Don’t want to let you go
Famous
last words.
Turning in my seat, I watch Ray through the back window of the Jeep as he stalks over to a black sedan parked two cars behind us. The driver must see Ray too, because the vehicle’s lights go on and I can hear the faint grind of an engine starting. Ray’s steps become longer and then he runs at the car, launching himself at the vehicle before the driver has time to pull away. He yanks open the door and drags the driver out, then pummels him to the ground. From this distance, I can’t see the driver’s face, but I catch a flash of blond hair and blue jeans and white streaks on a black T-shirt that remind me of the Viva la Vida shirt I got when Coldplay played San Francisco’s Warfield Theatre.
Nausea roils in my belly. Who is the man in the car, and why was he following us? Should I get out and stop the fight? But this is no street brawl. Ray is fighting with one purpose in mind, and that seems to be to kill. Every strike is vicious and precisely directed to where it could do the most damage.
Anger doesn’t even begin to describe what I see in his face.
However, the man from the car is holding his own. He manages to roll away and push himself to his feet. Ray charges and slams him against the vehicle, his hand around the man’s throat. His shout echoes in the quiet street. I catch a few words: “nothing to do with this,” “stay the fuck away,” and “I’m done with this shit.” He raises his fist and the man puts up his hands in a warding-off gesture and begs for his life. My heart squeezes in my chest, and I silently beg Ray not to make that final strike. He doesn’t. Instead, he smashes his fist on the hood beside the man, so hard I’m sure he’ll leave a dent.
After slamming the man one last time against the vehicle and watching him slide to his knees on the ground, Ray returns to the Jeep and bangs the door so hard the vehicle shakes. For a moment, he doesn’t move, save for the violent quivering of his body. Lips pursed in suppressed fury, hands gripping the steering wheel so hard his knuckles whiten, he glares at the rearview mirror until the black sedan pulls away from the curb and speeds past us and into the night.
I’ve been to enough fights, talked to Tag enough times, that I know better than to speak to or even touch Ray until he’s calmed down. But I can’t slow the pounding of my heart or deny my instinctive desire to run from an angry Predator. A familiar prickle crawls across my skin, and I grit my teeth and fight it away. The last thing Ray needs right now is me having a panic attack, so I dig my nails into my thigh and take a deep breath and tell myself it will be okay.
Without a word, Ray turns on the ignition and pulls into the road. He doesn’t look at me, and I wonder if he’s so far into the zone that he has forgotten I’m sitting beside him.
We drive and drive. I break and ask if he’s okay, but he doesn’t answer. Finally, he pulls over at a historic hotel at the edge of the Claremont Canyon Regional Preserve and reaches over me to grab a flashlight from the glove box.
“Take this.”
When he slides out the door, I sling my purse over my shoulder and tuck my phone into my jacket pocket.
Not that I think he’ll hurt me, but I like to be prepared.
Ray fishes around in the back of the Jeep and produces another flashlight, bigger than the one he gave me. Then he takes my hand and tugs me toward the back of the hotel.
“If we’re going up the Stonewall Fire Trail, I’ll need to change my shoes.” I point to my black sling-back pumps. “I’ve got a pair of running shoes in my gym bag in the backseat.”
After a quick shoe change, I follow Ray to the back of the hotel. I haven’t been up the Stonewall Fire Trail in years, and never at night. I hiked into the hills a few times as a teenager and occasionally with Jess for the incredible, expansive views of the East Bay and San Francisco. But the steep one-mile ascent is a killer.
Ray holds my hand as we make the climb. Creatures scurry in the underbrush, and birds swoosh overhead. I startle at an unfamiliar noise in the darkness and squeeze Ray’s fingers. But I am more worried about not sounding like a freight train than being attacked by a wild animal—especially since I’ve got one holding my hand.
When we reach the top, Ray sits on the grass and pulls me down between his legs, my back against his chest, his warm arms wrapped around my waist. The city spreads out below us, soft lights fading to the inky black bay.
“Do I get to know what’s going on?” I look over my shoulder, and Ray leans down and presses his cheek against mine, rough with a five o’clock shadow.
“Don’t want to let you go.” He pulls me in tighter and buries his face in my shoulder.
“I’m not planning on going anywhere.” And then my blood chills. “Are you ending this? Is that why we’re here?” Was Doctor Death right when he said Ray would walk away?
