Below the Belt(65)

“Maybe. But how many tournaments would the team have won with just him fighting?”

“You can’t have just one guy. You’ve got someone from every weight class.”

Brad rocked back on his heels and remained silent.

“He was still the best,” Tressler insisted.

Brad shrugged.

“It’s bullshit,” he said again, quieter now.

“Think about it.” Brad slung his arm around Tressler and led him back toward the gym.

Marianne ran like hell to beat them back to the main doors. She had just barely thrown herself against the wall, ankles crossed, looking at her nails as if she’d been waiting there the whole time, when they approached. “Ready to go?” she asked, fighting to keep her heavy breathing from showing.

“Sure thing. Thanks for waiting.”

“No problem.”

He pushed Tressler out the door, then waited while she locked up. “Hear anything interesting?”

When she looked up sharply, key still stuck in the lock, he grinned. She scowled at him. “How’d you know?”

“First off, you’re too curious to let that opportunity slide. And secondly, you’re terrible at hiding. But thirdly,” he said, kissing her lightly on the nose, ignoring Tressler’s groan from across the parking lot, “you were sucking wind like a half-dead racehorse when we came back.”

She rolled her eyes and finished locking up.

“Can I bum a ride?”

“How’d you get here?”

“Made Tressler pick me up. He’s got the Compensation-Mobile, so I figured I’d let him waste the gas.”

“A ride back to your place, or mine?”

“Yours, if you’ll let me bum a spot in bed, too.”

Tressler’s headlights flashed over them as he pulled out of his parking spot. He honked a few times, rudely, then disappeared.

“Little shit,” Brad muttered without heat.

“Like you’re one to talk. You came in with a nearly identical attitude, Mr. I Work Solo.”

“I didn’t have nearly as pissy an attitude.”

She said nothing.

“I wasn’t so arrogant.”

“I’ll agree with that one.” She poked him on the shoulder, then walked to her car. “Is that where you dug that cute speech up from? The depths of your forever-changed soul?”

“Don’t make it any deeper than it’s supposed to be.” He opened her door and waited for her to slide in. “I watched a ton of movies in the last week in my spare time. All the inspirational sporting greats. From Hoosiers to Coach Carter and up to When the Game Stands Tall, I made the rounds.”

Waiting for him to sit in her passenger seat, she started the car. “I’ve seen all those movies. Most of them more than once. That speech wasn’t in any of them.”

“I modified.”

“You ripped off Hollywood,” she clarified. “You plagiarized your most important motivational speech.”

He shrugged. “Whatever. It worked.”

“Maybe.”

“If he’s still a little shit in the morning, I guess we’ll know.”





CHAPTER


19


Later that night, with Marianne curled up against his shoulder, Brad tried to imagine returning to California without her.

It hurt. The thought of it alone sucked his breath away. The thought that it could start tomorrow made him want to punch a wall. He wasn’t ready to lose her—lose them—yet.

As if sensing his inner thoughts, Marianne slid her body more firmly over his. She’d slipped on a shirt and underwear—“I can’t sleep naked!”—but there was enough skin-to-skin contact that his body hummed in response. It seemed like a never-ending condition, this constant state of desire around her.

“Why’d you join the boxing team?”

Her voice surprised him. He’d thought she was asleep. “Hmm?”

“Why boxing instead of, say, wrestling or baseball?”

He fidgeted with her hair a minute, letting the nearly colorless strands flow through his fingers. “I started with karate early, like a lot of kids. But that became less cool the older you got. So I dropped out for a while. Played typical team sports, but wasn’t great at them.”

“The lone wolf and his need for solo sports,” she said with a grin. She eased the joke with a kiss. “You could have tried golf, or tennis, or even bowling. Why boxing, specifically?”

“I’m getting there.” He tugged gently on a lock of her hair in mock reproof. “I tried other team sports, but failed miserably at them. My hand-eye coordination when it comes to flying balls, or even stationary ones, is subpar at best.” When she laughed, he squeezed the area between her neck and shoulder, making her squeal and squirm. “Thanks a lot for the boost to my manhood.”

Her knee rubbed suggestively where his half-erect cock lay against his thigh. “I think your manhood’s doing just fine, with or without my laughing.”

“Not wrong. So, my mom asked if I wanted to try karate again when I hit high school. I was burned out of trying other sports, but I wanted to be active. I said no to karate. Been there, done that. Needed something new. So she took me to boxing instead.”