Page 62 of The Fighter

“No, I’m good,” Ben said, still watching me. Nik just shook his head as he tossed his apple core in the trash.

“I’ll make coffee.” Con left my side to fiddle with the coffee maker. “Sit everyone.”

I sat immediately at a stool along the short side of the island, while Nik took another on the long side. Ben poked around the kitchen for a minute before taking a seat himself, as if he didn’t want to seem too eager to follow Con’s command.

Con placed steaming mugs in front of everyone. I noticed Nik’s was milky white and Ben’s was black. When Nik caught me looking at his, he made a face. “Black coffee tastes like dirt.”

Con didn’t sit but stood at the other long side of the island across from Nik and Ben. “I don’t drink it for the taste, Nik. I need it to make me want to live.”

“Oh!” Ben exclaimed loudly after a slurp. “Good news! The warehouse is ash.”

Con went very still as he stared at Ben, who wasn’t looking at him. He fumbled around in his pocket before withdrawing his phone. He swiped at it until he found what he was looking for and dropped it on the island for us all to see. I leaned over, catching a glimpse of the smoking remnants of a building set against the backdrop of a blue sky. I leaned back in the stool, not thinking that the picture pertained to me, until I spotted a familiar tree.

I snatched the phone before Con could grab it and used my fingers to zoom in on the picture. Sure enough, I knew that tree. I knew that color of that sunken roof too. I lifted my gaze to find Con staring at me. “You burned the warehouse?”

He held my gaze. “Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because you were hurt there and knowing it stood made me angry.”

I didn’t know what to say to that. “But what about any blowback?”

He lifted an eyebrow. “You think this is my first arson?”

Ben snorted. I looked at him and Nik, curious if they also thought this was crazy, but neither seemed alarmed nor concerned.

He took the phone from me, swiped the picture off, and handed it back to Ben, who deposited it in his coat. “Devlin would hurt more people there. Now it’s gone.”

“He’ll find somewhere else.”

Con’s eyes glittered with something that sent a thrill down my spine. “Then I’ll burn that down too. I’m not fucking around with him anymore. I told you this is where I end it.”

He had told me that, and it had sent me on a tailspin thinking of all the ways this could go wrong until he’d stuck his cock in my mouth so that my brain went numb.

He had men watching Amara and Holden. He’d taken care of my apartment. He’d burnt the warehouse to ash. And he was just getting started. While Con held me in his arms and calmed my soul, Soto made the world burn for me.

I held his gaze. “You’re right. You did.”

His expression softened somewhat. “And you believe me now?”

“Yeah.” I answered quickly. “I do.”I’m sorry I doubted you.

TWENTY-TWO

Conrad

The first week with Tav in my apartment passed too fast and too slow all at once. We touched all the time. Soft, coffee-scented kisses in the morning. Linked fingers while watching TV with our thighs pressed together. My arms around his waist while he cooked us dinner, usually something protein and veggie-heavy that still tasted good.

Every night, he slipped between my legs, drew my cock into his mouth, and fell asleep with his head on my thigh, heavy body sinking into the mattress where he slept like the dead until morning. I’d wake up, cock as hard as a spike, his lips often still kissing my crown. I refused to come as long as he didn’t, so I would get into the shower and turn the dial to cold and will my erection to deflate.

I was half-hard all the time, my brain constantly fuzzing a little on the edges with the need to come. I’d been able to go weeks, sometimes months without sex, but Tav’s presence in the apartment was like an aphrodisiac. I ran on the treadmill untilmy legs were jelly and worked until my eyes ached, anything to take my mind off fucking Tav until he dripped with my cum.

But a large part of me was also relatively content. Sex had been all we had at first, and now that it was off the table, we talked a lot. We got to know each other’s bodies without the speed-run to an orgasm. He appreciated my gentle touches, when I’d brush my lips across his temple, when I finger-combed his too-long hair, when I rubbed his spine while we stood together brushing our teeth.

And while I’d never craved casual touches from anyone, I found I liked them from Tav. He was like a Golden Retriever, often butting my shoulder with his head, pressing his lips to my neck, and wrapping me in his strong arms with nearly suffocating hugs that I loved a disgusting amount.

He told me more about his childhood, how once he showed promise in his teens as a fighter who could go pro, his coach strictly controlled his diet, his trainings, and his personal life. I found it abhorrent, but Tav said it wasn’t out of the norm. Tav didn’t socialize with kids his age other than those he trained with. He was at the gym every day for hours.