Ringside (9 page)

Sloane

“Do you like room
service?” he asked, the bruises on his face doing nothing to take away from the
sly little grin he flashed me.

It was no secret
that he lived at the Ritz, but I wasn’t ready to go home with him. For one
thing, I still hadn’t convinced myself that he wasn’t in on fixing the boxing
match I’d just watched, and for another…

Well, I just
didn’t know how to move that fast, even if I wanted to.

“Let’s just find an
all -night diner and hang out, okay?”

“Sounds good,”
Angel said.

But did it really?
I knew by how aggressive he’d been at the bar that he had the capacity to be a
total asshole about trying to get into my pants…

But then again,
when we’d chatted last night after he’d found me on the web cam site and saved
me from what could well have been a lifetime worth of regret and embarrassment,
he’d been so different.

We ordered. I got
a coffee and a slice of banana cream pie, and he went with water and pancakes.
I couldn’t help but smile as he drizzled them in maple syrup.

“What?” he asked.
“I’m a growing boy! I burnt a lot of calories in that fight, and I need to get
them back.”

“Go nuts,” I told
him with a laugh.

He took a big
bite, chewed, and then swallowed before watching me thoughtfully.

I tried to ignore
the fact that he was studying me, but when the look in his eyes got almost
wistful, I couldn’t take it anymore. “You going to just stare at me the whole
meal?” I asked.

“Sorry,” he said.
“I just can’t stop looking at you. I want you so bad.”

He reached out his
hand and caught mine. God, he was strong!

“Enough of that,”
I warned him, more than half joking. “After the beating you just took, there’s
no way you and I are doing anything tonight. With my luck, I’d end up with you
getting a concussion in the middle, or something.”

Angel wasn’t about
to be so easily dissuaded, though. “So you admit that it’ll happen then, just
not tonight…”

He had me there.
“Heal up and then we’ll see.”

Angel nodded,
surprising me by not trying to force the issue. I’d expected him to be pushy,
trying again and again to talk his ways into my pants.

I was happy that
he was playing it cool, but the way the fight had ended still bothered me.

“Angel…” I let my
voice trail off. How does one go about this sort of thing?

“Yeah?”

“The fight… Tell
me what you thought about the end of it.”

He shrugged. “I’d
like to be able to tell you how awesome it felt, that there was this moment of
clarity in the heat of battle where I saw my shot and took it. But I can’t.”

Was he about to
admit that he was in on fixing the fight? “Why not?” I asked.

“Because I was
almost gone. Out of it, you know? I just remember the impact of his punches
making my vision blur. I lashed out and got lucky. That’s all it was Sloane,
dumb fucking luck.”

I nodded slowly,
biting my tongue. I believed that he was sincere, but all that meant was he was
as duped as the rest of the crowd.

“What’s wrong?” he
asked.

“Nothing.”

“Bullshit. I
haven’t known you for long, but I’m starting to dread that look you’ve got on
your face right now. Whatever you’ve got to say, just spill it. I’m way too
tired to have to drag it out of you.”

I hesitated. The
truth would hurt, but I had a feeling that the deception would bite him on the
ass even harder than knowing what had really happened would.

“Come on,” he
prompted.

“Okay, here goes,”
I said. “But just remember, I’m hardly an expert on these things, okay?”

“Okay.”

“I mean, I’ve
never even seen a boxing match happen in front of my eyes, like that, so I could
be imagining things…”

“God, you’re
infuriating,” he said. “Just tell me whatever it is you’ve got to say, huh?”

I looked down at
my hands. He was still holding on to one of them, and he gave me a reassuring
squeeze.

My heart broke for
this guy. Maybe he’d been a manwhore in a previous life, before he met me, but
all he’d ever treated me with was some degree of kindness and generosity.

And here he was,
trying to give me the strength to tell
him
something as shit as thing I was about to say.

“I saw it happen,
Angel. I was over by Jessie, and right before you knocked out the big guy he
wasn’t even watching the fight. He was talking to some guys in suits he called
the Carellos.”

“Wait, what?”

