Nikki and I walked alongside Gunner and Neron to the back door of the underground club, and as we entered, Neron placed his hand on the backside of Nikki's shoulder, guiding her away from me. "Come with me. I'll walk you to your seat." He told her.

I looked at Gunner. "Am I not sitting with Nikki?"

"Yes, you'll be sitting with her, but right now, you're coming with me to help me get ready," Gunner said, walking me to his room. I didn't know how to get him ready, but I was willing to learn.

He walked me into the room and had me sit on the bench while he changed. I sat quietly, but I couldn't help but watch him remove his clothes. The second he removed his shirt, and I got a glimpse of the upper half of his body, my stomach dived, and my tongue slid along my bottom lip.

I know I've seen him half-naked a few times before, but this time felt different. He was undressing in front of me. And I imagined it as he was undressing for us to make love, and I found it extremely stimulating. He was so well-built and beefy that I wished to take this alone time with him before he went into the ring to run my hands all over his broad shoulders, muscular corded arms, buff chest, and beautifully shaped abs.

And now that I see his fabulous-looking body, with nobody standing in the way, where he's not bouncing around, not swinging his arms, or taking any punches. I'm in heaven with what I see up close, especially when the cords in his arms bulge out when his arm flexes.

He was fucking built like a brick shithouse.

And I loved it.

Finally, I have a guy who's interested in me that's not a bean-pole. And as I studied Gunner, it appeared that he was much bigger than he was a couple of days ago.

He stepped over to the table, grabbed the athletic tape and gauze, then handed me the items. "Help me wrap my hands," he said, then explained what I needed to do. I'm sure this is something he could've done himself, but I feel this could also be his way of involving me and showing how one prepares themselves for a fight.

"How is that? Did I do it right? " I asked after securing the wrap.

He raised his hand and squeezed his hand a few times. "It's perfect, thank you," he smiled, then held out his other hand. "Now do this one."

"You wear all this underneath your gloves? What's the reason for that?" I asked as I began wrapping his hand.

He chuckled. "Yes. You need your hands wrapped to help keep your fist tight. It gives us more strength and power when we hit. And it's also used to help prevent pain and injuries. But they have to be wrapped right; if they're not, that's when the injuries occur. But tonight, I feel my gloves will be coming off, anyway."

I stopped wrapping and looked up. "How come?"

"Because the guy I'm fighting is a dirty fighter. The entire reason Neron had me training the other day with the objects this guy is known to use—preparing me to think and move faster while training me to keep my eyes on the lookout at all times."

My heart instantly stopped.

They don't wear any protective gear. So what if Gunner were to get stabbed in the heart? Or what if those brass knuckles this guy wears were to crush his skull, and it kills him?

Oh, God...

"Why are you fighting this guy if you know how he fights? Aren't there any rules about not using anything he does during a fight?"

He shook his head.

"Not in the underground," he admitted, then added, "there are rules where you aren't supposed to use things like that, but they're also not enforced. So that's why these places are illegal. But I don't care what this guy is capable of; I'm fighting him for a reason," he informed, a serious look in his eye.

"What's the reason?" I asked, my hands nervously trembling as I secured the wrap.

He firmly grabbed hold of my hands and then looked deeply into my eyes. "I have my reasons. And by fighting him, it'll get who I'm after, out, especially if I hurt him or win the fight. So I need to win tonight and cannot have any distractions. Okay?"

I nodded nervously.

I don't like this one bit.

But I also need to realize that Gunner knows what he's doing, and I need to continue trusting him and his decisions. He wants me to trust him, so this is another way to gain his trust.

"Okay," I sighed, thinking about everything he said.

I had so many questions. So I started asking with hopes Gunner would answer them truthfully. "Who are you after? Who is this guy you wish to fight, anyway?"

He started rubbing my arms, looking nervous to answer what I wanted to know. "The guy I need to come out calls himself The Tormentor. And BK the Tiger has close ties to him."

