Fighting Chance (Misty Grove Book 1) (9 page)

Cassie laughed. “Judging by how hard I screamed, I’ll say you’re making a good case for it.” She sobered after remembering why she couldn’t do this with him. “Trent, this doesn’t change—”

“Hush.” He raised a finger to her lips. “Don’t say anything right now. We don’t have to call this anything at all. Let’s just take it one day at a time.”

“Okay.” It wasn’t, but she didn’t know what else to say after her orgasms decimated her mind.

He stroked her hair and face. “Also, I’m finding myself very possessive of you. You think while we’re trying to figure out what’s happening between us, we won’t see anyone else?”

“That sounds like a relationship.” Cassie frowned.

“I don’t think I can stand it if you fucked other people,” Trent stated bluntly. “My deputies might have to arrest me for murder.”

This was happening way too fast, and normally, Cassie would run the other way, but for some reason her instincts were telling her to take a leap of faith with Trent.

“I won’t sleep with other people. Believe me, that won’t be a problem.”

A dark brow quirked up. “Been a while?”

“A year,” Cassie sighed, and of course the caveman in front of her looked please. “And let me just warn you, he was also pushing for a relationship, so I don’t know why the hell I’m agreeing to this.”

“Orgasms.” He kissed her nose.

A car’s headlights washed through the windows. With the sun finally set, the living room was in twilight darkness.
 

“Shit,” Cassie muttered, noting her torn top. She pushed away from Trent and switched on the lamp on the side table by the couch. “Stay here, I need to throw something on.”

Luckily, her room was on the first floor and she was able to pull on a shirt, check her reflection—she couldn’t do anything about her just-fucked look—and headed back out to the living room just in time to see Wyatt square off a second time with Trent in less than a week. This time Lucas was with him, and it gave Cassie some relief that her twin could help keep the peace just in case tempers flared.

“What’s the meaning of this?” Wyatt asked angrily, his eyes cutting to Cassie disbelievingly when she joined them. “Cassie? Why is the sheriff here?”

“I don’t think it’s any of your business, Stratford,” Trent replied evenly.

“Was I talking to you?” Wyatt snapped. “Cassie?”

“Trent was visiting, and like he said, I don’t think it’s any of your business.”

“What did you just say?” Her manager narrowed his eyes. “You’re not thinking this through, are you, Cassie? Who suddenly appeared along the road when you got hurt to offer you assistance?”

“Why you sniveling son of a bitch.” Trent took an angry step toward Wyatt. Cassie pulled him back.
 

“Trent, I need to talk to Wyatt and Lucas,” Cassie pleaded. “Can you give me tonight to explain this to them?”

“There’s nothing to explain. It’s you and me.”

“What the hell, Cassie?” Wyatt sputtered

“And I’m not going to leave you alone with him.” Trent directed his glare at Wyatt.

“Please. They think you’re in Bowman’s pockets.”

“That’s just fucking ridiculous,” Trent snapped, but Cassie poured all the pleading into her eyes. She had to get him out of here. And it was tearing her up deep inside that what would happen next would alienate him from her forever.

Trent cupped her cheeks and kissed her hard. “You and me. Remember that, hellcat.”

“You and me,” Cassie said softly.

Uncertainty passed through his eyes, but she squeezed his hands to reassure him.

Trent reluctantly let her go, speared Wyatt with a withering look, and nodded at Lucas before he walked out the door.

Wyatt stared at her with unconcealed disgust. “You’ve now gone and fucked things up this time, sweet thing.”

“It wasn’t smart, Cassie,” Lucas said quietly. “We’re not sure where his loyalties lie. What if he was just using you?”

“He was persistent,” Cassie said. “I’m pretty sure he’s not in league with Bowman.”

“He’s got half the county women falling all over him. Why would you think you’re so special?”

“Fuck off, Wyatt, you’re making it worse,” Lucas said angrily.

“Worse? We have a tournament in two weeks, and Cassie has decided to hook up with the sheriff.”

“This is what it’s all about, isn’t it?” Cassie said. “You’re afraid Trent will bust your illegal business.”

“And whose fault would that be?’

Cassie didn’t answer. She couldn’t look at either of them, especially Lucas who had nothing but disappointment on his face.

