Spirit of a Champion (Sisters of Spirit #7) (17 page)

Kyle watched Jerry as he put the bad tire in the trunk. “You say
you have two fights left on your contract?”

“Yes,” Jerry said, hitting the tire with the jack handle. “ Even
if I get out of this one, the next person I fight will probably do the trick.”

“You can demand a rematch, right away. Say that Stormy’s
accident caused you to lose your focus.”

“I’ll do that,” said Jerry.

“We could fight the same way. Only this time you’ll announce the
presence of the soft spots and that the doctors won’t allow you to box any
longer. You’ll officially retire. And I’ll retire and leave the championship
open.”

“And marry Stormy,” Jerry said.

“If we can wait that long. So make sure you ask for a quick
rematch.”

Hugo laughed. “Keep her with you until after the fight, Kyle. I
don’t want anyone seeing her and drawing conclusions.”

“I’ll take granny home with me,” Kyle said. Jerry looked
confused, so Kyle explained Stormy’s disguise.

“Oh. I wondered how you got her past the casino area. They have
cameras in every place.”

“You’ll have a lot of press around you, Kyle, when you win,”
Hugo said. “So I’ll get granny and take her home with me. You can come get her
from there.”

Kyle looked at him and smiled. “No. You just take her to the
outskirts of town. I’ll meet you and take her from there. To your place if you
want to.”

“We’ll ask her. She’ll probably only want to go where you go
anyway.”

Jerry agreed. “Stormy’s loyal. And true to her word. Once she
decides you’re worthy, she’ll stick with you through anything. But should you
wait until after the fight to take her out of the room? What if the promoters
want to come up afterwards?”

“Good point,” Kyle said. “Move her during the fight, Hugo. It’ll
be a perfect distraction.”

“If you can think of a way to end it with just this match, the
better,” Kyle said. “You don’t want them threatening Stormy or Amy again. And
our fights won’t stand up to too much scrutiny.”

“I’ll work on it,” Jerry said. “I just couldn’t think of a way
out.”

Hugo got into the car with Kyle and rode the rest of the way to
his hotel, which Kyle discovered was at the boxing venue, right next door to
where he was staying.

“You said those killers had an accident. What happened?” he
asked Hugo.

“They fell.”

“And?”

“Nothing. They won’t bother Stormy again. That’s not to say that
some others might not take their place.”

“Remind me not to make you mad at me.”

Hugo chuckled. “I said they had an accident. I wasn’t anywhere
around. They made a mechanic angry at them.”

“Oh. Then how do you know...?”

“Joe’s a friend of mine.”

“Then I won’t make your friends angry at me.”

“Just take care of Stormy.”

“With my life.”

“Yes. You’ll do.”

It sounded like Hugo had given his seal of approval on Kyle. It
made Kyle feel good.

Hugo got out of the car and Kyle drove the short distance to his
hotel. He turned the car over to the valet. Tommy again.

He felt so happy, he gave him a huge tip.

“Wow, Mr. Torrin. Thank you.”

“You do a good job, Tommy. I appreciate it. And don’t throw it
away on the tables.”

“I don’t gamble, sir. I’m doing this to earn a college degree. I
get enough each season to pay for one year. So I work one year, go to school
one year.”

“No student loan?”

“Not for me. You graduate in debt. You can’t afford to marry or
get a house, because you have to pay back a debt with interest. I know about
money, from working here. You don’t want to be in debt.”

“When you get your degree, Tommy, come see me. I’ll give you a
letter of recommendation, or help you however I can.”

“Thanks, Mr. Torrin.”

“Thank you, Tommy. It’s good to see young fellows like you now
and then. Too many are looking for the easy way. They don’t want to pay the
price. They want someone else to foot the bill.”

“Hard work never hurt anyone,” Tommy said. “This is not really
hard work, either.”

“How about the hours?”

“Well, they are long. But the pay is good. And I share an
apartment with several other fellows who are doing the same thing.”

“Good luck,” Kyle said as he walked away.

“You make your own,” Tommy said in return.

The crowd that gathered around Kyle as he tried to cross the
casino was even greater than before.

The last time he had boxed here, he had tried parking his car
himself and riding up the elevator directly to his room. But once the crowd
found him, he wasn’t able to get his car out. This arrangement with Tommy kept
his car “private” until it was needed.

It took him a half hour to settle people down and get up to his
room. Even then some wanted to come in with him.

“Look, fellows, I’ve got a match tomorrow. This is not party
night. Clear out. Now.”

“See you tomorrow, Champ.”

“Knock his head off!”

“We’ll party tomorrow night.”

Kyle waited until the hallway cleared, then entered his suite.

He locked the door and looked around. No sign of Stormy.
“Stormy,” he said. He walked into her room. There was no sign of her.

Just as Kyle was beginning to panic, Stormy crawled out from
under the bed.

“That was quite a mob out there. I could hear them asking to
come inside.”

She reached down and pulled her suitcase out. “The maids are
pretty good in this hotel. They even dust under the bed.”

Kyle smiled and gathered her into his arms. “You know, I could
get used to this—coming home to you—very easily.”

“I’d be waiting.”

He kissed her then, feeling complete. This was the girl he
wanted. He must ask her to marry him. But not now. After the match. If Jerry
could fake it well enough, Stormy would no longer be in danger.

Actually, Las Vegas was a good place to get married. He’d do it
tomorrow, but he knew that Perri would want to be there. And, he realized, that
as much as he wanted to marry Stormy right now, he wanted her to have the white
dress and big ceremony with Perri as her matron of honor and Hugo as his best
man. They would have to get that planned first. And her friends in Seattle.
Some of them would probably want to come.

