Worth The Fight (Hard To Love Book 1) (17 page)

“You were asleep on the floor, I managed to get you into bed and then I tidied up a little. I didn’t think it was a good idea to leave you with the mess you were in, so I slept in the bed next to you. Something obviously had you upset.” She still won’t look at me and now I'm actually happy about that. I don’t want to have to lie to her, I might not know what I did last night, but I know what caused it. I didn’t know how to cope with Bryce leaving, all my emotions finally catching up with me. The alcohol had helped me block everything out for a little while, but now in the cold light of day, all the feelings come flooding back. The pain from last night seeps into my bones and I just want to start drinking again but I don’t know how I would explain that behavior to Asha. She's the woman I’m going to marry, but she's also the person I have the most secrets from.

I watch as she moves around the room, cleaning up the mess that I've caused, and I wish that I could love her like she deserves. She’s such a nice girl and she would make an amazing wife. Standing there in my underwear, surrounded by what’s left of my bedroom, I realize one important thing, and something that makes me rethink everything I'm doing.
I’m taking away Asha’s chance to find someone who truly loves her, someone who wants to give her the world
. There’s someone out there who will be her everything but she won’t look for him if she thinks I love her. I close my eyes, making the decision that I need to leave her and let her get on with her life.

“Asha.” I say her name softly, and she stands slowly.

“Not today, Zeke. We’ll talk soon.” She walks towards me, still looking at the ground. When she’s standing next to me, she reaches up and kisses me on the cheek.

“No matter what, I love you, I always have.” She walks away from me, leaving me standing in the same spot. I finally walk over to the bed and collapse on top of it.
When did my life become such a clusterfuck?
A year ago I though I had life sorted out. That I had everything that I ever wanted. I was working towards my first championship, I was at the top of my game, and I was fucking any woman I wanted. But now? Now I'm hurting people by using them to make my life easier. I hate this, I hate what I’ve become and I can’t go on like this, I can’t keep letting them get as hurt as I am. Why should their lives become harder just so mine can look picture perfect from the outside? It’s time to stop being selfish, even if it’s too late for my happy ever after. I threw away my one chance at true love when I ran from him, and I’ll never get him back.

I bounce in place watching my opponent walk towards the cage. This is the final obstacle standing between me and my showdown with Dwayne. Just this fight to win and I’ll be in the final. I can finally show the world that I’m the best, and believe me when I say I won’t be stop until someone drags me from his fallen body.

I look over to where Asha’s standing and see her smiling widely as she watches me. Things have been strained ever since I decided we needed to end things a few weeks ago. I think she knew what I was going to do, her expression told me that she could tell there was something bad coming, and I haven’t seen her much since then. She’s dropped into the gym a few times, since that’s where I’ve been practically living in the build up to tonight, but I refuse to talk to her with an audience. What we have to sort out isn’t the sort of thing you want to do in front of others, I have more respect for her than that. I’ve decided that it will be sorted tomorrow. I will win this fight tonight, getting my professional life back to where it should be, and then I will get my personal life back on track by telling Asha it’s over. I just pray that she can understand my reasons, and that one day she might forgive me because hurting her is the last thing I ever wanted.

My attention is pulled back to my opponent when he walks up in front of me with a cocky look on his face. Little does he know that he is about to get his ass kicked. The skills that Bryce taught me have been invaluable, he knows how to fight and showed me it all. I clear my mind, knowing that if I spend too long thinking about Bryce it will affect my concentration and that’s the last thing I need right now. I fist bump with my opponent before backing up into my corner to wait for the bell. I start to bounce again, the energy inside me is starting to build so much that I can’t keep it inside. I just want to get this fight over with so I can concentrate on training for the final, my only goal is to get there and kill Dwayne. Okay, not actually kill him but hurt him … a lot.

