Down and Out(8)

Marcus comes up beside me. “She’s hot,” he says, following my gaze.
I frown and take another drink, watching her wipe down machines and collect stray towels as she goes along. “That’s not why I hired her.”
“Then why did you? A scrawny thing like that can’t lift shit around here.”
I’m not going to lie and say there was some kind of instant connection between us, because there wasn’t. Savannah’s a pretty girl who needed help, and guys are hardwired to want to help pretty girls. Simple as that.
Besides, I’m not a heartless bastard. She reeked of desperation yesterday and I was in a position to help her out. So I did.
I shrug and glance at Marcus. “She needed a job, I needed the help. End of story.”
She bends over and he tilts his head, eyeing her ass. “You gonna hit that?”
Rolling my eyes, I hit him on the chest. “Knock it off, man.” Marcus needs to learn to think with the head on his shoulders, not the one in his shorts. He already has a kid with his ex, and had a separate pregnancy scare a couple months back.
The side of his mouth hitches up into a cocky grin. “I’ll take that as a no. . . Can I?”
I set my water bottle back down, glaring at him as I point to him. “Stay away from her. The last thing I need is her taking off for maternity leave.”
His smile fades. “Not cool, bro. The last thing I need is you jinxing me with another baby mama.”
“There are these things called condoms. Maybe you should learn how to use one.”
He flips me off and gives me a droll look. “Ha-ha.”
I’d just popped my mouth guard back in when I see Blake enter the gym. His hazel eyes are grim as they land on mine. “Shit,” I mutter under my breath, taking the piece of plastic out of my mouth once again. “Let’s call it a day,” I say to Marcus, who frowns and shakes his head.
“This can’t be good.”
I bend down and grab my water bottle, then yank my shirt off the ropes. “Nope.”
Marcus knows better than anyone that Blake does not enjoy stepping foot inside this gym. So if he’s here, then some shit somewhere has hit some fan and he’s here to ask me to clean it up for him. Again.
As I wonder who he owes and how much, Blake heads around the ring to my office, keeping his head down. Marcus hits me on the arm and I turn to look at him.
“Whatever drama he’s about to bring your way, you gotta leave that shit at home, you feel me? Same goes for the new girl.”
I open my mouth to object when he cuts me off.
“Don’t waste your breath tryin’ to tell me she ain’t in your head. If she wasn’t, then I wouldn’t have been able to get one in today and you know it.”
My jaw clenches. He might be right.
“You can’t afford those kinds of distractions when you go up against Kerrigan this Friday. You’re good and he knows it. You better believe he’ll be lookin’ for any opportunity to slip one past you, and if your head’s as far up your ass as it was today, it won’t be hard.” His nostrils flare, his lips pressing into a hard line. “One second, Declan, that’s all it takes. One second of you being less than a hundred percent, and you’re on the ground while he takes the lead.”
My eyes drop down to the black knee brace on Marcus’s left leg. He should know more than anyone that one second is all it takes to make or break your career.
I mumble a goodbye and duck between the ropes, jumping down to the floor and making my way to the office. I push the door open, seeing Blake perched on the edge of the desk. His head’s still down, and all I can see is the mop of dark hair that’s the same shade as mine.
The door clicks shut behind me and I lean against the frame, crossing my arms. “How much?”
Blake lifts his head. His eyes are red and bloodshot as he sneers at me. “I don’t need a dime from you. It’s Dad.”
I laugh and wipe off my face with my shirt, then sling it over my shoulder. “I’m not settling any of that bastard’s debts, so you can tell him to go—”
“He’s dying, Declan.”
I frown and study my brother. “How?” I’m ashamed to admit it, but my first thought is that this might be some kind of scam. My old man brings it on himself, though, for consistently being a shady and generally shitty person. Father of the year he is not.
Blake rubs the back of his neck, looking much older than his twenty-five years. “His liver’s shot to hell.”
Snorting, I say, “I could’ve told you that. You can’t knock back a bottle of Jim Beam every day and expect to live forever.”
Blake scowls at me, and I feel like shit for cracking a joke when he’s so obviously torn up about it. “Sorry. Has he, uh, been to the doctor or anything?”
He nods. “Doctor said it was . . . psoriasis?”
My brows pull tighter as I bite my thumbnail. “Cirrhosis.”
“Yeah, that.”
“Well. . .” I rack my brain for anything other than a “that sucks” and come up empty. Like I said, father of the year he is not. There’s no love lost between us, and I’ve made my peace with that years ago. “How much time does he have left?”
Blake shrugs. “More if he quits drinking, less if he doesn’t.”
“So not much, then.”
He clucks his tongue. “Nope.”
After several seconds of tense silence, Blake says, “You know what you have to do.”
I cock a brow. “No, I don’t.”
“Yes, you do. You have to make things right with him before it’s too late.”