Fight or Fall (5 page)

Shutting off the shower, I stepped out of the stall, grabbed the blue towel, and walked towards the metal locker. Since one fight was scheduled per month and most likely only one fighter would be returning to the locker room – walking and breathing on his own anyways, I had no problems letting it all hang out while getting ready for the party that the winner was required to attend. I’d rather go home and catch up on some sleep so I can train again tomorrow, but I guess I had signed up for this. I’d rather be at a party than at a hospital any time of the day.

Before reaching the locker, I suddenly felt tired. I dropped the towel on the bench and sat down. The clock on the wall showed 9:48. I had twelve minutes to get ready and meet the highfaluting assholes who were betting for me and against me. I wrapped my arms around my neck and bent my head down.

When did my life get reduced to this? How could I mess up everything? How could I do that to him, to her, to them?

Lost in my own thoughts, I barely heard the gasp from behind me. Barely. Who would be here? Everyone who’s anyone would be busy mingling and drinking their overpriced champagne while they gloated about the fight. I gave them a hell of a show. I knew they’d be talking about it.

“Sorry…” her voice came out as a shocked whisper.

I twisted my body around, facing the door.

Instead of hightailing it out of here, she slowly walked towards where I was sitting, her cheeks turning pinker with each step, her eyes directed at my head. I bet she just figured out that the only thing between me and the bench was the towel, no other articles of clothing present. Standing a few steps away, she stopped in her tracks, her hands fiddling with the small bag she had on her right shoulder, and her face almost full-on red now. In a small voice she said, “Hi, Swimmer Boy.”

It took me a second or two to respond to her. “Prissy Princess.”

Her cheeks burned and she turned her head to the right, avoiding any more visuals of my current state of glory. “Umm…umm…I think I better go. I’ll see you upstairs.”

She turned on her heels, the quick movement causing her right shoe to get caught on the back of her other shoe. I jumped over the bench and caught her upper body before she completely fell on the floor, encasing her in my arms. Just as I was about to help her up, I felt a stirring down below. Fuck. I was completely naked still. Well, it wasn’t my fault that she was trespassing in the Men’s Shower Room.

Her head was still downcast, her hands were caught in between my grip. She slowly turned her face up towards me. Her gray eyes, the color of stormy clouds, looked worried. “Did he hurt you?”

I pulled us up to a standing position, ensuring that I had a solid hold on her waist.

“He’s the one saying hi to the doctors right now,” I said, trying to collect my thoughts and make sense of what was happening right now. This was Ava. The woman who could make my blood boil and my veins freeze at the same time when she rained insults on me.

She was tall for a woman, but at 6’4” I was still almost a head taller than her. I lowered my gaze to hers, and she bit the inside of her cheek, a small frown forming on her face. “I saw that brutal punch to your side… You need to get checked, you might have internal bleeding...the kidney’s a tender organ.”

My dick was a tender organ, but now it was becoming hard as fuck.

She stepped away, obviously feeling my undeniable erection between us, my hands feeling the loss of her skin close to mine. Since when did Ava make my dick stand up and follow her around? Since forever.

She vexed the hell out of me. The snobby little way she lifts her brows whenever she sees me, the smirk that forms on her face when I called her “Prissy Princess,” and the way she had to counter everything I say. She’s the woman I wanted to throttle and spank until the next full moon. But by holy motherfucking irony, no one could make my dick stand to attention faster than her.

Ava. Avalea Troudeau
. My sister’s best friend.

One time, Leif Sturgen, my buddy of German descent who swam for the U.S. Swim Team, my teammate before I was banned, asked me, “If there is one woman, one girl, who you could describe as the image of perfection, of beauty, who would you say it would be?”

