Chapter 15
Dominic
The bell rings and everything else disappears.
Roman circles left the way we’ve drilled a thousand times, hands high and chin tucked, and Herrera comes forward immediately.
The champion moves with the confidence of someone who’s never really been tested, who fully expects this kid to crumble under the lights the way so many others have crumbled before him.
Roman stays patient, making Herrera work for every inch of cage, and thirty seconds in he lands the check hook we’ve been sharpening for eight weeks.
The punch snaps Herrera’s head back and I see the surprise flicker across the champion’s face before he can hide it.
This isn’t the green kid he thought he was fighting.
The rest of the round is Roman executing the game plan like we’re back in the gym on a Tuesday afternoon, just the two of us and the sound of gloves on pads.
When Herrera shoots a takedown, Roman sprawls perfectly and resets to center cage.
When Herrera presses forward trying to cut off angles, Roman circles and counters with shots that keep the champion honest.
Eventually the horn sounds, Roman walks back to the corner, and I climb the steps.
“He’s rattled,” I tell him. “He’s going to try to wrestle because he knows he can’t strike with you now. When he shoots, you sprawl and take his back. You get there, it’s over. You understand?”
“I got it, Coach.” His voice is steady.
The ten-second warning comes and I step back through the cage door. Roman stands and I grip the chain-link, leaning close.
“This is yours,” I tell him. “Everything you’ve worked for. Go take it.”
The bell rings for round two and Herrera changes levels immediately, shooting a desperate double-leg within the first fifteen seconds. Roman sprawls hard, hips back, weight down, and as Herrera tries to drive forward Roman spins off to the side and takes his back in one fluid motion.
Roman has both hooks in, heels locked to Herrera’s hips, and his arm is snaking around the champion’s neck looking for the choke. Herrera defends, hand-fighting, chin tucked, trying to create space, but Roman is patient.
Herrera makes a mistake, explodes up too hard trying to shake Roman off, and in that moment of overextension Roman sinks the rear-naked choke deep under the chin. His forearm across the throat, other hand gripping his own bicep, squeezing with everything he has.
Herrera’s hand slaps the canvas once. Twice. Three times. The sign of submission.
The referee jumps in waving his arms and the arena detonates into noise.
I’m climbing through the cage door before my brain fully processes what just happened, and then Roman is sprinting toward me with his mouthguard hanging half out and his eyes wild and I catch him, wrap my arms around him, hold on while he screams something into my shoulder that gets swallowed by twenty thousand people losing their minds.
“You did it,” I scream. “You fucking did it, kid.”
He pulls back and his face is split wide open with the kind of grin that makes him look about twelve years old, all the cool composure gone now, replaced by pure unfiltered joy.
The announcer’s voice cuts through somehow, that boom designed to fill arenas: “Ladies and gentlemen, your winner by submission at fifty-seven seconds of round two, rear-naked choke... ROMAN... KINCAID!”
The noise somehow gets even louder, and Roman throws both fists in the air and the crowd roars back at him. They hand him a microphone and he says something about his team, the hard work, about this being just the beginning, and I step back toward the cage wall to give him the room he’s earned.
My phone is buzzing in my pocket, the vibrations coming so fast and continuous that it has to be all four of my brothers losing their collective minds at once, but I ignore it.
I just stand here with my back against the chain-link and watch Roman soak in every second of this, the cameras flashing and the crowd chanting his name and reporters shouting questions and his whole life changing in real time right in front of me.
This is everything I’ve worked for. Every late night reviewing tape until my eyes burned and my coffee went cold. Every year I spent rebuilding my reputation brick by fucking brick while the rest of the combat sports world forgot I existed.
All of it led here. To this cage, this moment, and this kid with his arms raised and twenty thousand people screaming his name. This is his night. His win. His moment.
But I’d be lying if I said some part of it didn’t feel like mine too.
I wake up to my phone buzzing like an angry hornet on the nightstand.
The hotel room is dark, heavy blackout curtains blocking whatever New York morning is happening outside, just a sliver of light creeping in at the edges to tell me the sun exists.
I grab my phone and squint at the screen through eyes that feel like they’ve been sandpapered shut.
6:47 AM
I can’t remember the last time I slept past five, but I didn’t crawl into this bed until almost three after the post-fight chaos.
Media obligations, medical checks for Roman, meetings with his management about the title shot offer, a celebratory drink with the team that turned into several celebratory drinks.
By the time I made it back to my room I was running on fumes and adrenaline crash, and I’d barely managed to kick off my shoes before I was unconscious.
I scroll through the notifications first. Seventeen texts from my brothers, which tracks. Congratulations and photos of all of them crammed onto Calvin and Maren’s couch watching the fight. Then I see the latest text from Alex, sent twenty minutes ago.
