I had just finished cooking my mother’s lasagna recipe and Paxton was yelling at everyone that dinner was ready, like he was the one that had cooked it. I just smiled and shook my head in response. Paxton was an out in front kind of guy, the one on our team that always needed to be taking action and touching everything that we did. I didn’t mind. I liked taking a more backseat role and making sure that my Whistler family was well taken care of. Paxton may be our team’s poster boy, but it was me that made sure everyone ate and got home safely at the end of the day.
Ethan and Liam emerged from Ethan’s office and moved to take seats at the table. Those two were the closest on the team. Liam was the first person Ethan picked to join him on the team and they stayed as a two membered small team for an entire year before Ethan added Paxton and me to the group. I was of the opinion that the two men bonded in their year alone and now they worked amazingly well together. Ethan lead and Liam followed. Ethan handled the big picture while Liam noticed the small details. And both men preferred to maintain a comfortable silence.
Oliver bounded into the room and took a seat next to his brother. Those two looked so much alike but I was finding out that Oliver was drastically different from his brother. He was less flash and more easy-going kindness. One had to prove they were worth Christopher Paxton’s time and attention while Oliver accepted and paid attention to everyone he met. It was hard for me to believe they grew up in the same household.
The last person to join the table was Payton. I was having a hard time getting a read on her. She would smile and throw my flirtations back at me, but I could see that she wasn’t really affected by my charm the way most women were. She took my banter in the way that it was given, as a way to break the ice with her. Tonight, she was focused on the meal and did not look up as she served herself some of my mom’s lasagna and started eating. After the first bite, she closed her eyes and looked like she was softly moaning. She then began shoveling the pasta dish into her mouth at an impressive rate. I softly chuckled and when she looked up at me, I winked at her. At least someone appreciated the effort I had put into dinner that night.
My enjoyment of watching Payton eat my food was interrupted when my phone rang. I pulled out my phone as saw that my Dad was calling. Shit, Dad only called when something went wrong. I quickly got up and answered the phone in Ethan’s office.
“Hey, Dad, what’s up?”
“It’s your mother, she has had an episode.” I was going to need more information than that. My mother was schizophrenic and constantly had to deal with hallucinations and accompanying delusions. But if my father was calling, then something more than Mom talking to an empty room must have happened.
“What happened? Is she okay?” I asked with real concern and worry.
“She attacked Mr. Forsberg in the supermarket. Claimed that he was possessed by a demon and threw an entire container of salt at him. Old Ms. Delany had to pull your mother out of the store kicking and screaming. It caused quite the disturbance here.” My father cared more about the gossip that this would have caused than he did about his own wife. Mom always suffered after a big episode like that, and I was more concerned about her right now than the town drama.
“Is she okay now? Why was she shopping alone?” I demanded the concern that I felt turned my voice harsh.
“Don’t give me that, boy!” My father yelled into the phone, “I cannot be with your mother all-the-fucking time. That was your job. You were the one that abandoned us to be some secret James Bond type. Your mother depended on you and you just left her. And now I have to clean up her messes. Do you have any idea what her episodes do to my reputation?” I knew that any hope of having a constructive conversation with my father had gone out the window the moment he called me boy. If I had been in our hometown of Dixie Valley Nevada, my father would have removed his belt at the same time he called me boy.
“Call me back when you have calmed down, so we can figure out what to do,” I said calmly into the phone before hanging up. As I turned to walk back into the kitchen to where Payton was washing dishes, my stomach clenched with guilt. I wasn’t positive that my father wouldn’t turn to Mom as a substitute because I wasn’t there to take the beating. And my father had been right, Mom had depended on me. And I had left. Left her to suffer, not only within her own head but also with the despicable man she had married.
I needed to let out some aggression. I needed to feel pain to alleviate some of this crippling guilt. I needed to find a fight.
I looked at Payton and asked, “Want to go out and find some trouble tonight?” When she agreed I took her to the fight club that I had discovered through some of the workers at the ChemGen plant. The place was notorious for bloody fights with no rules. Just what I needed right now. I was surprised to see that Payton didn’t appear to mind the mayhem or violence within the club, and I smiled approvingly at her.
