Hawk

Her shoulder was deemed fine by the doctors, but the whole process still took almost all night. Mostly because I was real annoying, demanding that they perform all the tests they can do, after Vlad and her seemed to be happy with whatever they could get. I wish our MC medic Doc was here. He’d probably take one look at it, put her arm in a sling and tell her to take it easy for a couple of days. But he’s taking his sweet time getting down here to Vegas, and the hospital with all their equipment and gadgets is better anyway.

Yanna just wants to start training again as soon as she can, and it looks like she’ll be able to. Her next fight is in five days and after that it’s only the championship fight she still has to worry about. Then I get her all to myself.

Once we got to her house, she fell asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow. She didn’t shower, she didn’t even undress, and while I would be more than happy to help her with both those things and then some, I figured she needed the rest, so I didn’t even suggest it.

I can’t sleep though. My dick’s too hard for one thing, and for another, I didn’t get the best news regarding the Russians, while I was sitting beside her in the waiting room at the hospital.

Yuri, Mikhail and two more of their thugs met with Yanna’s opponent in the next fight. They visited her at home since she’s local, and were in there for an hour, after which an ambulance needed to be called for her boyfriend, who’s apparently also her bodyguard. At least that’s how Ink summarized it, based on the fact that she came out, “as white in the face as the walls of a building washed in moonlight”, which according to him is only possible when you lose a lover. He’s much too poetic for his own good most of the time, but I’ve grown to enjoy his colorful descriptions. Not so much tonight, since this is a complication I didn’t need.

The Vipers are only doing event security for the tournament. It’d be better if the woman organizing the whole thing — an ex-fighter who won a couple such tournaments in her day—hired them to keep the vultures swarming and trying to profit off it too. I’m sure the Vipers could keep the Russians away. Better than I can on my own.

My own brothers would be even more efficient at it, but I’m not gonna ask Cross for that favor. The Russians are an important new client for us, so it would be too much to ask. My father had lots to say on the subject of what you can ask of whom and at what time in business, and most of it turned out to be universally applicable. Sometimes I wish I’d listened to him more. But the man talked a lot, and I did listen at least some of the time.

No, I can’t ask Cross for this.

What I will do is go speak to the event organizer tomorrow. I already did some background checking on her on my phone, while I waited for Yanna at the hospital, and I’ll go downstairs to do some more on my computer in a little bit. She seems like a legit lady who wants to keep fights clean. I hope I can persuade her to up the security. I hope she cares enough to do it.

Then I’ll pay that other fighter a visit too, and find out what the Russians wanted from her.

But first I’m gonna spend some time right here, holding Yanna while she sleeps, because nothing else seems quite as urgent or necessary as that. Besides, dawn is breaking outside which means everyone’s asleep. We can have this time together now.

* * *

It wasn’t easy leaving her in bed without even a kiss goodbye, but she slept right through the alarm she had set for nine AM, and the phone call from her trainer at about half past. I told him she was sleeping and I’d rather not wake her. Through gritted teeth, he agreed it’s best to let her rest, which I suppose meant that he was barely able to contain himself from asking why the fuck I was answering her calls, and telling me I should just fuck off altogether. That’s the vibe I got from him all of last night at the ER too. Guess the guy fancies himself something like her dad in addition to being her trainer, which is an honorable thing, but she has me now. He’ll grow to understand that. I’m good at persuading people to do things even when they’d rather not. Which is what I hope to do now.

I persuaded the Vipers to get me a meeting with the tournament director and that part went smoothly, but as I watch her approach my table in this restaurant where she wanted to meet, I think I might be shit out of luck as for the rest of it going well. Her hair is unnaturally white, pulled back into an unnaturally tight bun any ballerina would be proud of, and her lips are just one very thin, tight line, which looks pretty unnatural too. Her face is set and warning everyone around that they better not talk to her. No one does, and I’m reconsidering doing it too. Even the hostess just pointed me out and let her walk over on her own.

I get up and extend my hand, smiling warmly, once she’s close enough. “I’m Hawk. Thanks for taking the time to meet me.”

“Tamara,” she barks and grips my hand very tightly. “What’s this about? I don’t have much time.”

She looks like she’s gonna march right back out if I don’t get to the point in the next two seconds, but I wave the waitress over first, so she can order something to take the edge off her sour mood, though I’m afraid that’s a permanent feature with this woman.

She gets a mineral water.

“What’s this about?” she asks again as soon as the waitress leaves.

She kept asking me that on the phone while we set up this meeting, but I wouldn’t tell her. I guess I better get to the point now, since it’s pretty obvious that trying to soften this woman up first would be pointless.

“There’s a new player in town, fresh off the plane from Russia, so to speak,” I say, since getting right to the point is never a good idea either, my father taught me that much too. “His name is Yuri Kazarov. Perhaps you’ve heard of him?”

Her eyes narrow like she’s thinking, but there’s no shock in her face, once they finally widen again. “Never heard of him. Is he looking to arrange a tournament too? Because that would be a great idea. The girls don’t have very many chances to compete at well-organized international events.”

