Fight (4 page)

Maybe he’d stop in the middle of a crowded street one day and be straight, conservative, Christian, and godly, and he’d realize it’d been years since there’d been a club, a boy, or a fresh line of mind-numbing powder. He wouldn’t want to wake up next to a slumbering bear of masculinity, but rather the soft suppleness of a woman, with whom he could have children and a life safe from the disdain of outside influences.

And at any moment, Nathan was going to sprout a curly pink tail, a snout, and wings and fly out the window oinking wee-wee-wee all the way to the gay bar down the street.

Lies made poor bedfellows. One nice thing Nathan could say about truth: it was awfully hard to kill.

He would worry about it later. There’d be time for as much flagellation as his soul could stand. Hell, Laura would probably be around to give him a hand with that, sweet thing that she was.

Nathan got to work reviewing presentation slides and materials, and he spent the rest of the day eying the clock, counting seconds until he could escape to the gym.

* * * *

“So they ate that shit up, huh?” Paul asked, yanking open the door and holding it for Nathan.

“’Course they did. I am the Almighty of the interactive conference world.” Nathan nodded at the girl behind the counter. “Hey, Tracy. How’s it going?”

“Good, Nathan,” Tracy drawled. “Hi, Paul. You guys gonna get your sweat on?”

“Absolutely.” Nathan checked in after Paul, and they headed for the locker room. Adrenaline Gym was one of the largest outfits in town. Trainers prowled the floors in bright orange, green, and pink shirts. Nathan could hear the grind of treadmills, bikes, and elliptical machines. Air freshener and sweat seemed suspended in the very air, and the smell got stronger in the men’s locker room.

With practiced skill honed since his middle school days, Nathan flattened his gaze so he looked through people instead of at them. He ignored the men meandering around in towels and shorts. Paul made it easier with his constant chatter.

“How was the boss after? Glowing?” Paul dropped his bag on a bench, started to strip, and Nathan didn’t have to look elsewhere. Paul held about as much attraction for Nathan as a lesbian music festival.

“He seemed pleased.” Nathan opened a free locker and started to change into gym clothes.

Paul sighed dramatically. “Christ, why couldn’t it have been me?”

“Been you what?” Nathan asked, though he knew what Paul meant.

“Been me to catch the boss’s eye, asshole. Climb the ladder, get the daughter.”

Nathan threw a sidelong glance at Paul, raising an eyebrow. “Maybe that whole wife-and-four-kids thing distracted Greg when he was selecting his new chosen one?” Nathan’s gaze slid across the ass of the guy farther down the bench. He’d long since learned that jerking away when something particularly attractive caught his eye was as obvious as staring slack-jawed and oozing drool.

Paul snorted. “You’d think with the old man’s focus on family and whatnot that it would have been a perk.”

“The whole two-wives-and-cheating thing, though, probably wouldn’t be.”

“Nothing a lawyer and higher salary couldn’t fix, am I right?”

“Well, true,” Nathan agreed. “But fact is, you don’t have my brains.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Or my looks.”

“Right.”

“And God knows the kids are all the UPS man’s, ’cause you couldn’t find your dick with a map and a magnifying—”

“Fucker!” Paul swung good-naturedly at Nathan, who dodged the blow along with next two. “It’s Moore’s taste in surrogate sons that’s the real problem.” Paul sat to shove his feet into sneakers.

“Yeah?” Nathan asked, inwardly cringing. He slammed the locker closed, sliding a lock into the D ring.

“Yeah. Look what happened to the last schmuck.”

“Doug was nice enough to leave me his office.”

“Yeah, after the old man kicked his queer ass to the curb.”

Nathan stretched his neck, and the vertebrae popped. He so didn’t need to rehash this story after the day he’d had. “There was no proof that the man was gay.”

Paul didn’t have to say
you poor delusional fool
when his eyes and the twist of his mouth said it for him. “Old Man Moore went out of his way to ruin Doug’s rep in this state and probably the other lower forty-seven. I don’t think Doug was just a Democrat or, God forbid, a Catholic.”

“Unsubstantiated rumors,” Nathan said loftily, itching to get out of the room and the conversation. “Guy couldn’t have been gay.”

“Why not?” Paul asked, stepping right into the punch line like a good little boy.

Now Nathan gave Paul the incredulous expression. “’Cause he would have been blowin’ you, right?”

Paul made a derisive noise and rolled his eyes. He picked up his racket and tossed another to Nathan. “I’m gonna murder you, asshole. Let’s go.”