“What did Hugo want?” Stormy asked, her eyes radiant.

He kissed her again. He could make this a full time job.

“He arranged for me to meet with Jerry.” Kyle smiled as he
remembered how Hugo had set up the meeting. “It’s all planned. We box. I don’t
hit him in the head. He falls down. I win. He lives.”

She threw her arms around him and kissed him harder.
Sir Galahad could
get the girl after all.

Kissing in a bedroom. Not smart. He wanted to do a lot more than
kissing her. He grabbed Stormy’s hand and pulled her out into the sitting room.

“In return for saving your brother’s life, I want to know all
about you. Where you grew up, what things happened to you, and how you learned
to swim like a fish.”

“That last is because my feet are hinged right. Look.” She
pointed her foot downward. It went beyond straight out. “Most people’s feet
pull them down when they kick. Mine act like a dolphin’s tail. The fast
swimmers all have ankle joints like mine.”

“Beautiful ankles.” He admired them. “So that’s how you swam so
far.”

“Partly. I also know how to relax in the water so I don’t get
worn out. Your head is the heaviest. You have to let the water hold your head.
And distance swimming requires knowing how to change strokes so you last
longer. Part of the reason the Havasu swim was so hard on me was that I did a
lot of it underwater.”

Kyle pointed his foot. It barely went past a 130 degree angle.
He could see why he didn’t swim very fast.

“That crowd wants to come in after the fight,” he said, “so Hugo
is going to come get you tomorrow night, just as the fight is starting. I
expect he’ll take you across to his hotel and keep you there until it’s over.
You’ll want to get into your granny wig and be ready to go.”

“Okay.”

“I’ll have to leave early for the weigh-in.”

“I know.”

“Did I tell you, I’m going to retire.”

“You said when you were through boxing.”

“That’s now. I don’t want to do it anymore. This will be my last
fight, unless I need to do one more with Jerry to keep him alive.”

She nodded.

He sat down on the couch and patted the spot beside him. “Now
tell me about yourself. I have a lot of catching up to do.”

She sat down next to him. “Only if you’ll do the same.”

“Fair enough.” He took her hand in both of his.

“Well, I was born on a small farm near the Tucannon River. We
moved to Coeur d’Alene when I was five. I didn’t like being so close to town,
but we had a mountain as our back yard, so Jerry and I explored it. That was
when mother left us. She said she couldn’t take the ups and downs of prize
fighting.”

Kyle could feel the hurt that resounded in her voice after all
these years. He pulled her onto his lap and kissed her, feeling her hungry
response.
How
could anyone leave Stormy?

“It wasn’t your fault, you know,” he said covering her face with
kisses.

“I know.”

He pulled back and looked her in the eyes. “It really wasn’t. It
was your mother’s fault for not being strong enough and caring enough to stay
with her family. It wasn’t your fault. You were only a child.”

She looked at him. “I thought that if I had been better, she
would have stayed. That I had done something wrong. Dad said it was for the
best, but I felt so forsaken.”

He wrapped his arms around her, as if to shield her from the
past. “Divorce always hurts the children the most. They don’t understand what
is going on.”

“I remember the night she left. I thought she was just going on
a trip. They were yelling at each other, and when the cab came, she just walked
out.” Stormy hesitated, then slowly added, “She didn’t even say goodbye. She
never wrote, or sent a birthday card. She was just...gone.”

Suddenly Stormy started to cry and Kyle just held her. He didn’t
know how to comfort her any more than to just hold her. He rocked her back and
forth, as he would a child, thinking that she’d feel better if she could
release some of that grief.

“Let it out,” he said. As the older sister, she had probably put
on a brave front to protect Jerry. He wondered how Elston had handled it. If
the way he had put off Stormy’s attempt to rescue Jerry was any indication, he
had probably put off Stormy’s need for comfort.

Was this one of the reasons she threw herself into so many
causes? She needed people to appreciate her, and to tell her how worthwhile she
was?

He didn’t know if that were true, but he could feel the need in
her, to be wanted. To be loved. He responded to that need with one of his own.
He had so many people who wanted money and help from him, who were just
clingers-on, that he’d pushed people away. He’d isolated himself from all but
his family on the ranch and his trainer.

He stroked Stormy’s red-gold hair, feeling its silky strands
under his fingers. He could picture little Torrin girls looking like her, being
the delight of her grandparents’ eyes, having an entire Texas ranch to grow up
on.

Stormy would never leave them. She would stick through any
crisis.

He recalled what he had thought out at Hugo’s place. She had the
spirit of a winner, the heart of a champion. It was a heart he wanted to win.

It would be won with tenderness, he realized. His physical
strength did not matter. Stormy needed to be loved and he had a heart filled
with love, just waiting to be given to her.

Tonight he would comfort
the child. Tomorrow, after the match, he would propose to the woman. And he
would never leave her.

The locker rooms were painted white, utilitarian, one for each
of the contenders, consisting of a shower area with lockers and an outer
waiting, sitting room. They were large rooms, because they were used by rock
stars and their bands, and all the other groups who performed at the venue.
Kyle knew it well and felt comfortable there.

He sent out the hanger-ons and went into the locker room to suit
up. Arne came in to tape his hands for him.

“It’s terrible about Jerry’s sister,” Arne said, shaking his
head in sorrow. “I don’t see how Jerry can box today, with her missing. She’s
probably dead. She was trying so hard to get this fight stopped. Everybody knew
it. I wonder if it really was an accident.”