Battlescars (12 page)

The man examined the check and pulled a few bills from his wallet to slip inside the black folder. Handing it off to the waiter, the man reached over and laid his hand on hers one more time. They stood up together, and Kayla gave him a warm hug before he walked away.

She sat back down at the table and fiddled with her water glass. The man headed toward Dyson and walked right past him, not even acknowledging the man on the sidewalk. Dyson got a good look at him, though: tall, fit, and definitely handsome in a very classic way. He also looked more than a little cocky, which certainly rubbed Dyson the wrong way. He wondered if the guy was so arrogant because he was pleased to have won the attention of such a beautiful women. Had he won her affection as well? Kayla and her mystery man were clearly close, and since Dyson knew that she had no family, he was certain that Kayla must have been playing him – juggling Dyson and this man at the same time. Filled with fury, Dyson decided that he had seen enough.

He turned on his heel and walked quickly down the sidewalk toward his car, trailing the guy toward the parking lot. He watched as the man climbed into a sleek black Mercedes and turned out of the drive toward the college. Was he a professor? He certainly wasn’t some lowly maintenance guy. Dyson climbed into his beat-up Volvo, nearly as old as Kayla was, Dyson figured, and sat there for a long moment, thinking.

He shook his head, trying to dislodge and banish the images he’d just seen. He knew it was futile to try, but he just couldn’t stand to think about Kayla, laughing and embracing her lunch companion. Obviously she felt very comfortable with the man, who had been allowed to touch her without her pulling away. She had laughed with him, a warm and hearty laugh, the kind of laugh that Dyson yearned to coax out of her. This man hadn’t been treated coolly, like she had treated Dyson at first. Instead, she acted like this guy was an old friend.

But if he was just an old friend, why hadn’t she explained the meeting to Dyson?

What was there to hide?

Everything
, Dyson decided. There was
everything
to hide.

Damn it to hell! He knew not to trust people, didn’t he? He already knew that it wasn’t hard to believe the best of people, only to have them shatter you illusions. He had learned that lesson firsthand in Iraq, where people he thought he could trust inflicted terror and pain on the very people they should have protected. Dyson had taken the fall, felt the wrath of their revenge, as he went to jail and they all testified against him before the tribunal, claiming that Dyson had inexplicably snapped under pressure. Dyson knew the truth, though, and he knew what was right and what was wrong. He learned in Iraq that people were not always who they seemed to be.

So why had he let his guard down this time?

He slammed his hands against the steering wheel. It felt good, so he did it again, and again. He threw his head back and hollered, his voice filling up the small space and making his ears ring. He glared through the windshield, wishing he could tell Kayla exactly what he thought of someone who would two-time a guy who really liked her. If Dyson knew nothing else, though, he knew when to cut his losses and move on. There were millions of other women in the world, and he’d be damned if he’d chase after this one any longer. It was best to walk away while he still had the upper hand, while he could still control the situation.

Dyson vowed that Kayla would be a lesson to him, one that he clearly needed.

He fired up the engine and took off, squealing tires around the turn, hoping that the rubber smoke would drift all the way to her pretty little table. He hoped she would recognize it for what it was – a man walking away and not looking back.

T
he phone rang and rang and rang.

Kayla hung up and stared at her cell phone. One o’clock had come and gone, and Dyson hadn’t shown up. She would be the first to admit that she didn’t know him that well yet, but he didn’t seem like the kind of man who would simply stand a woman up without any explanation at all. She was so certain of that fact that she wasn’t angry with him for not being there – instead, she was very worried. What would make a man like Dyson miss a date?

Even if he had changed his mind about her, even if he had taken the time to really think about that night at the bar and decided she wasn’t the girl for him, he would at least have had the decency to tell her – if not face-to-face, then surely over a phone call. He seemed like the type of man who would feel like he owed her an explanation, and he would give it with kindness.

It had to be something bad, she thought, as she finally gave up and started on her walk home. But even so, she kept looking at every car that passed, hoping that it would be him behind the wheel. She wondered where he lived. The bar was on her way, so she stopped there and asked the bartender if he had seen Dyson.

“Not since he left here with you the other night,” he said. “Sorry.”

Kayla thanked him, and as she left, she remembered Dyson teasing the bartender for actually speaking. The memory made her smile, but it didn’t last long. She was too worried about Dyson to think about much else.

When she got to her apartment, Kayla sat down on her bed and tried his number one more time. Her call went straight to voicemail, which could mean that his battery had died, or could mean that Dyson was screening his calls, dumping her into voicemail to avoid talking to her. She listened to Dyson’s deep voice giving instructions to leave a message, and Kayla wondered what was going on.

Why would he ignore her? Was she right about him changing his mind, but wrong about him telling her straight-out that he wasn’t interested?

Kayla decided to leave a message. She tried to keep her voice cool and calm. She wanted him to know she was concerned, but not worried; she wanted him to know she cared, but not too much.

“Dyson, it’s Kayla. I hope everything is okay. I finally left the restaurant, but you can reach me here. I waited for nearly half an hour. Please give me a call when you get the chance.”

She hung up, satisfied that she had left a somewhat professional-sounding message that wouldn’t make her sound desperate. She stared at the phone and suddenly rolled her eyes. Why the hell was she resorting to games? Was it too much to tell him she cared?

But Kayla knew what could happen if a person cared too much.

The meeting with the private investigator had gone very well, so at least there was that bright side to the day. After Mr. Dawkins – “Call me Richard,” he had said – had seen the information she had, he was positive that he could find her father without much of a problem. Her father hadn’t deliberately vanished; Kayla had just chosen not to seek him out until now. It might take a few days, but since Richard had experience tracking down people who had actively hidden their tracks, he expected to be in touch soon with good news.