Ray doesn’t answer. Instead he draws in a deep, shuddering breath and I try to connect with him in the stillness. Closing my eyes, I sink back into his body. My breath is his breath. Our hearts beat as one. We are in full contact. But I can’t sense him in the darkness. How can he be so close and yet so far away?
“I shouldn’t have taken you with me,” he says after an interminably long silence.
“I wanted to go.”
“It was too dangerous. I knew that. Every other time, I’ve stopped myself from taking you out in public. Even this afternoon, I made myself walk away. But when you gave me that picture…” He squeezes me so hard, I can barely breathe. “Fuck. It was so beautiful. After all the beauty I destroyed in my life, you gave a piece of it back to me. And the way you drew yourself…that’s what I see. The real you. And you gave me that too.”
“Ray.” I turn my head and rest my forehead on his cheek, rough with stubble. “You’re scaring me. Talk to me.”
A tree frog croaks in the distance, and something scurries in the tall grass. We are alone but not alone. Even the silence is not silence because I can still hear the hum of traffic, the wail of sirens, and the occasional faint blare of a car horn. But the breeze is soft and cool, fragrant with the smell of grass and a kiss of the ocean. And Ray still has his arms around me, protecting me in the darkness.
“When I moved to the Bay Area a couple of years ago and started up as a PI, it was the first time I had control over my work.” His voice drops to a soothing murmur and I relax into his arms. “I got a job working at the law firm where Amanda used to work. Met Amanda. Liked her. She was a good person caught in a bad situation. Turns out power corrupts at all levels, and when I saw they were doin’ her an injustice, I did my best to help. Got to know her very well, and Penny, her secretary, and the boys at Redemption. Before that, my life had always been about duty, never staying in one place long enough to have friends. Lisa was my first and only serious relationship and we hooked up only because we were stationed together.”
“In the army?”
He brushes a kiss over my cheek and sighs. “I started thinking about staying here, and Torment hounded me to join the Redemption team, but duty kept calling. I had assignments that kept taking me away. I joined the underground league so I could fight without letting anyone down. And then one day, I saw you at a fight.”
“You saw me? I kinda stayed in the back.”
“Couldn’t see anything else. That was the day I decided I wanted a real life. I wanted a chance to be with a girl who took my breath away, to have friends, to answer only to myself. But the job I do, it’s not that easy to walk away, so I tried not to get too close to you. When you gave me that picture, I realized I’d lost that battle a long time ago. Suddenly I wanted to take you out so bad—more than anything I’ve wanted before. Just for a night, pretend it was real.”
“It is real.” I brush my hand over the cool grass.
“Tonight says it can’t be real.” Ray releases me and pushes himself to his feet. “I put you in danger. It can’t happen again, especially after what you’ve already been through. It was a stupid dream and I should have known better.” He stalks away through the darkness. I hear rocks clatter, swearing, a strangled cry. I shine the flashlight in the direction of the noise and find him seated on a rise, his arms crossed on his knees, head down.
Although not very reassured by his words, I can’t ignore his pain, so I make my way up the little hill and kneel in front of him.
“Let me in.” I ease his legs apart and he lifts his head as I shuffle close and wrap my arms around him.
“Shhhhh.” It’s my turn for shushing now and, curiously, he doesn’t resist. Instead he wraps his arms around me and pulls me tight against him, shuddering against my body.
“Look at me,” I whisper. “This last month we’ve been together, I’ve done things I never thought I’d do before. Things I thought would destroy me. I’m stronger than I thought I was. I’ve been leaning on people for too long. I don’t know what threat that guy was to me, but whatever it is, I can deal with it, Ray. We can deal with it. Together.”
“My beautiful girl.” His words are a soft murmur against my neck. “Never wanted anything as much as I want you. Never wanted a normal life as much as I want it now. But I can’t go through losing someone again. What if, one day, you turn the corner, and he’s there and I’m not fast enough? The guilt never goes away. It eats at my soul.”
Kneeling, I stroke his hair, soft and silky under my palm. “You need to forgive yourself. What happened with Scott, and with Lisa too, wasn’t your fault. They made their choices. Just like I’ve made mine.”
