Brawler's Baby: An MMA Mob Romance (Mob City Book 1) (9 page)

C
onor

"What the hell are you doing here?"

Okay, sure, it wasn't exactly the friendliest way to answer the door, but I wasn't exactly in the friendliest of moods – and that was putting it lightly. Besides, Maya was flanked on either side by a pair of nameless Russian gangsters – and I wasn't really in the mood to deal with guys like them right now.

I poked my chin angrily at her companions. "And who the hell are they?"

She turned her head and looked at the gangsters, as if noticing them for the first time. I guessed that after a lifetime of being followed around by men just like them, she was probably just used to it. "Dad said I had to bring them. Around you, you know."

"They stay outside." I grunted. I was in no mood to have guys like that around – especially not since my stomach was bruised black and purple as a result of their boss's attentions. Its protesting screams of pain were the only reminder I needed of what had gone down in that basement.

"Fine," she agreed quickly. I thought I detected a hint of relief in her eyes, like she was happy I'd given her an excuse to send them away.

"Boris, Chekhov," she said. And then she said something else, but it was in Russian, and I'm not even going to pretend like I knew what the hell she was saying. It sounded like gobbledygook, to be honest, but I had to admit, it sounded kind of sexy coming from her.

Her bodyguards blinked in unison, then looked at each other, as if trying to work out whether their new orders computed. The one to her right – Chekhov, I think – he looked at me funny, like he was worried about leaving the boss's daughter in a room with a half-dressed Irishman, but as I stared him down he seemed to think better of fighting his corner.

That’s right, you pussy.

"
Da
," they said. I knew that one – it meant yes. They walked back toward the gray, concrete stairwell with the swagger of men who'd spent far too much time working out in the weight room, and not enough in school. Their massive bulk made it impossible to walk side-by-side without their shoulders touching each other, so Boris walked a pace behind.

I wondered how they'd worked that out – maybe an arm wrestle.

Yeah, that fits
.

I shook my head, baffled that anyone would bother spending enough time in the gym to get that big. Men like Boris and Chekhov always did – they were too stupid to understand that size wasn't everything. I wasn't a small guy by any means –
or
in any
department
.

Standing at six foot two and a hundred and seventy pounds, I was taller than most welterweights. But I knew what they didn't – in a fight, speed always matters more than size. I wasn’t just a master of landing a killer right jab, I was whippet quick too, and that was what mattered. When it came down to it, I knew without a doubt that these guys wouldn't put up much of a fight.

"You're hurt." Maya said, looking down at my bare torso, her hands flying to her face as, in the absence of her watchful bodyguards, she finally relaxed her control over her emotions.

I blinked.

It was hard not to show some sort of surprise at a statement like that.

Of course I’m sodding hurt
, I thought, sounding even more Irish in the confines of my own head.
Your father had me beaten half to death!

"Well, yeah," I said in an incredulous tone of voice. "Of course I'm bloody hurt. It's not often that someone drives a rifle butt into my stomach on a Tuesday evening…"

"I'm sorry," Maya apologized. "I didn't mean –."

I took a deep breath. I was screwing this up, and I knew it. The girl was stuck between a rock and a hard place, and I wasn't helping. It wasn't Maya's fault that her father was a psychopath. It wasn't Maya's fault that my stomach looked more like someone had spilled a can of purple paint on it, and it sure as hell wasn't Maya's fault that I was in a foul, foul mood.

"Why are you here, Maya?" I asked, more calmly than I had earlier. I was wrestling to get control over my emotions, to stop the bubbling rage that was inside me from building up and boiling over. It had been a long time since I'd bothered to control myself like this, tamping down my anger instead of just going out and starting a bar brawl to work it out.

But then – it had been a long time since I'd needed to.

Maya seemed nervous. I worried that the anger I felt inside was beginning to bleed through, and I worried that she thought that it was directed at her, not this screwed up situation we were in. I just didn't know how to tell her that.

She looked at the floor as she spoke, and the wall – in fact, she looked everywhere except my eyes. "Did my father tell you what he wants you to do?"

Wrong topic. If you want to keep me calm, that is
.

"He did. I won't do it. I'm not going to lose the fight – never have, never will."

Maya's eyes narrowed anxiously on her strained, pale face. "You have to!"

"Says who?" I growled. I was pissed off – more than pissed off, I was angry! I'd been humiliated in that basement – humiliated by a bunch of men who wouldn't last a second in a ring with me if they weren't holding guns like cowards, and now
she
was telling me I had to go along with it!

Sure, I'd agreed to it when her father's man had the barrel of a gun pointed at my head, but this was the real world, and doing something like throwing a fight had consequences – real consequences. And none of them of them were good for me.