An image formed in my mind the instant he asked. It wasn’t of my ex-girlfriend, Dia. Not even of that supermodel, Adriana, who was pretty close to perfection. The image that my brain produced was that of Ava’s. Some girls had great asses, okay legs, and a so-so face. Some had great legs, alright tits, and hmm face. An algorithm could be produced as to probabilities of different combinations of assets of beauty. I’ve watched Ava grow into a stunning woman. She might cause my veins to pop out in annoyance and anger, but I couldn’t deny that Ava’s a trifecta.
Perfect ass, amazing rack, and never-ending legs.

“Milo…” Her unsure voice broke through my thoughts. “Are you okay?” She was now bending down on the bench that I had left earlier, picking up the blue towel. Her gold dress slid up higher, showcasing her ass. She straightened herself up, handing me the towel. I noticed that she didn’t let her eyes wander down below my waist.

I took the towel from her, wrapping it around my waist, nodding my head in thanks. “I’m okay. I just need to change.”

She gave me a small grin, her right hand hanging against her side while her left hand fiddled with her shiny purse. “Don’t take too much time getting pretty. It might take forever.” A tiny laugh followed her statement as she sauntered towards the door.

To say I was floored about what just happened would be an understatement. I knew her father owned Troudeau Enterprises. Hell, everyone who had internet access knew who her father was. I just didn’t expect her to come see me after a brutal fight, buck naked, and for her to leave like nothing happened.

After the swimming scandal I created, everyone looked at me with either disdain, pity, anger, or disappointment. But Ava, even with the slight awkwardness between us because she caught me off guard and without clothes on, she looked at me with the same haughty stare, with a hint of an underlying insult waiting to be thrown with the slightest provocation. I didn’t know if it was relief or awe that I felt, but somehow it was a nice feeling to have – that she still saw me as the same Milo, before I had compromised my values and my honor.

In her haunting, piercing gray eyes I saw
me,
a small part of me I thought I’d lost.

“Sweetheart, can you please get me champagne?” Her grating voice was annoying the shit out of me. I shouldn’t have invited her in the first place. To make matters worse, she was clinging on my right arm like I was her lifeline. She needed to phone a fucking friend or I’m going to dump her ass in front of a crowd. Again.

“Dia, listen. Stop calling me sweetheart. I retracted that privilege when you slept with another guy.
Goddamnit,
stop clinging on my arm or I’ll be looking for a new accounts manager the second we get out of this party,” I warned in a hissing whisper, brushing my hand out of her way.

She huffed and her clawing arm left my side. One of the stupidest decisions I’ve made in the past few months was keeping her as my accounts manager for the foundation. But she’s the only one who could keep a secret like this. After all, she helped me start it when we were in college. As much as I hated her being involved in this, she was great at what she did. So great that it was her call that woke me up from my state of stupor three months ago.

“Fine. I’ll get my own champagne. You’re no fun, Milo.” Her green eyes glared in equal parts annoyance and dejection. Years ago I could barely stand having those eyes look at me with the slightest bit of irritation. I bowed to her every wish, followed her like a dog, and refused to listen to any of the rumors circulating around the University of Connecticut about her. I thought she was a fiery, beautiful woman whose temper matched her blazing red hair, her signature red-hot lipstick, and glowing emerald eyes. She helped me tide over the loneliness I had felt being away from my Aunt Margie and Bee by offering a soothing shoulder and a helping hand when I told her about my plans to start the foundation.

During the first five months of our relationship, she was an ideal girlfriend – cooked me breakfast, folded my laundry, and worshipped my dick. On the sixth month, I remembered it like it was a bad case of diarrhea, she became the witchy, bitchy, girlfriend. She started demanding promise rings and became crazy when I didn’t call her right away. She’d leave a minimum of thirty voice messages and hundreds of text messages when my phone was off – she couldn’t understand the fact that I couldn’t answer my phone
while
I was trying to win swim meets.

