the referee was talking to the two men, his hand raised
between them. Then the whistle blew and it was game on.

Ash’s opponent wasted
no time in taking point and landed a fist right into Ash’s forehead, splitting
his cut open again. If I was fighting against him, I would’ve gone for the weak
spot, too. Blood began to seep from the wound, but it didn’t seem to faze him
at all. Ash closed in and uppercutted his fist into the guy’s stomach and when
the guy doubled over, Ash’s knee connected to the soft spot underneath the jaw.
The impact made his opponents teeth clack together, making me wince.

I hadn’t seen Ash
fight since the day Dean had tried to take him on at Beat. Compared to the way
he fought now, that day had been
nothing
. He’d totally let go and any
will he had to reign himself in was just gone. He pounded his fists into his
opponent again and again, the crowd screaming for blood.

My heart was in my
throat, but I didn’t have anything to worry about. That guy was no match for
Ash. Not by a long shot.

Ash hooked his leg
around the guy’s shin, toppling him over and at the last second, curled his
fingers into his hair and shoved. Bone connected with the ground, making a
sickening smack that was audible over the hurricane of noise around me. It was
a totally illegal move in the real world, but this wasn’t the pros with its
rules and regulations. This kind of thing flew here.

The guy tried to get
up, leaving a splatter of blood behind, but fell back down. He was dazed and confused
as Ash circled like a shark, blood thick in the water.

Fuck,
tap out
, I thought, my
fingers tightening around the bench.

Ash loomed over the
guy, fists clenched at his sides, chest heaving. He was wild and feral and my
body began to stir in response.

A hand slammed into
the mat, desperately trying to tap out and the crowd started pounding their
feet into the bleachers. The referee ran in from the side and grasped Ash’s
hand, holding it in the air. He allowed it for a moment, before wrenching away,
striding for the exit. Coming for me no doubt and my pussy began to clench at
the thought.

It should've scared
me, the beast that he’d unleashed in that cage, but it had the opposite effect.
Ash was the flame and I was the moth.

The referee from
before tapped me on the shoulder, breaking the spell. “You’re up after this,
Ms. Terror. Can’t wait to see what you’ve got and neither can they.” He nodded
toward the crowd. “Fresh meat always gets the crowd foaming at the mouth.”

I swallowed hard and
nodded. “I’ll be ready.”

“What the
fuck
was that?”

I spun on my heel and
found a mostly naked, sweaty and bleeding Ash standing behind me, a gaggle of
fake titted women fawning in the background. For a split second I felt fear
course through my veins, but at the sight of all those women trying to get
their claws on his dick, I saw red.

“What does it look
like?” I glared at him, not caring that the cut over his eyebrow had split open
and was bleeding into his eye.

“You’re
fighting
?
Why
?”

“I have my reasons,”
I hissed, turning to go out back and find a place to stretch and get ready.

Ash grabbed my arm
and jerked me back into his chest. “I won’t let you.”

I shoved him away.
“Do not tell me what I can and cannot do, Ash.”

“This is why I didn’t
want you to come,” he moaned. “I knew you’d…Ren, don’t.”

“Ash, you told me the
one thing you’re good at is fighting. Well, guess the fuck what? It’s the only
thing I’m good at, too. You can try and stop me tonight, but you won’t stop me
forever.”

He reached for me
again, but I backed out of the way and shoved through the crowd and into the
change rooms. A few curious glances found me as I stripped down to my tank top
and undies, glad that I’d worn boy shorts that day. It seemed to be the
accepted dress code between the women fighters in this place, so I didn’t feel
exposed in the slightest. I snatched up a roll of tape, just as Ash shoved his
way into the room.

“I don’t want to
fucking hear it,” I hissed at him.

Kneeling before me,
he took the tape and grasped my wrist. “It’s been five minutes and you’re
already killing me,” he whispered as he began taping up my hands, obviously
resigned that he'd lost this round.

“How do you think I
felt, watching you take that beating just now?”

He glared at my
hands, refusing to meet my eyes. He was pissed at me. “A man should protect his
woman from getting hurt.”

