Grey
My heart has just about jumped out of my body by the time I have completed my training for the day. I hunch over and try to catch my breath when I exit the gym. I have been tiring myself out, but I can’t slow down, not now. The tournament is coming up rapidly in just a few short days. I feel like I’m ready, but that doesn’t mean I can ease up on myself. I will finally be able to prove to everyone that I’m serious about this being my life—fighting. I can barely stand still at the idea of using my fists to reach my goal.
I have fought so hard for this opportunity, literally. I can imagine the surging crowd, the thick-like-molasses tension, the mouth guard between my teeth, and me beating up fuckers who have no idea how much I have been yearning for it all. Oh, the anticipation is filling me up like fuel being injected into a machine. I feel like I’m going to explode from the fiery gasoline residing inside of me. And I just can’t wait until I am put in a ring and am able to show off my killer skills. All of this training will be worth it in the end, just you wait.
But all I want now more than anything in the world is my girl. She has been in the back of my mind with every weight I lifted and every mile I ran, my little motivation pushing me further and further. I haven’t been the closest to her, as I have dedicated the days to training, but she has made it her goal to sprinkle little bouts of affection here and there. Her kindness and compassion are a few qualities I love about her. She is always there: bath prepared and a little more if my body is up for it.
I have never met someone so charitable without wanting something in return. She is rare, but I don’t even think she realizes it. I continuously thank fate or whatever made it possible for us to meet, because I have the most beautiful, loving girl on this planet. She’s mine, and not in a possessive kind of way. But in the sense that she’s my light and savior, my fucking angel-princess.
Gosh, she’s turning me into a complete mush of bones—putty in her little hands. But to be honest, I don’t mind—because she’s turning me into a better man. For my girl, I’d turn into freaking Superman.
It’s dark by the time I am leaving the gym, nearing ten p.m. I usually come home an hour or two earlier, but I wanted to push a little harder and get some more workouts in. I’ve worked myself up so much, I can barely sit up as I drive. However, with my girl on my mind, soaked in the bath, bubbles covering her—I drive faster and feel my body tense, ready to be kissed. I could come undone just sitting here thinking about me on top of her, touching, caressing her while she works her magic and fixes me right up.
I finally arrive home about fifteen minutes later, giddy and practically bouncing to see my girl. My fucking princess. I get out of the car and lock it. I jog up the stairs and unlock and open the door. I kick off my shoes and set my duffel bag down, cracking my neck with a grin plastered onto my face.
“Honey, I’m home!” I holler jokingly. After a few seconds of silence, I frown. “Liv?” I call her name a little louder and take a cautious step forward. Another beat of silence and I begin to worry.
Normally, she runs up to me and quite literally jumps into my arms, showering me with kisses, which I happily reciprocate. She’d then drag me to the made bath and I’d have the best night of my life. But she isn’t doing anything right now, and I’m worried. And not because she isn’t peppering my face with kisses and showing me to a luxury bath. Okay, maybe a little bit because of that, but also because I fucking care if she’s hurt or worse.
“Olivia?” I softly call her name as I push the bathroom door open. Nothing. I turn and walk down the hall to the bedroom. “Olivia, are you in here?” My voice becomes a little shaky as I open the door. I feel my heart stutter when I find nothing but a cleaner room than how I left it. It’s obvious she’s been in here. She’s always been such a clean freak.
I pull out my phone and dial her number as my anxiety kicks into high gear. I get her voicemail as I open the glass doors that leads to the back porch. I step out and step down the wooden steps and walk on the sand, screaming her name and walking around. We don’t usually come out here, but maybe she wanted to come out and get her feet wet or walk around?
I step on something and look down. One of her books and a mug of tea. She was out here. Maybe she still is…
“Olivia? Are you out here?” I scream, getting looks from an older couple passing by. “Have you guys seen a girl out here? Short, about this tall? Dark brown hair, blue eyes?” I gesture just under my pecs, and they shake their heads. I become frantic as I gesture with my hands. “A-are you sure?”
They shake their heads and move on.
“Fuck!” I curse and press the balls of my hands against my eyes, rubbing hard. “Where the fuck are you?” I can’t breathe. Where the hell can she be? I remove my hands and storm back into the house. I have to look every-fucking-where. Maybe she went out with her friends? Calm down, Grey. Don’t lose your head.
I call every single one of her friends, except for Mason—I don’t have that bitch’s number—nearly screaming my fucking head off when they say they don’t know where she is. They’re panicked, though, and promise to begin searching for her in town. I text her a dozen times as I fumble with my boots, shoving them back on. She doesn’t reply to a single one of them as I storm out of the house and get in my car, peeling off onto the road, not caring if I hit anyone. I can’t fucking focus on anything other than my girl.
I try to track her, but I can’t even pinpoint her fucking phone!
Seriously, where the fuck can she be? I call her about twenty more times as I visit all the places she could be, scouring the boardwalk, the ice cream parlor, even the fucking Nordstrom place with all the khakis and shit. She is nowhere, and I’m seriously having a fucking panic attack. My mind is going crazy and my hands are bruised and kind of bleeding from punching the wheel. I rub my face, and I taste the blood. I have been searching for almost a fucking hour. Where the hell is she?