Alex: Holy shit the article. Tell me you saw it, man.
My stomach drops like I just missed a step going down a dark staircase. The article. Brooke’s profile was supposed to publish this morning, and I completely forgot about it.
I’d looked for her last night, against every instinct telling me to leave it alone.
My eyes kept scanning the crowd during the post-fight interviews, searching for dark hair and sharp cheekbones, but in the crush of cameras and reporters and people trying to get Roman’s attention, I never spotted her.
Probably for the best. I don’t know what I would have said anyway.
I sit up and swing my legs over the side of the bed, suddenly very awake despite running on three hours of sleep and whatever alcohol is still working its way out of my system. I pull up the website of The Sporting Standard on my phone, already braced for impact.
There it is. Top of the homepage, featured story, with a photo of me and Roman in the corner between rounds.
MIDNIGHT RISING: Roman Kincaid, Dominic Midnight, and the Comeback No One Saw Coming By Brooke Bennett
I blink at the headline and read it again. That doesn’t sound like a hit piece, but I’ve been burned before. I click and start reading, waiting for the knife.
It doesn’t come.
She opens with the gym, and writes about Roman’s background, his trajectory, interviews with people I didn’t even know she’d contacted.
Then she gets to me, and I brace myself, but instead of burying me she just tells the story.
The years of rebuilding and the reputation I’ve built in the regional scene.
Quotes from other coaches, people who’ve watched me work.
And then I get to the paragraph about the scandal and I have to read it three times because I’m convinced I’m hallucinating.
She addresses it head-on, but then she writes something that makes my chest seize up. It should be noted that Midnight’s involvement was never confirmed. The accusations that ended his career were speculation.
I stare at the screen. I don’t know what to do with that. I don’t know where to put it.
She’s always been an incredible writer. I’ve never denied that, not even when I hated her most. She has this way of cutting through noise to find the thing underneath, the story people don’t even know they’re telling.
I keep scrolling, still half-expecting the turn, but it doesn’t come. She writes about the fight, about Roman’s composure, about what it means for both of us going forward.
My phone buzzes.
Alex: Hello?? Did you read it? Dude you sound like a fucking badass!
I can practically hear him bouncing off the walls. I put the phone down and scrub my hands over my face. I should feel vindicated. Relieved. Maybe even smug that she didn’t take the shot everyone expected her to take.
My phone buzzes again. This time it’s not a text but an actual call, Roman’s agent, Tony. I debate letting it go to voicemail, but think better of it.
“You up?” he asks before I can say hello.
“I am now.” I yawn, rubbing a hand over my face.
“Come to Roman’s room,” he says. “UFC just called. You need to hear this.”
The phone clicks off before I can reply, so I throw on clothes and make my way down the hall to Roman’s room.
When I knock, Roman opens the door so fast he must have been standing right behind it, and he looks wide awake despite the hour.
He steps back and waves me inside without a word, bouncing on his heels like a kid who can’t sit still.
Tony’s by the window with his phone in his hand. He turns when I walk in, looking at me with his eyebrows raised and his mouth pressed into a line like he’s trying not to speak too fast.
“Nathan Cross tore his MCL yesterday,” Tony says.
My brain catches up before he finishes the sentence. Cross was supposed to challenge Volkov for the welterweight title in Mexico City. If Cross is out, they need a replacement.
“The UFC called twenty minutes ago,” Tony continues. “And they want Roman to step in.”
I let the information turn over in my head, trying to process it through the fog.
Seven weeks to prepare for a title fight against Ivan Volkov, the most dominant champion in the division.
Insane by any reasonable standard. A full camp would be ten or twelve weeks minimum, enough time to study tape and drill specific counters and peak at exactly the right moment. Seven weeks is nothing.
But you don’t say no to a title shot because the timing isn’t perfect. You sure as hell don’t say no when the whole world is watching after the kind of performance Roman put on last night.
“I already told them yes,” Roman says, his smile so wide it takes over his whole face. “We’re going to Mexico City, Coach.”
“Holy shit, kid,” I say, clapping his shoulder hard enough to make him rock back on his heels.
Roman lets out a whoop loud enough to wake everyone on the floor and pulls me into a hug that damn near cracks my ribs. Tony’s phone rings and he picks up, already talking logistics to someone on the other end, his voice all business while Roman’s still got me in a bear grip.
Seven weeks. My fighter is challenging for a world title in Mexico City.
This is the opportunity of Roman’s career, the kind of shot most fighters never get. If he wins this, he’ll be the youngest welterweight champion in UFC history. His one shot at everything he’s been working toward since he was sixteen years old, fighting in parking lots for gas money.
And for me, it’s the second chance I never thought I’d get.