“You know what needs to be done, right, Cassie?” Wyatt asked softly.

She nodded.

“You and Lucas need to disappear before the next match,” Wyatt continued. “It’s a pity we can’t show up in town and train at Foster’s, but I have a house outside of Buckland County where you two can practice until the night of the fight.”

“And if Trent comes looking for me?”

“Don’t worry, sweet thing.” Wyatt came up and touched her face the way Trent had earlier. “I’ll take care of it. I’ll find the perfect story for Mac to relate to your dear sheriff.”

CHAPTER SEVEN

No rules.
 

No gloves.
 

A fight until knockout. Or death.

Her overall standing was 20-1, but Cassie never killed anyone. She tried not to maim either, but sometimes when the opponent played dirty first, she wasn’t left with much choice. There were six fights tonight. Lucas’s was the main event, while her fight led up to it. It was almost midnight. The first fight lasted two minutes. The next three lasted longer.

Now she was standing in a fight circle lit up by tiki torches. Each contender was allowed to bring an entourage of no more than a dozen people. An unmarked van with video-communication equipment, together with several generators, provided the coverage needed to broadcast the fights on a secure website accessible only by invitation on the Darknet. One would look at Wyatt Stratford and think he was some rich redneck landowner from Georgia, but the man actually had an office in Brooklyn, NY where he employed some of the best hackers and programmers to keep this illegal part of his business under the fed’s radar. Probably why he was so pissed at the sheriff for sniffing around his prized fighters.

It had been two weeks since she’d seen Trent. After he had left the ranch, and Wyatt and Lucas had given her more lectures, she’d come to accept that staying away from him was in the town’s best interest. This morning when she’d checked on Mac about the ranch, he’d told her Trent had come by every day. And every day he had the same message. “She can’t hide from me forever, Mac.”

Trent was wrong. She’d been hiding for twelve years.

“You got this, sis,” Lucas said, coming to stand beside her.
 

“Of course, I do, Bear.” She grinned at her twin, who was covered in face paint same as she was. They still had to maintain anonymity.

Their attention shifted to the center of the circle, where Wyatt, as the promoter, was preparing to introduce the next fight.
 

“Showtime,” she muttered.

It all began with a death glare.

Trying to mentally intimidate your opponent.

Cassie always thought it was a moronic ritual, which she suffered through without bursting into laughter.
 

Her opponent, Jade “Scorpion” Tygs, had blonde, almost white, hair styled in intricate cornrow braids. She was an inch or two shorter than Cassie, but leaner all around. This woman was going to be fast.
 

Cassie was right.

As soon as the mediator—no referees really—dropped the red cloth, Jade started throwing out combination punches. A jab hit Cassie, which she quickly shook off, then faked left and right before nailing the other fighter with a hook. Jade staggered, but instantly spun and kicked out, which Cassie successfully parried with both forearms. The din of the crowd receded as they traded equal amounts of blows and blocks, but Cassie felt as if she was working twice as hard and Jade was simply playing with her.

This was pissing her off.
 

When Cassie was about to execute her signature judo hip throw, Jade anticipated her move by digging her feet into dirt. Before she knew what was happening, Jade lifted her by her torso and body slammed her on the ground.
Oh, that sneaky, speedy bitch!

Seeing stars and slightly dazed, Cassie was yanked to a standing position by her tightly knotted bun. She crossed her arms in time to block an oncoming fist and was about to deliver a punch of her own when her hair was released and she was immediately drop kicked into the crowd.

The spectators went wild when Jade dove in after her. Cassie, on the ground and on her back, managed to catch Jade with her feet and throw her over. The crowd gave them a wide berth as the fight transferred out of the circle, giving real meaning to the term “No Rules.” Jumping to their feet, they simultaneously charged each other and locked arms while sliding on the dirt. It was then Cassie felt the other fighter’s superior strength. Jade wasn’t even breathing hard. Her opponent’s triumphant grin starkly gleamed through all her facial warpaint. Cassie’s arms finally buckled and she was collared by the other woman and slammed once more into the dirt. This time, Jade straddled her, slamming Cassie’s head once on the ground before lowering her head.

“Don’t you recognize me, Scout?”

