21
Jules stared at the door, unable to believe that he was gone. He’d been so angry, but he hadn’t denied anything she’d accused him of. Wrapping her trembling arms around herself as if she could stop the pain from shredding her heart, she took in a gasping breath, and the tears she’d been holding back finally spilled down her cheeks.
How could they make their relationship work if he was always waiting for her to leave? He’d always be holding himself back. She wiped at the tears, but more fell down to replace them.
Walking to her bedroom, she retrieved her phone from where it was charging on her nightstand. She was feeling too many things—pain, anger, heartbreak—to keep them all inside. She needed to talk to Megan, the one person who had always had her back. Leaning against her pillows, she called her.
“Hey, Jules. What’s up?” Megan’s voice was so friendly and warm that Jules felt a lump well in her throat. She couldn’t speak. “Jules?”
“I’m here.” The words were forced, and she took a breath to stop even more tears from falling.
“Are you okay?”
“Yes.” Jules shook her head. “No . . . I . . . I think Nick and I just broke up.”
“What happened?” Megan asked, her voice full of love and concern.
Jules launched into everything. From Nick’s conversation with his brother to the fight in the gym to her dad finding out about them. When she was finished, she felt drained and not one bit better.
“I’m so sorry,” Megan said. “That sounds so unfair. I can’t believe that your dad would fire him. This isn’t a situation where a manager took advantage of a subordinate or gave out special favors.”
“I know.” Jules sighed, feeling tired and bone weary from all the weight she’d been carrying around. “But he’s Dad. It’s his way or no way. I told him I’d quit before I let him fire Nick. I guess we’ll see what happens.” Since their heated discussion the day before, her dad had been avoiding her like she’d been avoiding Nick. She had no idea if he planned to follow through on his plan to cut Nick.
“Jesus.” Megan’s voice sounded as stunned as Jules felt. How had everything gone bad so quickly? “I’m so sorry, honey. What can I do? Do you want me to come over?”
“No.” Jules looked at the clock on the wall. “It’s late. I’m going to go to bed.”
“Okay. Let’s have lunch tomorrow.”
“Okay. I’ll call you in the morning,” Jules promised.
Megan was silent for a minute before she said, “For what it’s worth, I think Nick is crazy about you. I know this is a rough patch, but I can’t see him letting you go so easily.”
Jules wasn’t so sure. He’d been angry and hurt. Every time she closed her eyes she saw his eyes, so hard and closed off. Not the eyes that had looked at her every night as he’d held her in his bed.
When Jules didn’t answer, Megan asked, “What happens now?”
“I’m not sure. I guess everything goes along normally until the tournament this weekend.”
“Do you want me to come with you to the tournament? I can be there . . . just in case you need a friend.”
“That’d be great.” She sagged against the pillows in relief, happy that she didn’t have to face this alone. She had a feeling she was going to need someone on her side. “Thanks, Megs, for everything.” If it all fell apart, at least she’d realized through all of this that she could open up to Megan. Her heart was hurting, but she still felt loved and she knew she wasn’t alone.
“Of course. That’s what friends are for.”
Sweat dripped down Nick’s face and streaked across his chest as he faced down Sam Kovac, his opponent in the first fight of the tournament. The bright lights of the MGM Grand Garden Arena blazed down onto the caged octagon. The air was warm and seemed to pulse around him with the crowd’s energy. Blood dotted the canvas beneath Nick’s bare feet, sacrificed in one of the other fights earlier that day.
His heart throbbing in his chest, he stalked Kovac across the octagon, satisfaction filling him at the sight of the welts rising up on Kovac’s face and legs. He’d done that. Marking him as he poured everything he had into the fight, wanting somehow to both feel and be numb at the same time. Chasing something that would make the world make sense again.
He ducked low, slamming his fist into Kovac’s gut, but it wasn’t enough. He needed more. More violence, more catharsis, more pain. Anything to obliterate the hollowness inside him, to make him forget that there was an empty shell where his heart used to be.
He’d spent the entire five minutes of the first round pounding relentlessly on Kovac, using his fists, his elbows, his knees, his feet to punish him in retribution for the shit Kovac had said about his Jules.
Except he was pretty sure she wasn’t his Jules anymore.
Maybe she never had been.
Seeing an opening, Nick launched a kick that caught Kovac in the side, hard. The snap echoed through the arena, and sixteen thousand people let out a sharp, collective “oh!” Kovac stumbled back, hurt by the kick, and Nick surged forward, landing a left hook that snapped Kovac’s head back. He landed another punch, a punishing jab with his right. Despite his wobbly legs, Kovac managed to scamper back, putting some distance between them. Nick moved toward him, and Kovac threw a wild, desperate, spinning kick. Nick ducked it easily.
