The Fighter's Block (53 page)

“And you’re quite nimble the morning after a huge fight. I kind of thought I’d be cutting your food into tiny pieces.”

He laughed with feigned ar
rogance. “
Me? Whatever.”

“Oh, so you’re perfectly fine to take on any sort of
lovin
’ I have in mind?”

He lifted a brow. “What do you have in mind? Last night was pretty damn awesome. I didn’t even have to milk it one bit and you treated me like a God.”

“Because you’re spoiled.”

“I am definitely spoiled.”

“And because you’re—”

There was a loud pounding on the door to their apartment. It sounded angry and impatient, and they heard a voice yell, “Answer the fucking door, Van!”

Van wasn’t sure what was going on and he moved to throw some clothes on.

“Don’t answer it,” Dani told him. “I don’t like the sound of that.”

The pounding continued and Van shook his head. “Well
it better be important or
someone’s
gonna
get their ass kicked for disrespecting my privacy.”

When he had some shorts on he left the bedroom as Dani scurried to put something on
,
as well.

“I’m not fucking kidding, Van!” the pounding continued. “Open this goddamn—”

Van flung the door
open,
ready to beat the shit out of Cody. “What the fuck is your problem
!?
”

Cody pushed past him and entered the room. Van was going to throw his ass out the door for barging in like that until Cody yelled, “I didn’t take your fucking shoes out of your locker!”

Van stared at him for a second as Dani peaked into the living room from the hall. Cody looked pissed as hell, but he also looked scared. She didn’t like how
close the two had looked to going at it right from the start.

Van was cautious as he narrowed his eyes at him. “I never accused you of taking my shoes,” he replied evenly. “Why would you say that?”

“Because that’s what everyone’s saying at the gym! That you said it was
me
!”

“I never said that to anyone, Cody,” Van replied suspiciously. “
Who
did you hear that from?”

“I don’t even fucking know. Paul told me
that’s
what was going around the
Divehouse
. He said he heard it from someone who heard it from someone else.”

“Well I never said that, man. If I thought it was you I would have confronted you myself.”

Cody swallowed, trying to keep himself from shaking. He’d never felt so scared in his life, having Van think he framed him for murder.
“So it’s not true? You didn’t say that to anyone, not even joking?”

“Never
. You’re like a brother to me, Code. I trust you.”

Cody exhaled. That was a relief. But if Van had never uttered such a thought, it meant only one thing…

“There’s something going on there, Van.
Something fucked up. We’re all at each other’s throats, everyone suspects everyone else. Whoever did that to you is still out there. If it wasn’t Q, then it’s someone else from the
Divehouse
. I don’t like this, Van. There’s a fucked up brother among us.”

By then Paul had entered the apartment
through the open door
, having easily heard the commotion from his
place. He was only in
a pair of sweats and looked like he’d just woken up.
Marnie
was right behind him, looking just as sleep deprived. Scotty came from next door, and then Gary, and then Cole from a few doors down.

They all stood in Van’s apartment, looking around at each other.

Having heard Cody’s last comment, Paul said, “I don’t know about you guys, but I feel like it’s up to us to end this shit once and for all. I’m sick of looking over my shoulder. We got how many fighters in the club? –Forty-some? Twelve of us live on this block
, a
nd twelve of us
have been
suspects
because
we live here.”

They all looked at each other again, not a single one of them comfortable with the tension.

Finally Van shook his head. “I don’t want to worry about this anymore. For whatever reason someone decided to make a deal with the devil, it’ll come out sooner or later. Until then, I have a wife and a kid on the way. I can’t risk their happiness and I won’t. I was close to losing everything, and now I need to just hold on to what I have and be grateful. I’m in no position to figure this out right now.”

“Maybe you are,” Cole said.

Everyone turned to look at him since he was still standing in the open doorway, leaning against the frame.

Van tilted his head with inquiry. “Meaning?”

Cole stepped into the room and shut the door behind him. It raised a couple of eyebrows, and Paul even felt a bit defensive being stuck in a room with this guy. They a
ll watched him walk toward Dani
of all people. Cole reached into his pocket and pulled out a handful of sparkling jewelry and held it out to her.

“I believe these are yours,” he said.

She gasped and put her hands to her mouth
. “Oh my God! Where did you find them
!?
”

She held her hands out and he gently dropped them into her palms. “It’s
all there
.”

“Oh my God,” she repeated, this time in a whisper. “Thank you, Cole.” She looked at him with confusion. “But I don’t understand. How did
you
get them?”

By this time the room was filled with a mix of emotions. There was curiosity, intrigue, and bewilderment, but most importantly, there was one person present who was ready to flee the scene.

“I think there’s someone else in the room that can answer that better than me,” Cole replied.

Instantly
every
pair
of eyes began darting from one person to another. The amount of unease thickened in the room
as
Cole walked across the apartment again.
It became a sick game of duck-duck-goose
as
he
move
d amongst the bodies standing about
.

Finally he stopped. He could practically hear the heartbeat crashing in the man’s chest. He looked at Scotty and said, “I think you owe Van an explanation.”

There was a synchronization of movement, each fighter’s body filling with a violent need to attack or defend.