After watching a couple of fights I signed up for the next round and that’s when Payton changed her tune. Her posture broadcasted worry as she tried to talk me out of taking the fight. But what Payton didn’t realize was this was nothing new for me. I had been trained by my father to take a punch since I was a kid and found places like this all over the world during our Whistler jobs. I would take a couple of punches I deserved for leaving my mother and then I would turn the tables and take out all the aggressions talking to my father had caused. Then I could wake up tomorrow and focus and being a part of the team.
But tonight, I needed to just be Ezra James.
I was so focused on the reasons why I was entering the ring I didn’t notice my opponent enter the ring but Payton had. After she looked over the man she turned to me and said, “Whatever issues you are planning on working out in that ring Ezra, cannot be solved by getting your skull dented in.”
But that was where she was wrong. This was how I solved things, I deserved the pain that his opponent would dole out.
“Just leave with me now,” Payton pleaded in a desperate voice, but I didn’t have time to coddle her female sensibilities right now. I shook Payton off and stepped into the ring. The Snake joined me in the center and moments after the whistle was blown to start the fight, my head exploded with pain as I took a hit to the left temple. Jesus Crist this guy could pack a punch.
I tried to rally and come back swinging but that first punch had rattled my balance and my footwork was off. Every hit that I took after the first made it worse and I started to fear that I wouldn’t be able to turn this around. I fell for a fake-out and left myself wide open to a left hook to the jaw that damn near took my head off. I fell back into a metal rail and slid to the floor. Maybe if I passed out, the fight would be called. Maybe I should just allow the darkness to claim me.
After a few very long blinks I saw that Payton was standing over me and trying to get me to stand up. The fight must be over I thought as Payton hauled me to my feet and started dragging me out of the club. I didn’t understand why she was pulling me along so quickly. Didn’t she see that I had just been almost knocked out? I needed a minute to sit down and rest. I was just about to tell Payton this when she shattered a car window with a butt of a gun. Why was Payton breaking into a car I wondered.
I then found myself sitting and Payton was hot-wiring the car. Wow, a girl who knew how to hotwire cars, now that was hot. “Well aren’t you handy,” I slurred out through swollen lips but didn’t receive a response in return. I was just testing out how much damage was done to my face by gently probing with my fingertips when Payton stopped the car and opened my door for me. We were back at the team house. When I limped away from the car and towards the house, Payton didn’t join me. “Wait, where are you going?”
“I am going to return this car that I just stole to get your sorry ass home,” she responded before getting back into the car and driving away. Well fuck. Whatever had happened had really pissed her off. Guess I will have to avoid taking her next time. I had enough to deal with without adding Payton’s judgment to the pile. I limped into the house and up the stairs into the bathroom that I was sharing with Paxton. I spent the next hour carefully taking off my clothes, showering, and putting steri-strips over the cuts in my face. Ethan was going to lose his shit when he saw my face.
When I finally got myself all patched up, I returned to my room and carefully laid down on the bed. My burner phone for this job had been vibrating almost constantly for the last twenty minutes so I pulled it out to check my text messages. I had over fifteen messages from guys I knew from ChemGen asking about the fight. They all wanted to know about the woman I was with. Why the fuck would they care about Payton? Maybe they wanted to see if she was up for some action. When I asked this question, one of them sent me a video clip. I watched as The Snake hit me with the left hook and saw myself fall against the rail. I then saw that The Snake was going to kick down on my shoulder and my stomach rolled. An injury like that would have ended my career.
But then Payton was there. And after she flipped the monster of a man, she kneeled on his throat and after he passed out, she pulled my slumped form out of the club with a gun at her side.
Jesus Crist.
That club was run by some serious guys that can’t be happy that a girl weighing no more than 150 just took out their top fighter. No wonder Payton was pissed at me. I could have gotten them both killed. Guilt started to grow within me again.
What had I done?
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