Chapter Twenty-Nine
NICK
I was buzzing with adrenaline anticipating this fight and still tasting that kiss with Karli. She looked shocked when I told her that I loved her. I couldn’t blame her; it was something I would have doubted I’d ever say to a woman myself. She didn’t say it back, but I wasn’t overly worried about that.
I could see that she loved me when she looked at me. I could feel it when she touched me. I was sure the only thing that either of us hadn’t done yet was say it aloud. She probably just needed time.
“You ready, kid?” Charlie asked me as he handed me my mouth guard and squeezed water from the plastic bottle he was holding into my mouth.
I grinned at him. “I’m ready. What do you say I make this a one-round knock-out?”
He raised his eye-brow in a classic Charlie move and said, “Don’t go out there cocky. Go out there and remember everything you’ve learned from me and remember that no one has ever beat this guy. Look at him; he’s an animal. This is all he knows and he’s not looking to lose it anytime soon.”
I looked across at Chavez. He would be without a doubt the biggest man I’d ever fought and obviously the one with the best record. My record was as good as his, but this was my first title fight. I thought about what Charlie said about this being all Chavez knows. I guessed we had that in common, too. My sponsors were counting on me winning this thing. They’d been grooming me for this for years. I wanted this win so badly, I could taste it, for so many different reasons.
“Okay,” I told Charlie in all seriousness, “I won’t be cocky, and I’ll listen to every word you say.”
“Good, don’t let it go to the mat, because your wrestling skills still suck.”
I chuckled and popped in my mouth guard. The referee called us to the middle, did his spiel, and told us both good-luck. I knocked fists with Chavez; his felt like steel. I went back to Charlie and took a few deep breaths and blew them out while I waited for the buzzer.
I looked out into the audience hoping to get one more look at Karli’s face…and my eyes landed on my father. My dad was sitting at the end of the front row and the thought of that made my heart race and my breaths grow short. I’d wanted him to come to one of my fights for so long, but now that he was here, I wasn’t absolutely certain that it was a good idea.
I moved my eyes down the row until they landed on my brother. He must have seen the question there because he shrugged. Finally, I looked at Karli. She smiled and blew me a kiss. It was almost like taking a sedative. My heartrate slowed down and I was able to breathe normally. I smiled back at her just as the buzzer rang.
Distracted, I flew out to the middle…right into Chavez’s huge fist. It caught me dead in the center of my face and blood spurted out from my nose, spraying the mat below us. It hurt like hell, but when he came at me with the other fist, I was ready.
I blocked his left hook and then realized he knew that’s what I would do. As I blocked it, I leaned back slightly, and his big tree-trunk leg swept out and he hooked the backs of my calves with his foot.
I could hear Charlie’s voice calling out to me, giving me direction, but the crowd was too loud for me to hear what he was saying. I tried to spin away, but his legs were too heavy and all my own motion did was knock me to the mat on my ass. He lifted his leg up and that giant foot was headed for my neck. I grabbed and twisted it, hard. As I twisted, I rolled my body to the side so when the giant crashed down to the mat, he didn’t land on top of me.
He did a belly flop that might have just shaken the entire building. For just a second, the wind was knocked out of him. It gave me time to jump up on his back. I straddled him and wrapped my arm around his neck, pulling up on his head to the sounds of the audience cheering, hissing, booing, and screaming. I pulled hard, hoping that he would tap out and this would be over in the first round.
It was a crazy thought. In six years, this man had never tapped out, not once.
He didn’t tap and he didn’t pass out. He took it until the buzzer sounded and the referee broke us up. I got off of him and headed toward Charlie.
The first thing he said when I got close enough was, “I told you not to go to the mat.” I sat down and accepted the sports drink he squirted in my mouth. After I swallowed it, I said,
“Thanks for the reminder; I won’t trip again.”
“Go ahead and be a sarcastic asshole. You’re losing this fight, either way.”
I shook my head. “I’m not going to lose.”
“Good, get your ass out there and act like it this round.”
When the buzzer rang, Chavez came out throwing punches again. He moved like lightning for a giant. I was trying to get close enough for my fist to reach him when he threw out a jab and a cross with his left. Neither of them made contact because I was moving, too, but he threw out an elbow next and it landed right between my eyes and against my already swollen nose.
My head was filled with stars for just a second. I could feel blood slowly running down my face and then I felt the son of a bitch throw a jab the landed right on the open cut. It hurt like hell, but it ignited the rage inside of me, and that’s what I’d been lacking.
Maybe having such a happy life hadn’t been all that good for my career, after all. Now I was pissed, though, and I hammered a fist underneath his jaw that caused his head to snap back, hard.
He stumbled back with a stunned expression on his face. I moved in while he was still completely out of it and wrapped him up in my arms and drove my forehead into his. We were struggling for hip position. I hated the mat. I hated the floor. But, the only way I was going to beat this big son of a bitch was if I could manage to get him to tap out.
He moved and wiggled until he was able to press his back into the mesh and plant his feet far enough apart to get some stability. We stayed wrapped up like that for a long time before the referee broke us up.
I went back over and Charlie pushed me down onto the stool and rubbed my cut with Eswell to close it up before slapping on a piece of gel foam. Fuck, it hurt! At least if Chavez went for it again, I’d have a slight bit of cushion.
“Stay on your feet. You don’t want to be on the mat with him.”
“I can’t knock him out, Charlie.”
“Sure you can. You have power in that fist of yours; use it. You go down with him, you give him the full advantage of his body weight. Stay on your feet.”
