Down and Out

As soon as Savannah darts out of the room to open the front door, I’m wincing as I try to stand. My body’s rejecting the painful movements with every fiber in my being. I’m actually glad she’s not here to see my tortured expression as I slowly and feebly make it onto my feet.
Dark, angry spots might litter my body, but the only bruise that really hurts is the one to my ego.
I don’t want Savannah to see me like this, all beat up and bloody. It makes me look weak. I’m a fighter for Christ’s sake—a damn good one at that—and I got my ass handed to me. I don’t care if there were three of them and a baseball bat. My testosterone-fueled brain equates getting my ass kicked with weakness, and for someone who’s never even so much as lost a fight before, it’s a hard pill to swallow.
Jesus, it hurts to even blink.
If it wasn’t for that damn baseball bat to the gut, I might’ve stood a chance at fighting them off, three guys or not. They weren’t that big and it was pretty obvious they didn’t have proper training. Hell, I might’ve even been able to take the blow to my stomach with a little warning. It’s a matter of tensing your abs and absorbing the hit, exhaling as you bend forward slightly. Don’t get me wrong, it’s still going to hurt like a bitch, but it’ll at least keep the wind from getting knocked out of you.
Marcus appears in the doorway, halting as he sees me. His brows pinch as he looks me over. “The hell happened to you?”
I pop the top off the pill bottle and toss a white, oblong pill back. “Kerrigan’s boys paid me a little visit last night.” I reach for the glass of water on the nightstand and grimace at the way it forces my muscles to stretch. Who the hell decided to make nightstands so goddamn short?
“Motherf*cker.” Marcus slams his palm against the doorframe, his face screwed into something ten shades past livid. I’ve never seen the guy look so lethal.
I take a sip of water, washing down the painkiller. I’m about to set the glass back down when I think better of it. Picking it up killed my ribs, so I’m not about to put it back. I’ll carry this bitch around with me until the meds kick in if I have to.
Marcus pulls his phone out of his pocket, scrolling through it. “No way is that piece of shit getting away with this. When Jimmy hears about this. . .” He shakes his head, laughing darkly. “Kerrigan’s a dead man walking.” Pressing the phone up to his ear, he says to me, “You know Jimmy’s got connections to the mob, right?”
That’s what I’ve heard. Jury’s still out on whether or not it’s true. Could be one of those false rumors that work in your favor and you don’t particularly want to dispel it.
But I wouldn’t put it past him. Don’t let the designer suits and good looks fool you—Jimmy’s a cold motherf*cker when he wants to be, and I wouldn’t be surprised if those hard baby blues had witnessed a murder or two.
Shit, I can’t let him get his hands on Kerrigan before I do. . .
“Hang up the phone,” I tell Marcus, slowly walking around the bed.
He frowns and moves the mouthpiece away. “What?”
I shove the glass at his chest. “Hang up the f*cking phone.”
“What the hell, man?”
Water splashes on his gray shirt as I brush past him and make my way to the bathroom across the hall as quickly as I can. I’m about to piss myself over here.
“If you call Jimmy, all you’re gonna do is get Kerrigan banned from The Pit and possibly killed,” I say, kicking the door shut with my foot.
Marcus’s voice drifts through the crack in the almost-closed door. “And?”
“And I want my revenge in public, not dealt out by some pretty boy millionaire in a Prada suit.” Lifting the toilet seat, I pull myself out of my boxers and almost groan in relief as the stream lands loudly in the toilet. “I want to be the one to take Kerrigan down—in the ring, in front of hundreds.”
Oh, would you look at that? I’m pissing blood.
Lovely.
Sighing, I tuck myself back in my boxer briefs and flush. “I’m not some f*ckin’ narc, Marcus, and I can’t take the p-ssy way out, not when I can crush him in a way Jimmy can’t.” I swing the door open and meet his stare.
Kerrigan’s a prideful son of a bitch. Getting the shit beat out of him in front of a giant crowd will hurt his ego more than a bullet to the head in some dark alley.