I tried to break it off with her three times before the last straw. I can admit that I’m not the easiest guy to be around. My temper could probably bend metal, and when I’m angry I don’t hide it. I let everyone, the whole world, know it. Dia managed to break past my defenses since the night I met her at a frat party. She stood out from all the women around. She was gorgeous and she had the fire and the intensity that I craved. I liked being around her. She made me forget about the tragedies of my past and made me think that I was just a normal college kid having a good time with his girlfriend. She was the first woman, outside of my family, that I’d really liked.

Until one day, she stomped all over me and broke my trust. She admitted to me, after I came back from the U.S. Open Aquatics Championships in Irvine, that she had made a mistake kissing another guy. It took a week for me before I could talk to her again. And the guy she kissed? He had a hard time eating on the right side of his mouth for two weeks. I forgave her because I cared for her. We make mistakes, we forgive, and move on.

But the second time she did it? There was no way in hell she was going to get back in my bed. She slept with my biggest rival, Kieran Stone. Leif was the one who told me about the rumor after another member of the U.S. Swim Team saw Dia coming out of Stone’s hotel room in the early morning hours. It took Leif, Darnell, and Chuck to hold me down so I wouldn’t pound on Stone’s door and imprint his face with my fists. When Dia met with me a few hours after I’d heard of her betrayal, I wanted her to tell me it was all a lie. But then she had acted like nothing happened and didn’t even breathe a word to me about it. My mother taught me to respect women, and my father instilled in me never to lift a hand to a girl. But I swear, that day, I wanted to smack her, shake her so she’d tell me the truth.

When you betray me, you better put your shoes on,
no,
forget the shoes, and run out the fucking door, because I’m never going to get past it. I gave her a chance, forgave her once. But the second she slept with him, which she admitted after crying her eyes out and almost losing her voice in begging for my forgiveness, she signed her release, her sayonara papers from me. Because when she slept with him, she broke every single piece of respect I had for her as my girlfriend. And that cannot be retrieved. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, I’m a stupid bitch. Not gonna happen.

“That was a great fight son.” I followed the source of the commanding voice. I wasn’t his son. I was my father’s son. For now, though, he was my boss.

Facing him, I shook the left hand he extended. “Glad you think so. I do try my best.”

He waved his right arm, his eyes tracking someone inside the room. “The next ones might not be so easy.”

Was he mocking me? Easy? That fight was not easy.

I stared at him, his face was now lined with something I couldn’t quite place. Maybe it was the calculating gray eyes or the coldness in his demeanor. He emanated power and he knew how to use that power. Maxwell Troudeau was a man not to be messed with. Not only because he basically owned Vegas, but because he practically had everyone at his beck-and-call. I happened to see how the senators, celebrities, and grown-ass men and women in this room clamored for his attention, even if they tried not to be obvious about it.

I swirled the white liquid in the small glass I was holding in my left hand and raised it to my lips to chug some down. Jean Marc XO’s still one of the finest vodkas in the world. French wheat and charcoal created this distilled masterpiece. It slid down smooth, easy, and only with a small amount of burn inside my throat. Alcohol was not my friend, but on occasion I indulged in some. Right now, anything that would help reduce the pain that I got from a recent beating helped. Scotch was next on the menu. The good thing was that Dia drove – the only reason why I invited her tonight. I knew I was going to win. Even if I hadn’t known who I was fighting, there was no doubt in my mind that I’d be the victor. Now, the condition that I’d be in and how I’d look after the fight – that was a question I couldn’t answer, so when Dia offered to go with me, I agreed. She wanted to stay at my place too, but there was no way in hell that was going to happen, so she would be dropping me off before going on her merry way.

My eyes involuntarily tracked the location of my designated driver when it inadvertently landed on the figure of a woman whose gold dress did her body justice. Her hair, silky and shiny, a welcome sight in this roomful of blondes, bald men, and toupees. She was immersed in a conversation with a tall guy who seemed enraptured by her presence. They were standing a few feet away from the bar area, but even with the distance between us I could tell that the dude had the hots for her. It was in the way he blocked other people from talking to her, his gaze not leaving hers, and the possessive hold that he had on her right elbow.