23. Dax
DAX
Dear Diary,
I told a Mafia kingpin I don’t care about his wife’s pussy. That might be my obituary headline.
The walls felt like they were closing in on me. My skin was too tight, my muscles too tense. Fighting was supposed to ease all of that, and yet tonight, it hadn’t. I needed a shower, but the thought of standing in one with my brain screaming at me was too much to bear.
Despite it being nearly midnight, I cracked open a beer and wandered through my house, into the back sunroom I used as a studio. Canvases lined the walls. Oil paints littered the table. Brushes were scattered about haphazardly, no organization in this room whatsoever.
Completely different to the shop, where everything was sterilized and in order.
I loved tattooing. It paid the bills. But this was where I came when I needed to switch my brain off. Out here where I could get paint on my hands, on the floor, and where what I created was only for me.
Or for her.
The canvas on the easel had been there ever since the first night she’d slept here. The morning sun had streamed through my bedroom window, covering her in golden light, and I’d known, without a doubt, she was the only woman I wanted in my bed for the rest of my life.
That image of her there, naked, wrapped in my sheets, smelling like me, was so burned into my brain it was all I’d been able to paint ever since.
I slumped down in my armchair, sipping my beer, staring at that painting, inhaling the scent of her that still clung to my skin.
That was the real reason I didn’t want to have a shower.
I didn’t want to lose the tiny bit of her I’d been given tonight.
Headlights flashed out front, and I ignored them. I lived on a busy street. There were always cars outside.
But I couldn’t ignore the knock on the door.
I squinted at it and then got up with a sigh, expecting one of my brothers to be standing there, drunk and needing a place to crash because my place was closer to the Strip than theirs.
Luca Guerra stood on the other side. “My father wants to speak to you.”
I didn’t answer. Because what the fuck did Carlos Guerra and I have to say to each other? I could tell him all about how I had just fucked his fiancée. I could say I loved her with every beat of my heart and that her marrying someone else was killing me.
But my brain was smarter than my heart.
It shouted at me, warning there was a danger here I needed to respect. Not because I gave a shit about my own life, because without her, I didn’t care if I had one. But I did care about her. She was scared of the man sitting in the back seat of that car. And not without good reason.
So I was smart enough to be scared too. “If I get in that car, is he going to put a bullet through my brain?”
Luca blinked, honest surprise on his expression. “Why the hell would he do that?”
So maybe he didn’t know about me and Nyah and what we’d just done on the back seat of my car.
Or maybe he was a really good fucking liar.
Either way, I got the impression I really had no say in the matter. If Carlos Guerra wanted to talk to me in the back of his sleek black limousine, then that’s what was happening.
Luca turned and led the way, sliding into the back seat, leaving the door open for me to follow.
I hesitated for a second but then got in beside him.
Carlos and another man I didn’t recognize sat across from us.
Both of them stared at me.
I waited, none of us saying anything. The silence drew out so long I got annoyed. “I’ve got shit to do, so if you’re just going to sit there…”
Carlos cocked his head to one side, studying me. “What shit do you have to do, Dax? It’s the middle of the night.”
It was on the tip of my tongue to tell him I was painting his fiancée in nothing but her birthday suit and my sheets, but I didn’t think that would go down too well. So I just said, “I paint.”
Carlos raised an eyebrow. “A man of many talents, then? Painting. Tattooing. Fighting…”
“Some would argue I’m mediocre at all three.”
“But they’d be wrong, wouldn’t they?” His gaze traveled down my body, over my bare chest and arms. “That your work?”
“Some of it.”
“It’s good.”
I sighed. “You come here to blow smoke up my ass, Carlos, or did you come here for an actual reason? If you’re going to shoot me, just fucking get on with it. I’ve had a hell of a night.”
He chuckled. “Why would I shoot you?”
Huh. It was much the same question Luca had asked. Maybe that actually wasn’t why he was here. “Isn’t that what you do? I’ve heard the rumors.”
“You shouldn’t believe everything you hear, Dax. Not all rumors are true. Like the one I heard where you once dated my fiancée.”
I froze.
Luca’s head snapped up.
But Carlos kept going. “I’m sure that’s not true, is it?”
I knew the truth. Something inside me said he didn’t want to hear it. So I downplayed it. “We know each other. Her friend is dating one of the guys who works at my shop.”
He nodded his approval. “Good. Good. Because if you had, I wouldn’t be pleased. I’d have to have you dragged down to my basement, locked in one of my cages, and only brought out for my amusement.”
“Sounds friendly.”
Carlos chuckled and pointed at me. “I like you, Dax. You have a sense of humor. A funny man.”
Nothing I’d said was funny, and we all knew it.
Carlos finally got to the point. “I watched you fight tonight. You’re talented.”
“Am I supposed to say thank you? I trained since I was seven. I can fight not because I have talent, but because I practiced.”
“It shows.” He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. “I want you to fight for me.”
I raised an eyebrow. “What does that mean?”
“I’m expanding my business dealings into sports. Your talent—or training, if you prefer—is wasted here in Saint View. I want to put you into bigger fights. On a national and international level.”
I raised an eyebrow. “I’m not that good.”
“I disagree. You were playing with that guy tonight. Letting him hit you.”
I ran my tongue over my teeth, surprised anyone had noticed.
I wasn’t fighting because I wanted to win.
I was fighting because getting slugged in the face a few times a couple nights a week was a better sort of pain than the one I lived with daily.
The one that reminded me the woman I loved was no longer mine. “So what if I was?”
Something in Carlos’s eyes lit up. “I want to see what you can really do. Come to my house next week. Let me show you what it could be like if you fight for me.”
I opened my mouth to refuse.
Luca tossed a wad of cash onto my lap.
I glanced down at it, staring at the bills held together by an elastic band.
“Five K to come to my house for a night,” Carlos said. “And a lot more if you perform the way I think you can.”
Five K would be a start on the new roof the shop needed. That alone made it a tempting offer. I stared down at the money, flicking through each bill like I was counting it. Like it was all that mattered.
When all that actually mattered was an invitation to the Guerra mansion was a chance to see Nyah again.
I pushed the money into my pocket and stared at Carlos. “Name your date and time. I’ll be there.’
Carlos clapped his hands together. “Excellent! Excellent. A smart decision, Dax.” He narrowed his eyes. “Much smarter than your decision to date my future wife.” He eyed me. “You fuck her?”
I blinked. “Excuse me?”
“You heard me. I asked if you fucked my future wife?”
My gut instinct roared loud in my head. “We went out like two times. She wouldn’t put out. So that was that.”
He stared at me for a long minute, but clearly, I could lie with a straight face.
He nodded. “I’d really hate to find out otherwise, Dax. Her father promised me a virgin. And that’s what I expect to have on my wedding night. Her sweet, untouched-by-anyone-but-me virgin pussy.”
I wanted to reach across the car and put my fingers around his throat. Wanted to squeeze hard until he spluttered and choked on the words.
But fighting had given me a poker face. In the ring, I could never let an opponent know when or where I was going to strike. And so I shrugged like I didn’t have a care in the world. “I couldn’t give a shit about your wife’s pussy, Carlos. Just keep the money coming and we’ll be fine.”
Carlos grinned. “There’ll be so much more than money, if you’re as good as I think you are. There’ll be overseas trips. Expensive clothes. Parties. Women begging to bounce on your cock. Just you wait. If all you know is dirty underground fighting in Saint View, I’m about to open a whole new world.”
I left the car without saying that the only world I cared about being in was one that revolved around Nyah. If I had to fight for Carlos Guerra in order to be near her, then that was exactly what I was going to do.