Full Contact (Worth the Fight #2) (3 page)

He was the typical oblivious male, she thought. On one hand, he was overbearingly protective; on the other, he came to the date on his motorcycle!

Fully expecting some fallout from her little tirade, she was surprised when instead he looked at her and his smile grew even bigger.

“You know, women don’t usually tell me what’s on their mind.” He squeezed her hand. “It’s kinda refreshing. Glad you don’t feel the need to go along with what you think I want.”

“Huh?”

“It’s just that most women seem to get on the back of my bike, happily. If they have issues with their hair, their dress, their panties showing, and all that other chick shit, they’ve never said anything. They just hop on. You’re right, I’m an asshole. Shoulda come in my truck. Wasn’t thinking.”

“Your weird compliment is appreciated. But I’m not such a fan of all this talk about other women, their panties, and their legs wrapped around you on the back of your bike. If you want to get to first base, maybe you can just shut it, take my keys, and feed me.”

“God, you’re perfect.” He grabbed her keys and led her to her car. Jessica couldn’t help but look at him. He wore dark loose-fitting jeans and a gray button-down shirt that strained around the forearms, where he had bunched up the sleeves. He looked hot. H-O-T. He opened the door for her, and when she sat down, he leaned in to help her with her seat belt.

“Seriously? Slade, I’m a twenty-eight-ye
ar-old woman. I don’t need help with my seat belt.”

He dropped his hands. “Sorry. Sorry. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. Habit, I guess.” He closed her door and walked around to the driver’s side, then folded his body into the car and put on his seat belt. He didn’t seem like himself; he seemed frazzled.

She placed her hand on his knee. “You okay?”

He closed his eyes for a moment, then opened them and slowly turned his head to look at her. “Yeah, I’m good. Been a little out of it today.”

She noticed the slight tremor of his hand. With all the blows to the head from years of professional cage fighting, not to mention the underground fights where there were no rules, Slade had had to quit or risk becoming permanently impaired. As it stood, he still had some residual symptoms, and she had noticed that when he was stressed they seemed to be more prevalent. But that was a boundary she dared not cross. His fighting, or lack thereof, was an off-limits conversation. Chrissy had mentioned it before, and Jessica remembered that Slade had quickly changed the subject. When he faced forward again and turned the car on, she noticed some back-and-blue marks around his neck.

She touched the bruise with the back of her hand. “What happened?”

“Fucking Cain, one of the fighters I train. He blindsided me and almost choked me out.”

“Oh my God.”

He looked over at her and smiled. “It’s okay. It didn’t hurt. Just caught me off guard. I’m fine.” He reached for the hand that was still gently caressing his neck and placed it on his lap, giving her fingers a little squeeze. “Seriously, Jess. I’m good.”

“You promise you’re being careful, right?” She was treading lightly. This wasn’t a conversation they’d had before.

“Yes.” His answer was short. It wasn’t angry, but the way he said it made it clear that the topic was closed.

“So, where is this first date of ours?”

He smiled. “The Tackle Box.”

“As in
the
Tackle Box?”

“Do you know any other restaurant called the Tackle Box?”

“No.” The Tackle Box was one town south, at Palm Harbor. It was a very upscale seafood restaurant by the beach. Dennis loved the Tackle Box, so she had been there before. Local politicians and socialites met there to drink, dine, and try to fix the world—in their own skewed, self-serving sort of way. She hated it. It was snooty and stuffy and not her kind of place. She was surprised he’d be interested in going there. It didn’t seem like his kind of place either.

“Have you been before?” he asked.

“Yes. You?”

“No. But I hear it has the best lobster in Florida.”

She hated lobster.

“Well, I’m glad I dressed up.” She leaned her head back on the car seat and they drove mostly in silence the rest of the way.

“You look beautiful, Jessica,” Slade said again once they’d arrived at the restaurant and had been seated.

She smiled. “You look pretty damn good yourself, Slay.”

