Page 91 of The Beginning and End of Everything
Larry shoves his way into the ring, closely followed by Kyan. "Time!" he shouts. "Disqualified for breach of conduct."
Harmon throws his head back and laughs as he lifts his hand. The light glints from the razor blades the bastard has in his wraps.
Larry and Kyan step in front of him.
"Protecting your boy?" Harmon says. "I would have destroyed him."
I snarl and step forward, but Finn is in front of me in a second. Harmon grins, spits on the floor, and steps out of the ring.
"We both know you would have had the fucking junkie," Finn says.
He never swears, and I can practically feel the tension hammering off him. His anger may be controlled, but all it does is feed my own. I shove away from him and pace the ring a few times, clenching and releasing my fists. My ribs sting. Blood trickles down my side, mixing with sweat.
Larry stops me, placing his hand on my side as he inspects the damage. "Go get cleaned up," he says, studying my face closely. "Finn, go with him. Get him some first aid, and donotlet him out."
By the time I'm back in the storeroom, I'm murderous. My skin itches and anger crawls over me like ants. Finn sits on the metal bench in the middle of the room with a small first aid kit in his lap. Although seemingly calm, his knee jerks repeatedly in my peripheral, and his agitation makes me nervous. Too much time in a battle zone will get you like that. When you live, work, and kill beside other guys, you feed off their emotions. If one of them suddenly becomes tense, you best assume you're about to get a bullet in your arse. In a way, you become like a pack of animals, each looking at the others for behavioral cues, and his anger is only setting light to my own, stoking it and stirring the flames higher.
"Finn, you need to go," I say through clenched teeth.
"Larry told me—"
"Look, you're pissed, and it's not helping me." I clench my fists and squeeze my eyes closed. I hate feeling this out of control, a slave to this aggression.
He hesitates for a second, then nods, gets up, and leaves the room. The second he does, I slam my fist into one of the metal lockers. The skin at my ribs pulls with the movement, and I place my hand over it. Blood slicks my palm. "Fuck!" I roar, jumping when the door to the storeroom slams against the wall.
Poppy’s gaze skims my side, and she shakes her head. Inhaling, she takes the first aid kit from the bench and begins rummaging through it.
"I'm fine," I say.
"You're bleeding." She kneels in front of me, swatting my arm away from my side so she can inspect the cut. “I don’t think you need stitches, at least.” A line sinks between her brows, and her lips press into an angry little line. “You should have knocked his teeth down his throat."
It's so cute that the anger in me ebbs slightly.
"I would have if Larry weren’t such a pussy about it."
She fiddles with a bandage. "I mean, what did he hope to accomplish by swiping you with a razor?"
I concentrate on a spot on the wall while she tapes the dressing in place. I count to a hundred in my head and focus on breathing. In and out. I allow the pleasant scent of Poppy's perfume to drown out the smell of blood and sweat and violence.
Her fingers trail over my cheek, and I blink, staring down at her. The little frown line is still there.
"Stop worrying, Poppy."
She scowls at me. “I didn't realize that you getting shanked by some filthy asshole—in an underground, illegal fight pit—was something I shouldn'tbe worried about."
"Babe, it's a scratch. I did not get shanked." I can't help but smile at that.
"Don't try to downplay this, Brandon."
I lift my hand and sweep the hair from her face, tucking it behind her ear.
Her eyes flutter closed, and she swallows. "I hate this," she whispers.
I press my lips against her forehead, then throw on my shirt and hoodie. "Let's go."
As soon as we step outside the storeroom, I spot Finn lingering against the back wall. Hope is with him, no doubt chewing off his ear about some pointless bullshit. The second he spots me, he crosses the room, Hope trailing behind.
The crowd in The Pit is still thick, and if anything, the blood has only riled them even more for Kyan's fight. I throw my arm around Poppy's shoulder and pull her tight to my side as we all make our way to the exit and into the alley. The door bangs shut behind us, wrapping the cold air and the smell of rotting food and piss wraps around me