“I’m gonna almost feel bad for destroying those delusions of grandeur.” Nathan grinned. “Almost.”

Nathan and Paul continued giving one another shit all the way out of the locker room and onto the main floor. Music thumped from overhead speakers, and the exposed metal support beams made the whole place echo. A man lifting weights dropped the barbell on the mat, and it boomed on impact. Nathan casually observed bunching muscles and sweat-covered, shining skin, scanning for a particular person but trying not to get his hopes up.

When Nathan found the man next to a weight bench, though, he slowed down, attempting to gawk without being noticed. The man was one of the reasons Nathan kept the expensive membership to this gym. And he was also the reason Nathan sometimes needed to take extra-long showers after a workout.

As always when Nathan watched Fury, his heart rate doubled, and the sound of his own breath filled his ears. Lust’s shadow swept down his spine, licking its way south and promising to get serious about the business at hand—and cock if given any opportunity at all.

Nathan knew he was staring, but everybody stared at Fury. He was a known brawler, in both legal and not-so-legal arenas, and he usually had a crowd around him. At six-four, Fury was imposing. Add the width of his shoulders and the heavy fighter’s build, and Fury was the kind of guy nobody in their right mind would want to cross. Fury didn’t have the typical meathead’s muscles. He had a body built for long, hard, manual labor that had been meticulously sculpted into the most advantageous form. For a moving mountain, he had a grace and a quiet confidence that floored Nathan. Made him want to say fuck the “But I’m straight, I swear!” pretense, wander over, and offer up…well, anything Fury might want, really, and twice on Sundays.

“Oh, hey, there’s Alex,” Paul said, forcing Nathan to tear his gaze off Fury. “Need to ask him something. Give me five?” Paul asked, already heading in his friend’s direction.

“Sure,” Nathan mumbled. He wandered over to the drinking fountain and bent to take a few sips. He couldn’t remember if Alex was Paul’s neighbor who did the carpool thing with the kids, or if Alex was the one Paul played basketball with sometimes. Shrugging it off, Nathan started for the racquetball courts.

“Hey.”

Nathan kept walking, assuming that gravelly, bass invitation was aimed elsewhere.

“Hey, you, in the black.”

Nathan glanced down and confirmed that he was definitely wearing the black T-shirt today. Turning, Nathan stumbled and forced his mouth shut. Fury stood next to him, leaning on the metal rails marking the weight lifting area off from the track. He was staring at Nathan with unreadable brown-black eyes.

“H-hey, uh, Fury?” Nathan had never heard anyone refer to Fury by any other name. It suited the guy or, well, maybe Fury had chosen the nickname to suit him. Fury had dark skin, which looked more Native American than African American. Gorgeous, whatever it was; a clear winner in the genetic lottery. His black hair was shaved on the sides and cut into a Mohawk that Fury kept in a braided ridge running over the center of his head down to his nape. Part of his hair had been dyed red, so the interwoven strands were red on black. The jungle-themed tattoo sleeve and other tribal ink added art to the total package. On a man like Nathan, such combinations would be ridiculous. On Fury, it was as though the man had come out of the womb with tats, attitude, and braid intact.

Fury nodded at a weight bench. “Spot me?”

Nathan glanced around at the horde of other better-suited candidates for that task. “Uh…you want me to…”

“You busy?” Fury interrupted. His voice wasn’t anything like Nathan expected. It was heavily Southern, for one, and it sent chills down Nathan’s spine. Nathan had a friend in college who used to sing in a band, whose music had been glorified roaring on the best of nights. Fury’s voice sounded like that singer’s the day after a gig, like the guy perpetually needed a cough drop and a drink of water.

“Not really,” Nathan answered, pulling himself together and walking around the divider bars and onto the weight floor. He wasn’t dumb enough to refuse the opportunity to get a better look at Fury, and if he spent too much time thinking it over, somebody might notice the hesitation.

Up close, Nathan got a load of Fury’s thick lips, heavy brow, and a white scar on the side of Fury’s neck, right under his jaw. Nathan couldn’t think of a thing to say, but Fury didn’t seem interested in conversation. He straddled the bench, lay down, and rocked his shoulders, settling under the weight bar. Nathan’s mouth went dry. Fury’s shirt bunched up, revealing a strip of dusky skin covered in black curls. Nathan swallowed, but his legs worked on autopilot, thank God, and he stopped when he was at Fury’s head. Nathan set his racket down so it leaned against the rail. For a stupid second, Nathan didn’t know what to do, and Fury watched Nathan from upside down and below. His eyebrows lifted, and his lips parted.