My whole body began
to tingle. “I’m your
woman
?”

“Of course you
fuckin’ are, Ren. I thought I made myself clear that once I got a taste, I
wasn’t letting you go. I can’t.”

“Then you should know
that I come with a whole fucking load of willpower, Ash Fuller.”

He laughed, but it
never reached his eyes. “You know more of my secrets than anyone else, Ren.”

I bit my tongue. I
didn’t know shit about his secrets. He wouldn’t tell me why he got kicked out
of pro, he wouldn’t tell me who was on the phone, he wouldn’t tell me anything
at all. He just got angry and deep down that’s who Ash Fuller was. Just an
angry son of a bitch. I wanted him to prove me wrong.

The ringmaster’s
voice boomed over the speaker in the change room, breaking us apart. “It’s time
for the woman’s league to have their fifteen minutes of fame.” The crowd roared
as Ash and I stared at each other. “Rogue versus our freshest, meanest, meat,
Reign of Terror!” Feet thundered in the stands, muffled by the walls around us.

“Reign.” The referee
stuck his head in the door. “Get your ass out there now. Two minutes or you
forfeit.”

I stood and began walking
into the tiny little arena, striding toward the cage. No fear.

“Ren.” Ash grabbed my
hand as the crowd caught sight of us and cheered. Sweat was still running down
his skin, beading over his tattoo. He looked wild and sexy and I wanted nothing
more than to fuck him right then and there, but I had to do this one thing
first.

“You heard the man,”
I said, nodding at the ringmaster. “Reign of Terror.”

Ash grasped my face
in his big paws and said, “Ren, you can ease into this. You don’t have to dive
in headfirst.”

I gazed into his
green eyes and smiled. “All or nothing, Maverick.” Lifting a taped hand, I ran
a finger over his lips. “See you on the other side.”

“Don’t,” Ash pleaded,
his fingers curling into the wire mesh as the cage door was shut between us.

I glanced up at him
and smiled. I was going to be okay, but the look on his face expressed
everything he was feeling and it was something deeper than panic. It was a kind
of fear I knew all too well. It was the fear I lived with every single day
until Mum died in my arms. It was the fear of losing someone forever.

Ash had nothing to
worry about. I was his, even if he didn’t seem to know it yet.

“You're going down,
bitch,” the woman who went by Rogue hissed at me.

I shrugged, loosening
my shoulders. “We'll see.”

She was a wild, built
as fuck Asian woman with long black hair done up in a high ponytail. Her name
suited her and I squashed down the nagging voice in the back of my head that
was telling me that this was a bad idea. I was shorter than her by a head, but
that meant she had to keep her guard lower to compensate. I had enough bounce
in my heels to get past if I was quick about it.

Jab. Guard. Feign.
Punch.

I could feel Ash's
hard glare burning into me from outside the cage. I'd deal with him later, it
was my time to live and damned if I was letting a man dictate the terms. I
couldn't give a flying fuck how talented he was with his dick.

The ringmaster held
up his hand between Rogue and I, readying us for our bout. First one to tap out
or be rendered unconscious. I could do that. I wanted to do that. She was so
far up her own ass there was a chance that she'd underestimate me and that was
the thing I was counting on.

It was my turn to
draw blood.

There was a shrill
whistle and it was game on.

Chapter 27

Ash

Rogue landed a fist
right into Ren's side and my stomach twisted.

I swear I felt her
pain as she stumbled and the crowd roared. I was in a bubble of agony watching
her fight. I couldn't protect her in the cage and I couldn't stop her from
getting hit.

Fucking
hell, Ren. Why'd you have to defy me?

She recovered quickly
and didn't waste any time lunging with her elbows out. Her leg hooked around
Rogue's while she was distracted by the frontal attack and Ren felled her with
effortless precision.

All that training
with the men in the classes at Beat had paid off. She knew how to take down
guys a lot heavier than her and she made it look effortless. My eyes widened as
I realized there was a chance she could actually win this thing. Rogue was
third on the scoreboard and the season was a few weeks from the championship
fight.

