Chapter 35
RAFE
When I make it back to my bedroom, Paige is already in bed.
She’s asleep, too, judging from the softness of her breathing and the way she’s curled up on her side. Her hair is braided again. I wonder if she does that most nights.
Sleep has always been hard for me. I sleep too little and too rarely, and the nightmares sometimes chase it away entirely. But tonight, after what just happened, it feels damn near impossible.
I lie on my back beside her and stare up at the ceiling. There’s a creeping sensation inside that won’t let me retreat into oblivion. A twitch to my hands, a heaviness in my chest. The pounding of unspent need and heat down my spine.
I look over at Paige.
Kissing her is always a mistake, because the want never goes away. It just grows and grows and there’s nothing I can do with it. It never goes anywhere. So it stays inside. Transforming into a jungle I can’t escape from.
It’s too dangerous to feel this way.
I need to remain in control.
I slip out of bed and walk quietly to the closet. There should be a fight tonight. My usual place doesn’t host them that often, but there’s another place that does. It’s seedier. Rougher. I haven’t been there in the last year. But they’ll let me in. They always do.
I throw things into a duffel bag and head to the door. The house is filled to the brim with guests. In every room, friends and family lie fast asleep. None of them can know.
It’s riskier than I’ve been in a long time.
But I can’t stay here. I need the escape and I need the pain.
So I head downstairs and grab a set of car keys. The Porsche is a bad choice, and not an inconspicuous one, but I want to go fast.
The night is late, the streets dark, and no one is out. I drive toward the town of Bergamo with my foot on the gas. There’s a place on the outskirts that runs cage fights on weekend nights. It’s mafia-run. I have nothing to do with them—want nothing to do with them—except for this.
They run a tight ship.
The house is nondescript, with an overgrown garden and a chain-link fence. It’s not a place that would make you look twice. Probably the point.
A young man stands by the gate, scrolling on his phone and smoking a cigarette. A guard. I speak to him in Italian, and he double-checks with someone inside. A few minutes later I’m let in.
When I came back from boarding school and started working in the family business, everything looked fine. I spent the days fulfilling the role that should have been Etienne’s.
And I spent the nights in the rings.
I know the best fighting spots in London. The best ones in Paris, too, and a few in New York. I’ve been to a few in Tokyo and one in Bangkok.
Fighting is the only way to make penance for my sins. Pain beats the guilt out of me, makes me feel like it compensates for the life I get to live. The life that went to me and not Etienne.
Because of me.
Inside, the house is barely livable. The living room and kitchen have been blown out. Spectators line the walls and the scent of smoke hangs heavy in the air. There’s betting going on here, money exchanging hands, favors settled.
No phones. No filming, no outsiders, no trade. No one talks about what happens here. Debts are settled, scores are evened, and bones are broken.
The referee is a broad, tall beast of a man named Fabrizio. I’ve dealt with him before. He’s an old fighter himself, and he pairs me up with another late arrival.
I wrap my fists in tape and feel the icy calm settle inside me. There’s no room for uncertainty here. No space for feelings of want and desire, of despair and guilt. There’s no room for mistakes. It’s just me and the opponent and the welcome bliss of pain.
I step into the ring.
This place has a smaller mat than my usual, and the cage is crudely put together. Clearly made for dramatic effect and using scraps.
Fabrizio calls out the rules. There are only two.
If you tap out or lose consciousness, you lose.
No weapons.
Everything else is on the table.
The mat is cool beneath my bare feet. I raise my hands, tuck my chin, elbows in.
The guy facing me is about my height, but he’s built leaner, with less muscle on him.
He’ll likely be fast. If I had to guess, he’s a new initiate in the mafia.
A young man with too much testosterone and too little sense.
I can beat some into him. Hopefully he’s strong enough to beat some into me, too.
The bell tolls, and he’s immediately moving. Good. I move with him, conserving my energy, using smaller steps and staying on the balls of my feet. He hits first and I duck. While he’s still adjusting, I aim a sharp kick to his left knee as he passes me.
He gives a low whoosh and stumbles.
I let him find his footing and hear the crowd roar around me. This has to be a new initiate. Fabrizio has paired him with me to teach him some humility. Fuck. I wanted a real opponent.
His eyes flash, and he calls out an insult in Italian. I make a come-hither motion with my fingers.