“Oh,” Nathan said before Fury could direct him. He cupped his hands under the lifting bar, and Fury took hold at the same time. Nathan guided it, but Fury did all the work as though he wasn’t pressing anything heavier than a bag of groceries. Nathan eyed the disks on both ends of the bar. The ability to add was beyond Nathan at that precise moment, though he was pretty sure Fury was benching something between Nathan’s body weight and a Toyota.

Fury started his reps, and Nathan made himself stare at the ground and not at Fury’s straining body. He firmly told his dick not to get involved, but it was no use. The proximity of Nathan’s groin to Fury’s face grew more and more dangerous as Fury’s panting got louder, and Fury’s ending grunts were enough to get Nathan half-erect. Nathan was sweating more than Fury when he grabbed the bar again and helped Fury set it on the supports.

“You good?” Nathan asked, wanting to shoot himself for the horny husk in his tone.

“Can be.” Fury sat up, and shit-fuck if his eyes didn’t sweep Nathan in a solid once-over. Probably wondering what in the hell was wrong with him.

“Cool.” Nathan grabbed his racket.

“Thanks,” Fury said.

“Yeah. No problem. Got a game.” Nathan almost ran into the divider rails in his escape, and he forced himself to slow his pace to a trot.

“You ask him if he needed coffee mugs while you were at it?” Paul asked from where he stood, arms crossed and leaning against a corner.

Nathan jerked but smoothed it over with a little laugh. “Tried. Would you believe he’d rather have bookmarks?”

Paul snorted, eying Fury in that greedy, wish-I-were-him way. “I bet. He and all his bookworm girlfriends.”

Nathan grunted, walking with Paul down a hallway. He prayed that Paul couldn’t somehow hear Nathan’s erratic heartbeat or the way Nathan couldn’t catch his breath.

“But you know, that reminds me. You still up for Thursday?”

“Huh?” Nathan asked, lost in a state of despair that had mated with desire and had angry babies.

“The fights. Thursday night.” Paul grinned over his shoulder at Nathan. “Your bookmark man’s gonna be there.”

Nathan’s neck liked to snap with its upward swing. He stopped himself from demanding to know what Paul meant by that and recovered his decorum. Barely. “Fury’s fighting?” Nathan asked lamely.

“Yeah. It’s an elimination match. He’s not the headliner, but he’ll be there.” Paul shrugged as though in apology.

“Oh,” Nathan replied, feigning indecision as they claimed a free court. “Eh, yeah, I can be there.” Nathan told himself that it was to keep up appearances of a normal social life. His mind snickered at him.

“Cool.” Paul stretched and twisted, reminding Nathan of an overgrown ostrich. “You want to bring Laura?”

“Nah. Not really her thing.”

Paul paused. “We talking about the same Laura?”

Paul had a point. Laura did enjoy her violence. “Okay, let me rephrase,” Nathan said. “It’s not really my thing to take her to this thing.”

“Aha.” Paul grinned. “Now we’re speaking the same language.”

“Good. So shut up, and let’s do this already.”

“Then fuckin’ serve, bitch!” Paul said in a terrible falsetto.

“One lesson in shame coming up.”

Paul spread his arms wide, backing up to his side of the court with his charming smirk in place. “Why you gotta hate, man? Where’s the love?”

“Nowhere you’ll get to go,” Nathan muttered. He got a ball, took his place, and channeled every ounce of pent-up, closeted frustration into his swing. And for a blissful short while, Nathan didn’t think about anything but wearing down his opponent.

Chapter Three

On Thursday evening, Nathan navigated through the nonsensical roads near the university, hoping he’d eventually get to the Bass building, where Nathan’s ticket to the fights was waiting. Knoxville was the kind of town that made “city planning” an oxymoron.

Nathan kneaded the steering wheel, driving slowly down Western Avenue. He shouldn’t have come out tonight. He’d pulled long hours at work, he’d slept for shit, and Laura still hadn’t called. It was beginning to annoy and worry Nathan, the lack of contact, and he’d caught himself digging around in his dresser drawers looking for pills. Nathan didn’t know what was more disturbing: that he was already jonesing and it’d only been a few days, that he was jonesing on a weeknight, or that it’d been an unconscious act to search for the drugs. None of the above was good.