MacKenzie

Alexa looked down at her phone again and typed in a message. I tried to get her to go meet up with Cade after the fight, but she’d insisted on following me back to their room, where we now sat on one of the beds.

“I told you, I’m fine,” I said. “I don’t need a babysitter. Go celebrate with the guys.”

“Come with me,” she said.

I shook my head. “Can’t I just have some alone time?”

I was glad I’d gotten to see Ian’s fight. I was through the roof about him winning. But I’d made my decision, I wasn’t going to be a distraction for him anymore. And as proof that I’d made the right decision, he’d won his fight, all while thinking I’d already left town. How much more proof did I need that I was bad luck?

The door of the room clicked as someone unlocked it from the outside, and I looked over at Alexa.

She shrugged and got up, heading to the door. “Hi,” I heard her say.

I assumed she was talking to Cade, though I couldn’t see because the door was just out of sight. She went out into the hallway and the door shut behind her. They talked low just outside the room, then the lock clicked again and I heard the door open, then shut.

Silence.

“Alexa?” I called out, but there was no answer. I got up and headed to the door, but it wasn’t Alexa who’d entered. “Ian,” I said when I saw him.

He was bruised and cut up, his left eyebrow crusted with blood. His eye was well on its way to swelling shut, and his lip was swollen. Part of me wanted to reach out and touch him, but I didn’t. He slowly made his way into the room, and I backed up until I couldn’t back up any farther because there was a bed behind me.

I sat down. Why was he here? Had Alexa told him where I was? That traitor.

Ian took a seat on the bed across from me. I avoided his gaze as silence thickened the air between us.

Unable to take the silence anymore, I finally said, “Congratulations.”

“Thanks,” he said, but he wasn’t smiling. He held his right hand up in the air, as if the simple act of resting it on his lap was painful.

“You hurt your hand.” I resisted the temptation to go to him and check his hand for the break I was sure was there.

“Yeah, I broke it on Chris’s face.” His jaw clenched, and his eyes smoldered.

“You punched Chris? Why?” I asked.

“You know why.” His voice was raspy, yet gentle.

God, I didn’t want him to know what happened. Unconsciously, I balled up my fists, and when he saw what I was doing he moved forward, as if he was going to take my hands. I sat on them.

“How did you figure out what happened?”

His lips tugged up briefly in a proud smirk. “Did you see what you did to his face?”

I shook my head, then my vision blurred as I thought back to the night. “I didn’t stick around to see what happened. I ran, just like you taught me.” I wiped a tear from my face.

He crossed over to sit next to me, but I scooted away, making sure there was a safe distance between us.

His forehead creased. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because I knew you’d do something stupid.” I sniffled and wiped at the tears again. “I thought you might go after Chris and get yourself hurt. I didn’t want to ruin your fight.”

I put my head in my hands. “And it turns out, you did something stupid anyway, and it did almost ruin your fight.”

Ian

Kenzie could be so infuriating. “Don’t worry about my fights, Kenzie. And don’t you ever sacrifice yourself for them. Nothing is ever that important. Besides, it’s my fight. If I want to do something stupid before it, I will.”

Damn, I was still pumped up from the fight.

Her eyes widened and she blinked. Fuck, I’d scared her.

I took a breath and tried to calm down. “I don’t understand why you think it’s your responsibility to make sure I get to my fight. I’ve been working on this my whole life, and I’ll keep on working on it. But there are some things that aren’t worth it. The thought of Chris trying to force himself on you…” I shook my head and felt the rage course through my veins. “There are no words for how angry that made me. I couldn’t punch him hard enough. I wanted to kill him. I almost did.”

“Why? Nothing happened. He didn’t…” She trailed off and hugged herself.

I put my hand on her back. “He tried. And I’m sorry. If I’d just fought harder for you, maybe you wouldn’t have been there with him.”

She shook her head. “I wouldn’t have stayed with you. I couldn’t. Chris would have pulled you from the fight.”

I drove my right fist into the bed next to me without thinking. “Fuck,” I yelled as shocks of pain spiked up my arm. I couldn’t believe she really had stayed with him for the sake of my fight. “Why would you do that? It’s not fucking worth it. This fight was not fucking worth it.” I shook from the pain of my broken hand hitting the mattress.

“Ian,” she said, leaning forward to take my injured fist in her delicate hands. “I did it because I knew you’d been waiting for this fight your whole life. I did it because I wanted this for you.”

“But you kept all this from me,” I insisted. If you had just trusted me, if you had just told me what he was up to, we would have been able to figure it out. Together.”

She bit her lip and looked at me, her eyes still glistening with tears.