"Trust me, if you don't throw the fight the way my father wants, you're a dead man walking." She said. "Him and his buddies will put hundreds of thousands, maybe even millions of dollars down on you losing. If you don't…" She trailed off, shuddering as she imagined what they’d do to me.

I couldn't contain myself. "What are they going to do, kill me?"

Maya blanched. I hadn't thought she could get any paler, but apparently I was wrong. "That's exactly what he'll do!" She exclaimed. "Are you crazy? You’ve seen him, haven't you? He won't just kill you – he'll tear you apart, rip you limb from limb and-".

I raised my hand and cut her off. "Alright, alright! I get it!"

I wasn't queasy. Violence didn't worry me, at least not to the same extent that it seemed to affect Maya, but the more she talked about it, the more I began to worry that she might have a heart attack. As pissed off as I was right now, that was still the last thing I wanted to happen…

I glanced out the window, making sure that neither of the bruisers posted on the motel's balcony had decided to get nosy and check up on what we were doing. They weren’t, and I could see the faint haze of a cloud of cigarette smoke by the stairwell. They didn't seem like the kind of hard-working employees who'd go above and beyond for their boss – especially not if my suspicion about Mikhail was correct.

I was pretty sure that Mikhail's men were with him out of fear, not trust or respect, and in my experience, that didn't instill much loyalty. We could screw like rabbits in here, and as long as we kept the noise down, they'd never bother checking up on us.

"Please, Conor," she said, her knee trembling anxiously. "Can't you just do it, this once? For me, if not for yourself. I don’t want him to make an example of you."

I sat down heavily on the cheap, old mattress and winced as the sudden movement jarred against my protesting stomach. "You know what you're asking?"

"Yes!" She burst out, the most animated I'd seen her since she arrived at my door. "I'm trying to save your life, Conor. You don't do this, you die –."

"And if I do," I bit back. "You know what happens then?"

Chill, Conor. Don't lose it, not on her – it's not her fault
.

She shook her head, looking surprised at the vehemence of my reply. I could understand that. After all, from her perspective what could be worse than dying? She'd had a tough life, but I could hardly believe that living in the kind of luxury she'd enjoyed all these years, while I'd been scrapping to pull myself up off the streets, was that great of a hardship.

Maybe some of that bitterness colored what I said next – and if not
what
I said, then definitely
how
I said it.

"Best case, I lose and no one's the wiser. I won't be undefeated any longer, and I'll have to spend the rest of my life fighting for scraps." I said. "But if I throw this fight, and someone finds out, which they will, I'll never work again. Not in this city, not in any city. I'll be blacklisted, and then the only fights I'll be able to get myself into will be dumb bar brawls when all I’ve got left in my life is the drink. You want that?"

The entire time I'd been talking, Maya had looked as if she wanted to say something. Her chest had puffed up with a deep intake of air, as she prepared to speak and she was practically vibrating with a righteous zeal. I knew that whatever she was about to say, it'd make sense – and I didn't want to hear it.

"What is it?" I pressed, my voice harsh, perhaps harsher than I'd intended.

Maya deflated like I'd just popped a balloon, and I regretted it the second I said it. I felt like an asshole, because her response told me that I wasn't just
wrong
about what her life was like in Alexandria – I was dead wrong.

Look at her. She’s not living the high life. She’s reacting like a kicked dog – and that’s not the kind of damage that happens overnight.

Far from it.

She sank back, folding in on herself, and her eyes went glossy – almost glazed over. It was like she was there in body, bu
t not in spirit
; like her mind had shut down to protect itself, leaving only an empty shell behind.

I knew two things. First – whatever Maya's secret was, she was hiding something. And it was big. Second – I needed to get a grip on myself. Her life was tough enough right now without me adding to her problems.

"I'm sorry…" I said helplessly, patting the bed next to me in the vain hope that it would get through to her.

"I didn't mean to hurt you. It's just… I don't know what I'll
do
if I can't fight anymore. I don't know who I am without it. You don't understand what it's like, being in that cage. Everyone's eyes are on you, and you know – for that moment, at least – that you're the most important person–."

I trailed off. Nothing I said seemed to be getting through Maya's waking coma, and my words sounded hollow even to me.

So what if I lost my undefeated record? Telling Maya that I'd be reduced to fighting for scraps was true – in a way. Mostly, it was a white lie. I knew I was too good to be down for long. I might not get fight purses in the tens of thousands of dollars for a few months, even years, but I'd get them back eventually.