I held up my hand,
eager to get all of it out before he had questions. “I dragged him away and
tried to get him to stop the fight. You were getting killed out there, though
obviously you’re tougher than I thought. Still, he wouldn’t hear of it. He kept
saying I had to have faith, that everything would work out.”

I took a deep
breath. Angel was clearly furious, but I pressed on.

“I was off to the
side, away from most of the crowd. I saw your last punch, Angel. You almost
missed him completely. I mean, you hit him, but barely. He went down like you’d
driven over him with a tank, but the whole thing looked staged to me…”

Angel withdrew his
hand from mine and cracked his knuckles. “That,” he said, “is going to be an
issue.”

Angel

I knew she was
right. Too much of it made sense. Too many things clicked into place when she’d
said it. The way Jessie hadn’t seemed surprised by the last minute change of my
opponent. The fact that I hadn’t felt that final punch…

That was the worst
of it. I hadn’t been able to enjoy the victory, and most of that was because
deep down I’d known.

I hadn’t wanted to
admit it, but I was right to feel hollow.

“Are you okay?”
she asked, clearly concerned.

“That’s a hard one
to answer.” I saw her face, and gave her a wink that hopefully reassured her.
“I’m not pissed off at you, that’s for sure. If anything, the worst thing about
this is that the only person I can trust is the one I’ve known for the least
amount of time.”

“Sorry…” she said.

“Don’t be. And
don’t get me wrong; I’m glad you’re on my side.”

She sighed. “You
just wish Jessie and the rest of the world were too?”

“I’m not holding
my breath for
that
.” I pushed the
plate of pancakes away, my appetite gone the way of whatever joy I’d felt at
winning the fight. “That fat little shit wouldn’t bother to step around my body
if he found me laying on the street. Still, I thought our best interests lay in
the same direction.”

“Maybe they still
do? I mean, I don’t know what they were talking about, so there’s every chance
that-”

I shook his head
angrily, cutting her off. “Now, this makes too much sense. There’s always the
chance that somebody like him ill hang you out to dry. I knew it from the
start. I’d just gotten too lazy to worry about looking after my own best
interests.”

Sloane lifted the
cup of coffee to her lips and took a sip. I was amazed that the cup came away
without a lipstick smear. With a mouth as red and inviting as hers, I was sure
there’d have been a metric fuckton of makeup involved.

But no, she didn’t
have time for games like that. She was the type of girl you either took as she
was or moved on.

I liked that.

No, I
needed
that…

“Thanks,” I said.

She cocked an
eyebrow at me. “What are you thanking me for? I just told you that you would
have lost a fight you thought you’d won.”

“Yeah, but you
only told me because you cared. That’s
new
to me, you know?”

Sloane gave me a
look that told me to cut the bullshit. “I saw home you came on to me, a couple
of nights ago. You’re used to girls falling all over your muscles, and don’t
tell me for an instant you aren’t.”

“Yeah, maybe,” I
said, “I’m not going to pretend that I haven’t slept with my share of easy
women. What I know for a fact is that none of them cared for me half as much as
you just showed you did.”

That caught her by
surprise. “So what, then? Are you going to take me back to your place like all
the other skanks?”

“I never brought
any of them home. I never showed them where I lived. I never called them back.”

Sloane rolled her
eyes. “Wow, you’re totally getting into my pants with an attitude like that.”

“This is more
about the truth than about trying to fuck you. I’d rather you know what I was
like before
now,
so when it isn’t
like that, when you see how I am with you you’ll know it’s the first time I’ve
been like that. Loving, and all.”

“You can’t know
that,” I said.

“I do.”

“You’ve just met
me.”

I shrugged. “It
doesn’t feel like that. Besides, and I know you’re going to get pissed off at
me for mentioning, but I’ve never done
anything
like that web cam stuff.”

I thought maybe
I’d played the wrong card when Sloane pushed the rest of her coffee away and
got up.

“Sorry,” I said,
trying to grab her hand. “I just want you to know that I’m different with you.
I
feel
different with you.”

Sloane tensed, but
she let me hold her hand even though she was standing and I was still in my
spot in the booth. “If I let you take me someplace right this second, Angel,
where would it be?”

“My place,” I
answered, without hesitation.

