3. Greer
GREER
Ididn't sleep last night. But this time, the memories don't own me—Dylan's apartment, the rope cutting into my wrists, his voice detailing every violation he inflicted on Lilah. The memories are there, white noise in the background, but they're not what keeps me staring at my ceiling at three AM.
It's her.
Viper. The woman who crushed a man's windpipe and looked at me like she could read every dark thought I've been shoving down for nine months. Who got close enough that I could smell sweat and violence on her skin, who touched my face with bloody knuckles and told me to run home like a good boy.
I should want to forget her. Should be grateful she walked away, that she saw straight through me and decided I wasn't worth corrupting.
Instead, I want to know everything.
At five-thirty AM, I give up on sleep. My home feels too quiet, too clean, too much like the carefully constructed life I've been pretending fits. I make coffee I don't drink and sit at my kitchen island with my laptop, staring at the search bar like it might spontaneously provide answers.
Start with what I know: underground fight club in Jersey. Woman called Viper. Undefeated. Lethal.
The logical part of my brain—the part that got me through business school and into Sterling & Cross—knows this is stupid.
Knows I should leave whatever that was in that basement, walk away from the violence and the chaos and the woman who made me feel alive for the first time since Dylan's fists reminded me what pain tastes like.
The other part, the one that's been growing louder since the kidnapping, wants to chase this feeling until it consumes me.
I type: underground fight clubs New Jersey
Hours disappear into dead ends. Forums that lead nowhere, Reddit threads about MMA gyms that are definitely legal, conspiracy theories about fight clubs that don't match what I saw. I pull up maps of Jersey, mark the industrial area where Jake drove us, try to narrow down locations.
Nothing.
Fighter Viper New Jersey returns results about a women's MMA promotion that definitely isn't basement death matches.
My coffee goes cold. Morning light creeps through my windows, turning the kitchen golden, normal, wrong.
I think about her eyes—amber, intense, holding mine while she told me I didn't belong in her world. The way she moved through that crowd like she owned every inch of space, like violence was just another language she spoke fluently.
The way part of me wanted to prove her wrong about everything.
My phone buzzes. Work reminder: team meeting at nine.
I check the time: seven forty-five. Enough time to shower, dress, pretend I'm the same person who sat in that meeting last week and cared about quarterly projections.
But I don't close the laptop. Instead, I pivot.
She said she'd been fighting there three years. High-profile enough that everyone knew her name—or her fight name, at least. If she's that visible in the underground, maybe she's been visible above ground too.
Arrested maybe. Charged with something.
I pull up New Jersey arrest records, start filtering by that area of Jersey, by dates going back three to five years. The database is clunky, designed by someone who never considered user experience, but I've analyzed worse data sets for clients.
Assault charges. Drug possession. Illegal gambling operations.
I scan faces, looking for amber eyes and dark skin and that particular brand of dangerous that walked through the crowd like violence was her birthright.
Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.
Then—Malcolm Bennett.
The name catches my attention because of the charges: racketeering, money laundering, illegal weapons distribution, organized crime. Serious shit. The kind that gets you federal time, not county jail.
I click through. Mugshot from five years ago: a man in his early fifties, dark skin, amber eyes that stare directly at the camera with the kind of authority that doesn't diminish behind bars.
The article loads slowly, my internet deciding now is the perfect time to buffer.
Malcolm Bennett, alleged head of Jersey's Bennett crime family, sentenced to fifteen years federal time on racketeering charges. Bennett maintained his innocence throughout the trial, though prosecutors presented extensive evidence of his involvement in...
I scroll past the crime details, looking for connections. Family. Associates. Anything that might?—
There.
A photo embedded in the article: Malcolm Bennett leaving the courthouse, federal marshals flanking him.
And beside him, just visible in the frame, a woman in her mid-twenties with dark skin and natural hair pulled back, wearing a leather jacket and an expression that would make grown men reconsider their life choices.
The caption reads: Malcolm Bennett with daughter Zaria Bennett outside federal courthouse.
My breath catches.
I zoom in on her face—the angle isn't perfect, half-shadowed by the courthouse overhang, but those eyes. Amber, intense, holding the camera with the same challenging stare she turned on me across the bar.