My Spitfire was
fucking 
good
. I knew she had skill, but that was at Beat where
everything was controlled. This was The Underground where control was a dirty
word. Rogue was the meanest bitch there ever was and wouldn’t make this easy.
Of all the fighters out there, they had to pair my Spitfire with that bitch?
Fuck. I shouldn’t have brought her here. I should’ve been strong enough to keep
saying no.

Ren fisted her hand
into Rogue's top, hauling her half off the ground and let out a roar. Her fist
hit the woman right in the temple with a smack that made me wince. Hands
flailed wildly, scratching and biting at her legs, but it didn’t seem to bother
Ren in the slightest. I knew that look and it wasn’t good. She’d tasted blood…
fuck
.

Ren’s fist slammed
into Rogue's temple a second time and the crowd went bat shit crazy. Spitfire
drew back and looked at the white tape on her hands and seemed confused to find
it smeared with red. The referee slid onto his knees next to the two women, his
hand in the air waiting for Rogue to move, but there was nothing.
K-fuckin'-O'd.

I smashed a fist into
the chain-link. She'd fucking 
won
. My Spitfire had a heart of 
fire
.

The crowd was going
mad, stomping their feet, screaming 
Reign of Terror.
 Ren was
laughing, shaking her head in disbelief like she didn't think the ref would be
holding her hand up. He turned her around, so the crowd could get a look at the
woman who'd come out of nowhere and felled one of the top place getters.

God, I felt high on
her.

A figure loomed in my
peripheral vision and I suppressed a groan. It could only be one person and
they'd be here for only one reason - to rain on my fuckin' parade.

“Fuller.”

I felt vomit rising
in the back of my throat. “Hammer.”

The last time I saw
Hammer was when I was looking down on his bloody pulp of a face. No regrets. I
warned him and he didn't listen. He got his ass handed to him on a weekly basis
and it was the thrill of my life paying him back. Glaring out the corner of my
eye at the six foot six monster, I noticed he was still as ugly without all the
swelling and red stuff.

I'd been kicked out
of pro, but he forfeited. I wasn't sure which one was better, but at least I
didn't chicken out over an injury.

“She's a sweet one,”
Hammer growled, nodding at Ren who was talking heatedly with the referee. “How
much does a whore like that cost you, Fuller? I'd like to fuck a woman like
that. A bitch who can fight.” He scratched his filthy balls.

Red. All I could see
was red. “Keep your fuckin' hands off her, Hammer.”

His lips curled into
a sneer I wanted to sucker punch right off his stupid face.

“She looks like she'd
like it hard.”

Rage flared hot in my
stomach and I fisted my hands into the front of his shirt, wrenching him close.
“We're not in pro now, asswipe,” I snarled. “You lay one finger on Ren and I
will snap you in half.”

“Hey!” One of the
referees shoved between us, breaking us up before shit got nasty. “If you guys
have got beef with each other, fight it out in the cage. Keep it out of the
stands or you'll lose points. Got it?”

Glaring at Hammer, I
spat. “Got it.”

I didn't give a shit
about the points, I was far enough in front of second place to be free and easy
with a couple. Ironically, second place was the dead shit known as Hammer.

He stared me down
just as hard and we both knew that when we finally met in the ring for the
championship bout, there would be no second chances. We'd beat each other
within an inch of our lives. The Underground was a place where lives could, and
had been, snuffed out.

Hammer broke our
standoff first, a sly smile on his face. “I'll see you in the cage, Fuller. You
better fuckin' bring it.”

“Wouldn't dream of
leaving it behind.”

My guts started to
squirm. I'd just let the asshole know how much I cared for Ren and I wouldn't
put it past him to try something. This was exactly why I didn't want to bring
her here. They'd try and get to her and it would be all my fault...
again
.

Spinning sharply on
my heel, I turned into a sweaty and glowing Ren. Fuck, she was beautiful. My
cock started to harden and I resisted the urge to drag her into the back and go
at it.

“Who was that?” she
asked, glancing around me.

I flung an arm around
her shoulder, breathing in her scent. “No one. Absolutely no one.”