"Ties?"

"Yes, ties. I found out that the tiger is the Tormentor's younger brother. So that's why this fight is important to me."

I still don't understand his reasoning, but whatever, I'm sure he'll advise me more about it later. But from what I'm gathering out of this conversation that something terrible happened between these guys once, and Gunner feels this is the only way he can get to him.

I think?

He released his hands from me, then raised one of his hands to his mouth, tapping it. "Kiss me... kiss me for good luck. I'll need all the luck I can get," he begged.

I straddled his lap, wrapped my arms around his shoulders, then stared him in the eyes for a moment. Then, finally, I said, "Good luck, and please do one thing for me. Don't get hurt. Remember, I'll be in that room watching you, and I'm not so sure my heart can handle seeing you get hurt."

He smiled, pressed my head to his, then spoke while kissing my lips. "By you sitting in the crowd, scared as can be, will give me all the incentives to make sure nothing happens. It'll also help me win." He broke the kiss, smiled, then winked. "Trust me, sweetheart."

***

I sat next to Nikki, holding her hand, trying to calm my racing heart, and the nerves trying to expose themselves from my body as I awaited Gunner to enter the ring. I squeezed her hand tighter when a man with a microphone entered the ring. "If you can't handle this, please look down or close your eyes," Nikki insisted. "I don't want you passing out or everything inside your stomach to come out as the girl did from the movie The Exorcist—grossing everyone around us out."

"I'll be fine," I told her, including myself. "I'm just nervous, is all. Gunner claims he can handle this guy. So he better, especially after the intense training Neron forced him to do these past few days. It better pay off," I added, my legs nervously bouncing up and down. Then my heart raced even faster when the announcer riled up the crowd as he announced BK the Tiger's name, and he entered the ring.

I turned towards Nikki, pushing out my chest. "Is my heart exposed?"

She looked at my chest, then laughed. "No, why?"

"Because it feels like my heart is beating outside of my chest. Like Jim Carey's was in the movie The Mask, when he sees Cameron Diaz performing on stage, and his heart's beating way out to here," I showed, extending my arm out. My hand then covered the area of my heart. "Put your hand right here and feel it. It's pounding super hard and extremely fast."

"Relax, Aria. I'm sure Gunner can handle this guy. And if he insisted he can, you need to believe him."

I took a couple of deep breaths, wishing I had a brown paper bag along to help keep me from doing what I always do. Faint.

"Now, for all who are here anxiously waiting to see who our special guest is tonight, here he is. The one. The only. Gunner!" the announcer yelled, riling up the crowd more than he did with BK. The crowd screamed, jumped from their seats, clapping while hooting and hollering, cheering on Gunner as he entered the room and went onto the ring.

"Gunner! Gunner! Gunner!" the crowd chanted. "Kill! Kill! Kill!" they chanted repeatedly.

I can do this.

I repeated this in my head. Aria, you can do this as I watched Neron talk with Gunner.

Gunner turned around, placing his mouth guard in. He punched his fists together a couple of times, then his eyes found mine, using his eyes to tell me that everything would be okay as he made his way to the center of the ring.

I raised my hands to my chest, entwining my fingers when the announcer informed us there'd be three rounds, lasting three minutes each round. Even though the rounds are only three minutes long, it'll seem more like an hour to me.

I looked away from Gunner and over to the freaky-looking guy, evilly smiling at Gunner, saying whatever he was to antagonize Gunner. Justin was right. BK is massive and tall. He's also extremely unattractive, with cauliflower-looking ears and scars tattooing his entire body. And now my nerves became more of a mess because BK is much bigger than Gunner. He isn't as muscular as Gunner, but he's still more enormous and blubbery like a whale.

The second the announcer stepped away to exit the ring, BK immediately punched Gunner, hitting his chin. Gunner bounced back, then caught BK off guard with a jab to the face following a powerful three-punch combo—right punch, left hook, right punch.