The part about throwing the fight, though – that
was
true. If anyone ever found out, I really
wouldn't
ever fight again. And enough degenerates, mobsters, triad members and powerful people you really wouldn't want to mess with gambled on MMA fights that whether I threw the fight or not, I'd still spend the rest of my life waiting for a bullet – whether from one of them, or Mikhail and his friends.

I was in a bind, and I didn't know what the hell to do about it.

But when I looked at Maya none of that mattered. It was a miracle that she'd stumbled back into my life at all, especially after I'd given up searching for her, and started trying to find solace at the end of a bottle. The last thing I wanted to do now was screw things up. The thing was, screwing things up was sort of my specialty.

I reached out toward her gently, careful to move calmly, like I was handling a nervous animal or an unstable chemical. I'd seen her glassy expression before – growing up on the streets of inner-city Dublin, most everyone had problems.

Domestic abuse, drug addiction, people whose kids had been taken away by the state, I'd seen it all before. It was the look of a person shutting themselves off from emotional pain. Whatever Maya's was, it ran deep. It was the kind of emotional damage that couldn't simply be washed away with a hug and a kiss.

The last thing she needs from me right now is more pain.

The problem was, every facet of my personality was wrong, all wrong, for situations like this. That emotional armor – not helpful. But if I couldn’t
talk
through it, then maybe there was something else I could do.

"Come here." I said gently, pulling her down slowly toward the bed.

Maya moved, but she may as well have been a zombie. She looked glassy eyed and was barely paying any attention to her surroundings. As far as she was concerned, she could have been anywhere, doing anything, at any time. I lay down, kicked off my shoes and pulled her into me, until her head was resting on top of my toned, naked chest. She was as stiff as a board.

He’s really done a number on you
, I thought.

I didn’t say a word, just hugged Maya tight. It was enough, to me at least, that she was here at all, in my life, when I’d given her up for dead.

The rest of it? It was just window dressing.

And after a while, when her body relaxed and her breathing slowed, I felt the soft, hot wetness of silent tears falling on my bare chest.

I didn’t say a word.

I’m here for you now.

M
aya

Should I tell Conor that he is Eamon's father?

Of course I should.

Could I?

That was another question entirely, and it was one that had been keeping me up at night ever since Conor had breezed back into my life with every ounce of the swagger and cocky confidence that I remembered. It wasn't the actual
telling him
part that I was nervous about, that bit I was sure I could handle.

Sure, forcing those words out of my mouth would be painfully awkward, maybe even hard. But harder than raising Eamon alone as a single mom?

I doubt it.

No, what was keeping me up at night was that I didn’t know how Conor would react to the news. He wasn't the same guy I'd fallen in love with back in Dublin – that was for sure.

He'd matured some, and was harder too. It was as though some of the softness in his soul had been scoured away by the harsh realities of the real world, the things he'd had to do to survive, and the things that people had done to him.

People like me.

But had growing up, and all the scouring and polishing that entailed, left behind a diamond in the rough?

Or was the opposite true?

There was an anger in Conor these days. It was unmistakable, a powerful and discordant scream of rage against a world that had treated him so poorly.

And anger, as I'd learned from my own trials, was the most powerful of all human emotions. More powerful than grief, more powerful than fear, perhaps even more potent than love – because while love can be used to build something, anger can only tear things apart.

Then again, sometimes anger was necessary. There were some things so evil they simply didn’t deserve to survive.

Conor had, once, been the best thing that ever happened to me. I'd always have those memories. But those days were a long time ago, and we were both very different people. Eamon was the best thing that had ever happened to me now, and he wasn't just a toy to be played with, he was my responsibility.

That's true, sure
.
But what are you lying to yourself about?

Eamon.

Eamon was as much a part of Conor as he was a part of me. Did I have any right to keep a piece of news like that from him?

If I was being honest with myself, the answer to that was no, of course I didn't. It wasn't
right
to hide Eamon's existence from his own father – not for Conor, and not for our son. He couldn't keep growing up with my father as his only male role model – not unless I wanted him to turn into a stone cold murderer.

Our son
.

Just thinking that, even in the confines of my own head, gave me shivers. I'd been alone so long, living daily with the threat that today was the day my father would finally snap and take Eamon from me that I'd become not just self-reliant, but far more than that – completely closed off: an island.

I wasn't even sure whether I functioned properly anymore, in an emotional sense, anyway. I passed through most everything I did more as a spectator than a jockey. I was a passenger in my own head, numb.

Maybe even depressed.

