Chapter 12
The week of training that lead up to the fight was particularly brutal on Ace. He could feel the strain on his body as he worked himself hard in the gym. If he wasn’t working out, then he was honing his technique.
When he wasn’t working, he was at home trying to get some sleep. He had hoped that, if he worked himself hard enough at the gym, he wouldn’t have to deal with the insomnia that kept creeping up on him. As it turned out, his mind didn’t care how hard he had been working his body- he was in for a rough time whenever his mind turned towards Christie and the baby.
Christie: beautiful, smart, and talented. She was everything that he had ever wanted out of a woman. She seemed to care for him too, at least before he had gone and broke her heart into a million pieces. She was sexy and she had turned his head from the get go. Opinionated and driven, she was a firecracker and she wasn’t afraid to let that show. Ace took a deep breath and slammed his fist into the punching bag.
It sent pain shooting up his arm and he winced and adjusted his technique. It was hard to focus when he kept thinking about her. She was on his mind constantly now, and he kept wondering, over and over again, if he had handled the news about the baby okay. He had made her cry. Could he have done it better?
His mind wondered and his next uppercut to the punching bag connected poorly. He adjusted and focused and landed a good, solid strike. Better. He needed to make this nice and convincing, after all.
“Looking good Ace.” Ace turned to the sound of a voice behind him. There was only one person who dared to interrupt his training and that was the boss. He looked and Cruz and just nodded. Cruz was looking dressed up today and his wealth was practically dripping off him, with the expensive cut of his suit and the shine of the rings on his fingers. Ace tried not to cringe. Cruz might have been very wealthy, but he still managed to look cheap in Ace’s eyes.
Cruz looked at him for a long moment, “I see you’ve been training hard this last week. He shifted his weight and looked at Ace with an intense, unbroken stare.
“Yeah, of course.”
Cruz nodded, “Working out every day, day and night. When you’re not at the gym down here, you’re at the gym in your neighborhood. Always training for the big fight.”
Ace wasn’t surprised that he knew. Word always got back to Cruz, “Of course.” He repeated, “The fights coming up soon.”
Cruz nodded, “Yes, one of the biggest ones in your career. So why the training?”
Ace shrugged, “Making it look convincing, Cruz. Isn’t that what you taught me?”
“Ah. Making it look convincing.” There was danger in Cruz’s eyes as he looked at Ace, “I see. No one will be suspicious that you fought your hardest if they all see you training, hmm?”
Ace shrugged, “Helps gather bets for me to win, right? It can’t hurt.”
“Can’t hurt.” Cruz mused, “No, I don’t suppose it could.”
He tilted his head, “Good work.” Then he smiled crookedly, “Just remember, all of this hard work better not pay off, Ace.”
Ace felt a chill move down his spine and a sudden, furious surge of anger in his chest. Cruz was known for making people pay badly for double crossing him. If Ace messed up, he’d end up with much more than a beating.
Ace shrugged, “I know the deal, Cruz.” He was impressed with how leveled his voice sounded. He was playing a dangerous game here, but he didn’t care. Something was starting to shift inside him. It was like his conversation with Christie had sped up the process that had already been starting within him. And he feared that he had probably lost Christie forever.
Ace wasn’t happy fighting for Cruz. He wasn’t happy and he wasn’t going to let Cruz keep walking all over him. He didn’t have a plan yet. He didn’t know what he was doing. He was tired of being a champion only to be kicked like a dog when it suited his boss. He was sick of holding back, sick of the punches to the guts that left him bruised and bleeding for days, sick of the broken bones because he had to lose a strategic fight.
If he lost this fight, Cruz would get rich, but he’d get almost nothing, and worse, he'd be nothing. He would be on his way down. The fights would get smaller and harder, and meaner. The pay would get smaller and the perks would dwindle until Ace could barely afford to eat. No. That wasn’t the life that Ace wanted to walk. He had pulled himself up and he wasn’t about to lose it all.
With a deep breath, Ace turned back to the punching bag and slammed his hand into the fabric, imagining Cruz’s face beneath his fist. And for the first time, it sunk in that, whether he was going to be part of that child’s life or not, he was about to be a father to that precious child.
He didn’t want to be like his father, a washed out old drunk who had been no good to anybody. He wanted to be a man of integrity, even though Ace wasn’t sure what that meant. He didn’t know much about integrity, honesty and trust, but he knew that he had to learn pretty quickly if he was going to be a good father.
And for some reason that Ace couldn’t quite explain, he wanted that. He wanted to be better. He took a deep breath and settled himself in the knowledge that Cruz had not known anything about the studying he’d been doing online. He didn’t think that had anything to do with integrity or trust, but when the insomnia became too bad to manage or deal with and the stress of it all had gotten to his head, he had signed up to a few courses.
He was getting through them faster than he had expected. He was supposedly stupid. That was what his teachers had always told him. Now he found himself working through the course work quickly, quicker than he had expected, and he realized that there might be more out there for him than fighting.
But Ace still needed a plan, and he wasn’t even close to that yet. That was okay. Ace knew his plan would come with time.