“Okay…okay, I’ll do my best.”
When the buzzer sounded, we met in the middle and after a few seconds of dancing around with each other, I threw out a roundhouse kick that landed hard on his upper thigh. He staggered back, so I did it again and again, pushing him back into the mesh.
My plan was to hammer him with my fists while I had him pinned with my body, but before I could get close enough to pin him, he managed to get his leg up and that size-fifteen foot collided with my knee and I felt it explode with pain. I was focused on that when he came at me with his fists.
I could hear screams in the crowd, and once again the sound of Charlie’s voice trying to be heard over it all. Chavez was throwing punch after punch and sweat was rolling off of us both, mixing with the splatters of blood and making the mats underneath our feet so slippery that it was hard to get any traction.
I knew it was going to piss Charlie off, but I felt like I had to take him down and somehow get him to tap out. He was too fucking strong and my punches barely fazed him. I lunged at him and the S.O.B. slid in the mess on the floor, but he still didn’t fall. How in the hell someone so big could have such good balance was beyond me.
He grabbed onto me, and I was the one that slipped. I didn’t let go of him, though, and we both hit the mat, hard. He was on top, and I lost control. He straddled me and started a ground and pound that I was sure was going to knock me out. I told myself, this was it. He wasn’t just using his fists, he was using his elbows, as well.
I’d never been in a fight where I took so many hard hits to my face. I was sure my nose was broken and maybe even a cheekbone or two. I was actually wondering if this big bastard was doing permanent damage to my face, and I almost heard Karli laughing inside my head at how conceited I was.
The thought of Karli, sitting out there in the audience watching me get my face pounded in, maybe watching me lose this fight, gave me a renewed sense of energy and somehow, I managed to harness it and use it to buck my hips up as wildly as the mechanical bull that I’d ridden at Gilley’s. The giant flew off of me and landed on his chest.
He was already using his arms to push himself up off of the floor by the time I got to him. I jumped on his back, dropping my full weight down onto him. I wrapped an arm around his neck and pulled back hard. He grunted, cussed, twisted, and turned, and just about the time I thought he was going to scream, he slowly lifted his hand and let it drop to the mat.
I just became the heavy-weight champion. I’ll be damned.
“Winner by tap-out…‘Tricky Nicky’ Nick Storelli! Ladies and Gentlemen…your new heavy-weight champion!” The level of noise in the event center hurt my head. The lights as I squinted out through the mesh and tried to find Karli hurt my eyes. Charlie was hugging me and pounding my sore body with his big, meaty hands, and then I was handed a belt that weighed more than I cared to lift at the moment and paraded around the ring with my arm in the air. I hurt all over, and I felt dazed and slightly confused. I physically shook my head to clear the fog out of it.
When the ref finally let go of my arm, I looked over and saw Chavez getting to his feet with the help of his trainer. I thought about how my life was going to be different now, and so was his. He’d put up a hell of a fight and right up to the end, it could have gone either way.
I went over and when I saw his face, I wondered if I was making a mistake, but I had to at least try to show him some respect. I put out my right hand and said,
“I hope I can do this title as much justice as you did.” Chavez stared at me for a few minutes like he either couldn’t focus, or he wasn’t sure if he wanted to and at last, he smiled. It wasn’t his scary, “I’m going to break you,” smile. It was a genuine, warm smile. He put his big hand out and shook mine.
“Anyone that can beat me the way you just did is going to be one hell of a champion. Congratulations, boy. I know you’ll do us proud.”
I was floating on cloud nine. Charlie was proud of me. The former heavyweight champion was proud of me. The only thing I could imagine would be better was finding Karli. When I turned away from Chavez, they had opened the door to the cage and Charlie was standing at the entrance with Karli just outside.
She was looking at my face with evidence of a wince on hers. I could only imagine what I must have looked like. I limped over to her and as soon as I got past the blood and sweat on the mat, she threw her arms around me. She tried to pull back when I grunted, but I held onto her tightly. “Are you okay?”
I smiled. It hurt like hell. “I’m better than okay, babe.”
“I’m so proud of you, but that was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to watch.”
I kissed the side of her face. That hurt like hell, too. “I’m sorry, babe.”
“Don’t be sorry. My boyfriend is a champion. I guess I’ll just have to get used to it. I love you, Nick.”
I squeezed her tighter and this time, she grunted. “I love you, Karli. So fucking much.”
“There’s someone else here who wants to see you.” She stepped to the side next to Charlie then, and I saw my dad. He was frowning. I just stared at him. I was at a loss for words. I would have never suspected in a million years that he would show up here of all places. What he did next completely blew me away. He held out his right hand and said,
“I don’t think I can watch another one of these, son, so I want you to know here and now that I’m proud of you…and I’m sorry.”
I ignored his hand and pulled his three-thousand-dollar suit up against my sweaty, bloody chest. He could afford a new one, and it had been over twenty years since I had a hug from my dad. He stiffened at first, but after a few seconds, he hugged me back. “Thank you, Dad. You have no idea how much it means to me that you came.”
“I do, actually, but you can thank your brother and his intervention for getting me to see the light.”
“Ethan’s intervention?”
“There are a lot of people and reporters that want to see you. We’ll talk about it later. I should go change my suit.”
I was still smiling hours later after I got untangled from fans, press, and other fighters who wanted to congratulate me. By the time I showered and limped out the side door with Charlie, it was really late and I had no expectations that Karli had waited for me. When I got to my truck with my heavy ass belt slung over my shoulder and saw her standing there, I felt like the fucking king of the world.