The waitress approaches with the water, and I wait for her to set it down before speaking. The fewer people who overhear this conversation, the better.

“He’s not looking to organize a tournament,” I tell her. “He’s looking to get in on the action by fixing this one. He already spoke to Violet “The Snake” Harrison last night and he’s been trying to get in touch with Yanna as well.”

The woman turns even paler than she already is naturally, which is quite a feat, since she’s about as white as a white building, or whatever the fuck Ink said last night.

“My tournaments are clean,” she says. “Everyone knows this. It’s the only way to build a serious and respected annual event.”

I nod along, since I don’t doubt that’s what she wants. Nothing I found out about her makes me think she’s lying. But I’m starting to think she’s just a naive middle-aged woman.

“No one’s gonna ask you if they can fix a fight,” I tell her. “They’re just gonna do it, and Yuri is doing it.”

“There’s so little money in female MMA,” she says. “Why would he bother? What’s the point? We’re so small and inconsequential in the grand scheme of things.”

I can see she firmly believes this makes her safe. I get that from her arrogant little smile and her harsh tone, but also from her suspicious eyes telling me she thinks I’m full of shit, that I have a different agenda to the one I’m laying out for her.

“That could be the exact reason why they want in on the action. Inconsequential equals less regulation and that makes it easier to fix the fights,” I explain, even though I’m not entirely sure that’s the reason why Yuri is so interested. “But it could also be that he has a fetish for female MMA fighters.”

She gives me an even wider arrogant grin. “He wouldn’t be the first. But we’ll deal with him as we’ve dealt with the others.”

“The others?” I ask, mostly out of curiosity.

“No one has tried to fix a tournament or match of mine, and I’ve been organizing them for over fifteen years now,” she says. “But there have always been men who wouldn’t take a nice no for an answer, and I’ve successfully dealt with all of them.”

I nod, even though she’s just proven to be more naive than I thought she was. But it’s always better to stay on the good side of anyone you’re doing business with. Another one of my father’s wisdoms.

“This one is different,” I tell her. “His father is the head cheese back in Russia, and I’m sure he taught little Yuri all about getting what he wants any way he wants. He’s from a different league to what you’re used to, is what I’m saying.”

I have no doubt about that, even though I don’t actually know it. But I do know my own father taught me all he knew back when he still thought I’d follow in his footsteps, and I imagine old man Kazarov did the same thing with his sons.

Her eyes are growing more and more suspicious by the moment. “What’s your angle in this? A manager from the company I hired for security told me I should meet with you, and that’s why I’m here, and also why I’m inclined to trust your word, but other than that, I have no way of knowing if I should.”

I didn’t want to tell her everything, but I guess I better come clean. Honesty breeds honest transactions. “I was hired as a bodyguard by Yanna “Cat Fight” Ivanova after the first time the Russians approached her under suspicious circumstances. She wishes to compete in a fair tournament, and I mean to make that happen for her. But I don’t think we can do it without your help.”

“My help?” she asks shrilly. “I’m already doing all that needs to be done, and I don’t like the insinuation that I’m not.”

I don’t much like the fact that this is the main conclusion she drew from what I just told her. Guilty minds and all that.

“I wasn’t insinuating you’re not doing a good job,” I tell her. “I’m saying you need to do an even better job if you want to protect your tournament. The security firm you hired can look into this for you too, just ask them to.”

She chuckles. Most women fold much faster when getting spoken to like I’m speaking to her now. This one probably never folds or stands down. I don’t have much experience talking to women, since the MC world is a man’s world, and I only get to question an occasional club whore, old lady, or female bar owner, who are all usually easy to turn. This one isn’t, and she’s not used to taking orders from men the way those other women are.

“I know what I’m doing, but thank you for the warning,” she says and finishes her mineral water, slamming the glass down too hard, the sound echoing in the relative silence of this near empty restaurant. “I will keep an eye out for these Russian mobsters, but I have to get back to work now.”

I grab her arm as she moves to get up and she doesn’t like that one bit, going by the angry glare it earns me. But I don’t let go of her arm, nor do I look away from her angry, ice blue eyes. Eye-contact is as good a way as any to get people to do what you want them to.

“Get your security firm to look into what the Russians are doing, so they can keep them away,” I tell her. “They have the capacity and the skills to do that. But give them a call today. As it is, it might already be too late.”

She yanks her arm out of my grasp, but remains seated, breathing kinda loudly for a lady. “I don’t appreciate being told how to run my tournament, but you sound serious and this whole thing sounds serious. I’ll look into it. Now I have to go. Goodbye.”

She gets up this time and walks away. I let her.

I’ll get in touch with the Vipers to see if she called them. Then I’ll work with them on this. I need backup, and I can’t ask Cross for help. Preventing the Russians from fixing this tournament probably won’t dissuade them from buying those guns from us, so Cross doesn’t need to know anything about this.

I hope I persuaded her to call them, but I’m not sure I did and that would complicate my little plan on how to deal with this.

But by now, Yanna’s bound to be awake and spending the day with her is the best way I know to keep the Russians away from her.