Richard had been warm and friendly, and something about him made Kayla feel very comfortable. She wondered if it was a private investigator thing – one of their tactics for getting close to someone in order to gain their trust and get more information, but she thought it might be just a winning personality. He had won her over not only with his professional attitude but also with his obvious love for his girlfriend, who he texted a few times while they were talking.

“She worries,” he said apologetically. “I need to tell her I’m meeting with a nice young lady instead of a biker guy who wants to figure out who put the hit on his brother.”

Kayla laughed as he chuckled. The tension was broken, and they had a very pleasant conversation until the moment he left her with a warm hug. She normally didn’t like to be touched by someone who was a virtual stranger, but he’d been so supportive and confident that he could find her father that he seemed like a new friend. As Richard walked away, Kayla felt at peace with her decision to find her father, and she was even contemplating telling Dyson about what she was doing.

She had been contemplating a lot of things with Dyson, in fact. But where the hell was he?

Kayla looked at the clock. Even though she didn’t know exactly what Dyson’s work schedule was, she thought that it was worth a shot to see if she could find him on campus. Even if she didn’t like what he had to say, she still needed to know if he was okay. She grabbed her keys and headed out the door.

Thirty minutes later Kayla was knocking tentatively on a door in the administration building. She stared at the word “Maintenance” on the placard and peeked through the glass to see a man approaching. He was wearing the usual uniform of navy blue and held something in his hands – a motor, from the looks of it, or at least parts of one. He nodded to her and she opened the door.

“I would shake hands but I’m all loaded up,” he greeted her. “What can I do for you?”

Kayla stepped into the room. It was actually a series of rooms down a long hallway. The hum of machinery came from one of the rooms, and she could hear conversation in another. The man before her had grease on his hands, and the room smelled of cleaning supplies and motor oil.

“I’m looking for someone,” she said. “Dyson?”

“Dyson Maddox?”

So that was his last name. Kayla smiled. “Yes. He works here, right?”

The guy shifted and shrugged. “He did. But he quit a few days ago.”

Kayla blinked in surprise. “He quit?”

“Yep! He’s got bigger fish to fry now, I guess. Good for him, I say.”

“Bigger fish?”

“He finally decided to do MMA full-time. Gonna train for some big fights with real prize money. I think he’s hoping to get a sponsor or something.” The man set the motor parts on a table and turned to wash his hands at the sink. “I wish him the best. He’s a good guy.”

Kayla was completely confused. Why hadn’t Dyson mentioned anything about that? But then she thought about the conversations they had had, and realized that she hadn’t once asked him more than the most basic questions about the fights he participated in. In fact, she knew little about what MMA was. Now she looked up at the stranger as he dried his hands and let her confusion show.

“He never said…I thought he had a good job here?”

The guy grinned. “It’s an alright place to work. But Dyson, well, he always seemed to be just marking time – like he was waiting for something better to come along. Can’t say I blame him. Apparently he’s a pretty good fighter.” The guy paused and frowned. “You know, I don’t think I should be telling you this…I think there’s a rule against giving out information about employees or even ex-employees…”

“No worries,” Kayla hurriedly assured him. “I won’t tell anyone. I just haven’t heard from him in a while, and I was a little concerned.”

“Well, when he left here the other day he was walking on air…he was fine. He’s got a fight tonight, I think. A little one, an exhibition or something.”

“Are the fights at the gym downtown?”

“As far as I know.”

“Okay.” Kayla smiled and nodded as she turned toward the door. “Thank you.”

“If he stops in, should I tell him you came by?”

Kayla paused, thinking, and looked back at the maintenance guy. “No. Don’t tell him. I’m gonna track him down and I’ll tell him myself.”

The man looked confused, but he shrugged and said goodbye. Kayla headed back home, staring at the sidewalk, thinking long and hard about what she should do next – if she should do anything at all.

She just couldn’t let it go.

Kayla had never understood the appeal of fighting as recreation. Sure, she could see sparring and boxing as a good way to work off calories and tone your body. She had a few friends who swore by kickboxing, and karate had always been a popular sport when she was growing up. But she saw the professional pursuit of boxing and mixed martial arts as a disturbing and violent career choice. Having grown up in a family where violence lurked in every room, every bottle of whiskey, and was practically a member of the family, Kayla had seen too many bruises and too much blood in her living room to find entertainment value in fighting.

She knew, logically, that domestic violence and MMA fights weren’t the same thing. Two consenting adults choosing to battle it out to determine who was stronger, quicker, and tougher bore no resemblance to her drunk father taking out his frustrations on her mother. She knew it was different, but she knew that the fight would still bother her – that the sound of punishing blows and cries of pain would be tough for her to take.

Kayla had every excuse she needed to stay home and far away from Dyson’s fight that evening. She had every excuse, every reason, and she had still decided to go. She wanted to see the man who had haunted her dreams, and if she had to go see him on his turf, so be it.

“You have surely lost your mind,” Kayla said to her reflection in the mirror as she put on lipstick.

Kayla’d decided that if she was going to attend the fight, she was going to look like a knockout – and she’d even laughed at her unintentional mental pun. She looked herself over from head to toe and tried to imagine how Dyson would see her. Her auburn hair fell past her shoulders, waves framing her face. She carefully put a little eyeliner and mascara on to make her eyes appear even larger, and her lips – she had to admit – looked luscious. Her black knit shirt was a snug fit, and the v-neck revealed an enticing glimpse of cleavage. She’d decided on jeans, but picked the pair that fit like a second skin and were long enough to skim the floor, even with the strappy black heels she’d selected. All in all, her look was carefully put together, not overdone, but wickedly sexy. If Dyson had decided that he wasn’t interested, Kayla was pretty sure that he’d have second thoughts as soon as he saw her.