Mr. Beautiful (Up in the Air #4)(12)

He managed to clip me on the shoulder before I laid into him again, but it was nothing, certainly not compared to the damage I did to him that round.

He just kept getting up.  He'd barely managed to land a blow, but he wouldn't stay down.  Either he had a death wish, or he didn't understand.

We got a breather after a time, and I went to check on Bianca while the poor bastard went and licked his wounds in the corner.

"You okay?" she asked, wiping my brow, her eyes as steady as her hands.

I nodded.  "I'm fine, but he won't be, if we keep this up.  Guy doesn't know when to quit."

"Be careful.  He strikes me as desperate."

I let her see the bleakness in my eyes.  "We all are."

She nodded.  "I know, but I don't trust him.  Just be extra careful, okay?"

I agreed and kissed her on the forehead.

She leaned into me, unmindful of the sweat, uncaring of the filth and blood on me.

It was what I needed.  It was all I'd ever needed.

Acceptance.

Such a simple concept, but I needed it like I needed air to breathe, and only one person had ever given it to me.

I hugged her into my chest and breathed it in.  It was more than salve to a wound.

It was life-sustaining.

I soaked up as much as I could before heading back into the ring.

My girl had impeccable instincts.

The guy pulled a knife on me for that round, jabbing me with it before I saw his intent.

It wasn't serious, just a flesh wound, but it set me off.

My vision went red, and so did the room.

I took his legs out from under him with a vicious kick to the front of his knee and a hard shove.  I followed him down, pummeling his face.

Someone tried to pull me off him, several someones, but it was useless.

And then I heard her.  Calling my name.  Snapping me out of it.

I shook my head, stilling.  I lifted my bloody fists up, staring at them.  They were trembling badly.  As I saw this, I realized my whole body had begun to shake.

I looked down at the mess of a man underneath me.

By the state of him, I'd been at it for some time.

I cringed, and retching, I scrambled off him.

It was his face that really got to me.  It was a bloody pulp, unrecognizable, pounded into just so much misshapen meat.

And he was so still.

I was barely clear of him when I emptied out the contents of my stomach on the ground.

Soft hands were stroking my shoulders from behind, Bianca saying something that I couldn't hear over the crowd.

I couldn't hear them, but I felt the words, knew them by heart, and tried to believe them now.

The room had gone wild with noise, cheers, and applause.  They loved the raw, brutal violence of what I'd done.  It's why they came, why I made money at this.

I wanted to curl into a ball and disappear.  This was the worst one yet.

Had I killed him? I wondered, praying that I hadn't, though it seemed that I was grasping at straws.  No one was trying to move him, as though they didn't think it was worthwhile to even try.

I felt slender arms hug me from behind, soft kisses on my temple, and then her voice in my ear, "You're okay.  He's okay.  I'm okay.  We're okay," she chanted soothingly, over and over.

It helped.  Even if it wasn't entirely true.  It helped.  She always knew how to take care of me.

She always had.

Always understanding, always accepting, always loving, from the very start.

Things got out of hand in the ring sometimes.  I'd done my fair share of damage, but so far, I'd never killed anyone in one of these fights.  I found I was having a very hard time coming to terms with it.

I had killed before.  When I'd stopped that old man from raping Bianca I'd beaten his head so hard against the pavement that I'd felt when his skull caved in.

No.  This wouldn't be the first time I'd killed, but that didn't make it any easier to stomach.

Who had he been?  Who would miss him?  Why was my life worth more than his?

It wasn't.  I knew it wasn't.  But hers was worth more, and she needed me.  The thought galvanized me, as it always did.  I would do what I needed to for her.  I'd do anything for her.  Because it was a fact that she was worth it, and that certainty had gotten me through many o' rough thing.

Who I assumed was a doctor was finally kneeling by the other fighter, tending to him.  He didn't pronounce him dead right away, and I took that as some small sign of hope.

Bianca pulled me gently away from the mess I'd made on the floor, and I blindly followed her.

Old Sam, the bastard that organized these things, came to stand in front of me, a sick grin on his face.

He waved a wad of cash in front of me.

I grabbed it, glaring at him.

He was the source of my livelihood at the moment, but I still hated him.  He was the worst kind of opportunist and had no qualms about preying on the weak and desperate.

"Good job, son," he told me with a good-natured chuckle.

"Don't call me son," I told him, my voice gravelly from all of the retching.

He shrugged.  "You always get touchy after these things, but you're a natural, my boy.  We're going to do great things together."