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I’d told him to stay in the parking lot.

Told him to go home.

Left him standing beside my bike with that furious, stubborn set to his jaw like he was deciding whether to obey me or defy me just to prove he could.

There was no chance in hell he was going to stay out there like I’d told him to.

“Let’s get this over with,” I said at last, already tugging my shirt over my head. If I could finish fast, then maybe I could get him the hell out of here before anyone recognized Senator McNeely’s kid and started taking pictures.

A grin flashed across Avila’s face. “Hell fucking yeah. You got this.” He clapped me on the shoulder and disappeared to call an end to the betting.

I wrapped my hands fast, the tape biting into my skin as I pulled it tight. Each loop felt like sealing myself into something I hadn’t chosen. I was pissed—at Wes, at Jack, at the timing, at the fact that I had too much acid rolling hotly under my skin tonight to keep things professional.

Avila’s voice boomed through the warehouse, cutting through the din.

“As you already heard, Wes Buchanan is out tonight⁠—”

A chorus of cheers.

“—and stepping in…”

I climbed into the cage as my name rolled out across the concrete.

The reaction shifted instantly. Louder. Sharper.

They liked it when I fought. Maybe because I was the only fighter who’d been around all these years, or maybe it was because I almost always won. Either way, the crowd was acting like they’d won the lottery with the unexpected matchup.

Morales was already inside the cage, bouncing lightly on his feet, built like he’d been carved from brick and bad decisions. He grinned when he saw me climb through the chain.

“Wasn’t expecting it to be you tonight, chief.”

“Neither was I,” I said.

I would’ve apologized, but he and I both knew fighting me would earn him more money. He’d happily take whatever I dished out as long as he got a bigger payout.

The bell rang.

He came at me hard, not reckless but confident. Testing.

A jab. A quick hook. I slipped the first, absorbed the second across my shoulder instead of my jaw. The impact vibrated down my arm.

I let the acid under my skin morph into anger.

Not the blinding, explosive kind. The steady kind. The sharpening kind. The clean kind.

It wore the images of my uncle. Of Jack fucking Youngblood. Of Wes, for getting sick and not telling me. And Bett fucking McNeely for daring to come to my house and put his nose where it didn’t belong.

Morales and I circled. The crowd pressed in, bodies packed around the cage. Morales lunged, and I drove a knee into his midsection, felt the air leave him in a harsh grunt. He recovered fast, slamming me back into the chain-link with enough force to rattle it.

Metal bit into my spine.

His forearm pressed against my throat. “You look distracted,” he muttered.

I was.

Because somewhere in the back of my mind, beneath the rhythm of movement and countermovement, beneath the calculation of distance and leverage, I felt it.

Him.