They were interrupted by the waitress, who took their drink orders. When she left, they chatted about the view a little; they were seated by the water, and they caught the scent of the salty ocean breeze. It really was a lovely restaurant.

Just then the waitress came back with their drinks.

“Not a fruity-drink kinda girl, I see.” He looked down at the amber liquid sitting in front of her. “Interesting.”

“Not a beer kinda guy, I see.” She looked at his similarly colored drink. “Interesting,” she added with a smirk.

“Glad you didn’t order Jack. I’d have felt emasculated.”

“Johnnie is just as strong as Jack.”

“Pfft!” He rolled his eyes and downed almost half his drink.

“Trust me, I’m a professional. Johnnie Walker is just as strong as that girly Jack Daniel’s crap you’re drinking.”

“Professional?” he teased.

“Hel-lo!” She waved a hand around. “Bartender. Remember?”

“That doesn’t make you a professional. Yeah, you can mix ’em. But can you drink ’em?”

“Trust me, I know what I’m talking about. I see the drunken results at the bar every day.”

“Well, in any case, don’t let Jack hear you say that.”

She laughed. “Jack? As in your friend Jack? Chrissy’s fiancé?” He nodded. “Is Jack Daniels really his name?”

“It sure is, and I wouldn’t poke fun at him about it. He hates it.”

“I don’t blame him.”

The waitress came to take their order. Slade ordered the lobster.

“And for you, miss?”

“Filet mignon, medium, with a baked potato, fully loaded, please.”

Slade leaned in, his eyebrows questioning yet amused. “I bring you to the Tackle Box. The best seafood in town. In fucking Florida. Maybe even in the entire Southeast. And you order a steak?”

“I don’t like seafood,” she said with a shrug.

He opened his mouth and then snapped it shut again. A moment later he burst out laughing.

“You’re really something else, Jessica. Why didn’t you tell me?”

She shrugged. “You didn’t ask. And anyway, maybe you wanted to eat seafood. I didn’t want to ruin your evening.”

“I’m out on a date with you. Trust me, nothing could possibly ruin tonight.”

She took a sip of her drink and said, “So, tell me how Mauricio’s doing.” Slade had mentioned that the owner of the Worth the Fight Academy, Mauricio Silva, had been in poor health and was actually thinking of moving back to Brazil.

“No good. Rumor has it he’s thinking of selling the Academy,” Slade said.

“Really? How do you feel about that?” Before he had a chance to say anything, she exclaimed, “Oh! You should totally buy it! You’d be great!”

He smiled his best smile and she lost her breath for a moment. “Actually, I’ve been thinking about it. He may want to have his daughter run it, but if not, buying WtF would be ideal. I’ve trained there for years, I know it like the back of my hand, and since I can’t train anymore, it would be pretty cool to still be able to train others. It would be like I never stopped training, ya know?”

“Ideal? It would be like a dream come true.”

“Guys don’t say things like that. But yeah, kind of like that.”

“You can say ‘dream come true’ and no one will revoke your man card, Slade.” She reached forward and squeezed his hand. “You’re the manliest man I’ve ever met.”

“You’re real good for the ego.”

She laughed. “I don’t think you need an ego boost. What with the harem you got goin’, I think your ego’s well fed.”

“I don’t have a harem. I do, however, like this one girl, but she’s all kinds of trouble. She flirts with me all the time and—”

Jessica laughed. “I do not flirt with you!”

He leaned back on his chair, crossed his arms, and gave her a knowing look.

“Okay, fine. But you flirt with me too,” Jessica said.

“I never said I didn’t.” He smiled.

“So, back to the Academy. Is that really something you’re thinking about doing?”

“Honestly?” She nodded. He rubbed the back of his neck. His long hair was tied back, making his blue eyes seem almost clear. “You know I can’t fight anymore. The doctor says that one more blow to the head and I could have permanent brain damage. Too many concussions. I know you’ve noticed the tremor in my hand. But I planned for this day. I saved and have been wanting to open a gym but haven’t done much other than think about it. If I could buy WtF, that would be perfect. It’s been like a home to me, and I’ve been picking up most of the slack for Mauricio for years. I trained Cain, Travis, and others. But now that it looks like it may be a real possibility, I’m—”

“Scared?” she finished.