Eamon was the only person I opened up to, the only person I allowed myself to be
me
around. But even then I only truly let my worries spill out when he was asleep, and that just made me feel even crazier. Besides, at four years old Eamon was hardly the conversation partner I needed him to be… I needed someone to share the burden with, someone to lighten the load. As much as I loved my son, he couldn’t be that person. Not yet. Maybe never. It’s a mother’s role to support their children, not load them up with pain.

My teeth ground together, hard enough that they must have been audible over the coughing bus engine as we rumbled down the potholed street. I was stuck in a bind. To tell Conor the truth was to trust him, but trusting him might risk Eamon's life.

The truth was as blunt as it was harsh.

You can’t.

Conor was unpredictable, and he had a short fuse, to boot. He always had been, it was one of the things I'd fallen in love with. But, unfortunately, spontaneity and unpredictability were character traits I looked for in a lover, not a father. I needed someone I could depend on, and right now Conor wasn't filling me with hope.

This isn't right, Maya
.
You were the one who left, not him, even if it wasn’t your choice. He didn't get a chance to be dependable – to be a father
.
And you don't know that he isn't capable of it
.

I angrily punched my hand against the bus window, glad that, for once, it was empty – and that it had turned up in the first place. Alexandria wasn't exactly known for its public transportation. Men like my father had bribed the city council for years to make sure that certain companies won certain contracts, and the final result was a Department of Public Transportation that was a department in name only.

The buses were decades old, and there weren't enough drivers. The money was siphoned off, some used to bribe city counselors, and the rest funneled into the city's criminal underworld. Used to pay for things like the new carpets my father had had installed just that month. Even used to pay for things like the sneakers on my feet. It made me sick.

"Hey, lady," the bus driver's stern voice rang out. I saw him peering back at me in a mirror toward the front of the bus. "You okay back there?"

"Sure." I replied, pulling my fur-rimmed jacket hood down over my eyes. There was no reason for the old guy to have any idea who I was, but my father was a big deal in this town – and to my constant dismay, that meant so was I. Meeting new people only ever ended up going two ways: either they were terrified I'd send my father's men after them, or they were fascinated by me.

I hated both approaches, but this guy took neither.

"Then stop vandalizing my bus, will ya?"

"Sure." I repeated, happy he hadn’t recognized me. The less I said, the better. Out of the corner of my eye I watched the driver – an elderly black man with a salt-and-pepper speckled beard eying me in the mirror, a suspicious look on his face. I wondered about what he saw running this route. Crazy things, no doubt. This wasn't a nice part of town – which is why I'd chosen it for today's… activity.

It was the only part of town worth caring about that wasn't in some gang's territory or other. It was no man's land – had been since the factories closed, and the only people who came here these days were high school kids looking for a place to drink, junkies and the homeless.

I looked out the window, the one I'd been bashing on only a few seconds before. The view through the glass, speckled with rain from an earlier squall, was gloomy, to say the least. The shells of the old, dirty red brick factories towered over the empty streets until they disappeared off into the foreboding looking, angry gray sky. There was still the better part of a mile to go, and the way the sky looked, I didn't want to have to walk.

"I'm sorry," I relented. "I shouldn't have done that."

He sighed, as if he’d decided that picking a fight with me over it wasn’t worth it. "All right then."

The bus kept trundling on, the engine coughing and spluttering as it powered its way up the slight incline toward the old Industrial District. The sound was soothing, almost cathartic in its monotonous drone, and allowed me to switch off, to let go. I could've stayed on that bus the rest of my life.

"Are you sure y’alright, young lady?" The bus driver asked, startling me out of my daydream.

Mind your business
, I thought sourly.
Just get me where I'm going, and I will be happy. That's how this is supposed to work, isn't it?

But I didn't want to make a scene. Didn't want to be recognized, or remembered at all. I bit down on that sour retort and smiled sweetly at him.

"Oh, don't you worry yourself. Long day at work, that's all." I replied, trying to stay as boring as possible. I've found that the best way to stay out of the limelight is to just be boring: to do, and say, as little as possible that draws any attention to you.

I learned it young. I realized that the more I disappointed my father, the less he wanted anything to do with me – and that was just the way I liked it. Even as a young girl, I'd understood the evil that lurked deep in his heart for what it was.

The bus hit a pothole, and the entire chassis rattled. Knowing how old these damn rust buckets were, I was surprised it didn't fall apart entirely. The bus driver took that precise moment to try and continue our conversation, and I couldn't help but wish that he’d just pay more attention to the road, and less to me.

But he was lonely.

"My girl, when she got a face like that, usually got something on her mind." He drawled, his voice gravelly and deep. It was a voice that was made for radio, and at any other time I could have listened to his rich, luxurious tones for hours.

