As she popped the pills and took a drink of water, she heard some noises below her. There were men yelling and loud thuds.
She slowly stood up and walked out the door and down a hallway overlooking a large room with several rings where men were fighting each other.
How did I end up here?
She looked around to see if she recognized any of the men. One man stood out to her in the corner. He was talking to two younger men and looked angry. It appeared as though one of the men was trying to explain something. The man gave the younger one a look which caused him to stop talking.
She looked down the hall to see how to get downstairs before she made her way down the hall. She glanced over to look at the man who appeared to be in charge, and when she did, their eyes met. He appeared to have a few more things to say to the two men, though.
She walked down the stairs, noticing several posters of fighters holding belts. She assumed they had trained here. She would never understand why anyone would want to do this for a living.
Several men turned to look at her as she made her way across the room. Ria felt self-conscious as she felt their attention on her. She looked at the supposed owner and saw him watching her walk toward him.
One of the younger men turned to her. “Hey, how are you feeling?” Ria could hear the concern in his voice and recognized it from the night before.
“Much better, thanks to you,” she replied. “I’m Ria Sloan.” Ria put her hand out to shake the hand of the man who’d saved her. She would never know what her attacker’s intentions would have been after he raped her.
She saw the men all stiffen when she introduced herself. She looked at them curiously. It was as if they were surprised by her name.
The young man reached out to shake her hand. “Hi, Ria. I’m Ty, and this is Lane. We both train and live here. This is Zane; he owns the gym.”
Ria looked up at the tall man. She vaguely remembered him from the night of the championship fight. She had been more focused on tending to Nicholas’s broken arm, though.
Looking at him now, he took her breath away. He was tall and perfectly proportioned in every way. He had a commanding presence that seemed to let everyone around him know he was the one in charge. He seemed like a man who called the shots and got his way.
“It’s nice to meet all of you,” Ria said warmly.
She turned to Ty. “But why am I here?”
“Ty thought it would be best to bring you here where you would be safe,” Zane answered for him.
Ria turned back to Zane. “Safe from what?”
“The man that attacked you,” Zane replied as if she was daft for asking.
“Oh, yeah.” Ria bit her lip. She didn’t want to admit what she had done, but she didn’t think that man would be coming back after her now.
“We checked your head and there’s a bad bump, but it’s not life-threatening.” Zane turned to scowl at Ty. “Considering Ty apparently beat the shit out of the man then left him there, we didn’t want charges pressed against Ty until we could make sure you were okay.”
“Oh, no! Ty saved my life. If not for him, God only knows what would have happened!” She didn’t want to take this to the police. She could only blame herself for this mess.
Ria continued, “I’m fine. Like you said, it’s just a bad bump. I’ll take it easy until the swelling goes down.”
“You need to report this to the police. Unfortunately, because Ty left the scene, the man was long gone before we could find him.” Zane scowled at Ty again.
Ria looked to see Ty’s reaction. She saw a mixture of rebellion and frustration in his face, though he kept his mouth shut.
“Look, it’s okay. I don’t think he’ll do it again. The only reason I was out last night was because my car wouldn’t start,” Ria explained.
“That doesn’t change the fact that you were attacked by a stranger,” Zane said firmly.
Ria could see he thought she wasn’t all there. Damn it, she was going to have to admit to what she had done.
“Listen, I fucked up last week and gave myself a tip on his credit card receipt. He had been an ass the whole night and when he didn’t leave me a tip, I wrote one in for myself,” Ria said quickly while keeping her eyes down in shame. “I know it was wrong, but I’m so tight for money right now I needed the tip. Regardless, that’s no excuse. I’m ashamed of myself for doing it.” Ria purposely omitted that she had thought Chris had fixed her deception. He had only been trying to help, knowing how desperate she was for money. It was embarrassing enough to have admitted her poor choice of actions out loud for others to hear.