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“What the fuck am I supposed to do?” I muttered into the empty room.

There was no answer, obviously. Just the little kitchen light reflecting off the stainless steel faucets and the neat rows of magnets on the fridge and the place where Chloe had knocked one crooked on purpose.

I should’ve fixed that too.

I didn’t.

The list in my head kept growing, a miserable inventory of failure. I couldn’t work. I couldn’t fight. I was nothing but a liability at home, at the station or to the woman who was the other half of my soul.

Forty-eight hours of nothing stretched ahead of me and the house was already immaculate. Rankin would lose his mind laughing if I called him at three a.m. to ask if I could come clean his house.

The living room felt like it was shrinking. I shot to my feet without thinking, ribs barking a sharp complaint. I paced toward the sliding glass door and shoved it open, stepping out onto the deck and into the cool spring air.

The backyard was quiet, trees at the back edge of the property silhouetted against the night sky. The kind of yard meant for barbecues, slip-and-slides, dogs and kids with sticky fingers—none of which I had any business imagining.

“What the hell am I supposed to do?” I asked the dark trees like they might know.

Nothing answered.

Of course nothing answered.

I stormed back inside, rubbing a hand over my face, and that was when I saw it: a small white rectangle on the living room floor near the couch. It must have fallen out of the pocket of my basketball shorts earlier.

I bent—slowly, because my ribs hated me—and picked it up.

Maurice Benson.

I stared at the name printed in crisp black ink. The guy had felt oily in a way that didn’t leave residue but left impressions. If he’d tried that same routine on JJ, I’d have chased his ass out of the gym and told JJ if he went anywhere near the guy I’d personally rearrange his teeth.

But maybe that was the difference—guys like JJ had people protecting them from slime.

Maybe I deserved slime.

I turned the card over. Blank on the back. No logo. No gym affiliation. Just a phone number, an email, and the name.

What was the guy up to?

If I had to guess: underground fights. I’d heard about them—real bare-knuckle shit, pop-up circuits, rent money won or lost in a night, side bets that paid better than the “winners’ purse” ever did.

Sure, I’d heard about them, but those were L.A. stories. New York stories. Vegas stories. Not Tennessee.

But Maurice had talked like there was a circuit. Like there was structure. Like there was a place for guys who wanted to hit and be hit without anyone asking about insurance or medical clearance.

I twisted just enough to test my ribs and a sharp pain lanced through my side.

“Dumbfuck,” I hissed.

Realistically? Ribs like this meant no fighting for six weeks minimum. That was if I wanted to be smart. If I wanted to actually heal.

Problem was, there wasn’t a single realistic thing about me these days.

I’d been at it long enough now that I knew how to protect my left side. I could keep my guard high, use my shoulder, work angles, stay outside, let smaller guys come to me. If Maurice could set me up with lower weight classes until I healed… Maybe some practice bouts.

I just needed the training time.

And something to do that wasn’t cleaning and thinking.

I pulled my phone from my pocket before I could talk myself out of it. My thumb hovered over the number on the card for half a second and then I hit call.