Kovac sneered at him despite the fact he was getting his ass kicked, and something dark and powerful surged through Nick. Something cold and black, bleak and savage. He shot his fist out, connecting with Kovac’s nose. He felt it give and blood began to drip from it almost immediately, spattering onto Kovac’s chest. Nick kicked him again, landing a hard shot in his stomach and sending him sprawling back against the fence. Nick lunged forward, wrapping his arms around Kovac’s hips and dumping him to the ground. He fell on top of him and let loose with punch after punch after punch, hammering his fists into Kovac’s bloody face over and over again.
He was exchanging his pain for Kovac’s, as though that could somehow balance out his fucked-up world. And for a second, it did, as he lost himself in the beauty of the violence, the thrill of the exertion, the scent of blood and victory sharp in his nostrils.
“Stop!” The referee yelled out as he dodged between them, separating them and waving his hands in the air as he called an end to the fight. Nick let his heavy arms drop to his sides as he rose to his feet, striding away from a groaning Kovac, who was now bleeding heavily from his nose and from the gash Nick had opened up over his left cheekbone.
“I think my ribs are broken,” he moaned, still on the ground.
The crowd had erupted as soon as the referee had called a stop to the fight, and their cheer swelled as Nick lifted his arms into the air in victory. But just as quickly, any relief he’d felt was gone, drained away almost instantly.
The victory was empty and meaningless, because even though he’d just won the fight, he’d lost the most important thing in his life. He wasn’t sure if he’d lost her the night he’d walked out of her apartment, or before that, when she’d decided to shut him out. Fuck, he wasn’t sure if he’d ever really had her. Maybe he’d just been deluding himself this entire time that they could be something that simply wasn’t possible.
The octagon’s door opened, and people flooded in—coaches, doctors, cameramen—swarming the space and making it feel much smaller. Omar slapped Nick on the back, saying something he didn’t hear, because even though he knew he shouldn’t, his gaze had moved into the crowd.
Looking for her. Like a goddamn fool.
It wasn’t as though there weren’t people cheering him on. There were. Alex had come. Gabe sat in the front row, an approving half smile on his face. A handful of other fighters he’d befriended. He wasn’t alone, and yet he was, achingly so.
Someone else from his team pulled him into a crushing hug, and Nick slapped him on the back, knowing he needed to pretend to be happy. To pretend to feel something. So he went through the motions and celebrated.
Craig Darcy sat in the front row not far from Gabe, his arms crossed in front of his chest, his gaze cool and appraising. Sharp anger soared through Nick. He wanted to curse at Darcy, wanted to blame him for what had gone wrong. The clause in the contract: Darcy’s fault. The fucked-up way he’d raised Jules, saddling her with unfair baggage: Darcy’s fault. Nick held his gaze and gave him a curt nod.
Fuck Craig Darcy.
“Giannakis!” Gary Watts, the WFC’s announcer, called, waving him to the center of the octagon. Kovac was still on the ground while a doctor examined him, his team of coaches huddled around him. Looking at him, Nick felt . . . nothing.
Pulling his mouth guard out, he plastered a smile on his face as the referee took his wrist, getting ready to raise his hand.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” boomed Gary’s voice through the arena’s sound system. “Referee Hank Carson has called a stop to this fight at two minutes and thirty-two seconds of the second round. The winner of this quarter-final middleweight tournament fight is Nick Giannakis, by TKO!”
Nick did all the stuff he was supposed to do—shake hands with Kovac’s coaches, wave to the crowd, pose for a few official pictures, look happy—but fuck, he couldn’t get out of that octagon fast enough. Tomorrow he’d fight in the semifinals, and the day after that, if he made it, the finals. There were other, nontournament fights scheduled for each day too, to make sure fans got their money’s worth.
Accepting a blur of fist bumps and high fives as he went, he made his way back to the dressing room. Reporters followed him, shoving microphones and digital recorders in his face as they asked him about the fight, about his strategy, about his thoughts on fighting Fernando Silva tomorrow. He answered their questions, even tossed in a few jokes, but as soon as he made it to the dressing room and shut them all behind him, he couldn’t have repeated his answers had his life depended on it.
Nick sank down onto a chair as Omar and his coaches chatted around him, buzzing with excitement over the win. The other fighters, having fought earlier in the day, had already long cleared out, leaving the space empty except for Nick and his team. He tried to listen as they talked about Silva, but he kept tuning out, letting that blackness inside him swallow him up.
