Chapter 10
Chapter Ten
When I walked through the door and saw her still standing there, smiling like she’d been waiting for me, I expected… I don’t know. Disappointment? Anger? Something loud enough to drown out the ringing in my own head.
What I didn’t expect was hope.
Real stupid, bright hope lighting up her whole face for one second before my words knocked it out.
“Oh,” I’d said. “You’re still here.”
I watched the hope die in her eyes, clean and fast. Watched her shoulders shift, watched her spine straighten like she was bracing against a blast. The worst part was that I felt a flick in my chest—some awful mix of satisfaction and relief—because pushing her away had become a reflex and I knew how to do that.
Then she smiled again. Not wide, not soft—just enough to let me know she wasn’t going down without a fight.
“Yep,” she said lightly. “Still here. Messing up your house. Burning your dinner.”
She tried to tease it off, like we were still us, and it should’ve worked. It might have, months ago.
“I didn’t ask you to cook for me,” I said, and my voice came out more sullen than I intended.
Her eyebrows went up. Just a fraction.
“I didn’t ask you to behave like an asshole,” she said, perfectly calm. “So I guess we both got something we didn’t want today.”
It hit like a gut jab. Not because she was wrong—because she didn’t yell it. She just laid it out there, clean and measured, and somehow that felt worse.
I set my bag down harder than I needed to and tried again to get her moving toward the door. “Chloe, you should go. This was… I don’t know. It was a mistake. You don’t have to stay here and play nurse or whatever you think you’re doing.”
She blinked once. Twice. Then that slow Avery patience slid over her like armor.
“I’m fine leaving,” she said. “If you can explain what changed between this morning and right now.”
I clenched my jaw. “Nothing changed.”
“Zarek,” she said, stepping closer. “You fell asleep last night knowing I was across the hall and you could breathe. You couldn’t even look at me this morning without smiling. Something happened. So tell me what it was.”
I wanted to lie. I almost did. But the day had been one long string of bad decisions and lies tasted worse on top of them.
“I was at the gym,” I muttered.
Her silence stretched. Not judgmental. Not furious. Just… evaluating.
“And you’re impressed with yourself for the stellar decision-making, I assume?” she asked mildly.
Heat flushed up the back of my neck. “It’s not—”
“No, it’s fine,” she cut in. “Truly. I’m glad you’re taking care of your mental health in such healthy and productive ways.”
The sarcasm should’ve stung, but instead she sighed. And then she did the most confusing thing of all—she dropped it.
“Okay,” she said. “Well, I’ll go.”
It was my turn to blink. “Just like that?”
“Just like that.” She was already moving toward the guest room. “Staying here if you don’t want me here isn’t going to magically fix anything.”
I heard drawers opening. The closet door sliding. The soft rustle of fabric.
Then she reappeared with an old canvas tote over her shoulder—the one she used to take to farmer’s markets and art fairs. It looked smaller on her than I remembered. Or maybe she looked smaller. I couldn’t tell.
She went to the kitchen without looking at me, opened the oven, and pulled out a plate wrapped in foil. She set it gently on the table, peeled the foil back, and turned to me.
“Eat,” she said. “You need to start taking care of yourself.”
I stared at her, blindsided. I’d expected anger. Accusations. Tears. Hell, even a slammed door would’ve been easier.
But she just offered me a plate of food and the belief that I didn’t deserve to starve.
She looked at the plate, then at me, and smiled—small and sad and stupidly strong.
Before I could form a sentence, she closed the distance between us. One hand came up to rest over my heart, warm and steady. The other cupped my cheek, fingers light against my skin where the bruise was darkening into something ugly.
“You can’t walk away from yourself forever, Zarek Post,” she said. Her voice didn’t shake. Mine might have if I’d tried to use it.
Then she stepped back, adjusted the tote on her shoulder, and walked out the front door.
The latch clicked behind her, quiet as a pin drop.
It still felt like an explosion.
It must have been close to three in the morning because the house had that particular kind of quiet where even the appliances quit pretending to hum. I was on the couch, elbows on my knees, hands clasped, staring at the untouched dinner sitting cold on the table.
Chloe had arranged it like she expected me to sit down and eat like a normal human being.
There was still one dirty pan in the sink waiting to go into the dishwasher.
I should have rinsed it hours ago, should have wiped the cutting board, should have restored the kitchen to whatever sterile order I’d convinced myself mattered.
But I didn’t want to move it.
It felt like doing so would erase her presence entirely, like the whole day might collapse into something I made up if I cleaned too well.
“What the fuck am I supposed to do?” I muttered into the empty room.
There was no answer, obviously. Just the little kitchen light reflecting off the stainless steel faucets and the neat rows of magnets on the fridge and the place where Chloe had knocked one crooked on purpose.