The sound that comes from his throat is part sob, part groan. A prickling sensation shoots up my spine and for some inexplicable reason, I feel like I’m about to lose him. So I don’t let him go. I hold him tight while in the back of my mind I wonder if this will be the last time.
* * *
“Where were you last night?” Tag paces beside me on the mat in the warm-up area of Redemption as we wait for the rest of his Get Fit or Die class to arrive. “I thought you were joining Renegade, Rampage, and me at the Protein Palace after work.”
“Something came up.” I pull my ball cap low on my forehead, hoping to hide the last vestiges of swollen eyes and a sleepless night. “So are you and Renegade tight again?”
“We’re good.” He frowns and tips up the visor on my cap. “You okay?”
“Yeah. I was with Ray. It wasn’t such a good night. Something happened.”
Tag stiffens, instantly on alert. “What happened?”
“I’m not sure. There was a guy in a car. Ray thought he was following us. He beat him up and afterward, he said he was a threat. He wouldn’t talk about it, but I don’t think it had to do with his work as a PI.”
Tag glances up as two women join us, both wearing tight Lycra bike shorts and tank tops and looking as if they’ve taken the class multiple times and have mastered the Get Fit part of Get Fit or Die.
“Ladies.” He smiles the smile that got him voted king of the high school prom. “We’re meeting over by the exercise mats.”
After the women leave, he says, “Why don’t you just ask him?”
“He won’t tell me. He’s always very vague when he talks about his work.” I bite my lip. “Would you be able to check him out? I mean, find out what else he does for a living other than being a PI, and other…stuff like that? I’m beginning to wonder if that rumor about him being in the CIA is true.”
“Are you fucking kidding me?” Tag leans against a lat machine and folds his arms. “I can’t believe he’s a fucking spook. That just sounds crazy. His work as a PI is legit. Ask Amanda or Renegade. And what else do you want to know about him?”
“Anything.”
“You don’t trust him.”
I scrub my hand over my face. “I thought I did, but now I’m not sure anymore.”
Tag pats my shoulder. “Then you should think about moving on. You’ve got nothing without trust.”
I follow Tag back to the mats, where the rest of the class is waiting. Maybe nothing has changed over the years. Maybe I’m still exercising the same poor judgment I showed when I was eighteen. One thing I know for certain, Tag is motivated only by the desire to protect me.
Or not.
Fifteen minutes into Get Fit or Die, I change my view. Tag doesn’t give a damn about protecting me. He wants to hurt me. Badly. Does he seriously think I can run ten laps of the gym, then do fifty starfish jumps followed by twenty burpees without a break? Does he think I’m not going to tell Mom and Dad about his filthy language as he hurls abuse at us for being too slow? And what the hell does this have to do with fighting?
“Move that ass, O’Donnell,” he shouts. “You’re at the back of the class. You know what we call the people at the back of the class? We call them losers. That’s you. So get the lead out, so we can have another loser to laugh at before the class is done.”
I look at the clock. Forty-five minutes to go. I’m not going to survive. Wheezing, I stumble over the mats and mentally write my epitaph,
Fuck
you, Tag.
Tag’s phone buzzes. As if possessed by a hive mind, the class stops as one. Tag jogs over to Doctor Death and Shayla, a.k.a. Shilla the Killa, who are spotting each other in the free-weight area. A few minutes later, he jogs back and scowls. “Did I tell you to stop running? Laziest class I’ve ever had. I gotta go take a call. Shill and Doctor Death will take over until I’m back. Show them what you’ve got. Ten more laps around the gym followed by fifty crunches and twenty push-ups.”
He looks over at me and the other women. “And don’t give me any bullshit about women’s push-ups. Only things on the floor should be your hands and your toes.” He looks over at Shayla and barks. “Show them the drill.”
Shayla laughs and drops to the mat. She does twenty push-ups, clapping in between, without her knees ever touching the mat. Then she bounces up and grins. “Who’s next?”
Not me.
Tag disappears and we run our obligatory laps, but as we position ourselves for the crunches, Doctor Death holds up a hand.
“Most of you are here to learn some MMA fight skills, isn’t that right?”
Most of us nod. Doctor Death smiles. “I always think it’s a good idea to give people a little taste of what they think they want, so they can be sure that’s what they really want. So while you all catch your breaths, Shilla and I will split the class into two and teach you a few fight moves.”