“Was your dad upset?” she asked, looking genuinely intrigued by his story.

“No. He was happy. He said that now he had the ammo he was looking for to help me get better. He’d seen the flaws in my fighting and now he knew where to focus. Losing also humbles a fighter. It shakes the confidence, and weaker fighters will sometimes quit or let the defeat get to them, making it impossible to get better. Dad taught me to use the loss as fuel—to train harder, learn more, always walk into the cage knowing I was more prepared than the other guy.” He had no idea why he was telling her any of this. He wasn’t even sure why he was still lying in her bed. Hit it and quit it, wasn’t that his thing? “I’ve never lost since,” he said with a smile as he tossed the bedsheet back and sat up, swinging his legs to the opposite side of the bed.

“You’re leaving,” she said behind him.

It didn’t sound like a question, as though she’d expected it. Which made him feel even worse. “Yeah . . . I should.”

She propped herself up against her pillows and nodded. “Of course.”

As he pulled on his boxer briefs, still damp from the pool, he turned and the sight of her trying to act nonchalant was too much. Kneeling on the bed, he leaned forward and kissed her forehead. “I had a really great time.” Immediately, he wished he could pull the words back. After-sex etiquette wasn’t something he was good at . . . but even he knew what “I had a really great time” meant.

Her eyes clouded. “Me too.”

“Look, Parker, I . . .”

She shook her head, tossing the bedsheets aside as she stood. “Don’t sweat it, Tyson. I know what a one-night stand feels like,” she said, reaching for her T-shirt.

He fought the urge to grab her and insist that wasn’t what this was. He couldn’t—wouldn’t—put himself or her in a position where they went too far too fast and couldn’t get out. She picked up her phone from the bedside table and frowned. “I just got a text from Dane. He says he’ll be back tomorrow, so that’s good news . . .” she said, not looking at him.

He crossed the room and his arms encircled her waist. “Fuck that. You’re not training with Dane anymore. From now on, I’m your trainer.” He may not be able to commit or promise her anything more than passion inside and outside the cage, but he’d be damned if he let anyone else be near her.

“You have enough going on . . .”

He silenced her with a kiss, because he wasn’t great with words. He hoped the kiss said everything he was feeling—that it didn’t matter what else he had going on, she was a light in all of that. He was desperate to hold onto her; he just had no idea how.

*   *   *

The lights were off in the apartment and everything was quiet when Tyson unlocked the door. A sinking feeling of anxiety washed over him. He instinctively reached for the bat, and this time it was still where he’d left it. Picking it up, he flicked on the light.

His brother was alone, his back to him, sitting on the sofa. He released a sigh, and set the bat back down. “What are you doing in the dark, man?” He tossed his motorcycle keys onto the counter and opened the fridge.

When Connor didn’t answer, he turned around. “What’s going on?”

“I can’t do this . . .” His brother’s face was as white as the thin blanket he had wrapped around his shoulders. His trembling hands clutched his waist, his knees tight to his chest, as he rocked back and forth on the couch. “I can’t.”

Not now. He was not equipped to deal with this. He shut the fridge door and went into the living room. “You can,” he said firmly, standing in front of his brother, feeling useless. He’d seen his brother like this once before and he’d had no idea what to do then either.

He wished he had known; then maybe his mother wouldn’t have stepped in as the strong one, the one determined to make sure Connor stuck to his commitment to get clean that time. The one by his side night and day, making sure he didn’t give in to the intense withdrawal symptoms plaguing him and testing his will, destroying whatever strength he had left. His mother had been Connor’s only support for weeks while he battled through his demons.

Maybe if Tyson had known what to do she wouldn’t have been the one who had to sit on Connor, keeping him safe and secure in the small bedroom he’d shared with him, stroking his hair and ushering soothing words of encouragement, wiping his sweaty forehead with a cool cloth, and cleaning up the mess whenever he got sick.

She wouldn’t have been the one who had to take Connor’s anger and hurtful words then forgive him when he’d cry and beg for her forgiveness.

And she wouldn’t have been the one he’d pushed down the stairs in an effort to escape the house in his desperate need for a fix to quiet the aching in his body and the torturous screaming in his mind.

His mother wouldn’t have suffered a concussion that had led the doctors to discover a life-threatening blood clot in her brain that claimed her life six months later. Her death hadn’t been Connor’s fault, but it was hard to forgive him for being the cause of their awareness, the cause of the pain and suffering they’d lived through knowing she was living on borrowed time.

He stood staring at his brother now, every part of him wanting to walk away and let him get through this on his own. But he just stood there.

“I’m freezing . . . my body hurts . . .” Connor curled in a ball on his side, shaking, as sweat pooled on the blanket beneath him.

Tyson sighed. Going into his room, he got his comforter, brought it back out to the living room and placed it over his brother. Then getting a face cloth from the bathroom, he wet it with cool water and wiped the sweat from Connor’s face.

His brother looked at him—so weak, so lost, so desperate. “I killed her,” he whispered.

Tyson swallowed hard. “An aneurysm killed her.”

Connor shook his head. “Dad doesn’t believe that . . . He’s never . . .” He coughed, and the sentence went unfinished, as he closed his eyes, and tears mixed with sweat on his cheek.

Anything Connor could have said to finish the sentence was true. His father never . . . a lot of things. Then again, his brother had never made it easy.

Tyson could go back and forth all day trying to find a reason for the dysfunction between his father and brother, but it wouldn’t matter. It didn’t change anything. The two men had never understood each other. Connor’s intellect and lack of physical strength and ability had been a disappointment to their father, a man who’d hoped both of his sons would follow in his footsteps. Alan Reed didn’t hide the fact he had a favorite son and he’d never made time for Connor.

But the truth was, it was hard for anyone to get close to Connor. He was always stuck in his own head, battling who he was with the desire of who he wanted to be.

“At least he got you,” Connor was saying as though sharing Tyson’s thoughts. “The good son, the great champion . . .” His voice was far away as he drifted off into a troubled sleep.

Tyson slumped onto the floor next to the couch. The good son, the great champion. He wondered if his brother had any idea the weight of that responsibility.

Chapter 7

“What’s in the bag?” Connor asked as Tyson entered his office later the next day.

“A Halloween costume,” he grumbled, not in the mood for his brother’s thoughts on the subject. “Better question—what are you doing in here?” He hung the garment bag behind the door.

“The delivery guys showed up with the new display case, and they said they required a Reed’s signature . . .” Connor said. “So, I thought the least I could do was install it.”