Gage?
What the hell is he doing here?
I let my bag slide off my shoulder and to the ground with a heavy thump that finally draws both men’s attention away from each other and toward me.
Atlas’s eyes widen slightly, but Gage just grins, a red mouth guard flashing as he inclines his head toward me. As if he’s been waiting for me to arrive and for this very moment.
That smug bastard…
Atlas approaches my side of the ring and spits out his mouth guard into his glove, leaning against the ropes. “Hey. I wasn’t sure you were coming in this morning. I would’ve waited for you”—he tips his head backward toward Gage—“but I found a fun sparring partner.”
Fun.
That’s certainly an interesting word to describe the man.
“Yeah?” My gaze dips over to Gage, and I do my best to appear unaffected by his sudden appearance in the place I come to blow off steam—when he has been the source of a lot of it himself. “Where’d you find him?”
Atlas shrugs, the movement causing his muscles to pull at the massive scar on his shoulder that came courtesy of yet another one of my failures and almost ended his boxing career. “He came in this morning and explained that he’s new to town and was looking for somewhere to train.”
I gape at my cousin, who has apparently lost his damn mind. “And you just let him?”
It isn’t like Atlas to risk an unknown opponent in sparring.
With the type of power he has, he could kill someone with a single blow if they weren’t prepared and built to withstand it.
Gage certainly has the size to take on Atlas, but presuming he would know what it takes to step into the ring with the man who holds the middleweight belt is a huge and dangerous leap to take.
Atlas grins. “Apparently, he fought WCAP a few years ago.”
Of fucking course, he did…
I narrow my gaze on Gage, who offers another half-grin as he starts to make his way over to us.
It shouldn’t surprise me, really. The first thing I did when Gage gave me his name at the club the other night was to run a background check on him. A basic check didn’t bring up much, though, save for a birth certificate from Virginia and a record confirming he was in the Army at some point but no longer active duty.
Knowing he served explained a lot.
The initial vibe I had of him and how he carried himself. The way he handled those assholes at the club so easily. The instinct to protect Jade in that situation even if it wasn’t his place.
If he fought WCAP, that means he was a damn good boxer when he served—with a potential to compete at the Olympic or even pro-level. That never happened or the background check would have come up with more information on him.
Which means something interfered with his plans.
That gives me somewhere to start digging, another clue that might help me unravel the mystery of why he’s really here.
Atlas pushes off the ropes and motions to his opponent. “Gage Newhart, this is my cousin, Bishop Clarke.”
Gage spits out his mouth guard and winks at me in a way that makes my entire body go molten—with a strange combination of hellfire and sexual heat. “We’ve met.”
Astrid’s eyes widen slightly as she looks between us. “You have?”
He waits for a moment to see if I’m going to offer an explanation. Maybe he’s holding open the door for me to describe our run-ins or the fact that I’ve expressed my distrust of him. But even though I don’t completely trust the man, he hasn’t actually done anything wrong or suspicious.
The fact that he got into the opening and I still don’t know how says more about how I failed in creating the security plan than it does about his motives.
And Atlas appears thrilled to have him in the ring.
I won’t shatter that unless there’s a very good reason to.