If you choose words in a fistfight, you’ve already lost.
It doesn’t take long. He gets a solid hit to my ribs that I let pass through, and pain blooms. It grounds me. Good. He leaves himself too open, and I grip him in a body lock. I plant my foot, twist my hip, and throw him off balance.
We hit the ground together.
He doesn’t know basic moves. It’s easy to slide my arms around, twist, and hold him in a tight lock he can’t escape out of. His hand claws at my bicep, but he can’t escape it.
It only takes a few seconds of trying before he slams his hand against the mat twice. Tapping out.
I release him, and Fabrizio steps into the cage. “Victory to Rafe!”
The crowd applauds, and more than a few jeer at my opponent. A guy who looks a lot like him gives him a wolfish smile. Has to be his older brother.
Yeah. He was definitely put in here to be taught a lesson.
Damn it.
“We have a surprise!” Fabrizio exclaims. “Someone tried to sneak in tonight. Uninvited.”
He’s one of the ugliest fighters I’ve ever seen, and he handles enforcement in this place. A cheer rises from the crowd. It happens occasionally, but rarely at a fight I’ve been to. Someone is going to get it tonight.
There’s a shuffle amongst the crowd, and then two guards walk up with a woman between them. She walks unencumbered, nearly as tall as them both.
There’s a blonde braid down the side of her neck. She’s wearing a jacket, and beneath it, a set of navy sweatpants.
My breathing stops.
“This pretty thing was looking around the house,” Fabrizio continues to the jeers of the crowd.
Paige’s face is blank in a way I’ve never seen. She must be terrified. Fuck. I walk forward, trying to get to her.
Paige finally catches my eyes, and there’s a look of relief on her face that hits me harder than the punch my previous opponent landed.
It hurts more, too.
She wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for me.
“You okay?” I mouth.
She gives a tiny nod. Anger follows immediately after the relief. Why did she insist on learning more about me? Why is she here? Why did she put herself in danger?
“Who claims this woman?” Fabrizio calls out again. He’s speaking Italian, and Paige won’t understand. “Who will take her punishment?”
Anticipation hangs in the smoky room. A lewd voice calls from the back. I wish I could!
“She’s mine,” I call, and head to the cage’s exit. “She’s off limits. Let her go.”
Fabrizio turns. It’s a slow, theatrical movement, like he’s shocked by this information. It’s fake as shit. “You let your new wife wander, hmm?”
“She’s not involved with this.”
“Ah, ah, ah,” he tuts. “She involved herself. We would never hurt a woman, you know that. But you, on the other hand…”
I flex my hands. Paige is still watching me. Her eyes are wide, and she’s looking at my bare chest, my taped-up hands, the cage I’m standing in. I can’t imagine what she’s thinking.
Those two guards are still flanking her, like she’s a threat.
Like she’ll run. The anger inside me burns brighter.
“Let her go first,” I tell Fabrizio. “I’ll stay where I am.”
He nods, and then he speaks to the guards. They step away from her, and with each inch I relax more.
She walks to the edge of the cage. “Rafe?”
I cross the distance, already rewrapping the bands around my hands. There are so many people here. People I’d never involve myself with.
The two never meet, the man I am during the nights when I crave the sting of pain and the man I am during the days. The man the world sees.
“Don’t talk to anyone here,” I tell her under my breath. “Don’t drink anything. I’ll take you home right after. You’re safe, okay? Don’t worry.”
“Raffaele,” Fabrizio taunts. I finish tightening the protective tape around my right hand.
“Rafe, what are you doing?” she says. Her voice is trembling, and it hits me like another punch. Her softness, wasted on me. “What is this place?”
“Don’t interfere. Promise me, Paige. Regardless of what happens. I’ll take you home after we’re done here. No one will hurt you.”
She hesitates for a second before she nods. There’s a fierce flush to her cheeks, and in that moment, I am as angry at myself as I am with her. She shouldn’t be here. Her loveliness, her fierceness, has no place in the seediness of this place.
I turn to face Fabrizio. He’s already taken his top off. Around the cage, people have started to stomp their feet. It’s a steady beat. He grins and raises his fists.
There’s a reason he rarely fights anymore. There’s a reason he’s the enforcer of rules, the judge and the jury.
Because he’s damn near impossible to beat.