Marcus’s stare bores into me as he leans against the doorframe to my bedroom, his arms crossed over his chest. “And how do you think Jimmy’s gonna take it if he finds out about Kerrigan’s little stunt? He’s gonna be pissed at you for not bringing this to his attention.” His jaw works under tense muscle. “You sure he likes you enough to spare you his wrath?”
That I do not know. I shrug, aiming for a confidence I’m not a hundred percent sure of, and walk past him, back into my room. “I’m the biggest name in that organization. I make Jimmy a lot of money. I think he likes that enough not to alienate me.”
“You damn well better hope so, bro.” Marcus sighs and pushes himself off the doorframe. “So what am I supposed to do? Call Jimmy and ask him to reschedule?”
“Yeah.” My face screws up as I climb back into bed. “Tell him I got into a bad car accident or something.”
Marcus sets the glass of water back on my nightstand. “He’s not gonna be happy.”
I grit my teeth and sink back onto my pillows. It’s not like I’m thrilled, either.
“So when should I ask him to reschedule this thing? A month?”
I shake my head. “A couple of my ribs are most likely broken.” Him and I both know it’ll take longer than a month for those to heal. Probably six to eight weeks.
“Shit.” He grips his phone in one hand and runs the other over his shortly cropped hair, pacing beside my bed. It looks like he’s trying not to throw the thing across my room. “So we’re looking at twelve weeks total?”
“Yep.” I can’t train while I’m healing, and after a potential eight week hiatus, I’ll need another four to get me back in fighting shape.
Marcus shakes his head slightly and holds up his phone. “Pics or it didn’t happen.”

One abysmal game of Battlefield later, Marcus walks back into my room. “We’re set,” he says on a long sigh. “Twelve weeks from now. Jimmy said he’d get back to us with a firm date and he’d let Kerrigan know.”
“How’d he take it?”
Marcus shrugs. “Better than I thought he would. Guess he likes you more than I realized.” He sits on the other side of my king-sized bed and smirks at me. “You been blowing him on the side or something?”
Flipping him off, I look back to the flat screen mounted on the wall across from my bed and toss him my controller. “Your mom’s been blowing me on the side,” I mutter, grabbing the extra controller from my nightstand.
I see him shake his head out of my peripherals and I have to stifle a grin. Marcus hates it when I talk smack about his mom, the friggin’ momma’s boy.
Eh, I probably shouldn’t be raggin’ on him. Hell, I’m sure I’d still be a momma’s boy if I had one.
After several seconds, he quietly asks, “Do I even want to know why Savannah answered your door this morning?”
Damn it, I was kind of hoping he wouldn’t notice.
My teeth bite down on the inside of my bottom lip as an overwhelming sense of defensiveness washes over me. Marcus is like a brother to me, but it’s none of his business why Savannah was here, and the last thing I want to hear right now is that I’m being stupid when it comes to her. I already f*cking know that.
“She found me last night as she was leaving the gym. Helped me up here and called Blake,” I say, my words terse.
“Shiiiit.” He scrubs his hands over his face. “How’d you get her not to take you to the hospital? Wasn’t she freaking out? I mean, Christ, if you look like this now, I can’t even imagine what your sorry ass looked like last night.”
I shrug before I can catch myself, feeling bursts of pain shoot up my sides and around my shoulders. “I told her not to. Told her to call Blake instead.”
“And she just listened?”
“I guess.” I was too out of it last night to really remember how much of a protest she put up, but knowing Savannah, it was probably epic. I’m actually kinda surprised she even listened to me, now that I think about it.
“She’s either stupid or incredibly loyal.”
I shoot him a glare, silently warning him to watch it.
He holds his hands up defensively. “I’m just sayin’ any normal person would’ve called nine-one-one instead of your dumbass brother. You got lucky you weren’t seriously injured.”
“I was coherent enough to tell her not to call an ambulance, all right? And if Blake really thought I needed to go to the ER, he would’ve taken me. So don’t put this all on her.”
He shakes his head, his mouth lifting into a disbelieving grin. “Damn. I never thought I’d live to see the day.”
My scowl’s still firmly in place as I start another game of Battlefield. I don’t bother looking over at him as I mutter, “Never thought you’d live to see what?”
“The day Declan Whitmore fell for a chick.”