The crowd went wild, cheering Gunner to kill the tiger.

BK's fist quickly came out in revenge, punching Gunner hard in the kidney. Gunner instantly dropped to the ground with his arm wrapped around his side, clearly showing he was in pain. The crowd booed loudly.

I looked at Nikki, frowning. "Why is the crowd booing? He's hurt!"

"Because a hit to the kidney is illegal. And if we were at an actual UFC fight, that hit would immediately disqualify him."

"They should be enforcing rules for fights like this because that's bullshit."

"Nothing is fair during underground fights. No rules, just a fight to give the crowd what they've come to see. Fights where nobody will get in their way, telling them they can't do that, can't do that. You know, like a street fight," Nikki briefed, turning to continue watching the fight.

Ugh.

As Gunner laid on his back, his eyes closed tight while holding his side, and with Neron yelling at him to get up, my eyes grew wide, and I screamed when I noticed BK's stance. He was about to jump and drop all of his weight onto Gunner's face.

Gunner's eyes opened, saw what was happening, and quickly raised his legs, wrapping them around BK, and like scissors, he squeezed and twisted, causing BK to fall and land on his face. Gunner held him until the tiger twisted his body and got out of the hold. Next, he wrestled with Gunner, and then he pinned him to the mat.

Gunner's eyes shot to me; he winked then devilishly grinned—letting me know he was having fun and toying with the monster. My hands lowered from my mouth, and I yelled, "Get him, Gunner!"

Nikki nudged me while laughing. "Get him? Don't you mean kill him?"

I ignored her mocking me and continued watching Gunner.

Gunner got out from beneath the ugly beast, got behind him, then quickly wrapped his arm around his neck, giving him a rear-naked choke. The crowd went wild, cheering, yelling, whistling, and chanting. Seeing what he did and hearing the crowd's cheers made me smile, thinking the fight was over. That was until I looked over and saw Neron yelling and pointing at the beast. Then, I looked the other way, saw BK had a large metal object that appeared to be a knife sticking out of his glove, and screamed—warning Gunner.

The Hulk wannabe swung his arm to Gunner's side, stabbing him in the rib cage. The sight of the blood that gushed out and poured down his skin caused my stomach to drop and my butt to fall right into the chair behind me.

Finally, the three minutes were up, and as Gunner headed over to Neron, I rushed over to them. "Go back and sit down," Neron angrily ordered. "You can't be over here."

"I want to see Gunner's wound!" I yelled, snatching the gauze and bottle of water from Neron's hand. Then, ignoring Neron's demands to go away, I pushed myself up into the ring.

Gunner removed his mouthpiece, grabbed the water from my hand, and drank some. He swooshed it around, then spit it into the bucket beside him. He squeezed the water into his mouth again, this time swallowing it before he scowled at me. "Aria, you can't be in here. Let Neron do this."

"I can do this. I'm a nurse, remember?" I started cleaning his wound, and when I saw the gash on his side wasn't as bad as it looked, I immediately felt relieved. "You need to finish this guy this round," I demanded, covering the wound.

His hand raised to the side of my face and then grinned. "Glad you're hanging on."

I forced a smile. "I'm trying my best."

His smile faded, and then he grew serious."I'm glad you're trying. But, Aria, you can't be in here. I need you to go back and sit with Nikki, okay?" He wrapped his arm around my neck, pulling me to him. "You've got nothing to worry about. But I need to warn you. This next round is when the tiger gets dirtier, so you might not want to watch," he warned, kissing my lips.

"Dirtier?" I asked when his lips left mine.

"Go on. Go back and sit down. And when the next three minutes are up, I ask that you stay seated. Let Neron do his job. That's why he's here."

I heavily sighed, "Okay."

After exiting the ring, Neron grabbed my hand, pulled me to him, then pointed at my face and snapped. "Don't you ever interrupt me like that again. There are breaks for a reason, and I need to coach him on the fight. Got it?"