"You sure you're not hanging onto nothing? Memory like mine, I'll have forgotten it by supper time."

I looked up and into the mirror and saw him smiling at me, the corners of his eyes wrinkled, and a kindly look in his eyes. I imagined he'd make an amazing grandfather – he seemed like that kind of guy. I imagined him hoisting Eamon up onto his knee and telling him a story. Hell, Eamon wouldn't be the only one listening.

Why couldn't I have been brought up by a man like that?

"Really, I'm sure." I said.

"Well okay, if you're sure, then." He said.

The rain pattered down gently on the roof of the bus, sounding tinny against the thin metal, and before long the driver broke the silence again.

"You don't mind if an old man like me mutters away, do you? Gets lonely in this bus, is all. God only knows why they keep me on this route. Nobody left to pick up in this part of town, not since the last couple factories closed, anyways."

I smiled. "Sure."

"Thanks.

I smiled shyly and stepped off the bus. As my foot hit the ground, I turned back. "Thanks."

"It wasn't nothing, girl. You be careful out here, you hear me? This ain't no place for a pretty girl like you."

"I'll be okay," I replied confidently, touched that he was worried at all. It was a strange feeling, this human connection – not one I'd experienced often since I'd returned to Alexandria.

I sat down at the stop and waited for the bus to pull away. The old man – I wished now that I'd asked his name – drove much more slowly than he had when I had been sitting on the bus, and I figured he was probably watching me and making sure I was safe.

His concern was touching, but I hadn't come this far to fall at the final hurdle. It was bad enough that I'd spoken to him in the first place – and not just for me. If my father ever found out where I'd escaped to, I had no doubt that the friendly old bus driver would receive an unexpected, and very unpleasant visit.

You hid your face, you didn't tell him your name, he'll be fine
. I hoped I wasn't wrong, because my father had beaten men to a pulp for much less before.

I waited until the rickety old bus turned the corner, and disappeared out of sight before I began walking. The less he knew, the less he could tell.

God I hope it doesn’t come to that.

I headed toward the old Ford factory, and more specifically, the bell tower that loomed over it, slipping away into a daydream as I stomped over the filth and detritus of a forgotten city – a windswept pile of trash here, a scattering of used needles there. I imagined the industrial district as it must once have been – buzzing and alive, the engine room of the city that never slept.

Perhaps I shouldn’t have come here, or at least should have been alive to the kind of dangers that lurk in dark places like this.

Alexandria had once been at the heart of America's industrial boom, and from the end of the first world war to Woodstock, workers and their families had flooded here from all over the country, hell, from all over the world. The Russian quarter hadn't just sprung up out of thin air by accident, after all. No, my grandfather hadn't come to Alexandria to be a gangster. That had just…happened. He'd first come here for work.

On a day like today, with rain threatening and angry gray clouds hovering low over rows of decrepit, rickety old factories, that all felt faraway, dreamlike, a hoax. It was hard to believe, looking around at the huge piles of demolished concrete and bent, rusted spars of iron rebar that stuck out of them like a hedgehog's spikes, that any of that was real, or that there had once been real wealth here.

Pull yourself together, Maya. This isn't the kind of place you want to get lost in your head
.
It’d be the last thing you do.

I pulled my jacket in close around me to stay warm and picked up my pace. As I did, the hard lump of metal I'd been concealing pressed against the underside of my rib cage. I don't like guns, hell I wouldn't be lying if I said I hated them. I've seen too many people hurt when they get into the wrong hands too many times. But contrary to the popular saying sometimes you've got to play with fire to
stop yourself
from getting burned.

I cast my eye around, looking for anyone who might be watching me. I'd spent the entire bus journey staring out the window, checking that no one was following, and since we'd crossed over the river I'd barely even seen another car.

I passed by a doorway that had been neatly lined with dozens of unread copies of the Alexandria Herald. Judging by the headline, they were almost a week old and it looked like someone had turned them into a rudimentary mattress, faint protection against the biting cold of an Alexandria winter.

Caw! Caw caw!

I jumped backward, my heart beating at a hundred beats per minute as a pair of fighting crows exploded out of a cardboard box a couple of paces to my left. Just briefly, ever so briefly, I had thought I was being attacked.

Chill, Maya – they’re just birds.

An uneasy shiver ran down my spine. I felt as though the temperature had suddenly dropped half a dozen degrees, or a cold wind had whistled down the long, derelict street and found its way by some stroke of bad luck down the back of my jacket. But it wasn't that, not really – it was my brain giving me the faintest taste of what it must be like to live, alone, huddled up against the chill. It was enough for me to know, without a shadow of a doubt, that I wouldn't survive the winter out here.