Page 109 of Keep Your Guard Up
“WOOOOOOOOO! RIO DE JANIOROOOOOOOOO! WOOOOOOO!” JJ’s loud cheers echoed through the room.
“Rio de Janioro?” Al asked.
“Yup!” JJ beamed, and I groaned at where this joke was going. “What’s in Rio, Al?”
“Uh … I dunno? The big j—”
“THE BIG JESUS!” JJ cheered, pointing down at me.
I glanced over to Mari sitting in the corner, bouncing between tapping away on her phone and scuffling through paperwork with a highlighter. Her straightened hair fell over her face, and I could tell she had been stress-sweating a little before she’d managed to heist her way in here—some of her curls were starting to come back around her face.
God, she is so fucking beautiful.
“Five minutes before you’re backstage, Chance.” Marilyn reappeared with a tray of coffees and a beer. To my surprise, she handed the beer to Mari with a knowing smile.
Sunny downed half of it almost instantly.
“C’mon, mate, let’s get you ready.” Al patted me on the shoulders as JJ shrugged a jacket up my arms.
I waited for the usual rush of adrenalin to start. I waited for the typical surge in my heart rate. I looked across the room.
At Al, who had taken on one last fighter to get me here to the big stage once again.
At Marilyn, who had taken a chance on a fighter down on spirits and pushed him to thrive as a coach.
At JJ, who had saved my ass on more than one occasion, but who would always be the one whose call saved mylife.
And Mari, who had shown me what it was like to be loved exactly asme—who proved to me that love was not transactional but a consistent partner dance through every twist and turn.
I couldn’t fight the smile that stretched across my face at the realisation; that survival-mode surge I’d waited for, what had used to be driven by threat and fear, was now driven by the love for the team around me. For the grit and the determination they had all taught me in their own ways.
“Well, that’s my cue.” Mari stood with an empty beer bottle in her hand. She passed it back to Marilyn and, to my surprise, wrapped her arms around my neck.
Her perfume, mixed with the sweet smell ofher, flooded my senses.
“Remember to stay with Hogs and JJ,” I whispered in her ear.
Gooseflesh lit up her bare back.
“You got this, Chance,” she whispered in return. “You’ve earned this. This is yours.”
“Rio.” JJ gently patted my shoulder. “It’s time, man.”
~
“Saw your girl out there tonight, Riordan.” Randy’s sick, slow voice smashed through every fucking heightened sense.
My fingers began to tingle. Not in fear, but in absolute anticipation to drop the prick in front of me.
“She’ll look better once she’s cuffed to my headboard though.”
JJ caught me just in time.
One of his cornermen had disappeared. The biggest one, who’s name I couldn’t remember, leaving his corner down to two.
“Fuck,” I muttered. “JJ, Hogs—”
He grabbed me by the shoulders. “He’s already onto her, man,” JJ stated. I’d never heard him speak so calmly. “Dylan is sitting two rows behind her too.”
