Break Me (Alpha MMA Fighter) (28 page)

With Mike’s arrest, if felt as though that chapter in their life was about to close for good. But the hours since the confrontation had passed by so quickly, with so much going on, Rose still couldn’t take in that it was all over. That the rendezvous she’d planned, obsessed over, trained for, was behind her.

Where she went from here was suddenly so open-ended it was like strolling along the lane of a misty highway that ended abruptly beneath her feet. There was nothing ahead, only where her instinct took her. But, unlike that period before she’d tricked her way into a job at the gym, it was not a cold, scary mist she was passing through. It invited her. The unknown felt safe somehow.

The reason?

She was no longer making the journey alone.

***

That evening, the four of them gathered in Avery’s living room. Cate was understandably withdrawn and didn’t really join in the conversation, which, by necessity, veered away from the traumatic events of the day. But Rose knew how resilient her little sister was; she’d seen her like this time and again over the years. Tonight was perhaps a big ask; their plan to have dinner out, a no-expense-spared birthday meal, would have to wait for another evening, when Cate felt more like herself.

“How about we order pizzas or something?” Rose suggested, feeling peckish. “I know it’s not exactly the slap-up we had in mind, but things being as they are…”

“Count me in,” said Avery.

Luca cleared his throat, a gentle reminder that his big brother was, in fact, in training for the fight of the decade in a few days’ time.

“I’ll skip the fries,” Avery promised, giving the scout sign. “And I’ll run an extra mile for every slice I eat. Good enough?”

Luca shook his head at Cate. His bemused smile was clearly for her benefit, to engage her. And to Rose’s delight, she did smile back, and even rolled her eyes, which made him laugh.

Rose and Avery shared a knowing aside, a private glance that said:
They’re hitting it off already. We need to encourage them.

“How about we share?” suggested Avery. “Rose normally picks the toppings I like; we can share a twelve-inch, thin crust. What about you two?”

Luca said, “I, ah, don’t really…whatever you go for, I guess. I think I’ll let the birthday girl choose for us.”

Sweet
,
thought Rose. Both guys were sweet, but they were laying it on a bit thick. Cate had a mischievous sense of humor that often bloomed when you thought she was at her lowest ebb. It was one of the ways they’d coped growing up. Every time Mike had spat a meanie, or said something unpleasant, they’d paid him back in lots of little ways he probably didn’t know about, but which made them feel good, in control, like miniature vigilantes. Cate had poured laxative in his coffee, smeared dye on his car seat, placed a slug on his pillow, and had hidden all sorts of things belonging to him over the years, just to mess with him, to pay him back.

One of her crowning glories had been when she’d ordered Chinese for the three of them, and had slyly asked for red peppers for Mike’s chow mien, the one thing he
specifically
avoided in his diet, being mildly allergic to it. Yes, she’d blamed it on the guy taking her order, saying his English wasn’t very good. And yes, Mike’s skin had come out in pink blotches. He’d had to take his antihistamine pills and felt sickly for the next couple of days.

That prank had been her idea, and Rose had found it hard to top. Until today, at least.

“I tell you what…,” Cate began, and Rose smiled to herself, waiting for the punchline, the mischievous little
something
that would lift Cate out of her funk. “I don’t feel like staying in tonight. Let’s eat out, all of us.”

“Really?” Even Rose couldn’t hide her surprise. She knew her kid sister was resilient, but so soon after…

The men didn’t say anything.

“I don’t think I should have to hide. Not on my birthday.”

Rose said, “You don’t think it would be better to give it a day—?”

“No. I want us to go out. All four of us.”

Avery spoke up and said, “If you don’t mind me asking, Cate, why—?”

“Because fuck him. That’s why.” It was the first time Rose had ever heard her little sister swear in front of anyone else. “I’m eighteen now,” Cate went on. “And I’m starting over. Starting tonight!”

Luca and Avery looked at each other, then at Cate. The admiration on their faces was clear. She was speaking their language. Defiance. The language of fighters. Even Rose got a secret thrill at the thought of Cate, out of the clutches of Mike, standing up to face the world on her own. This was absolutely the way to start, she reckoned.

It was the way Rose had started, and how she’d gotten to where she was.

Fuck him.

“If you’re in, we’re in,” said Luca. “Where do you want to go? It’s my treat. Anywhere in town.”

“In that case, we’re going to McDonald’s. We’re having a happy meal each.”

The guys both nodded politely and looked at their feet, not knowing what to say.

“Or we can do Giuseppe’s,” said Cate, flicking Rose a wink. “Unless you guys
want
the toy that comes with the burger.”

Luca heaved a sigh. “Giuseppe’s
.
Please God, make it Giuseppe’s
.
”

Rose and Avery agreed.

Cate gave a wistful pout and said, “A birthday without toys. Never thought I’d be glad to hear myself say that. The six-year-old in me is sulking right now.”

“Oh, I think you’ll cope,” replied Rose. “You might get fewer presents, but they’ll mean more to you when they arrive. Case in point…”—And she treated Avery to an impromptu, disarming kiss; it disarmed her, too, when he reciprocated. It always did.

