Untamed (A Bad Boy Secret Baby Romance)(179)

I’ve never wanted to please a girl more than I do Pen.

I’ve never felt the sting of disappointing a girl more than I do Pen.

And I’ve disappointed a metric fuckton of girls.

Usually I just get mine, and I’m fine with that. I fuck them, and leave them. I don’t need any attachments. For fuck’s sake, I fight underground. Attachments get you burned one way or another. Distractions take your mind off the prize, the win.

But now I’m doubting that philosophy. Now Pen has got me going back on my own beliefs, on the way I’ve lived my life.

Because now she’s the prize, she’s what I want to win… need to win. But I need to protect her, too, and that makes my mind go somewhere it doesn’t want to.

Do I need to protect her from me?

She is pissed at me, and rightfully so. I didn’t fucking know that I’d get involved with the mob. They basically gave me no choice but to fight in this pathetic little dick-measuring match. Some local mobster cunt and some Russian mafia cunt want to settle a bet, and they’re using me to do it, and some foreign beefcake fighter.

They’re not just using me, either. They’re using Pen, too. I wonder idly what this Anton fuckhead was threatened with. I wonder how they could make him fly half way around the world just to do one single fight. Maybe they got to him, too.

Nothing is worse than being a pawn. I’m going to find a fucking way out of this one way or another, and then I’m going to make sure Lev Fallon, the cocksucker, goes down.

But five million is retirement money. Five million on top of what I already got saved and invested? Shit, I don’t consider myself motivated by money, but damn, that’s a good life for me and my kids. And, it keeps Pen safe. If I don’t do the fight, they’ll get to her. That much is clear as day.

Wait a minute… My kids? I blink, surprised at myself for the thought.

I’ve never, ever considered having kids before. I’ve never considered settling down before. To me, that was always phony bullshit. Nobody wants to settle down. Nobody wants some boring fucking suburban life with picket fences and flower beds and shitty fake dinner parties filled by passive-aggressive small talk.

Well, imagine it with Penelope, and it doesn’t sound too bad. Waking up next to her every single morning? Making love to her every single morning? Every single night?

Tasting her, smelling her… having her every single day? Seeing her smile, making her laugh… pissing her off? That’s fucking heaven.

That’s what I want. I want her. I want her to be mine. She is mine… she just doesn’t know it yet.

Fuck.

Of course, we wouldn’t just be some asshole couple with rich-guilt and fake smiles. We’d be cool, do things our way. She’d run her tattoo shop, pick her clients, succeed in her life. She’d do whatever she wanted, because she can.

I recognize the fire in people. The burning will to win, to succeed.

My stomach crunches as I realize that I might just be derailing that.

But Fallon’s threat was clear. I’ll do this fight, win, and walk away with Penelope in my arms. If I listen to her, if I don’t fight, then he’s going after her. Shit, Fallon goes after both of us.

I can beat a man half to death in seven seconds, but I can’t take on the mob, no matter how much I want to. At least, not without a plan.

I need a plan.

All my winning, all my showboating, all my fame, and it just made me a target. Not just me, but Penelope, too.

Fuck them. Fuck them all.

I down a bottle of Gatorade, shake off the brain-freeze, and then start skipping again. I need to get my conditioning to peak level, and I’ve got less than a week to do so.

I’ve got to get Penny out of my mind… for now. Because if I don’t, I might just lose this fight.





Chapter Twenty Six





Tina Azume is beaming at me, and I feel the welcome flutter of pride in my chest and belly.

Before me, she holds up the imitation skin, a bespoke fabric designed to emulate real skin for tattoo artists to practice on.

Of course, nothing is the same as real skin. Nothing is the same as inking a living, breathing human who bleeds, whose temperature changes, who sweats, who feels pain.

But damn it if I haven’t done a good job. Tina had me draw that optical illusion where everybody is walking up and down steps, but there’s no way to tell which way is the right way up. It’s a visual trick; the lines are dishonest, but that we can’t make total sense of that reveals the brain’s willingness to try and interpret anything, and to mold information into something understandable.

Like with spelling errors, the brain can usually skip over them, automatically fill in the blanks. The same is true for perspective.