He let out a shocked laugh and shook his head. “Ow! Damn, woman.”
She shrugged. Though she’d hated that Tommy had been banned from the cage and even his training facility, this was all part of the growing up he needed to do. As he’d gotten older, instead of settling down like most men eventually did, Tommy had only gotten wilder.
The man did love his women. As a consequence, he’d never had a serious relationship. In fact, in the twenty-three years she had known him, she couldn’t remember seeing him with the same woman twice. Well. She had seen him with two women at the same time, but, again, the actual girls never stayed the same.
Then there was his attitude. Thankfully, that had never been directed at her. He’d always stayed the same with her, but everyone else—including his training posse, especially after he won the Middleweight championship a little over a year ago—yeah, she understood how it had been easy for Mike to tell him to get the hell out.
Fighting hadn’t changed Tommy. He’d fought his way up since he was twenty. But the lifestyle that came with “hitting it big” had. The parties, the cockiness, the women, all of it. The man had become so wrapped up in everything and everyone else around him, he had completely ignored Julie. Hell, he hadn’t even noticed when she’d left.
She really didn’t ever want to meet that man again.
She just hated that his blindness had cost him the cage. And brought him to this.
No career, no future. And now, no home.
…
Tommy tucked a long yellow envelope under his arm as he walked out of the post office exit.
Julie had been awesome, as always. She’d chauffeured him around all morning, stopping to let him buy some necessities. Thankfully, when he ran, he always carried a debit card, his license, and some cash, along with his phone, in his wrist wallet. That habit had kept him from being completely without access to money.
Too bad money wasn’t finding him a place to stay. A pet-friendly hotel was an option, of course, but he didn’t like the idea of his dog being cooped up in a hotel room for God only knew how long before he found a new place.
But Julie didn’t need him underfoot, either.
He had to see if he could make other arrangements. Unfortunately, only one other person came to mind, and he knew it would be a long shot. He dug out his phone, thumbed through his contact list, then hit the call button.
Dante “Inferno” Jones had been a good friend of his for a couple of years now. “Hello,” Dante answered.
“Hey, man. It’s Tommy.”
“Tommy! It’s been a while. How’ve you been?”
“All right. Keeping busy.”
There was a moment of silence. “So what’s up?”
Tommy rubbed the stubble on his jaw. He had never been big on asking for help. “Uh, yeah…I had a fire at my place. Looks like I’m going to be out somewhere to live for a bit, so I was wondering if I could crash over at your place.” He left out how bad the fire actually was, not wanting Dante to feel obligated.
“Fuck, Tommy, I’m sorry. Of course you can stay here. I’m warning you, though, this place will be a madhouse for the next two weeks. We’ve got family coming in who decided to make our wedding a vacation trip. On top of that, Caitlyn is on edge. She’s pushing me to elope and call off the wedding. She’s so over the planning.” He chuckled softly. “But you are more than welcome to stay.”
Tommy grimaced. Yeah, he wasn’t doing that to Dante. “You know, don’t worry about it; you have your hands full now.”
“Are you sure?”
“Certain.”
“Well, just know the offer is open if you want to crash here.”
“Will do. I’ll talk to you soon.”
He went to hang up when he heard Dante’s, “Tommy. Wait a sec,” and he brought the cell back to his ear.
“Yeah?”
Muffled mumbling came across the line. He figured Dante had put his hand over the speaker.
Then Dante came back clear. “Caitlyn just reminded me you never responded to the wedding invitation. She needs a final head count. Are you coming?”
Tommy grimaced. A wedding. The last place in the world he wanted to be. But Dante had always supported him, so he needed to return the favor. “Yeah, I’ll be there.”
“Are you bringing anyone?”
“Julie, probably.”
There was a moment of silence, where Dante’s mumbling came through again. “Are you her extra, then?”
“What are you talking about?”
“She’s already RSVP’d and checked the extra person.”
Tommy blinked. She hadn’t mentioned that to him.
“Well, put me down as attending.”
“And a date?”
He was sort of in between women right now. Not from lack of interest from them, just on his part. He wasn’t too worried about it. He figured he was still adjusting to the changes from the fallout. He’d get his groove back. “Nah. Just me.”
“All right, then. Looking forward to seeing you, buddy. Been too long.”
“Yeah. Me, too.”