Punching and Kissing (30 page)

Rick had left the ring. He knew that we got it. He knew that we’d finish it, now. The only question, for him and the crowd, was how it played out. Had we made a pact...and would we honor it?

I stared at Aedan across the ring. Both of us had tears in our eyes. Both of us knew it had to happen.

I nodded at him and he nodded back, looking relieved. He thought I was going to go through with the plan. He thought I was going to kill him.

And he had to go on thinking that. Right up until the very end.

The bell went and the final round began.

Aedan

This time, when we came towards each other, our fists were already raised. This time, neither of us was denying what needed to be done.

I felt this overwhelming sense of...relief. She was going to be okay. Sylvie was going to be alright.

Her first punch slammed into my forehead, hard enough to make me stagger. Good. She was going for the head, not wasting time on the body. The head would make me go down and then she could finish it.

The next punch hit my cheek and I heard something crack. I saw the anguished look on her face and I wanted to tell her that it was okay, but she was already lashing out again. I lifted my hands a little, to make it look good, but I made sure it hit me. This time she got my eye and I rocked backward on my heels, pleasantly surprised at how hard she was hitting. She was getting it over fast. That was good.

I saw her reach down and touch the pocket of her sweatpants and I wondered what she had there. Some good luck charm, maybe, or a photo of her folks. Then she put up her guard and came in close. “Hit me,” she said quickly. She didn’t even have to lower her voice. There was no way the crowd could hear anything except their own insane yelling. “Just once. Under the chin. Make it look good.”

I glanced at Rick. Did we need to? He was still outside the ring and looked content to see her pummel me. But maybe she was right. One quick hit on her and then she’d return to me and knock me out and this whole thing would be over.

Forever.

I drew back my hand, feeling sick.
Just do it. One hit. Get it over with.
“I love you,” I said.

“I love you, too.”

I swung, aiming for her chin. An uppercut that would knock her back a little but not do any real harm.

And everything went wrong.

Just as I swung, she kicked both her legs out in the air, as if she was deliberately flopping onto her back on a trampoline. My punch, instead of making her stagger, sent her soaring through the air.

She landed hard on her back. And she didn’t get up.

The crowd fell silent.

I was on my knees beside her in a second. I didn’t know how hard she’d hit her head—the roar of the crowd had covered the sound of the impact. “Sylvie? Jesus,
Sylvie?
”

I checked for a pulse. I couldn’t find one. Her eyes stared up at me, fixed and unseeing.

I refused to believe it. “
Sylvie?”

Then I saw how her beautiful angel’s hair was turning sticky with blood under her head. “
Sylvie?!”

No response.

She was dead.

Aedan

“Well,
holy shit,
” I heard Rick say. “I didn’t expect
that.”

I was on my feet and across the ring in a heartbeat. I didn’t care about the bodyguards anymore. I didn’t care about the guns anymore.

The crowd moved out of the way as they saw me coming and that started a general exodus. There was something about the way Sylvie’s body lay there on the floor, crumpled so awkwardly, legs stretched out but one hand to her hip. Suddenly, none of those bastards who’d thought they were so brave and edgy for sampling underground entertainment could bear to see it.

Rick’s bodyguards slammed into me just as I reached him. I very nearly managed to drag them along with me, but then Al had his shoulder against my chest and Carl was holding my arms behind my back and all I could do was yell and snarl. I was less than a foot away from Rick and I couldn’t touch him.

“I guess you get the winnings,” said Rick. He was staring at Sylvie’s body, genuinely disquieted. He shoved a bundle of bills into the pocket of my sweatpants. “Congratulations,” he said coldly. “That’s what you get for murdering your girlfriend. You really are a monster.”

I remembered how she’d kicked her legs out from under her, ensuring she’d go down hard. She’d wanted to do it.

She’d fooled me. She hadn’t gone along with my plan at all. She’d sacrificed herself for me.

The crowd was dispersing quickly. The bodyguards pushed me to the ground and hustled Rick outside. I no longer had the energy to go after them. All I wanted to do was hold the woman I loved.

