Page 102 of Mean Machine

“It’s near the phone in the main room.” Brooklyn watched Em get up and happily observed the man’s naked backside and the tattoo when he left the room. In the bathroom, Rose was washing his hands and face and neck, and he returned with a towel that he tossed to Brooklyn.

Brooklyn wiped himself down but didn’t have enough energy left to do much more than that. All right, so he might have dozed off for a while there, because he started fully awake when somebody knocked on the door. By the time he’d managed to gather himself enough to leave the bedroom, Rose and Em were already bringing in several dishes. A cursory glance suggested they’d gone all out on the meat and fish options, plus some appetisers and salad. Brooklyn gave them a thumbs-up and vanished into the shower. They’d probably need all of those calories.

Five months later

THE TALLwhite-dressed man was unmistakable even at that distance. A small cart stood relatively close by, and Brooklyn thought he recognised the caddy as Thorne’s bodyguard back when they’d met that first time, under very different circumstances in that hotel in London.

Thorne swung the golf club a few times, as if to prepare for a swing, but then seemed to notice Brooklyn, who in his jeans and leather jacket did admittedly stand out among the other golfers and club staff. It was a sunny day, with enough of a breeze to make the nearby trees rustle, but apparently not enough to interfere with the game.

“Brooklyn.” Thorne offered a gloved hand, and Brooklyn took it, but stepped closer into a somewhat awkward embrace. Thorne smiled at him, though he looked about ten years older than he had the last time they’d met. “How are you doing?”

“Just making sure you’re okay. You jerked my team around a lot about that fight. First, you confirm that fight you’d been angling for five months, then you cancel the press conference, and I end up fighting this Queens bruiser that I wasn’t actually prepared for. What was all that about?”

The bodyguard/caddy looked up, watchful enough that Brooklyn blew out a breath and rolled his shoulders.

“Sorry for the tone. I wasn’t happy.”

“You still beat the guy.” Thorne tapped the side of his face. “I’ve watched it.”

“So, what was the reason? The money? Cash said the purse was all sorted. You bowing out with a shoulder injury, but here you are, playing golf?”

“Here I am, playing golf.” Thorne shifted his weight, then made eye contact with his caddy. “Why don’t we take a little walk, Brook?”

“All right.”

Thorne handed the club to the caddy. “Ten minutes. We’ll be over there.”

“Of course, sir.”

Thorne came walking back to him, and nothing about his movements suggested pain or discomfort. With Thorne stringing everybody along for months and then cancelling at the last minute, Brooklyn was keen to hear the real story. Thorne stuck to his guns when Cash had reached out, and there was no conflicting information coming through from Derek via Joseph.

“I want to hear it from you. No bullshit. You know you can have a title fight whenever you want it. I owe you that much, and people love that kind of thing—the great feuds of boxing, Ali, Frazier. There’s nothing like it right now.”

“Yeah, nobody is taking that risk.” Thorne gave a thoughtful nod. “We were too evenly matched, you and me. I’ve never been knocked out in the ring, and I fucked up your skull.”

“I’m okay.”

“Of course you are.” Thorne gave him an up-down glance with irony so thick he could have cut slices off it. “Well. Promise you’ll keep it to yourself.”

“All right.”

“I’m retired. I did go back to the gym to get ready for that fight, though hell, it was more about proving something to myself than the money. I don’t need the money anymore.” Thorne pulled off his cap and wiped his forehead. “The truth is, I’ve taken some damage too. I’ve tried to play my career as safe as possible, you know, travel the whole road as far as I could, but those punches to the head build up over time, so there’s some damage to my spine, mostly wear and tear, but the scarier part was that my sight was shot after our fight. I didn’t fancy going blind or getting beaten into a vegetable, and I don’t want to risk spinal surgery. And all of those factors came together, so I retired.” Thorne looked at him squarely, seemingly relaxed and mostly at peace, more than resigned to the fact that even a big powerful body like his had proved to have limits.

“Uh, congratulations, I guess, but why didn’t you just simply say so?”

Thorne laughed, a low, wholly pleasant rumble, and reached for Brooklyn’s shoulder. Brooklyn allowed Thorne to drape an arm across his shoulders, despite the fact that his body viscerally remembered getting leaned on, remembered having to carry the man’s weight in the clinch when Thorne had tried to rest his bulk on him to tire out his legs. But no such games here—Thorne was only supremely at ease touching a man he’d fought. And a bisexual man as well.

“How long have you been in America now?”

“On and off for almost a year.”

“You like it?”

“It’s different. Yeah, I like it. I got to travel to see the famous gyms. I went to Louisville to pay my respects.”

“Ah, Ali’s grave, of course.” Thorne leaned his head in closer, conspiratorially. “You need to learn one thing about Americans. We only love winners. You people, you love a loser, you love the underdog, but that’s one of the things we never got. For us, winning means you’re morally superior. Money and wealth make you a good person. Winning means God’s on your side. That’s it.”

Brooklyn turned away from the wide stretches of perfectly manicured grass and gently sloping landscape and looked at Thorne, but the man was dead serious. “And how long will you fool them?”

---