Maksim thanks everyone for coming tonight, and the crowd roars with applause as the lights dim once more. I relax in my seat, knowing thefirst fight will begin soon and Maksim will be fighting next. Someone sits beside me in the reserved seat between me and Maverick. I straighten and lean away from them, closer to Parker. They put a hand on me. I’m about to wind my arm back and throw a punch, but the lights flicker above, and I catch my husband’s dark features, staring back at me, a smirk on his face.
He collects me in his arms and kisses me deeply.
“What are you doing?” I ask when we pull apart.
“I’m not fighting tonight.”
My eyebrows fly up. “You aren’t?”
He shakes his head. “No. We're going to watch Niko win, then we’re going home and celebrating the new year, Duchess.”
“Niko’s fighting? But… why?”
“Because I want to spend it with you. There will be other fights, cara mia. I can sit this one out.” He rests his arm around my shoulders. I snuggle into him, grabbing Parker’s hand, threading my fingers through his, not letting go.
Parker doesn’t either, relaxing with me as the first fighters enter the ring.
Chapter Forty-Two
Parker
Niko knocks the guy out during the beginning of the fourth round. My phone buzzes in my suit pocket. I pull it out and see Aleksi’s name on the screen.
Aleksi: I’m here.
Maksim quirks a brow at me as we make our way to the back, where the fighters usually hang out in separate green rooms until it’s their turn to fight. Maks knocks on the door to the left. It opens, Aleksi pokes his head out, and steps aside, letting us through with a goofy smile on his face.
Niko sits on a bench, getting his brow stitched. “Hey,” he grins crookedly at me. “I look like you now.”
“You wish,” I shoot back.
While Maksim and Sabrina talk to Niko and the medic on site, Aleksi and I step out of the room and into the quiet, empty hallway. “I want you to know this was a fucking pain in my ass,” he grumbles, handing me a hard drive and a memory stick. “The manor has been condemned.”
“I know. I really appreciate it.”
He shakes his head. “Don’t worry about it. I would’ve done it ten times over if I had to. It was worth it.”
I shake the hard drive at him. “Was this the only one?”
“To burn,” he replies solemnly, light brown eyes filled with sadness. “There were too many hours of video, so I sped it up when nothing was happening and slowed it down when someone entered the room. It was… hard to watch. But it’s been condensed into a few hours. It’s all there.”
I dip my chin in thanks and shove it in my pocket just as Maks and Sabrina open the door and they step out with us.
Aleksi bends and kisses Sabrina’s cheek. “Hi, Boss Lady. Have a happy New Year.”
She grins up at the giant and pats him in the stomach. “You, too. You’ll come by the day after tomorrow?”
“I wouldn’t miss it,” he says, clasping Maksim’s hand in a dude-hug-handshake.
We leave Eden quickly after, making it home thirty minutes before midnight. After getting undressed and changing into thermal pajama bottoms, I put the memory stick in my pocket then go back downstairs. After lighting a fire, I turn on the only TV in the house so we can watch the ball drop. Maks and Sabrina come down a few minutes after me and sit on the sofa.
“So, what was that about? You and Aleksi.”
I knew he was going to ask, which is why I brought the damn stick. “A few weeks ago I had Aleksi see if he could find any footage of you while you were in the facility.”
The muscles in his jaw tic and Sabrina’s eyes widen. “And?”
I take out the memory stick and toss it to him. “I don’t know what’s on it, but he was able to get the hard drive somehow, too. He said it’s so we can burn it after. Nobody but him and you will ever know what’s on it.”