Zaria Bennett.
I sit back, my heart doing something complicated in my chest.
She's not just some underground fighter. She's the daughter of a major crime boss. Which means everything about her—the confidence, the violence, the way people parted around her like she was royalty—makes complete sense.
I pull up everything I can find on Malcolm Bennett. Articles pile up, documenting his rise through Jersey's criminal underworld, the territory he controlled, the businesses he ran as fronts. Legitimate operations layered over illegal ones, a network built over decades.
Nothing about Zaria specifically, except occasional mentions as "Bennett's daughter" or "the younger Bennett." The media focused on Malcolm, on his empire, on his eventual arrest and conviction. His daughter remained mostly peripheral, a footnote.
But I remember how that crowd looked at her. How they screamed when she won. How even the referee gave her respect, like she'd earned her place in that violent ecosystem through more than just her last name.
I check the time again: eight-thirty.
Fuck.
I close the laptop, head for the shower, my mind spinning through implications.
Zaria Bennett. Daughter of Malcolm Bennett, currently serving fifteen years federal time.
Which means what—she's running things while he's locked up?
Holding his territory? Fighting in underground clubs to maintain reputation?
The water runs hot, steam fogging the mirror, and I stand there letting it scald my shoulders while pieces connect.
She didn't want to tell me her name because names mean vulnerability in her world. She walked away because corrupting civilians isn't worth the risk to whatever operation she's protecting. She's not just dangerous—she's important dangerous, the kind where people's lives depend on her decisions.
And I'm the idiot who wants back in anyway.
Work is impossible.
I sit through the nine AM meeting while Patricia from client services drones about engagement metrics, and all I can think about is the way Zaria's voice went rough when she called me private school.
The casual condescension in her touch when she patted my cheek, like I was a child playing dress-up.
The split-second before she pulled away when her expression shifted—like maybe she wanted to stay, wanted to see what happened if she stopped being responsible.
"Greer?"
I blink. Everyone's looking at me.
"Sorry, what?"
Patricia's smile is patient but strained. "The Morrison account projections. You said you'd have preliminary analysis ready today?"
"Right. Yes. I'll have those to you by end of day."
Except I haven't even started them because I spent this morning stalking a crime boss's daughter through public records instead of doing my actual job.
The meeting drags. I take notes I won't remember, nod at appropriate intervals, and count the minutes until I can return to my desk.
When we finally break, I grab my laptop and escape before anyone can corner me with follow-up questions.
My desk sits in an open-plan nightmare where privacy is theoretical and everyone can see everyone else's screens. I pull up the Morrison account files, stare at spreadsheets that used to engage my brain, and feel absolutely nothing.
"Hey stranger."
Sarah Chen perches on the edge of my desk, coffee in hand, wearing a blue dress that complements her dark hair. She's pretty in an uncomplicated way—friendly smile, easy laugh, the kind of woman who probably has her life figured out.
Three weeks ago, I would've been interested. Would've noticed the way she leans slightly closer, the deliberate casualness of her visit.
Now I just want her to leave so I can think about amber eyes and violence.
"Hey Sarah."
"You've been quiet lately." She sips her coffee, studying me with genuine concern. "Everything okay?"
"Yeah, just busy."
"Busy enough to skip happy hour last week? Jake said you've been weird since that night out with the guys."
My jaw tightens. Of course Jake mentioned it. "Just had a lot on my mind."
"Anything you want to talk about?"
I watched a woman kill someone with her bare hands and now I can't stop thinking about her. I found out she's a crime boss's daughter and instead of running, I want to find her again. I'm pretty sure I'm losing my mind but it's the first time in nine months I've felt anything other than numb.
"Work stuff," I say instead. "Nothing interesting."
Sarah's expression says she doesn't believe me, but she's too polite to push. "Well, if you need a distraction, some of us are getting drinks Thursday. You should come."
"I'll think about it."
"That's Greer-speak for no, but I appreciate the politeness." She slides off my desk, squeezes my shoulder briefly. "Take care of yourself, okay?"
She walks away before I can respond, and I return to spreadsheets that might as well be written in a foreign language for all the sense they make.