I crawled over to her body and cradled her head, the blood sticky on my fingers. I closed her eyes. And then I wept and wept, my tears wetting her cheek as if she was crying, too.

Aedan

When I finally looked up, Rick and his goons were standing over me. Everyone else had gone.

“Time to go,” said Rick. “We’ll take her from here.”

Al stepped forward to gather her up. He wasn’t as careful as he normally would have been. He probably thought I was beyond fighting back.

He was wrong.

As he put out his hand, I grabbed his wrist and
pulled,
putting all my strength behind it. Al flipped over my head and hit the floor with a crack of breaking bones.

“Don’t you
feckin’ touch her!”
I screamed.

Rick and Carl took a step back. It had happened so fast they were caught off balance. Long enough for me to snatch Al’s gun from his holster. I pointed it right at Rick. Immediately, Carl pointed his own gun at me.

“Whoah,” said Rick. “Whoah, whoah,
whoah.”

“Get out,” I spat. I needed them gone because, in another few seconds, the urge to put a bullet in both of them was going to become irresistible. And Sylvie wouldn’t have wanted that.

“We can’t leave him,” said Carl. “He’s got the body!”

Rick ignored him. “You go to the cops,” he told me, “and I’ll put a pillow over her brother’s face.”

“No cops,” I snarled. “I just don’t want you to touch her. I’ll bury her. Me.”

Rick stared at me for another few seconds. “Let him,” he said at last. “If he gets caught, he can take the heat.” He backed away. “I don’t ever want to see you again, Aedan.”

I kept the gun on them until they reached the door, then waited until I heard their car drive away. Only then did I toss the gun away and cradle Sylvie’s body again. “It’ll be okay,” I said, rocking her gently. “I won’t let them touch you.”

Sylvie

Three hours earlier

Heather, Alec’s doctor, listened as I laid it out for her. The Pit. Aedan. My brother’s fight. The fight I’d have to have with Aedan. I explained why we couldn’t go to the police and then I explained what I needed from her.

“I can’t kill him,” I said simply. “And he can’t kill me. And that means Rick will kill us both. Our only chance is for me to do it to myself.”

I swallowed and looked her right in the eye. I spoke slowly and deliberately.

“I need you to give me something that’ll kill me,” I said. “Quickly. Within seconds. I don’t care if it hurts or not. But I need to be able to inject it, so I can do it just before Aedan knocks me down.”

Heather’s mouth moved soundlessly. “He’ll think he killed you!” she said at last.

“I know. And it’ll destroy him. But he’ll be alive and so will Alec.”

She shook her head. “You’re talking about suicide! I can’t do that! I can’t help you!”

“You’re saving two lives. If you
don’t
do this, we’re all dead.”

Heather stood up and walked away. My chest tightened because I thought she was going to call security and then the cops, but she started to pace instead. “No. No way. There’s got to be another way.”

“There
isn’t,
Heather. This is the way things are when you’re dealing with people like Rick. There are no ways out. Only ways to minimize the damage.”

She walked back around to the chair she’d been sitting on and braced herself on it, staring down at the floor, thinking. I sat down, shut the hell up and let her think.

“What if I gave you something to knock you out?” she said at last.

I shook my head. “They’re not stupid. They’ll see I’m just unconscious. Then they’ll try to make Aedan kill me and he won’t be able to do it. Then we’re
all
dead—Aedan, Alec, me....”

She went quiet again, hanging her head and letting her long blonde hair hang down to cover her face. I could see her knuckles whitening as she gripped the chair. I really thought she was going to snap and call security. But then she spoke and her voice was drawn from somewhere way down deep, as if each word made her feel physically ill. “I can’t give you poison,” she began.

I stood up. “It’s okay,” I said. “I shouldn’t have asked you. Bleach will work, right? If I get a needle and shoot it into—“

Her head snapped up. “Sylvie, stop trying to be a fucking hero and
listen!”
Her voice was like the crack of a whip.

I shut up.