“Good. But let’s
go to my apartment anyway. I’ve got some stray cats that need feeding, and I
don’t think I could handle our first time being at the Ritz. Too much to live
up to, you know?”

I sat there,
dumbfounded. “Huh?”

She smiled,
slipping her hand from mine and heading toward the door. “I said pay the bill
and let’s see what you’ve still got left in you, after the night’s exertions…”

I leapt up, sending
the coffee cup crashing to the floor. It didn’t matter. I left enough money on
the table to cover what we’d eaten as well as a big tip and hurried after her,
unable or unwilling to believe my luck.

Sloane

I melted into his
body as my mouth opened up to him beneath his hot kiss. I heard myself moan
into his mouth ever so slightly, and for the first time in a long time my own
actions didn’t make me feel self-conscious.

His arms came
around me, and I couldn’t remember the last time I’d felt so
needed
. Yes, there was desire there too,
of course, but there was so much more.

His broad thumb
tilted my head back and his lips drifted down the side of my neck, making me
shudder deliciously.

“You don’t have to
invite me up,” he said into my ear, his voice dark and smooth. “We can go as
slow as you want.”

“It’s messy,” I
said, feeling lame.

“I don’t care.”

I put my hands
flat on his chest and pushed away a little, trying to get some space between us
to clear my head. I could hear my own heart pounding in my chest, and my breath
was coming fast.

“It’s just some
crappy apartment, Angel.”

“Good,” he said,
grabbing my hands and spinning me around so that my breasts were pressed to the
wall. Instinctively, I ground my ass against him when I felt his body press
close to mine, only to find that he was hard and ready for me.

“My place is
nothing like you’re used to.”

He nibbled the
nape of my neck and growled against my flesh. “You’re nothing like I’m used to
Sloane. I’m done with all that bullshit. Don’t hold the money you think I’ve
got against me. It’s all just smoke and mirrors. Shit like that comes and goes,
but I want you forever.”

My head was
swimming with lust, and for the first time in a long time my brain couldn’t
come up with a good reason to put in front of my desire.

I trusted Angel. I
didn’t think he’d hurt me, and I was tired of denying myself something that
felt so right just because things in the past had gone so wrong with others.

And his body felt
like heaven! His hands came up my body and cupped my breasts, his thumb and
forefinger capturing my nipples in amazing pinpricks of pleasure that pooled
between my thighs and made me pant with desire.

It was everything
that I had hoped it would be and more. My mouth opened and his found it, our
lips pressing against one another and our tongues intertwining.

He and I were
suddenly in a frenzy, tugging furiously at each other’s clothing and trying to
get into the apartment at the same time. I lived up three flights, and every
time I broke away to show him where we were going either he or I would return
to our embrace.

Was he going to have me right here in the stairwell?

“Listen,” I said
into his ear, fighting the urge to let my hand slide down his torso again and
brush his cock. I was able to stop myself somehow, but only just. “Let me have
you.”

“Of course,” he
said, and I saw a sly little grin on his face appear. “Not like that,” I said,
shaking my head. “I can’t do it like that. I need to be the one in charge, this
time. If you aren’t okay with that, I get it. But that’s what I need right now.
I’ve been… I’ve been hurt before and…”

The wicked smile
vanished from his face, and he grabbed my shoulders with a calm and gentle
strength that made the fire in me blaze into something even greater.

“Hey,” he said,
kissing my mouth hard to shut me up. “You don’t need to say anything else,
okay? You can tell me later, or you can never mention it again. Take me up to
your apartment and do what you’d got to do. I’m yours, and I’m willing.”

The fears, the
worry and the pain from my past fell away in a rush. I let my head fall
forward, my face in the crook of his shoulder as I let him hold me for a
moment.

Was this love? I
didn’t even know what that was anymore. I’d spent so long trying to avoid the
word, desperate not to put myself into situations where I’d be confronted by
it.

But now…

Now I wanted
Angel, and I knew Angel wanted me. The web cam had been a dress rehearsal, and
I needed to show him that I could be just as sensual when I wasn’t getting paid
for my services.

“Follow me,” I
whispered, turning around hurrying up the stairs, dragging him behind me by the
hand. “And hurry up!”