Total pages in book: 26
Estimated words: 24566 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 123(@200wpm)___ 98(@250wpm)___ 82(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 24566 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 123(@200wpm)___ 98(@250wpm)___ 82(@300wpm)
The crowd goes wild. Adrenaline hoses through me.
My heart, already pumping like it’s ready to burst, pounds harder and faster.
This is it. This is my moment.
My opponent, Jack O’Connell, looks up at me, blood dripping from his left eye, his cheek swollen, his face filled with hatred. He thinks he’s here to take my championship title from me today and has been telling the world my days as a fighter are over–that I’m nothing but a washed-up husband and father–but he’s about to be proven wrong.
I lunge in with a feint that causes him to dodge left and throw up his guard. Then I drive a hard knee into his chest and follow it up with a hook to the jaw that sends him sprawling.
I know right then as he falls that the fight is over.
I could continue. I could jump on him and keep pounding him as he tumbles to the mat, even as the ref rushes in to end things, but I’m not that kind of fighter. I back away and throw my hands in the air in victory as the crowd goes wild. Two seconds later, the fight is called, and the whole arena erupts with cheers and screams.
I leap over the cage fencing and rush straight over to my wife and throw my arms around her.
“You did it, baby!” she cries into my ear. “You did it!”
“I did it!” I cry back, barely able to contain myself and the overwhelming joy of the moment. “I’m the champion!”
“You’ve always been my champion, baby!”
I kiss her again, deeply and proudly on the lips, before leaping back into the cage for the whole circus that goes along with the presentation of the belt and everything else. But I can’t keep my eyes off her the whole time.
Winning this fight was an enormous deal for me. During my court case, the league decided to take my title away from me and give it up for anyone to compete for. I tried to be magnanimous and look at things from their point of view, but it really ate at me, especially when the case ended up taking a year and a half more of my life and I wasn’t able to fight professionally. Tucker and his family basically took the only meaningful thing in my life away from me. That is of course until I married Nina and we brought Rebecca into our lives.
It didn’t take long. I’m almost one hundred percent sure that first time we had sex she got pregnant, because almost nine months later to the day Rebecca was born. Our baby girl, and what an angel she is.
I don’t let her come to my fights, of course. She’s not old enough to see them yet. I tell her that Daddy wrestles for a living, and then she and I play-fight in her bedroom and I show her fun little moves that always make her giggle and want to stay up past her bedtime. I have a feeling if it weren’t for her mother, I’d be raising a total tomboy.
Neve is sitting on the couch when we come into the house. She springs up and jumps on top of me as I step through the door.
“Holy shit!” she hisses, doing her best not to wake Rebecca. “You did it, you did it, you did it! I was watching after I put Becca to sleep–don’t worry, she didn’t see anything–and oh my God you kicked the shit out of that guy!”
Nina laughs from behind me as she sets down our things. “He wasn’t that tough,” she teases.
“Oh shut up, you!” Neve replies, laughing. “My brother could beat up Superman! After he takes a shower, though.”
Neve lets go of me and crinkles her nose.
“Yeah, sorry about that,” I laugh. “Two sweaty guys tussling around in a ring together isn’t the best cologne.”
“Thanks for watching Becca for us, Neve,” Nina says, handing her fifty dollars for her fee.
“Of course! You know I love your little girl. She’s the best. And so smart! She really loves reptiles. She was telling me about the Belalanda chameleon.”
I laugh. “Yeah, she loves that one. She thinks it’s cute.”
“Anyways, I’ll get outta you guys’ hair. Can I tell Mom you’re coming by tomorrow for a celebratory dinner?”
“Sure.” I nod. “That’ll be fine.”
“Look at us.” Neve grins. “An actual functioning family now. And all thanks to my big brother.”
I chuckle and give Neve a love tap on the shoulder as she heads out the door to her car.
“Ah, alone with my wife at last,” I growl, snatching Nina up by the ass and pulling her to me. I slip my hands up her shirt and grab both of her breasts. Five years later, and I still love them just as much as the first time I touched them.