Page 85 of Crash
It’d be another month before I could fight again, and then it was only two and a half months after that and the season would end for me. I wouldn’t be able to make up the points to progress any further even if I won every bout. Right now, I was fighting for the money. Hopefully, the title would come next year. Dean, however, still had a shot, and I had to be happy and present for him.
The view really was beautiful, and I wished Veewasstanding next to me so I could share it with her.
Glancing over my shoulder as my mobile phone began to ring, I crossed the room to the bed and picked it up. I answered immediately when I saw Vee’s name on the screen.
“Hey,” I murmured, sitting down.
“Hey,” she replied. “How are you?”
That was a loaded question even though people usually rattled it off to be polite.
“Okay,” I replied even though I wasn’t totally sure that I was.
“Training going okay?”
Kicking off my trainers, I moved onto the bed, leaning my back against the headboard. “Yeah, it’s tough, but that’s just because it’s been a while. It’ll get better. Is everything good at Pulse?”
“As good as it can be, I guess.” She sighed heavily, and there was a rustle as she moved.
“Where are you?”
“In bed.”
“What are you wearing?”
“Lincoln,” she shot back, but I could hear the smile in her voice.
Laughing, I replied, “I’m in bed too.”
“I wish I could be there,” she said after a moment.
“Yeah, but I get why you’re not.”
There were another few minutes of silence, so I just hung on the line and let her work out what she was trying to tell me.
“I feel like I should explain about that night,” she said finally, and I bristled.
“Vee, you don’t need to tell me anything if you don’t want to. It doesn’t matter to me.”
“I know, but it matters to me.”
“We never—”
“I can talk about it on the phone,” she interrupted. “It’s less…confronting.”
“Is it something you need to do?” I asked, my voice low.
I knew the guy was off someplace in a wheelchair or wherever he ended up after Ash nearly beat him into a grave at The Underground, but I feared that hearing about what he’d done to Vee would send me over the edge. I came after the fact—much after—but I still wished I had been there for her from the beginning.
“I’ve never told anyone exactly what happened,” she murmured. “Ash knows because…”
She trailed off, but I knew why Ash knew. Hammer had filmed it and sent it to him as bait. I pinched the bridge of my nose, pissed at the fact I was being totally useless right now.
“Linc?”
“I hate that I can’t touch you right now,” I said.
There was a rustling over the line. “Yeah. I know.”
