Jabs rolls his eyes. “You and your fucking superstitions.”
“They haven’t failed me yet.”
Dave orders himself a beer.
When the waitress brings our drinks, I cut Coach a glare.
He looks at me and smiles big, then takes a healthy drink of his frosty mug of beer.
“Asshole,” I mutter.
Coach laughs. “Sunday you can have all the beer you want. You’ll need to work it off on Monday, though.”
I shake my head. “Not worth the hassle or the hangover.”
“Where’s your boy?” Jabs asks.
“Ethan’s got a gig in L.A. A charity benefit.”
“Ah. They’re about as big as it gets, yeah?”
I nod. “Pretty much.”
“All the rags and media are makin’ a spectacle out of ya.” His accent makes me think of Tera and how she goes nuts for it. Jabs is from Ireland. Born there, moved to the US when he was 14. He’s managed to keep the accent. I think he goes out of his way to do so. Seems all the chicks love an Irishman.
I nod. “We’re ignoring most of it. We’ve got PR handling it.”
“Still can’t be easy hearing all the insults.”
“Nope, it’s not, but we’ll get through,” I reply.
Coach excuses himself to go talk to the owner of Bandits.
“Tell me,” Jabs urges.
“We got it, man. Really. We prepared for it.”
Jabs nods. “Tired of hiding, huh? Can’t blame ya. It’s gotta suck keeping such a big part of your life a secret.”
“It wasn’t easy. Truthfully, I hated it, though I understood why. Until Ethan and I were living in the same place, we didn’t want speculation. With him living there and me living in the city, you know if someone saw us sitting here, they’d blow it out of proportion. Likely, you’re going to be my side piece,” I tease.
“You could only be so lucky, you fucker.”
I chuckle, but that fades quickly when I see three other fighters walk through the door—and these aren’t the friendly sort.
“Fuck,” Jabs mutters.
I grunt.
“Spyder, Reaper, and Mayhem. Word must’ve gotten around, and you’ve been here less than half an hour,” Coach says as he sits down.
I nod.
“This can’t be good,” Jabs mutters.
I shrug. “What’re they gonna do? I don’t fight outside of the ring or cage. There, they can bring it and bring it hard.”
Coach gives me a look. “Just because they know it, doesn’t mean they’ll abide by it.”
