“But?”
“But I am absolutely, categorically going to dismantle every defense that man has, one deliberate move at a time.”
My phone feels warm in my hand as I stare at Victor’s name on my screen. Three hours since I left Julian’s place, and my body still carries the delicious ache of everything Victor wrung from it last night. I tap my fingers against the bar top, considering my approach.
With Victor, the game is different. Too direct and he’ll panic. Too casual and he’ll think he imagined the significance of what happened between us.
I type, delete, type again, then finally settle on:
Miss something this morning? Besides me, I mean. Your watch was on the nightstand. Come find it tonight at Eclipse. I’ll be behind the decks from midnight.
I hit send before I can overthink it, a small smile playing at my lips. Just enough innuendo to make him uncomfortable, just enough reason to justify his showing up.
Dropping my phone face down on the bar, I push aside my coffee cup and nod to Sloane.
“Time to set up for tonight. I’m taking the midnight slot.”
I spend the next few hours meticulously selecting tracks, building a set that pulses with the same energy I felt coursingthrough Victor’s body as he surrendered to me. Each beat, each drop carefully chosen to recreate that same tension and release.
As midnight approaches, I step behind the decks, scanning the packed dance floor without letting my eyes linger on the entrance. My phone remains in my back pocket, deliberately untouched since I sent that text.
I lose myself in the music, hands moving instinctively across the controls, body swaying with the rhythm. The crowd responds, a living organism that breathes and moves with each transition I create.
Theo Winters does not wait by the phone for anyone. People wait for me.
10
VICTOR
Icrank the combination on my office lock and push inside, grateful for the scent of the place—sweat, leather, and the faint tang of blood.
Rolling my shoulders, I shake off the memories that attempt to chase me into my space. Last night never happened. It can’t have.
“Boss, you’re early.” Marco glances up from where he’s taping a fighter’s hand. “Thought you weren’t in till noon.” His thermos sits on the bench beside him—the cafecito he carries in every morning. He’s been carrying that same thermos as long as I’ve known him.
“Change of plans.” I drop my bag in the corner and scan the gym floor.
Twenty-five hundred square feet of discipline and pain. The ring sits in the center—not some fancy, elevated platform like in commercial gyms, but an old-school square ringed with ropes that have absorbed more sweat and blood than a battlefield. Around it, heavy bags hang from reinforced chains, speed bags are mounted on the walls, and free weights line the far corner.
This place isn’t pretty. The concrete floor is stained with years of spilled water, sweat, and occasionally blood. The walls,once white, have yellowed from thousands of bodies working through pain.
But it’s mine. Every fucking inch of it.
“Jenkins is on the ropes again,” Marco says, nodding toward the back where my newest prospect is pounding a heavy bag. “Kid’s got potential.”
I grunt in agreement. “Tell him to watch his footwork. He drops his right shoulder before he throws that hook.”
This is where I belong. Where men respect strength, not words. Where actions are measured in blood and sweat, not confused feelings or whispered confessions.
The basement below us holds the real money—the underground fights that draw the city’s wealthiest men looking to bet on blood sport away from prying eyes. Three nights a week, I transform that concrete dungeon into a gladiator pit where fighters earn more in ten minutes than most make in a month.
I built this empire with these hands. Fought my way up, broke bones and bled on floors across the country until I had enough to start my own place. The men here look at me and see something solid. Uncompromising. A fucking man’s man.
Not someone who’d...
I slam that thought down and grab the nearest pair of mitts.
“Jenkins! Center ring, now!”