Eventually they all left, leaving Nick to his thoughts. He hadn’t moved from his chair. He knew he should treat his tired muscles with an ice bath, get dressed, go home. He glanced down at the bruise forming on his thigh—one of Kovac’s kicks he’d failed to dodge. His jaw ached from the few punches he’d absorbed. Tomorrow he’d fight again, and maybe he’d find some more of that relief he’d tasted in the octagon earlier. What he really wanted was to go home to Jules. To have her massage his sore muscles and then curl up beside her in bed. Instead, he was supposed to go out for drinks with Alex. Before he could rouse himself to action, a knock sounded at the door, and Gabe poked his head in.
“You decent?” he asked, stepping inside and closing the door behind him.
Nick shrugged. He’d tugged his T-shirt over his head, but he was still in his fight shorts, his hair pulled up in a braided topknot.
“Good win.” Gabe crossed the small room and sat down on the bench that lined the wall, facing Nick. “Kovac was outclassed. He’s not ready for the belt.”
Nick nodded. “Thanks, man.”
“Silva is better on his back than Kovac, but he’s slow. You’ll take him, no problem.”
“That’s the plan,” Nick said.
Gabe studied him for a moment, his eyes narrowed. He dropped his forearms onto his thighs and clasped his hands in front of him. A silence fell between them, and finally Gabe cleared his throat. “I heard what Kovac said about Jules. I get why you punched him now.”
Nick snorted. “Yeah, I think everyone knows now.” Nick shook his head slowly. “Not that it matters anymore. Darcy found out I’d violated the nonfraternization clause, and he’s trying to decide if he’s gonna can me. Jules and I . . . we had a fight about it.” It had been more than a fight. Even though they hadn’t said as much, there’d been an air of finality to the way he’d left.
“About the contract and her dad?”
“And some other stuff,” he said, not wanting to unpack it all when he’d managed to shove it all down.
Gabe let out a low sound. “He shouldn’t treat his fighters like this. It’s not right.”
“No. It’s really fucking not.” But Nick wasn’t thinking about unfair management practices. Only Jules, and the way she’d shut him out.
He felt the weight of Gabe’s silence and gaze, and he looked up to meet his eyes. Gabe cocked an eyebrow. “Is that what happened out there?” Nick didn’t have a chance to respond before Gabe continued. “You’re pissed about the contract and your fight with your girlfriend, so you tried to take Kovac’s head off?”
Nick shrugged, not wanting to get into what happened in the octagon. It scared him a little, the way he’d wanted not just to win, but to hurt Kovac. That wasn’t normally his MO. But fuck, it had felt good to forget about his own pain by causing it in another.
“That wasn’t you,” Gabe continued when he didn’t answer. “You’re not one of those assholes who think they have something to prove every fight. You fight with your head.”
“I know,” Nick admitted. “I wasn’t looking to prove anything. I just wanted . . .” To stop the pain.
“Oh hell . . . this isn’t about the contract at all, is it?” He studied Nick for a second, then cut right to the heart of it. “You love her, and it was more than just an argument, wasn’t it?”
Nick shrugged, not trusting himself to speak.
Gabe let out a deep breath in a low huff that hinted at the weight of the emotion he carried around. “That wasn’t anger out there. It was pain.”
Nick’s head snapped up, something clicking into place. Something he’d long struggled and failed to understand about Gabe. “That’s why you fight,” he said, his voice quiet.
Gabe held his gaze, not denying it, but not confirming it either. “Pain and anger only get you so far. Eventually, they swallow you whole and there’s nothing left of you. Nothing left to love. Nothing left to hate. Nothing.” Silence settled between them for a minute before he continued. “You lose yourself, because you forget how to separate yourself from it.” He dropped his head and gazed at a spot on the floor. “You have to find other ways to deal with it. Not to let it so deep inside. Otherwise, one day you wake up and don’t know where it ends and you begin. You can’t feed it, whatever its source.”
Jesus Christ. In that moment, knowing what Gabe had gone through, what he’d lost, Nick couldn’t have felt like a bigger asshole. His pain was nothing compared to Gabe’s. A puddle compared to an ocean.
Gabe cleared his throat, and when Nick met his eyes, he could see the shattering loss he’d endured shining there. “I wish I could go back. I’d give anything to change what happened. But I can’t.” His unspoken words hung between them. I can’t fix the source of my pain. Can you?
Nick’s throat tightened and words failed him. How could he fix it if he loved someone who didn’t know how to love him back? How could he fight for something that wasn’t even there?
Gabe stood and clapped Nick on the shoulder. “Buy you a beer once you’re champ. Get some rest. You look like shit.” And with that, he left the dressing room.
Nick sat for a long time, staring at nothing, thinking about everything, and wondering what the fuck he was supposed to do.