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“I have fun,” I assure her. I try to think of an example to set her mind at ease. Something that doesn’t involve flowers.

Hmm…it’ll come to me in a minute.

It’s midnight and I’m flat on my back in bed, staring at the ceiling.

It’s quiet upstairs. Tonight the fact I’m lying awake has nothing to do with my new neighbour and everything to do with the after-dinner coffee I knew was a mistake when I accepted it. But Mum and Dad’s coffee machine is so good. It’s hard to say no.

At my feet, Penny is out for the count, snoring gently.

I turn over. Then turn back. My brain just won’t switch off. For some reason, of all things, it’s replaying the clips Innes showed me at dinner, the ones of Ryan “Axe King” Sloan.

Okay, so maybe the fact I’m lying awake does have something to do with my new neighbour.

The whole thing is just so…distasteful. This is the twenty-first century, and yet men are still fighting each other while crowds bay for blood, like something out of ancient Rome.

Giving up on sleep, I lift my phone from the bedside table and look Ryan up on social media. I’m awake anyway, and a few minutes of harmless nosiness might help tire my brain out.

Holy granola. He has over a million followers. A million. All of them voluntarily following the life of the man in the flat above me. Briony’s Blooms has four hundred and thirteen followers, which I was quite chuffed about until a few seconds ago.

I scroll through his photos. Ryan in the cage, blood streaked beneath one eye as he roars at the crowd. Ryan at a weigh-in, nose to nose with another enormous man, both performing the sort of intense male glaring that apparently sells tickets. Then training shots—wrapping his hands, hanging from a pull-up bar, slumped on a mat with his forearms on his knees and sweat dripping from his chin. There’s also a post in which he holds a sports drink beside his face and scowls at the camera. Because, you know, hydration is an aggressive activity.

It’s when I reach a sportswear advert—for Razor Athletics, whoever they are—that I stop.

He isn’t showing any more skin than he was in the other photographs, but this one is different somehow. Maybe it’s the studio lighting, carefully arranged to catch every contour of his body. His shoulders almost fill the frame, making his waist look narrower. His arms are all hard curves and deep shadows, and his stomach is divided into a frankly unreasonable number of ridges. A black tattoo stretches down his right side—some sort of bird, though it’s too small on the screen to make out properly. Beneath it are muscles I didn’t know existed, tapering into a hard V at his hips.

It seems excessive. No one needs that many muscles.

And then there are the black compression shorts. If I’m honest with myself, they may have something to do with why I stopped at this photo. Let’s just say they’re doing very little to preserve the mystery of what’s underneath them.

I tilt my head like I’m contemplating a particularly challenging piece of art. One that requires prolonged consideration.

Penny shuffles in her sleep, and I quickly drag my gaze back to Ryan’s face. Heat climbs into my cheeks. She’s an unconscious dog, and there is nobody else here to be embarrassed in front of. Still, I don’t dare look back down there.

Isn’t this the sort of thing advertising standards are supposed to prevent? If shorts are going to reveal that much, the photograph should at least come with a warning. I didn’t consent to seeing all that. If I stared, it’s only because I was surprised.

I swipe to the next photo. It’s an older one he’s apparently reposted. In it, he stands in the cage with a belt over his shoulder, surrounded by four women in tiny sparkly outfits and towering heels.

God, they still have ring girls in this day and age? The thought of four women being hired to stand about looking decorative is enough to take the heat out of my cheeks.

Naturally, he’s smiling in this photo. Not warmly. Cockily. Bet he loved it.

I should stop. Going through his social media isn’t making me any sleepier, it’s just getting me worked up. But I’m clearly a glutton for punishment because instead of putting my phone down, I hit the video tab and tap one.

It’s a post-fight interview. He’s a state: dried blood under one nostril, his bottom lip split and swollen on one side, angry red marks across his torso. Beside him, a man in a suit says into a microphone, “Talk us through it. He came out fast.”

Ryan starts to speak, and I discover that I do not care for hearing his low voice come out of my phone at midnight.

“Aye, he came out fast. He was always gonnae. He empties the tank in the first two and then he’s done, so I let him do it. Then I took his legs away in the third, and after that it was just a matter of time. I knew I’d break him in the fourth.”

Most of what he says passes me by in a blur of numbers and tactics I don’t understand, but two words snag. Break him. I don’t like that, not at all.

When the clip finishes, another one starts automatically. This one’s a fight, and it’s as horrible as I expect. Ryan’s shin slams into his opponent’s ribs with a flat smack that carries through my phone, drawing a roar from the crowd.

I should swipe away, but I don’t. I can’t seem to take my eyes off him.

I may not be able to name a single move Ryan makes, but even I can tell he’s good. It’s the speed of him, the focus, the absolute certainty with which he moves. As much as I hate what he’s doing, there’s something compelling about how completely he’s mastered it.

Then he lands a brutal punch, and his opponent drops hard.