Brawler's Baby: An MMA Mob Romance (Mob City Book 1) (13 page)

It should be in a museum
.

Conor walked over to the empty boxing ring, his arm still slung over my bodyguard's thick shoulders. The man protested the entire way, casting worried glances at both me and his companion, who I noticed was being
very
careful not to get involved. I couldn't blame him – the last thing I'd ever want to do would be to climb into the ring with a man like Conor.

A bed, on the other hand…

"Here you go, Boris, put these on," Conor said, tossing the man pair of dark blue martial arts gloves.

"Not called Boris," the man protested feebly. It didn't really sound like his heart was in it anymore, though. He looked like a man who knew his fate was inevitable, no matter what he said.

"Sorry," Conor apologized, without the faintest hint of seriousness in his voice. He strode to the center of the ring, raised his gloves and said, "ready?"

Boris – even I was calling him that now – walked much less enthusiastically to meet him and tapped his gloves against Conor's.

"Don't worry," Conor said. "I'll go easy."

My eyes were fixed on my lover’s torso – entranced by the crisscross of gashes, tattoos and the slightly discolored scar tissue of a body that had clearly experienced more than its fair share of fights. But more than anything, more than sympathy, more than worry, I was excited. I wanted to see him in action again. I had a taste for it.

The contrast of styles was unmistakable. Boris was amateurish, at best. He was a strong man who clearly spent many hours lifting weights, but his undoing was that he matched that time and more in the cafés, restaurants and bars that lined the narrow streets of the Russian quarter.

In short, he had a gut, and it didn't do much to help his technique. His shoulders were thick and powerful, but if Conor was a quick, streamlined Ferrari, Boris was a Lamborghini – but one from back when they still made tractors.

I had no doubts about who would win this fight. It was a foregone conclusion. My only question was why. Why was Conor doing it? Was he trying to prove something to me, or to my father?

If he was, I didn't know what it was.

They circled each other like two predators. Conor was light on his feet, and stood on the balls of his feet, almost on the tips of his toes, ready to rock back or lunge forward at any time. If I'd shaded my eyes, I could have mistaken him for a dancer.

A very violent dancer…

There was no way I could make a mistake like that with Boris. As he turned, he dragged his rearmost leg in such a way that someone like me, with an untrained eye, could tell that if Conor attacked, Boris wouldn’t have a chance of dodging or dancing away.

He seemed like the kind of man who tried to win his fights the old-fashioned way – ducking and rolling, and absorbing the punches until his opponent finally tired himself out.

I couldn't see that happening with Conor. He was in far too good a shape for that, and the difference between the physical condition of the two men in the ring together was stark.

I think Boris recognized that too, because he went on the offensive from the off.

"Nice hit!" Conor said, after Boris tapped him lightly, at full stretch, on the side. The bruiser almost toppled over as he followed through with the punch, but Conor simply ducked away from the incoming fist. I watched with stunned admiration as I realized that Conor had let his opponent hit him…
on purpose
. He was playing with him, like a cat with a mouse.

Conor danced around the ring, almost catlike in his movements, with a gentle grace and elegance that belied a man of his size.

"That's right." He cheered as Boris raised his guard. "Keep it up!" It was almost as though Conor was Boris's coach, leading him through the motions and training him.

But Conor was no teacher. The man I loved was a natural born predator, and he had a predator’s instincts.

I covered my mouth as Conor let loose with a final flurry of punches that all landed in the same spot – Boris's right eyebrow. The first punch landed flush against his forehead and split the man's slug-like eyebrow with unyielding force. A crimson red fountain burst forth from Boris's skull, spattering the ring with blood, but Conor didn't stop until he'd landed the final two punches, pulverizing the right-hand side of Boris's face.

He ducked away from the fountain of blood and swore. "Shit, Boris – sorry, buddy. I didn't think I was hitting you that hard…"

Boris slumped to the floor, desperately trying to staunch the flow of blood from above his right eye lid, but failing as his fighting gloves slipped against the slick red liquid. Within seconds, his face looked like a scene from a low-budget horror movie.