Cate blushed. Poor Luca didn’t know where to look. But by the time Rose had recomposed herself and was about to suggest they get a move on if they wanted to get a table, she noticed her kid sister was holding hands with Avery’s kid brother.

It was so perfect, it wiped away everything bad that had happened that day.

Starting over,
thought Rose.
Starting tonight.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Dinner at Giuseppe’s wasn’t as upbeat as Cate’s eighteenth birthday meal should have been, nor was it as somber as it could have been, under the circumstances. Instead, it consisted mainly of storytelling—a long, linked chain of personal anecdotes from each of their pasts. Rose and Cate described their lives together, how they’d grown up close and dependent on each other, not really having friends outside until they’d reached high school. They kept it as upbeat as they could, skipping over the darker parts. And Avery and Luca seemed to do the same with their recollections of life on the streets of Detroit. It was all about the rebelliousness, the crazy things they’d done to cope with such a harsh upbringing. It had made them who they were, all four of them, in their own, defiant ways.

But in other ways, they’d all turned out so different. Avery and Luca were almost nothing alike, and neither were Rose and Cate. Adopted siblings who’d shared the same life experiences, they were nonetheless unique individuals. Perhaps more unique and more individual in that they’d had to overcome so much at such young ages. Who they were now was a direct result of forces over which, most of the time, they’d had little or no control.

But they also had another important thing in common. Each of them had managed to break free of the forces that had constrained them. The brothers had done it together, with help from Maggie. They’d used their fighting talent and Luca’s entrepreneurial savvy to strike out for a better life. One would probably not have managed it without the other. The same could be said for Rose and Cate, who’d first planned this day years ago, and who had kept the dream alive in one another all this time. The dream to be free of Mike, to not have to be afraid anymore.

In so many ways, this dinner out was a dream come true.

“I’m sorry I had to send you that text message,” Cate told her. “But when he found out someone had been in his drawer, looking at his black book, I tried telling him it was me. He didn’t believe me. He put it all together before I’d even finished. And he said he’d kill you the next time you came anywhere near the house. So I had to warn you away the only way I could think of. I had to tell you to forget about me. He has made idle threats before, but I could see it in his eyes that he meant it this time. It affected his job, his whole organization, and
that’s
his real family now. So you can believe he meant every word.

“I hoped you’d stay away, but I also hoped you’d come for me like you always promised. Deep down I knew you would, when the day came. And you did. You really did. When I got your text the other day telling me to pack my things in secret, I said to myself, ‘It’s on now. It’s all or nothing.’”

“And you stood up to him,” said Rose. “You did it when it mattered most.”

“Only because you were there. When you showed up at the door, and I saw how much you’d changed, it made me want to change everything, too.”

“Who’d have thought it? A few years ago, who’d have thought we could ever kick his ass like that—in his own living room?”

Cate smiled and glanced sheepishly at Luca. “I didn’t do much.”

“You did whatever you could, and that’s always enough,” replied Luca, clasping her hand under the table. “And I’ve just had déjà vu.” He felt the hair on the back of his neck.

“With what?” Avery asked.

“With what Cate just said, and my response,” Luca explained. “It’s almost word for word what Rose and I said during her job interview. You remember, Rose? After you tackled that purse snatcher?”

The memory flooded back. And Rose did feel a strange tinge of pride for her part in it. She’d felt weak and pathetic at the time, getting her ass handed to her like that, but now that she remembered it in context, together with what she’d seen Cate do against Mike, she saw it differently. As Luca had told her at the time, it wasn’t the outcome that mattered, it was the fact that she’d
tried.
Against a much bigger guy.

“I wouldn’t mind a rematch,” she joked. “Now that I’m a veteran ball-breaker and all.”

“I can vouch for that,” said Avery. It earned him a punch to the arm.

Cate held up her glass of Pepsi. “To sisters…and brothers.”

“Hear! Hear!” They all shared her toast.

***

Toward the end of the main course, Avery’s cell phone rang. He immediately set his cutlery down, swallowed the mouthful of pasta he was chewing, and cleared his throat. If this was who he expected, it would absolutely be worth interrupting his meal to take this call. He didn’t recognize the number; it was a landline, not local.

“Hello?”

“Avery, it’s Nix.”

“Agent Nix.” He glanced around the table, making sure the others were listening in. Whatever the news was, it concerned them all. “Is everything all right?”

“I promised to let you know the outcome of the investigation.”

“That’s right. How did it go?” Several tense seconds later, without reply: “Agent Nix? You there?”

“Avery. Yeah, sorry about that. Things are a little crazy here right now. The warrants have just come in. That sting operation I mentioned, it’s paid off big-time—I daresay like one of Hoskins’s slot machine jackpots.”

“You’ve got Delgado?”

“Delgado
and
Hoskins. And most of the names in Mike Hague’s black book. We’ve got them all, including Hague. The office is going nuts right now, I can tell you. This is huge. It’s bigger than we ever imagined. And I want to thank you guys personally for helping make it happen. Special Agent Helmsley will want to come and see you at some point, to thank you in person. And I’ll be damned if I don’t come along with him. Seriously, you did great work, all three of you.”

