"Sorry, man, did you see that, though?" asked the young fighter.
"Yeah, yeah. Thanks, Skylar."
I gave a weak smile and looked at the screen, where Austin "The Killer" Aquila was getting to his feet in the middle of the cage. There wasn't a mark on him, but his opponent was still on the ground.
Aquila was a crowd favorite, who had made some truly talented fighters look like circus clowns over the past couple of years. He would have had a title shot by now, if not for those few surprise losses along the way.
With those looks, he's my favorite too. He could-
I cut off my own thought before I could let myself go down that path, fighting off a blush. As much as I tried to tell myself that the way my dad used to terrorize me about boys and dating as I was growing up was wrong, I couldn't shake my past. No matter how good I tried to be, nothing was ever good enough for him.
If he was to be believed, I was going to bring about the apocalypse with my whorish ways, even though I'd been too scared to even let a boy kiss me. I wore a purity ring in an effort to appease him. I even meant it when I promised to abstain until marriage, but the second I wore a skirt shorter than halfway down my calves or went outside without a sweater in the middle of summer, well, the whiskey came out, and sooner or later so did the belt. And the maniacal screaming.
One time a boy had practically signed my death warrant by coming to our door and having the gall to ask for permission to take me out on a date. Even now, miles away, I still felt that self-loathing that had been beaten into me every time somebody showed an interest in me, or every time I even fleetingly entertained the thought of any kind of intimacy.
"You look whacked. Go ahead and take fifteen," said Gordon, nodding at the door.
I blinked and shook my head, tearing my eyes away from Austin and bringing myself back to reality. This wasn't something I wanted Gordon to notice.
"No! I'm fine, there's so much to do, I … "
Gordon pulled the needle through the fighter's scalp, then held up his hand and shook his head to cut me off. "Go ahead, there'll still be plenty to do in fifteen minutes, you've been great tonight."
I could almost taste the ice-cold water from the watercooler and the fruit I'd packed for myself.
"Well … "
"Go."
"OK, I guess. I'll be back to help soon, though."
Skylar
Crunch!
I was about ten minutes into my break, and the apple was going down good, when Gordon's head popped in the door. He looked desperate.
"Hey, sorry about this, but can you take care of something for me?"
I swallowed the mouthful of apple and bolted to my feet. "Yes! What can I do?"
"Team one is down a lot of people with the flu that's going around, they need somebody to help out. Henry said Aquila needs a massage."
When the name came out of his mouth, it was like somebody with a tiny defibrillator zapped me on my spine, and I startled before my heart started thundering in response.
"A … a mas … me?"
"Yeah, sorry about this, there's just nobody else I can spare. He's not injured or anything, just needs to work out some kinks before the post-event press conference. Can you head over now? Tell them I sent you."
"I … well … of c-course, I'll do my best," I said.
"Thanks for that." Gordon was gone before he had even finished the sentence.
I felt like I was sitting inside my own head watching a movie play out as I dropped the remains of my apple in the trash and headed towards the Tier-1 fighters' area. Uncle Malcolm wasn't here to show me what to do. All I had was less than a year of study and a general appreciation of massages to rely on. It would have to do.
The Tier-1 wing had a guard at the door who looked mean enough to actually fight for NHBFC, but he let me through when he saw my uniform and heard that Gordon had sent me at Henry's request. The hallway behind said door was just as chaotic as the ones I'd just left, but for a completely different reason.
With a smaller group of fighters to look after, and an already smaller staff diminished by illness, it was the MMA groupies making the most noise over here. Clusters of some of the most stunning girls currently in the city hovered around their favorite fighters' doors, giggling and talking loudly. It wasn't official of course, but the guard knew only to let in the best of the best.
The intensity of their beauty only served to make me feel self-conscious, as I awkwardly nudged my way through them to Austin's door. Most of them were taller than me and the tops they wore made absolutely sure to show off their breasts, at my eye-level, to maximum effect.
They made me feel like a potato in a diamond display case as I sheepishly knocked on the door. A few moments later an older guy, Austin's coach, snatched the door open.
"I told you bitches he isn't ready yet!"
"Uh, Gordon sent me? Henry said you-"
"Oh, right, yeah. He's just in the shower-"
The groupies in earshot all squealed and started talking at once.
"You come in, he'll be ready in a second, I'm stepping out. Lock it behind you. Which of you girls wants to do me a special favor so I put a good word in for you with The Killer?"
I squeezed past him as a chorus of "I do!" "I will" rang out behind me. One of them said "How come the cleaning lady gets to go in?" Another said, "I'll deepthroat your-" just as the door clicked shut.
Stepping into a Tier-1 dressing room after working on the other side for so long was like stepping into first-class on an airplane after only ever flying coach. They had all the same stuff that we had, but instead of bare concrete, there was actual paint on the walls, a permanent massage table, a brand new heavy punching bag hung from the ceiling on a chain. Plenty of bells and whistles.
Steam poured out of a cracked-open door and I could hear a shower running. I walked over and paused by the door, before knocking even more tentatively than I had on the other one.
"Austin? I'm here for the-"
"I told Ross to tell you I wasn't ready!" he yelled out.
"Uh … no I'm not … uh … I work here? Henry said you needed a massage?"
"Oh, yeah. I'll be right out."
The sound of running water stopped and I caught a flash of movement in the steamed-up mirror through the opening. Quickly, I turned and faced the other way, ashamed at the flush of excitement that came unbidden and made me bite my bottom lip without thinking about it.
After a couple minutes I felt the waft of air as the door was pulled open behind me, and turned to face him. Standing there, wearing only a towel, with beads of water dripping down his neck and torso from his hair, was fan (and my) favorite, Austin "The Killer" Aquila.
That perfectly sculpted body looked like it was made from granite by an artist with an eye for sin, then decorated with ink in designs that curled all over. His thick arms had contours that drew my eyes up to his broad shoulders, and then sent them down across his pecs and over each and every bump of his abs.
His lower abdominals formed lines that narrowed as my eyes roamed lower … lower … lower until the visual ride was abruptly cut off by the towel, which he held up by one hand.
I looked up and heard my jaw click shut when our eyes met. I only hoped I'd closed my mouth before I drooled. If I was looking at him like a piece of art, he was looking at me like a piece of food, and it took all my willpower not to find a plate to climb on to.
All heavyweights have a certain presence. It would be hard not to when you're a tank that has briefly assumed human form, but Austin had presence that almost seemed to make the air crackle between us and around him. His eyes, they were looking at me in a way that would give my dad a stroke. That brought me partway back to reality.
"Um … over there?" I pointed at the massage table.
"You sure you work here?" he asked.
"Yeah, I … I normally work in Tier-2 … "
Austin closed the distance between us and leaned down towards me. My heart tried to jump up my throat to get a better view out my mouth at all that solid muscle so close to me, and my ability to breathe be damned.
"Because, if you're another girl that stole a uniform just to get in here … well, I'll have to do to you what I did to her."
A drop of water fell from his head and landed on my ear, making me flinch. The scent of soap and the faint musk of him filled my lungs as I took a deep breath to offer whatever reassurance I could.
"I promise I work here," I squeaked.
I'd been around men before, I'd seen Austin on TV before, but I'd never felt anything like this. I'd always been able to keep what my father called my evil nature shut up in a box, but something about this was different.