A pinprick burned in her diaphragm, and at first, Cassie thought she had been stabbed. She tried to focus on Jade’s face, which was rapidly blurring. The crowd was closing in, or was it her imagination? Cassie kicked her legs out in desperation and squinted at the woman looming above her. The eyes and maybe the lips could belong to ...

“Piper?” she whispered.

Blackness.

*****

It was 3:00 a.m. by the time Trent walked into the sheriff’s office. A bad pileup on the interstate called in most of his deputies to help out the state troopers managing the deadly incident. It was all hands on deck for first responders. Fire trucks, ambulances, and law enforcement types worked hand in hand to minimize casualties and fatalities.
 

His deputies were drained.

Trent approached Brooks, who was sitting in his chair with hands in his hair.

“You holding up, Brooks?”
 

His deputy shook his head. Trent exhaled heavily. He and Brooks had extracted a crying two-year-old from a wrecked SUV whose mother had perished at the scene. Those were the images from tonight that would forever be seared into their brain. “Go home and get some rest.”

“I don’t think I’d be able to sleep,” his deputy responded listlessly.
 

Trent nodded. He would talk to his department tomorrow to see if they’d like to seek some counseling. It was the same way in the military. Everybody’s trigger was different, but it was usually harder when it involved children.

His phone buzzed.

Frowning at who could be calling him at this hour, his pulse quickened when he saw that it was Mac. He had left his card with the ranch’s caretaker when Cassie disappeared two weeks ago.

“Mac?”

“Sheriff,” the man’s gravelly voice sounded distraught.

“What’s going on?”

“You have to come to the ranch. They don’t know what they’re doing.”

A chill settled in his gut. Trent was telling himself that he was simply tweaked from tonight’s events.

“Mac, you’re not making sense,” he tried to speak calmly. “Start from the beginning.”

“The fight. She won’t wake up.”

And just like that, his calmness shattered. “Has there been an attack again?”

“No, but you have to come now, Sheriff, before it’s too late.”

Trent was already heading for the exit.

The 911 lines were still busy, probably from frantic relatives and friends wanting to check on the victims of the Interstate pile-up, but Trent managed to get an ambulance to follow him to the ranch. He wasn’t taking any chances, and if he had to cuff her to the gurney, she was going to the damned hospital this time.
 

These past two weeks had been an exercise in patience and frustration. Sure, he might have come on too strong, too cocky, and pushy, but dammit, he’d never felt this overwhelming desire to stake a claim on a woman before. There were times when he had tried to talk himself into moving on, to convince himself it was the chase that kept him interested. He was only making excuses for himself. Trent didn’t know what this was. He knew they didn’t have a foundation, but they had a spark. Hell, they had a conflagration. The taste of her on his tongue scrambled his brain. When she asked him to leave, it was all he could muster in self-control not to club her over the head, throw her over his shoulder, and stalk out of that ranch house like a caveman. That was how it was done before anyway. Like 50,000 years ago.

And now she was hurt. He wanted, no, needed to protect her, and that was part of his frustration. She was so damned independent, he tried not to crowd her.

She won’t wake up.

Trent shook his head to maintain his focus. She had to be all right. He shouldn’t have left her when she had asked, but he’d have that discussion after he was sure she was okay.

The gate of the ranch was open and Mac waved him and the ambulance through. Trent’s body tensed when he saw Stratford pacing the house’s front porch with a phone to his ear. The man glanced up when he heard their vehicles, and even in the cover of darkness, he could sense the man’s displeasure with their arrival. But what made Trent’s blood boil over was spotting his own man, Frank Briggs, standing with Stratford, and he was in fucking uniform. Did he know where Cassie had been the entire time? He’d asked him if he’d heard from Cassie. One thing was for sure, Trent was done playing nice with the town of Misty Grove. He wasn’t a tyrant, but he wasn’t getting anywhere with everyone lying and hiding their allegiances, especially when it was someone who was supposed to uphold the law.

“Mac, you fool,” Wyatt hissed. “You brought him in, didn’t you?”

“Mr. Montgomery put me in charge of the ranch and those kids, not you,” Mac shot back. “I’ve put up with your bullshit for so long, but not anymore. Cassie needs to see a doctor.”