With a scoff Scotty said, “Who the fuck do you think you are? Are you the
asshole
spreading the rumors at the gym?”

With a smile Cole replied, “Actually, yes I am. And it was quite productive. See, it gave you a little bit of breathing room. And you used it, which was stupid. You thought you were in the clear
because the police weren’t able to tie the evidence to anyone after Van was released. There was no knowledge of where the gun came from, how it got in Van’s truck, how his shoes ended up at the crime scene… It was only proved that
Van
had nothing to do with any of that. An obvious set up. And well done, if I do say so myself.”

“You are out of your fucking mind!” Scotty yelled. He looked at everyone in the room. “Do you see what he’s doing? We’ve all been accused of this shit!”

“But you’re the only one that actually did it,” Cole
said
smugly.

The room was deathly still. Everyone was staring at Scott with anger and confusion, waiting for an explanation.

Finally he scoffed.
“I don’t have to listen to this garbage.
If you guys want to believe this dipshit over me, then whatever.
Who is he anyways? I’ve known you for six years, Van! I don’t even know who the hell
he
is!”

He turned to leave but Cole said, “The police are downstairs waiting to talk to you, Scotty. It’s over. We’ve got what we need to put you away, my friend. I suggest you just come clean. You owe Van at least that much.”

Scotty froze at the door. His heart was pounding through his body. He was torn between punching
a
fist through something and daring anyone to stop him if he just walked away. The guy was bluffing.

“You broke your hand weeks ago, didn’t you?” Cole continued. “Most likely when you bashed Brian Thompson’s face in with it. I’m sure a few of the guys at the gym will say that you’ve been favoring it this entire time. You’ve held back on your workouts until you finally had it looked at and casted.”

It made sense to Gary and he said, “That’s true. You’ve just been taping it up, doing lower body workouts or non-contact with upper body.”

“And you told me you wanted to just work your left side,”
Cody added.

“So what if I didn’t know I broke my hand! That proves I killed someone?”

“No, but you’ve been in this apartment dozens of times,” Cole said. “You m
ade a copy of Van’s truck key, y
ou broke into his locker and took his shoes
, and y
ou wiped the gun clean
and planted it in his truck
.”

“I thought the gun was Quincy’s?” Paul asked.

Cole shook his head. “Nope.
Same
make and model, different weapon. Quincy’s gun has been with him this entire time and it’s never fired a shot.”

The eyes in the room shifted to one another and then settled on Scotty again.

“Why would you do this?” Van finally asked. “Why would you frame me for something that would put me in prison for the rest of my life?”

Scotty’s stone
façade
almost faltered but he couldn’t let
it
. “This is all bullshit, Van. I didn’t do any of that. Who the fuck is this guy, accusing us of this shit! You’ve got a lot of nerve working your way into our family,” he said to Cole. “Mickey needs his fucking head examined! You’re an
outsider
,” he growled.

“Try again,” Cole told him. “I’ve known Mickey almost my entire life. He trained me when I was ten years old, and after getting into some minor trouble with the law, he bailed me out of it and helped me focus on using my talents for something
good
instead. Sound a little familiar?” he asked, looking around the room at each fighter.

Yeah that sounded familiar to every single one of them.

Even Scott.

“
I would think you’d be grateful for what Mickey’s done for you,” Cole said. “He’s kept a pretty big secret about you all this time and no one was the wiser.”

Scott immediately looked at Van. Besides Mickey, Van was the only other person that knew.

“You really think Van had something to do with people finding out?” Cole asked. “Think again. Brian Thompson was on that fight club like a fly on a piece of shit. He was looking for the right candidate. He could have
tried blackmailing
any one of you but he chose Scott. The one person with the most to lose
, and the one other person besides Quincy he could manipulate
. You’d finally found a place where you could hide your identity and
someone
was going to ruin it all. It could have ruined your career.
Personally, I would never reveal such a secret, but since it’s why Brian chose you…
”

“What the
fuck are
we talking about here?” Paul scoffed. “Jesus, what identity?” He looked at Cole for an answer b
ut he wasn’t going to give one, so he
looked at Scotty and asked, “What is he talking about, man?”

He would have denied it until he was dead in his grave before this moment, but Scott decided to come clean. “I’m gay,” he finally announced. “Okay? I’m a fucking homo, or queer, or fag, or whatever loose homophobic term it is you guys always throw around. And before you get all grossed out about me fondling you in the cage or whatever, you can fuck off. It was never like that.”

The room was silent. Dani felt a little sick where she still stood by the hallway observing all of this. It was mor
ning sickness, but add
a mou
ntain slide of new information and
she was
absolutely
overwhelmed.

Van was the next to speak. “Did Brian really blackmail you?” he asked Scott.

There was no answer. Scotty wasn’t going to admit to anything.

“
Brian got to Quincy first,” Cole continued. “When Quincy was pretty much no good to him anym
ore
and went into hiding
, he moved on to the next person that could help him
.”

Everyone looked at each other again and then settled on Scotty. Scott wouldn’t look any of them in the eye.

“But
a person can only take so much, right Scotty?”
Cole asked.