I know she wouldn’t just go anywhere without giving me a heads up. Not saying that I have a fucking leash on her or something, but we are together. And if I went fucking rogue and dropped off the planet, she would lose her shit too and go insane searching for me.
“Fuck!” I hit the wheel again as I tug on my lip, trying to think. “Fucking think, Grey. Where could she be?”
It takes a moment for it to slap me in the face: her parents’ house.
I furrow my brows but make a U-turn, upsetting drivers; I ignore them and slam on the gas pedal. It doesn’t seem like the sanest idea of her to visit her raging bitch of a mother, but it’s the only other place I can think of. I just don’t understand why she’d ever go there willingly. But this is Liv I’m talking about, and she loves to test her safety. Like how much she loves going to parties even though they literally never end well. Like, at fucking all.
When I finally pull up at the ridiculous mansion, I nearly bust my ass as I stumble out of the car. I don’t even bother locking it. As if anyone in this neighborhood would steal my hunk of junk compared to their shiny Porsches and Lambos.
“Open the fuck up!” I bang on the door and ring the doorbell repeatedly, not giving a damn if I’m disrupting anyone’s beauty sleep. Everybody better get the fuck up. “Olivia, are you in there? Liv—?”
My screams are shut off abruptly when the door swings open, revealing Liv’s caregiver’s groggy face. She rubs her eyes, and I push past her, screaming Liv’s name, jogging up to her room. I burst inside, faintly hearing her call after me and her feet slapping against the marble spiral staircase. She isn’t here. I exit the room after quickly checking the ensuite. I check the guest room even though she’d never come here to stay. We’ve been nothing but great and in-sync the entire week, no fights or anything. She has no reason to come here to escape anything.
“Excuse me. It’s too late for all this hollering. Why are you screaming Liv’s name?” Lana, or whatever her name is, asks me at the stairs when I walk over to her.
“Because she’s fucking missing!” I snap from the building anxiety and anger filling my senses. I feel like I’m drowning from all of the emotions covering me from head to toe.
Her face drops, and she stammers, “What? W-what do you mean, she’s missing?”
“Are you fucking deaf?” I grip my hair before rubbing my face, hard. “I got home and she wasn’t there. I searched everywhere she could have possibly gone, but I’ve come up empty.” I take a lethal step forward. “If you have any idea where she is, I suggest you tell me right now,” I warn her through gritted teeth. Liv is the one thing in this world I would fucking kill for.
She shakes her head with wide eyes. “I swear, I don’t know either.” When I don’t let up on her after a beat of silence, she looks offended and pushes me. “I raised her, you know. Don’t look at me as if I don’t care she’s missing. I care about her.”
“Sure, you do.” I roll my eyes and look away. I catch sight of blue eyes and a trailing white robe before it disappears into one of their immaculate living rooms. “Hold on…” I narrow my eyes skeptically and fly down the stairs.
I stand at the mouth of the living room. Her mother is standing at the lit marble fireplace. The pale orange flicker against her strong jaw and ridiculous bun while she holds a glass of red wine. She looks like that top monster you have to fight to beat some stupid fancy game.
“Where is she?” I growl, balling up my fists.
“You don’t deserve her,” she says calmly, raising the tall glass to her red lips.
What the fuck?
“I didn’t fucking ask you that, now did I?” I stride over to her and glare down at her. “Where the hell is my girlfriend?”
She finally looks up from the raging flames and at me. Her blue eyes gleam with malicious intent as her full red lips curl into a cat-like smile, fucking evil as shit.
“Like hell I’d tell you.” She laughs like the insane woman she is.
Okay, I’ve had it.
“Listen, lady, I am not messing around. Tell me where she is…now!”
“I’m working on getting rid of you, and with her treatment, you will be a blip in her memory just like that,” she slithers out, snapping her fingers.
“Treatment, huh?” I smirk just to fuck with her, and it works because her face twitches like she’s been caught. “Brainwash, really? Do you really have to stoop that low to be the worst fucking mother ever?” Her hand comes to my face, but I grab her wrist before it can touch me. “Where is she?”
I hold her intense gaze. Her lips twisted up ruefully.
“I will never—” she begins.
I squeeze her wrist, and she gasps. “Where…is she?” I’m getting my answer now with her wrist intact or in halves.
She groans with her mouth closed before huffing out, “Memorial Hospital…”
“Thank you for that.” I push her hand away easily and whisper, “Your daughter loves me and nothing you do will be enough to deter her away from me. Get that through your fucking skull and leave us alone.”
I glare at her for a few moments, the only sound in the house her heavy breathing and the crackling fire. I want my calm tone and words to seep into her brain until they are all she sees and hears. She needs to understand that her daughter can very well do whatever she wants and be with me.
I walk away but stop at the mouth of the living room.
“She doesn’t love you. You are only a plaything—a phase!” she screams, desperate to hurt me. But nothing this witch can say will hurt me.
“Funny, doesn’t seem like it when I fuck her, and she tells me I am everything to her,” I say without looking back, smirking as she gasps and throws her glass of wine at the wall beside me. “Don’t fuck with my girl ever again, got it?” I say as I walk to the door. I listen to her faint screams of losing as I slam the heavy door behind me.