Torment snorts a laugh. “We all start out telling ourselves that, but at some point you start seeing what everyone else sees. I ripped through the gym when I caught Makayla playing strip poker with you losers. Renegade almost broke Doctor Death’s neck when he was putting the moves on Amanda. The Predator risked his job and his life to avenge Sia. We protect our friends, but we only lose control when it comes to the women we care about.”

    “You’re wrong.” I push myself to my feet, uncomfortable with where this conversation is headed and the reminder that I am breaking one of my cardinal rules about getting involved.

    “Yeah?” Torment grins. “Where did you spend the night after you took her home?”

    “Fuck off.”

    He holds up his hands in a pacifying gesture. “I’m happy for you. All these years I’ve known you, I’ve never seen you with a woman in any way other than friendship.”

    “Christ. Just let it go.” Fucking bastard is trying to get under my skin in the worst possible way.

    “What does she think?” Torment scrawls something on a piece of paper and slides it over the desk.

    “It doesn’t matter what she thinks. It is what it is. Friendship.”

    “Are you sure about that?” He gives me a smug smile when I pick up the piece of paper. “From what I’ve seen, Penny’s a very determined woman. When she wants something, she gives it 110 percent effort. No one works harder in the classes. No one has ever challenged Fuzzy the way she does. She had next to no experience, and yet she stepped into the ring with Shilla because there was something she wanted from that encounter and she wasn’t afraid to go after it. She’s got more courage than most of the guys who walk in here and tell me they want to be fighters. Hell, if she wanted to become a fighter, I’d train her myself.”

    The thought of Torment going anywhere near Penny has me crushing the paper in my hand. I know everything that goes on at Redemption, and Torment is number one on the single ladies’ fantasy list of whom they want to sleep with at the gym. I trust Torment. He’s one of my closest friends. He is head over heels in love with Makayla, and he isn’t the kind of man who would ever stray. And yet the thought of him training Penny, being with her every day, touching her, drives me out of my fucking mind.

    “I wouldn’t allow her to fight. It’s too fucking dangerous.” I slam my hand against the wall. “Christ. Just the thought of her in the ring makes me fucking crazy.”

    Torment chuckles. “Welcome to the club.”

    “What club?”

    “The club where you fight the inevitable and lose.”

    Fed up with Torment and his insinuations, I grab the door handle. “I’m outta here.”

    “Don’t lose that piece of paper,” Torment calls out. “You’ll need it tonight.”

    “What is it?” Pausing in the doorway, I smooth the paper and frown at the number written on it in blue pen.

    “The number of drinks you’ll have to buy for the team at Score tonight to atone for your sins,” he says. “Plus one.”

    “Plus one?”

    Torment gives me an irritating bastard smile. “You want to keep your membership at Redemption, I expect to see Penny there. Just try not to cause any trouble.”

17

    Goddamn. Bastard. Touching. My. Girl.

    PENNY

    “We’re rocking this sports bar.”

    Cora turns away from the sea of big-screen TVs and checks out the crowd. She’s wearing a black-and-red dress with vinyl strips angling across her breasts and running down the front, with knee-high black leather boots. She says it’s a sci-fi thing, although it looks more peace sign than alien to me. She hasn’t said anything about how things are going with Blade Saw, but when I called her up after getting Jack’s text about coming out tonight, she was more than happy to join us.

    “You’re rocking. I’m normal.” Well, sort of normal. I’m wearing a dove-gray, curve-hugging dress with a naughty heart-shaped cutout in the front that exposes the crescents of my breasts. Cora convinced me to ditch the girly frills, pastels, and flowers tonight, but she couldn’t get me to wear black. Gray is as far outside my color spectrum as I get.

    One of three sports bars in Chinatown and the go-to place for MMA fighters in town, Score is packed tonight with pumped, cut, testosterone-filled fighters all ready to shout at the game on the televisions and battle it out in drunken arm-wrestling matches that often devolve into alley fights. From rank amateurs to seasoned pros, everyone comes to Score, not just for its fabulous sports-themed drinks and vast selection of international beer, but for the gossip, the ring girls, and the chance to see and be seen.

    A DJ spins music from a small stage, and fight posters are plastered all over the walls. I head over to the Redemption corner where Doctor Death, Torment, Makayla, and Blade Saw have snagged a couple of highboy tables and an entire tray of vodka shots that are disappearing at lightning speed.

    Blade Saw nods at Cora but doesn’t go over to greet her. She grabs a drink from the tray, and we join Doctor Death and Makayla.

    If Torment hadn’t told us Makayla was three months pregnant, I never would have guessed. Even dressed up in a tight black dress and heels, she looks exactly the same: small and curvy with fantastic, thick auburn hair and big hazel eyes.

    “Cora, what’s going on with you and Blade Saw?” she whispers.

    “Nothing.” Cora downs her shot and leans across Doctor Death to get another, her breasts brushing over his arm, which appears to be on purpose. I catch Blade Saw watching them from another table, his face cold and hard.

    “You sure you want to play this game?” I say softly. “Blade Saw’s a pretty chill guy. It takes a lot to rile him, but once he’s there, he’s really there. I’ve seen him punch holes in walls and break the windshield of a car.”