"I need to go hospital! He cried out. "I need to go hospital, now!"

"Ah, don't be a girl about it," Conor said. "This kind of thing happens all the time. They've got bandages downstairs, go get your buddy to patch you up."

"No," Boris insisted, injecting a hint of panic into his voice. "I need to go to the hospital, now. He will take me!"

He pointed to his companion with a bloodsoaked hand, and my eyes followed in the direction of his outstretched finger and came to rest on my other bodyguard's face. He looked terrified, and was nodding along dumbly with every word, completely forgetting that he was only here in the first place to guard me.

Definitely not professionals
…

Conor turned at me and winked surreptitiously. "Okay then," he said in a faux-doubtful tone of voice. "I guess it
is
bleeding pretty hard now. Maybe you should go after all."

"Yes, yes," Boris agreed, nodding vigorously and looking desperate to be absolutely anywhere in the world other than in the same room as Conor Reagan.

I turned to Boris's companion. "Go on then, take him."

"You must come with us, Miss Antonov." The other bodyguard insisted. "Your father –."

"Like hell I will," I said, finally understanding why Conor had winked at me. "I'll stay here with Conor and call for another couple of men to come pick me up."

The man looked torn. I knew he would have been instructed never to leave me alone – but I also knew that he was low enough in my father's organization to not just be terrified of dad, but also to still actually think that I might have some kind of power.

I decided to nudge him along. "Trust me," I said. "I'll be safe here. Conor won't let anyone hurt me, will you?"

"Safe with me," Conor replied, playing along. "Go on, get your friend to the hospital."

It was all the encouragement either of them needed, and they left the room in a panicked rush, casting terrified looks over their shoulders like they were worries Conor might change his mind and drag them back in.

"Was that your plan all along?" I asked.

"What plan?" Conor replied innocently.

"To get me alone. Couldn't you have done it without beating the poor guy up?"

"How could you think something like that?" Conor smirked. "But now I come to think about it, I guess we
are
alone. Fancy that…"
Conor

I didn't want to play games anymore. I knew what I wanted – Maya back in my life. I was going to get it, whatever it took. And if I had to beat up some half wit Russian punk just to spend a little bit of time with her, then so be it.

I'd have felt guilty for splitting the guy's eyebrow open, but Boris, or whoever the hell he actually was made his choice the moment he threw his hat in Mikhail Antonov's ring.

Nice guys don't get mixed up with gangs in my book.

Sure they do
.
Case in point, you
.

I felt a twinge of conscience prick at me as I allowed my mind to journey back to those long winter nights I'd spent back home in Dublin pickpocketing wallets and robbing people’s houses. That was gang work too, wasn't it?

So are you a good guy?

That was different – I was young and what other choice did I have, with mom off her face on cocaine, crack and God knows what else. I needed to eat, and since I didn't even know my dad's name, or what he looked like, I knew I wasn’t going to get any help there.

"But did you have to send him to the hospital? What's my dad going to say about that?" Maya frowned.

I shrugged. "They didn't have to go to the hospital. Head wounds always bleed like that, Boris was just… soft. I told him he'd be fine, didn't I?"

"Yeah, but…"

"I wasn't lying, he will. And as for your dad," I continued. "You can always call him in a bit."

"A bit?" Maya said, flushing. "What have you got in mind?"

I closed my eyes, just savoring the smell of her. It was clean, floral, and a whole host of other adjectives that I didn't know. She was unlike any other girl I'd ever slept with. "I think you know."

"We can't." Maya begged. "Not here…"

I was done with talking. I'd waited too long to get her alone, and I wasn't going to risk wasting any more time. I knew she wanted me, and I sure as hell wanted her. That was enough for me.

I leaned forward and softly took hold of the back of her neck, pulling it toward me with a gentle, teasing slowness that invited, practically begged her to resist. She did no such thing. I knew I had her.

I pushed my lips against hers with an urgent hungriness. I needed to have her by my side, to hold her and never let go. I'd stopped searching for her once, and all it had succeeded in doing was sending me down, ever deeper into a hopeless alcoholic spiral which I didn't know whether I'd ever escape. I wasn't going to make that mistake this time.

