Chapter One
I wrapped the tape around my hands while I eyed the man in the other corner of the ring. He was older – probably somewhere in his thirties, and he was grinning, laughing at me.
He thought this would be an easy match.
The joke was on him.
I was an incredible fighter, and my small frame made me more agile than his larger body would make him. He would have a hard time keeping up with me. Being small had its advantages.
“You paired me with a scrawny little girl?” he asked his trainer. Both of them laughed.
“Don’t let his words get to you,” Kyle coached me. I just grunted. “You’ve got this in the bag. You’re an incredible fighter – remember that – and don’t lose sight of it. Focus on blocking your weak spot and get this fight over with,” he instructed me.
Kyle had been my oldest brother’s trainer. My oldest brother had been brutally murdered, and I wanted revenge. The cops had done nothing to find his murderer.
So, when I found out exactly how my brother had been murdered, I had come to Kyle, begging him to train me.
He had been reluctant at first, but he had quickly gotten on board with it when he finally figured out that I was not going to take no for an answer.
I wanted revenge, and I vowed to have it.
Nodding at Kyle to let him know I understood what he said, I let him slip my mouth guard in my mouth. The referee blew his whistle, and the guy across the ring moved towards me, swinging his fist at a rapid speed. I quickly ducked, sending a punishing blow to his ribs that I knew he wasn’t expecting from someone as little as me. He stumbled back in shock at the force of my punch, and I used that to my advantage, raining blows on his face one after the other until he was sprawled out beneath me, knocked out cold.
These days, fighting guys his size was like taking candy from a baby.
The ref grabbed my arm and threw it up in the air, the man’s blood trickling down my arm from my hand as he announced me as the winner of the fight by knockout. “And my beautiful ladies and incredible men, there you have it! Let’s hear it for Storm!” the announcer roared.
The crowd’s cheers were almost deafening, but I didn’t grin or smile. I just waited for the referee to drop my arm, and once he did, I slid out of the ring and met Kyle on the side.
I didn’t do this for the fame or for the money.
I had only one goal in mind, and once that was taken care of, I would quit this.
Kyle instantly led me back to his office. He grimaced at the look of my hands once he shut the door behind us.
“Doesn’t ever matter how much tape you use, your hands still manage to get banged up,” he admitted, watching as I unwrapped the tape from my hands.
I shrugged, tossing the bloody tape into the garbage can, moving over to his small bathroom where I washed my hands, revealing the cuts on my knuckles and fingers from busting up that cocky guy’s face.
One day, these men and women would learn that I wasn’t the girl they wanted to screw with.
“There’s a new guy fighting tonight.” I looked over at Kyle, arching my eyebrow. “Story is that he just moved here from the west coast. I looked him up – the guy was a phenomenal fighter back at his old ring. Want to check out how decent this guy is?” Kyle asked me as I stepped back out of the bathroom.
“Sure; why not?” I asked, snatching my plain black t-shirt from my duffel bag before I followed him out of the office.
I shrugged the shirt on, allowing Kyle’s much larger body to lead me through the crowd until we were near the ring. I could hear the murmurs, the questions everyone had about the new guy.
They were much like the questions I had first heard when I had started fighting about two years ago, but now, I was a crowd favorite. Everyone loved me, and my name was normally a feared, yet highly respected one.
The referee slid between the ropes into the ring. “Alright, my favorite ladies and my sexy gents, first up from Phoenix, Arizona, we have Travis White, weighing in at two hundred and fifty-seven pounds! Let’s hear it for the man!” the ref shouted, making the crowd go wild. I silently watched the exchange of bets before I dragged my eyes back to the stage where a beefier man was standing, and my lips twitched slightly.
He had been one of my first fights – outside of the ring, that is. I’d gotten my butt royally kicked, and I hadn’t seen him around much since. He sent me a single nod, though – a nod of respect. I simply let a small smirk tilt my lips as I inclined my head towards him.
“And next up, brand new here from Los Angeles, California, we have Cayne Reynolds, weighing in at one hundred and ninety-five pounds! Let’s hear it for the man!”
There weren’t as many cheers for him as there were for Travis, and I knew why. The crowd didn’t know him. He was new here, and it was going to take him a minute to get a fan base. And judging by the look on Travis’s face, he wasn’t going to end up gaining a fan base anytime tonight.
Cayne stepped into the ring, a pair of athletic shorts riding low on his hips, his hands completely bare, with no tape or anything else to protect his hands. His arms were thick, the bulging muscles flexing with every move that he made. His chest was wide and hard, and below that were even more delicious abs that drew not only my eyes but the eyes of many other girls and women in the arena. His hair was dark and messy, and his stunning, blue eyes took in everything around him so easily, yet I had a feeling those eyes didn’t miss a thing.