“Sounds like you guys did all the hard work,” Avery answered. “We just got the ball rolling for you.”

“Don’t sell yourselves short. Not over this. Think of it this way: there’ll be no more fight-fixing from now on, at least not from
this
outfit. You guys have saved countless careers, maybe even lives, by what you did. So take a bow. And enjoy the rest of your dinner.”

Avery glanced around the restaurant, to see if anyone was watching. “How did you know we were—?”

“FBI,” Nix interrupted. “We know things.”

Avery snorted a laugh. “Okay, well you might want to tell the waiter to hurry up with our wine refills.”

“Tell him yourself. But have an extra one on me, okay?”

“Okay. Will do.”

“Take care, Avery.”

“Take it easy, Agent Nix.”

When he looked across at the others, he saw that none of them were chewing. They held their utensils, but they hadn’t eaten a bite since he’d taken the call.

“Well? Don’t keep us in suspense,” said Rose, leaning forward. “How did it go?”

Avery hesitated while he wrapped his mind around the implications of what had just happened in Nevada and elsewhere. “I think we’ve just brought down a billionaire.”

Luca’s jaw dropped. Cate spat out a mouthful of Pepsi in shock.

Meanwhile, Rose merely half-raised an eyebrow. “Far out.”

***

After the meal, Luca kissed both women goodnight, but more importantly, he asked Cate for her number. No sooner had he asked than she slid a napkin into his hand; she had to have written her number on it sometime during dinner. He kissed her goodnight a second time, then drove home. She barely uttered a word on the way back to Avery’s, but she was glowing. That dreamy twinkle in her eyes said more than any words could.

With it being her birthday, she didn’t want to go to bed early, so the three of them stayed up and chatted. Well, Avery did most of the talking, extrapolating on what Nix had told him, while still trying to come to terms himself with the enormity of the FBI’s arrests. 

He’d forgotten all about his upcoming fight with Grillo until Cate brought it up. She asked him if he felt ready, what with all the distractions around him so near the big day.

“You’d think it would throw me off,” he replied, “but to be honest, once I enter that arena, it all slips away. None of this stuff will even cross my mind. At least, it had
better
not
.
”

“I think it will all help,” said Cate, “even if you’re not aware of it. The good stuff gives you confidence; the bad stuff will make you fight even harder. I think that makes us who we are…how we use the good and bad things that happen to us.”

“You reckon?”

“Uh-huh. I think if nothing good or bad ever happened to us, we’d never find anything out about ourselves. About who we are.”

Avery nodded his appreciation. “You know what? I think I’ll have you in my ring corner.”

Cate blushed.

“Gee, thanks,” said Rose. “And I get to cheer from the back row, is that it?”

“No, you can be the ring card girl. Bikini optional.”

She grinned and narrowed her eyes at him. “That’s it. I’m rooting for Grillo.” Though Cate chuckled at that, she couldn’t hide a gaping yawn. It was obvious she was forcing herself to stay up. “There’s a cozy bed waiting up there any time you want it,” Rose told her.

Cate yawned again. “You know what? I think I do.”

“I’ll show you the way,” said Rose, linking arms with her as they went to the stairs.

“Night, Avery,” Cate called back.

“Night, Cate. Sleep tight.”

“Don’t go anywhere,” Rose said to him. “There’s something we need to talk about.”

He snapped off a salute, then went to the sideboard and poured himself a nightcap—a creamy brandy liqueur Marlon’s wife had given him. It wasn’t half bad. He thought Rose might like it, so he poured her a glass.

When she came back down, she climbed over the back of the sofa and slid onto his lap, one arm hooked around his neck. “They really hit it off, huh?”

“She’s exactly his type,” Avery explained. “Sweet and feminine, and blonde.”

“I didn’t really know her type. But I guess I do now.” Rose accepted the liqueur and clinked glasses with him. “Mm, that’s delish.” She drank half of it in one go. “So here’s the thing,” she said. “I know this isn’t what you want to hear, but I really think I should stay here for a while and keep an eye on her, just until she’s settled in. I don’t think it would be fair leaving her here alone while I fly off to Vegas. So I won’t be coming with you.” She paused. “And anyway, I’d only be in the way. It’s Luca you need with you. I’ll be here waiting for when you get back. Me and Cate. That’ll be cool, right? Something to look forward to?”

His heart dropped. “Hmm, sure. Whatever you think’s best.”

He suddenly felt as though he was on that rickety bridge again, the no-win scenario. The far side was only a few steps away, but he would have to reach it alone after all, and the bridge was about to collapse behind him. He felt it so strongly it chilled him to his core. There was just something in the way she’d said it, the timing of it, something finite. It wasn’t only because he wanted Rose with him in Vegas—being with her made him that much stronger, that much more alive; it was also the celebrity thing. The razzle-dazzle. She was not comfortable around it, which meant there was a part of him she could never be comfortable with.

Was it too big a part of him for her to live with?

All the time they’d been together, Rose had been preoccupied with her sister. At times, he’d felt secondary to that filial devotion. But this was the first time that idea had crystallized into anything like a threat. Now that she had Cate, and they were free of Mike,
would
Rose be here when he got back from Vegas?