“I was going to say nervous.” He took a sip of his drink. “But yeah, I guess I’m scared.”

She felt honored that he was speaking so earnestly, so openly. This was not a man who spoke of feelings, and he was basically telling her his hopes and dreams. She was pretty sure it wasn’t a conversation he’d had with one of his harem girls. “Starting something new always is scary. But like my granddaddy always said, anything worth anything is worth the fight. So, Slade, you gotta do it. Fight for it. Make it happen. It’s your dream.”

He continued to rub the back of his neck as the server arrived with their food. He seemed to be contemplating her words as if her opinion held some real weight.

As Jessica picked up her knife to cut into her steak, an ominous feeling suddenly descended upon her. The hairs on the back of her neck stood up, and her heart began to beat a little faster. Her eyes wandered around the room.

“You okay?” he asked.

She reached for her glass of water. “Yeah, I’m fine.” Out of the corner of her eye, at the far end of the restaurant, she noticed a man looking her way. Or so she thought. He was too far away for her to see him clearly, but there was something familiar about him.

“You look uncomfortable. I brought you here because I know you’re used to eating in nice places and being around…” He gestured toward the people.

“What? Snobs?” She took another sip of her drink and tried to see if she could make out the familiar-looking man, but he was no longer there. Slade must have noticed, because he looked over his shoulder and back at her.

“What? You sure you’re okay?”

“Yes.” Her imagination was running away with her. “Yeah, I’m fine. Just thought I saw someone I knew.” She downed a gulp of her scotch. “So. You were saying something about me being a snob.”

He laughed. “I didn’t say you were a snob.
You
said it. I said that I thought this was the kind of place you liked.” He reached for his drink and finished it in one pull. “I guess I was trying to impress you.”

She reached forward and placed her hands on top of his. “You don’t need to bring me to a pretentious and expensive restaurant to impress me, Slade. You’ve already impressed me. You’ve barely left my side for what, three weeks? You stayed with me at the hospital and then took care of me at your house. I will never forget that. No one else has ever done anything like that for me before.”

“How could I not take care of you? I feel responsible that this happened. If you hadn’t been trying to help me, Dennis wouldn’t have—”

Guilt? Is that what this is all about?

She placed her palm to his mouth to quiet him. “It wasn’t the first time he roughed me up.” She looked down, too ashamed by her admission to meet his gaze. She gathered strength and met his eyes, her palm still against his mouth. “Me defending you didn’t make a difference. He would’ve found some other excuse to hit me. This is not your fault. Not one bit.”

“That fucker beat the shit out of you because of me. It
was
my fault.”

“You were so wonderful to me at the hospital, and I’d been attracted to you for a long time. That night, the night when you defended me, I think that was when I knew that you were…I don’t know…something special. I just couldn’t imagine that you”—she gestured toward his body and face—“would want to date someone like me.”

“Someone like you?”

“Yeah, plain-Jane me. I work at a bar, get my ass kicked by my boyfriend, can’t walk in heels properly. I love yoga, but that’s as far as my physical endurance takes me. And you’re this macho badass who can have any woman you want. I mean, seriously. Look around. There are women in here who’d leave their husbands right this very second for a quickie in the bathroom with you.”

“You underestimate yourself, babe. I don’t think you’re plain. I think you are strong and classy and one of the most intelligent women I’ve ever met. Yes, I think it’s ridiculous that you’re working at a bar. What the hell you’re doing at the Pier is beyond me, but you’re the one I want. You bring out this big surge of overprotectiveness in me that I’ve never felt before. I just want to be near you all the time. I know you’re scared and I know that I don’t have the best reputation, but you have to trust me. I wouldn’t commit to someone I’m just going to end up screwing over, and trust me, babe, I don’t want to hurt you.”