“You two know the rules,” the ref stated before he slid off of the stage.
“You think you can just show up here expecting to fight anyone you want?” Travis snapped at Cayne, a sick grin on his lips. Cayne just stared back at him coldly, his eyes emotionless as he waited for Travis to make a move, his form completely relaxed.
“Your mother seemed to think I could last night,” Cayne spoke smoothly, his tone coming off bored.
My mouth dropped open in astonishment. That was a bold line.
Travis’s face reddened with rage, and he swung his fist out. Cayne quickly blocked it, and swung his other fist, clocking Travis so hard across the face that he spun to the floor, blood spilling from his mouth onto the white mat.
“This is boring,” I saw Cayne mutter before he slung Travis over so the man was on his back and rained two more punishing blows, knocking Travis out clean beneath him.
The crowd went wild. Travis was one of the best fighters I’d ever known, and if this newbie was able to defeat him, that meant something.
Cayne Reynolds was an excellent fighter – a heck of a lot better than me, that was for sure.
His eyes met mine as the ref lifted his arm up in the air. A slight smirk tilted his lips. Curling my lip in disgust at him and rolling my eyes, I turned on my heel and walked away, pushing through the crowd to get back to Kyle’s office.
“The kid is fantastic,” Kyle admitted as we stepped into his office.
“One fight doesn’t show anything,” I reminded Kyle.
Kyle shrugged. “He just knocked out Travis with three hits, Storm. You’ve got to admit that you’re a bit impressed as well.”
I was, but I wasn’t going to admit that out loud.
Instead, I carelessly shrugged and grabbed my duffel off the floor. “I’ll be back here after school tomorrow for some more practice,” I informed him.
Kyle nodded. “I’ll be here, Storm.” He always was.
I pulled my house keys out of the side of my duffel and stuffed them into my pocket before I strode out of the old warehouse-turned-gym.
It was time to head home to hell.
~ * ~ * ~
Dressed in a pair of dark-wash skinny jeans and a plain, gray t-shirt covered by my leather jacket, I let my black combat boots pound the concrete steps as I marched up the stairs to the entrance of the building I needed on campus. I stepped in, instantly annoyed by the amount of noise surrounding me.
How did these people manage to like each other so much to the point that they had this much to talk about? I would never understand it.
I liked silence and solitude. College was just another form of torture.
My eyes fell on a familiar figure, and I had to cover my shock at seeing him there.
Cayne Reynolds.
His tall, muscular figure was encased in a pair of black jeans paired with a black t-shirt, a leather jacket shrugged on over his wide, broad shoulders, barely hiding the muscular arms and toned torso beneath. His dark hair was messy – almost as if he had run his fingers through it numerous times.
He was swoon-worthy – drop dead freaking gorgeous.
As if sensing my stare, he looked up from the floor that he’d been staring at while he’d been leaning on the wall, his stunning, blue eyes meeting mine instantly.
He was even more gorgeous in the light than he’d been in the dark arena.
And though he barely moved his gaze, I somehow knew he had just taken in every bit of me extremely quickly.
I watched my twin brother stride up to Cayne, dragging Cayne’s attention away from me as he looked at my brother. I tensed up instantly, clenching my jaw as I resisted the urge to cause a scene that I knew would only get me arrested.
To say that my twin and I were on bad terms was an understatement. After our brother passed, everything changed – including us.
It made me sad most days. Camron and I used to be extremely close, but life dealt us too hard of a hand, and our bond severed.
Cayne and my brother were the same height, but Cayne definitely outdid him by about sixty to seventy pounds. My brother had a lanky build, whereas Cayne was extremely muscular and built. But I also knew my brother was so well trained in fighting that he could take just about anyone. He used his smaller build to his advantage, just like I did.
Keeping my jaw clenched, I walked past the pair of them, but my brother reached out and gripped my shoulder. I quickly yanked my shoulder from his grip, turning to glare up at him. “What?” I snapped.
“Dad was looking for you last night at dinner,” he informed me.
I snorted, rolling my eyes, not bothering to answer. If he was, it wasn’t for anything good. I already knew that. Dad had been the one to change the most out of all of us.
I turned to walk away, but Camron spoke up again. “Storm, he wants you home tonight,” he told me, a warning in his voice.
It was a clear warning that if I wasn’t home for dinner tonight, my life at home was going to get a heck of a lot worse.
But I didn’t care.
“Yeah, well, since you’re such a good brother, you can inform him that I won’t be able to make it,” I sarcastically snapped back at Camron, storming off down the hallway.
I could feel eyes staring into me as I walked away, and when I turned around, my eyes met those stunning, blue eyes again.
And my heart fluttered in my chest.
Clenching my jaw, I turned away, ignoring the strange feeling in my chest.