I yanked my arm out of his grip, then hissed, "Yeah, I got it." I spun on my heel, then as I headed back to my seat, I raised my hand and flipped him the bird.

"How did his side look?" Nikki asked as I sat.

I rocked my head from side to side. "It's deep, but not as bad as I thought it would be. It should heal quickly."

She giggled, then leaned to my ear. "Looks like you got a scolding from both Gunner and Neron."

"I did," I side smiled. "But Gunner also told me that this is when BK gets dirtier, and he advised me not to watch." I looked at Nikki. "I'll admit I don't want to. But somehow, I have to force myself to watch it."

The next round started, and Gunner and BK immediately removed their boxing gloves. BK danced around, swaying his body from side to side, avoiding Gunner's fists. The monster then jumped, twirling his body around with his leg high in the air, hoping to knock Gunner down, but missed him. Then, as he landed, Gunner quickly knocked the tiger face down to the ground. Gunner jumped high and then landed on BK's back. As Gunner's knees dug into BK's back, he firmly grabbed his legs with one arm, then wrapped his other arm around his neck, hoping to get him into submission.

But that didn't happen as the crowd had hoped. Instead, BK got free from Gunner. Then, as they both stood, my heart got a workout when they started brawling—both taking punches and kicks to the face and stomach.

What really made my heart lose it was when BK's wrapping came undone and his brass knuckles exposed for all to see. He punched Gunner multiple times in the abdomen, and then as Gunner's fist extended out, he dropped to the mat after the beast blocked the punch, beating Gunner in the side of the face instead.

"Come on, Gunner, get up!" I yelled. His face was pressed into the mat, doing all he could to get back up. The crowd started chanting Gunner's name repeatedly, urging him to get up and kill BK the Tiger.

I saw something shiny out of the corner of my eye and turned my head. When I saw that it was a sword, I screamed as loud as possible. "Beetlejuice!"

Gunner turned his head my way, and when his eyes met mine, I pointed at BK. Trying to get Gunner to look the other way, I yelled again when he continued eyeing me, repeating, "Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice!"

"Beetlejuice?" Nikki asked, playfully shoving me. "Why in the world are you screaming that? Do you see him or something?" she laughed.

I ignored her and continued pointing at BK; wishing Gunner would look the other way. BK ran towards him, and I repeatedly jumped up and down while screaming for him to move.

Gunner rolled to his side just as BK slammed the sword's tip down into the mat. Gunner's arm extended towards the beast and then grabbed one of his ankles and knocked the tiger to the ground.

With blood strolling down the side of Gunner's face and into his eyes, he got on his knees, took the sword from BK's hand, then climbed on top of him and pressed his elbow into BK's throat, pushing hard, causing BK's feet to raise and jerk in the air.

The next thing I saw was Gunner talking through his teeth and BK yelling back, shaking his head no, and it had me wondering if Gunner was telling him to go into submission. BK continued shaking his head but then stopped and spat at Gunner's face. Gunner lifted the sword high, the tip of the sword aiming at the beast's throat.

My eyes widened. I grabbed hold of Nikki and yelled, "What is he doing?"

"Don't worry. Gunner's trying to scare him and get BK to submit," Nikki informed.

I was seconds away from having a panic attack; thinking Gunner was about to kill BK. Suddenly, the whole room spun, and I couldn't breathe. I looked at Nikki, and the next thing I saw was blackness.

***

"This is why I didn't want her here," Gunner grumbled.

"She's fine. I know she is," Nikki responded.

"You're one lucky son of a bitch," Neron angrily snapped. "You know that? What I said would happen did!"

My eyes opened after I heard arguing. Then, after getting my eyes to focus, I noticed I was in a different room than where I last was and rolled my head to the side. Gunner was pacing back and forth; Neron was staring at Gunner with his arms crossed along his chest and a scowled look on his face. Then I rolled my head to the other side and saw Nikki sitting beside me.

