The crowd reacted. Blaze scrambled on top of Drake before he could throw him off. The strength advantage dropped on the floor. Drake could still bench him into the air. But he couldn’t punch from his back without giving up position, and he’d never learned to fight from down there.
Blaze worked to get past Drake’s legs. Drake bucked under him and almost flipped him. Blaze planted his hands, rode it out, and kept his chest pinned to Drake’s. He got one leg through, then the other, and dragged himself up across Drake’s chest. He pinned him there with his full weight.
Blaze threw an elbow. Drake’s arm came up to defend, and Blaze threw another, harder, into the gap. The elbow caught his nose. Blood went onto the concrete. Drake had fought twenty-two times without losing because every man before Blaze had been scared of him on his feet. The buzzer ended the round, and Blaze rolled off him.
He walked back to his side of the pit on rubbery legs. The cut over his eye was wide open and pumping. The bruise on his ribs had gone from purple to black. His left eye was swelling shut. He couldn’t take a full breath.
He’s going to come at me again. He’s going to be aggressive. He’s going to make a mistake.
The buzzer sounded.
Drake walked at him faster than before. He wanted the finish standing because the ground had exposed him. Blaze covered and ate two more on the arms. He let Drake back him toward the wall of the pit and let him think he had him pinned. Drake threw a heavy right that dropped in low and caught him on the side.
Blaze’s ribs screamed, but he didn’t go down. Drake was committed now, hungry for the finish. He threw the same overhand right that had caught Blaze in the first round. Blaze dodged it. Drake’s momentum carried him a step past Blaze. His head came forward.
Shoot the takedown, he thought, but a takedown wasn’t what his body went for. The wolf’s instinct moved first. The wolf knew what to do when something bigger than him exposed its throat.
His right arm slid under Drake’s chin. His left arm locked behind Drake’s head. He clamped down. The guillotine. He dropped to his back and pulled Drake down with him. Drake’s full weight came down on Blaze’s chest. The cracked ribs ground under the weight, but he kept the choke hold.
Drake tried to muscle out of it. He drove his weight forward, trying to crack the grip with brute force. Blaze’s arms shook with the effort of holding the choke. But Blaze’s whole body was the choke now. Drake couldn’t get his head free. Five seconds. Ten.
Blaze’s vision started to go gray from the pressure of Drake’s weight on his chest. He kept the lock. His forearms screamed. His shoulders screamed. The ribs that might have been cracked at the start of the round were definitely cracked now. The pain was a white light running up through his chest, but he kept the lock.
Fifteen seconds.
Drake’s hand came up off the concrete.
He tapped the floor twice.
Blaze released the choke.
Drake rolled off him onto the concrete. The crowd erupted. Blaze lay on his back, the lights overhead a white blur. He got one knee under him, then the other and stood. He swayed. Blood was in his mouth, his left eye was shut, and he couldn’t take a full breath. The room came back into focus by degrees, the lights first and the crowd second and Stella third.
She was at the bar. Her hand was on her stomach against the dress, fingers spread wide, the only motion she had let her body make. He held her gaze and then pulled his eyes off her. Pierce was descending to the lip of the pit. He reached a hand down. Blaze took the hand and let Pierce help him over the cinderblock.
“Mister Russo. You’re the new top of the card.”
“All right.”
“There’s a private event coming up. Something special. We’d like you on it.”
Pierce patted him once on the shoulder the way a man pats his hoarse. He turned and walked back through the crowd.
The sale event, Blaze thought.He just put me on the sale event. I’m going to be on the card the night they sell Nell.
Chapter
Twenty-Two
Stella satat the bar with a bourbon in front of her and a bored expression on her face. The crowd was thick tonight. The buyers’ corner was full, the bookies were working fast, and the smooth voice on the PA had already announced the first bout.
Blaze was in the holding room. She’d watched him disappear forty-five minutes ago with Ryder at his shoulder. Stella lifted her glass an inch, let the bourbon touch her lip without drinking, and set the glass back down.
Two men she hadn’t seen before sat at the bar four feet from her. One was in his mid-sixties, wearing a navy blazer over a white button-up shirt. The second one was in his late forties, in a grey suit with no tie. The younger one paid for the two Old Fashioneds in cash from a money clip. Stella kept her body turned toward the pit, and her right ear in line with their conversation.
“You coming to the auction this week?”
“Wouldn’t miss it.”
