Total pages in book: 130
Estimated words: 126003 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 630(@200wpm)___ 504(@250wpm)___ 420(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 126003 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 630(@200wpm)___ 504(@250wpm)___ 420(@300wpm)
I do realize I’m an adult. And I think my life here is very adult. But boys and sex… that I’m just not sure about.
So sometimes I just make up pretend boyfriends to keep her off my back. Of course, they always end in disaster a week later.
“So… what do you think?”
I wasn’t even listening. But I don’t need to, really. She tries to set me up at least once a month. “I’ll think about it.” It’s another one of my standard answers.
“You don’t have time to think about it. It’s tomorrow. I need to let him know.”
“Then no.”
“Why not? You’re not working. I already asked my dad.”
“I… I joined a gym.”
She makes a face of puzzlement. “OK. That’s… great. But what does that have to do with going on a date?”
Nothing. It has nothing to do with what she’s asking me. I need to lie to her. It needs to be a very small lie or she’ll smell it. “I mean, I already joined the gym. Last month. And there’s… like… like a thing tomorrow.”
“What kind of thing?” Now she’s making a face of suspicion. See, she’s just way too smart.
“It’s like a… um… you know…”
Nandy laughs. “You’re making this up. There is no thing.”
“I don’t want to go. I really am going to train.”
“You never want to go, Irina.”
“I’m just not ready to think about dating right now.”
“Because the last fake boyfriend you told me about broke your heart?”
I look down, huffing a little.
“Never mind. I’ll butt out. I’m just… I just get worried about you.”
I raise my eyes back up to meet her gaze. “You really don’t need to worry about me. I promise, Nandy, I am the last person you need to worry about.”
She makes a face of sadness. “That’s the whole reason I worry. You don’t have any family, I’m your only friend, you’re a twenty-something waitress who owns her own condo, and you came to me with a Russian accent you needed to lose. Do you think I can’t read between those lines?”
“Of course you can.” My Russian accent leaks through. “You’re a linguist, Nandy. You read between all lines. But I’m telling you, you do not have to worry. A man isn’t going to make my life better.”
“And the gym will? Assuming you’re telling the truth about that.”
I make a face of yes. “It will, believe it or not. It really will.”
She studies me for a moment, reading my face the way I read hers. She has no idea why the gym is suddenly important to me, but she does accept that it is. She blows out a breath. “Fine.” She puts up both hands in surrender. “I’ll stop asking then. But the moment you stop having drinks with me on the weekly, I’ll hunt you down, Irina van Breda. I will not let you walk away without a word.”
I lift my drink, she lifts hers, and we clink. “I promise. I will not walk away without a word.”
I end the night early after that. I don’t usually stray far into the city and Nandy still lives at home, so we almost always meet up in South Beach these days. Which means my walk back to the condo is only seven blocks and I spend every minute of that walk thinking about the fights.
I picture them in my mind.
I start planning my training.
I say my new name over and over in my head.
I am the storm and they will never see me coming.
Because I am a girl… and so they never do.
The text comes in late evening the next day and includes an address and a time, but nothing else.
Tonight.
I’m not ready. I haven’t been training. Not even cardio.
But winning isn’t even the point.
It’s not even the point.
CHAPTER 4
I’m lying on my bed looking up at the poster when Davis stops under the archway of my door, knocks on the wooden doorframe, and says, “Guess what?”
I just sigh.
“I found her.”
I look over at him. “Found who.”
He points to my ceiling. “Her.”
I’m already sitting up. Getting up. Walking over to him. Trying not to wince each time my foot hits the floor. “Where?”
“Well, I don’t know where she lives or anything, but I asked the guys around town to keep an eye out—I figure once a gym rat, always a gym rat, right? So I just got a call from Dog—’member him?”
I nod, rolling my hand at Davis to get on with it.
“Well, blah, blah, blah—he found her on the beach. Says she gave him her number because she wants in on the tournaments.”
“Really? Why? I mean, if she ran away from Maart, why would she want to fight again?”
“According to Dog, she was in the fights a few years ago. Her best night was three rounds. Took her several months to get that far. The guys were just starting to get used to her, kind of enjoying her progress. But then, after that night, she just took her money and disappeared.” Davis proceeds to tell me about how Dog bumped into her on the beach, floating on the ocean. Just… floating there like a dead body.