I should’ve fixed that too.
I didn’t.
The list in my head kept growing, a miserable inventory of failure. I couldn’t work. I couldn’t fight. I was nothing but a liability at home, at the station or to the woman who was the other half of my soul.
Forty-eight hours of nothing stretched ahead of me and the house was already immaculate. Rankin would lose his mind laughing if I called him at three a.m. to ask if I could come clean his house.
The living room felt like it was shrinking. I shot to my feet without thinking, ribs barking a sharp complaint. I paced toward the sliding glass door and shoved it open, stepping out onto the deck and into the cool spring air.
The backyard was quiet, trees at the back edge of the property silhouetted against the night sky. The kind of yard meant for barbecues, slip-and-slides, dogs and kids with sticky fingers—none of which I had any business imagining.
“What the hell am I supposed to do?” I asked the dark trees like they might know.
Nothing answered.
Of course nothing answered.
I stormed back inside, rubbing a hand over my face, and that was when I saw it: a small white rectangle on the living room floor near the couch. It must have fallen out of the pocket of my basketball shorts earlier.
I bent—slowly, because my ribs hated me—and picked it up.
Maurice Benson.
I stared at the name printed in crisp black ink. The guy had felt oily in a way that didn’t leave residue but left impressions. If he’d tried that same routine on JJ, I’d have chased his ass out of the gym and told JJ if he went anywhere near the guy I’d personally rearrange his teeth.
But maybe that was the difference—guys like JJ had people protecting them from slime.
Maybe I deserved slime.
I turned the card over. Blank on the back. No logo. No gym affiliation. Just a phone number, an email, and the name.
What was the guy up to?
If I had to guess: underground fights. I’d heard about them—real bare-knuckle shit, pop-up circuits, rent money won or lost in a night, side bets that paid better than the “winners’ purse” ever did.
Sure, I’d heard about them, but those were L.A. stories. New York stories. Vegas stories. Not Tennessee.
But Maurice had talked like there was a circuit. Like there was structure. Like there was a place for guys who wanted to hit and be hit without anyone asking about insurance or medical clearance.
I twisted just enough to test my ribs and a sharp pain lanced through my side.
“Dumbfuck,” I hissed.
Realistically? Ribs like this meant no fighting for six weeks minimum. That was if I wanted to be smart. If I wanted to actually heal.
Problem was, there wasn’t a single realistic thing about me these days.
I’d been at it long enough now that I knew how to protect my left side. I could keep my guard high, use my shoulder, work angles, stay outside, let smaller guys come to me. If Maurice could set me up with lower weight classes until I healed… Maybe some practice bouts.
I just needed the training time.
And something to do that wasn’t cleaning and thinking.
I pulled my phone from my pocket before I could talk myself out of it. My thumb hovered over the number on the card for half a second and then I hit call.
The phone barely rang once before he picked up.
“Benson,” he answered. Alert. Too alert for three or four in the morning.
“It’s Zarek,” I said. “Zarek Post. You gave me your card today.”
“Post!” Maurice sounded genuinely pleased. “Hell of a good call. I was hoping I’d hear from you. I had a feeling you weren’t done.”
My skin prickled at that. He sounded like a man who could smell blood from across a parking lot.
Parking lot. Yeah that fit. He’d probably been a used car salesman at some point in his career.
“Wanted to talk,” I said. “About what you mentioned.”
“Sure, sure,” he said. “We should meet. Easier to answer questions that way.”
“Where?” I asked.
“You know Kellerman’s?”
“Knoxville?” I clarified. “Diner off the strip?”
“That’s the one.”
“Time?”
“Ten p.m. Friday.”
The night before the barbeque. “All right,” I said.
“Good man,” he replied warmly. “You won’t regret it.”
I hung up before he could make it sound any sweeter.
The house was quiet again. The card sat heavy in my hand. I set it on the table and finally sat down in front of the plate Chloe had made.
The chicken was dry and the potatoes had lost their crisp edges, but it still tasted like someone had cooked for me. Like someone had cared if I ate.
Comfort slid under my skin, slow and stupid.
Then the anger came right on its heels. Angry that my head was this screwed up. Angry that I couldn’t just be like Chloe—see the wound, name it, clean it, stitch it, keep moving.
I chewed and stared at the opposite chair.
Maybe it wouldn’t matter if she walked away and never came back.
“Yeah, sure, dumbshit. That’s it.”
I swallowed a sip of water.
How much further down did I need to fall before… Before what?
I shoved the plate away and headed to the master bedroom. This time I peeked inside the nursery before hitting the sheets.
After everyone I failed, rock bottom wasn’t deep enough.