Nikki's eyes fluttered away from mine and up, looking over at me. "Gunner, she's awake."

"What happened?" I asked.

"You did exactly what I said would happen," Gunner groaned. I turned my head Gunner's way and swallowed hard as he approached me. He looked pissed, but there was also a look of worry behind those upset, sore eyes.

Shit. I hope I didn't do anything to cause Gunner to lose the fight. "Did you win?"

"Barely," he muttered, then said, "I won, and right now, BK the Tiger is on his way to the hospital."

My eyes quickly widened, my heart stopped, and my stomach fell. "Did you kill him?"

He furrowed his brows. "No, I didn't kill him. What you saw before you fainted was me scaring him into thinking I would kill him."

"Gunner slammed down the sword, missing his neck by like this much," Nikki said excitedly, showing how close he was to his neck with her fingers.

I pushed myself up, then turned and slid my legs over the table. I studied Gunner's face, then lowered my eyes when I saw how bludgeoned his face looked from the brass knuckles. "How are your ribs?"

"Sore. But they'll be fine. My ribs will heal before the next fight."

I quickly looked up, then back down at the floor. Next fight? Hopefully, it isn't another fight like this one was.

After promising Gunner I wouldn't faint, I felt extremely guilty and bad that I did anyway. "Sorry I missed the ending of the fight. I tried my hardest to get through to the end, but when I saw you with the sword, I thought you were going to kill him. The next thing I felt was the room spinning, and I couldn't breathe. Then I wake up in here, listening to Neron yell at you and you and Nikki arguing."

"I wasn't arguing with her. I only told her I knew this would happen," Gunner said, curling his finger under my chin, lifting it. "I was right, wasn't I?"

"I was doing fine until I saw you with the sword," I said, ashamed. "I thought you were going to kill him."

"I'll give her that. She was doing really well up until that point." Nikki interjected, sticking up for me. "Which tells she'll get better the more she comes to watch you fight. You'll just have to remember; this is the second big fight she's ever been to in her life."

"Thanks, Nikki," I said, my mouth slowly curving into a smile.

Nikki placed her hand on my back and rubbed it before leaning down and hugging me. "Since you're okay, I'm leaving the room to let the two of you be. Justin has been out there waiting for me and waiting to hear how you're doing. I'm sure he's out there causing a scene, wanting to come in here."

"Tell him I'll call tomorrow."

Neron walked Nikki out, and after the door closed, I looked over at Gunner when he sat next to me. "I'm glad to see you're okay. Hopefully, I didn't screw the fight up for you."

He shook his head. "When I saw you fall, I thought I was done for. Had he not said what he did when I looked at you, I would have lost the fight."

"What did he say?"

"Something he shouldn't have, and he paid the price for it. And because of what happened, I feel The Tormentor will come out of his shell very soon. Which means there'll be more self-defense practice for you."

"Okay, that sounds good," I responded, feeling confused about why I would need more self-defense practice if the guy he's looking for came out. It's not like we know each other. And I never did anything for this guy to come after me. However, I like how concerned Gunner is about my well-being and insists that I learn how to protect myself. "When do I start?"

"Monday after you get off work."

I smiled. "I'll be ready."

He stood from the table, offering his hand, and he said, as I place my hand in his. "I'm fortunate and happy tonight went in my favor, but there is something that happened tonight that I'm not happy with."

I furrowed my brows. "What's that?"

I mean, I know I fainted after I promised I wouldn't. So Gunner can't be upset about that, can he be?

He pulled me to him, and then his eyes gazed into mine. "You said the safe word numerous times after I asked you not to say it tonight. I warned you that the safe word is only meant for us. So because of your disobedience, that means after leaving here, you're getting punished."

"Punished? What kind of punishment?"

Hope you enjoyed the chapter!❤🤞❤🤞