You need to tell her how you feel
.

But much as I wanted to, I couldn't. I'd never much liked talking, but around Maya it was worse, it was like my lips were sealed shut and my tongue was encased in cement. She had a hold on me that I’d never imagined was possible.

She kissed me back with a tender urgency that said everything I couldn't. I knew that she felt the same way – at least, I suspected as much, but I couldn't be sure. I could tell she was holding something back from me, and I was desperate to know what it was. She had changed, or something had changed in her, since she'd left Dublin, and me, without so much as a word of explanation.

I was still desperate to know why she'd done that as well. My mother's descent into addiction had pushed me toward this life in the first place, but when I first met Maya, I thought all that had changed.

I thought I’d found someone who’d always be there for me.

I pulled her toward me by her neck, tangling my fingers into her silky soft hair. I bit her lip gently, scratched my fingernails against the back of her scalp until she purred. I let my hands fall to her sides, and rubbed her outer thighs in circles, shortening the journey every time until my fingers made it to her plump, delicious ass. I couldn't help myself, I pulled her up onto me with one hand and, furious with desire, started to unbutton her pants.

She pulled away sharply, panting. "Not here," she said, her face flushed red with exertion and desire.

I groaned with pent-up frustration. "Why?"

She jerked her head upward, toward a round, black protrusion on the ceiling. "Cameras."

Whatever she was hiding, it had everything to do with her father. I could tell she was terrified of him, and I didn't understand why she stayed. Those two thugs that Mikhail Antonov forced her to take around with her everywhere weren't there to protect her.

No, they were the Russian mobster's way of marking his territory, and they were a symbol of his utter domination of his own daughter. After all, I thought, what kind of man would watch a video of his daughter fucking?

What kind of man would want to?

"I can't see them," I said.

“They’re around that pillar," she replied. "They'll catch us if we move. And I don't want your hairy ass caught on film." She grinned, trying to distract me – or maybe even herself, from the overbearing presence of her father that was making her do this.

"And how would that make me look?"

And then it struck me – from the moment she'd walked into that room, she'd known exactly where the cameras were, and what they could see.

She knows she's being watched, wherever she goes
, I thought.
It's like she's had to acquire a sixth sense
for danger
.

I bit down on my outrage. I wanted to leap up, to protest the unfairness of Maya's situation, but I knew that she was, first and foremost, her own woman. There was no way the girl I'd met would've wanted me to fight her battles for her, no matter what the stakes.

That girl was strong, and independent, and wild – and she’d have saved herself. The fact that she knew where the cameras were, that she thought about it, kept it all in that gorgeous head, was just a sign of how damn strong she was.

But then
, the little voice said,
why's she still here? It's been years, why hasn't she made it out?

"The locker room," I said. "It's safe – no cameras."

She looked at me, and I realized that I could still read her like a book. I could see the battle going on inside her mind – that on the one hand she was terrified of doing this, and of the consequences of getting caught, but on the other hand she still had the same impetuous, spontaneous personality I'd fallen in love with. It was also the part of her that won out.

"Okay," she said, the set look on her face indicating that she'd made her decision. She repeated the word, as if to steel herself, like she knew she was breaking a little, and needed to talk herself into doing it.

I looked at her, hiding the anguish that I felt inside me. I knew that if I could make her mine again, she'd never have to make that kind of sick, twisted decision again. A cold certainty was growing inside me – I needed to make this right, even if that meant doing something drastic.

Whatever it takes.

"We don't have long." She said swiftly, interrupting my train of thought. "I'll need to call in soon, or Sergei might send someone to look for me. Meet me down there, but go down the back stairs, okay?"

I nodded, keeping my expression light to hide the darkness that was on my mind. I wondered what Maya's reaction would be if she knew that I was thinking about murdering her father. Would she stay with me? Did it matter? After all, I'd given that stripper tens of thousands of dollars just to make me feel less god damn miserable for a few minutes. What was a murder, after all, if it meant saving a person as wonderful as Maya?