The bell goes and I instantly go into attack mode. Coach told me I had to make this fight last, to let the guy get a few hits in before I floored him but I'm not planning on that happening. I have watched DVDs of this guy’s fights, and to say that he’s here by pure luck alone is no exaggeration. He couldn’t fight himself out of a paper bag, and I'm pretty sure some other contenders had been paid to throw fights against him. If I let him connect a punch with my skin then people think I'm not as good as I am, and if I pretend that he's winning at any point I may as well just go home. Even now, he’s bouncing about like he's fucking Tigger and I'm not sure what to do with him, he doesn’t stay still long enough for me to hit. Out of nowhere his fist flies and hits me across the cheek. The fucker just managed to punch me and I'm not happy about it. Another fist strikes across my jaw and I feel my lip burst under the pressure. This guy is really annoying me now. He’s moving so much that I can’t plan my attack, so I decide to just let him wear himself out, there’s no way he can keep this up for too long.

Movement catches my eye and I look away from the bouncing idiot in front of me. I don’t know what makes me look, there are so many people in the place that movement in an aisle shouldn’t distract me but there is something that pulls me. Walking up the aisle is a guy in jeans and a shirt, his hair cut close at the back. My heart starts beating faster in my chest as I watch him walk away from me, I recognize the way his body moves and I have to stop myself from running to him. I don’t know if he can feel my stare on his skin or if he just happened to look back, but he turns and my breath is stolen when our eyes meet for the first time in weeks. The world around me fades away as I stand and look at the man I didn’t think I would ever see again. I didn’t think it was possible but he looks even sexier now than I remember with his hair styled and his body bigger.

A sudden punch to the ribs brings my attention back to what I'm meant to be doing. I turn my head as I hear coach shouting at me to get my head out of my ass but all I can think about is Bryce. I need to finish this now so I can go after him, I need to talk to him and ask him why he left. Thankfully my opponent has stopped jumping like an irritating frog and I throw a perfectly practiced punch. I smile as it connects under his chin and I watch his head as it’s thrown backwards and his eyes roll back into his head. I see him start to fall towards the ground and I know there will be no more fighting for this guy tonight, he is out like a light so I’ve won the fight. I wait for a moment to hear the referees call it and as soon as I hear my name being announced as the winner I jump from the cage. I barely take time to land properly before I take off up the aisle towards where I last saw Bryce.

I push through the doors, shouting his name even before I enter the hall on the other side. I look around, panic starting to rise in me when I can’t see him. I run blindly, my only thought is to find him. I want to know why he's here and where he's been. I want to tell him that I can’t stop thinking about him and my heart is breaking into smaller pieces the longer I'm without him. I don’t think I’ll be able to tell him any of this but just to see him close up, to make sure he's okay will be enough. I'm worried about him, the last time I went by his apartment it was empty. I don’t know when he moved out or where he’s gone, and that has me worrying. I know that he moved here not long before he started working for me, so now he’s jobless and living fuck knows where. I heard rumors about him working for Dwayne but I know he wouldn’t do that, or at least I hope he wouldn’t. He knows what I went through at his hands, and he's also the reason I acted like a fucking fool, so I'm sure that Bryce wouldn’t want anything to do with him. I need to make sure though and this might be my only chance.

After searching for far too long I realize he's gone, he must have left while I was still fighting. I hear Coach shouting down the corridor to me, telling me to get my ass into the changing room. I barrel into the room, slamming the door into the wall behind it. All heads turn towards me and I don’t know what they see in my face but they all step back, putting a lot of space between them and me. I'm glad they do because the way I'm feeling just now, if someone said one wrong thing there’s a chance that I will put my fist through their face. I unwrap my hands, throwing my bandages across the room. I can’t believe that I finally had him in my sights and I let him get away. I don’t know when I’ll ever see him again and I missed my one fucking chance. Damn it!

I lean over slightly with my hands on my knees, concentrating on taking deep breaths. I realize that since I met Bryce I’ve spent more time controlling my emotions than at any other time. Everything was simple before him, I spent my days training and my nights fucking. Any nameless woman would do since there was no attachment or emotions, but then Bryce ruined it all. He made me feel, he made me want something I’d never had or wanted before and now I want more. But when faced with telling the world who I really was I got scared and went back into the little box I’d tried to fit so neatly into. No wonder Bryce wanted nothing to do with me, I couldn’t even admit who I was, so what chance did I have being the man that Bryce deserved.

When I stand up I realize that the room has emptied and I'm alone with Coach. He's sitting on the massage table watching me very closely, a look of worry on his face.

“Do I need to worry about you? Are you going to do something stupid to ruin your chance at the final?” His questions are simple ones, ones I should be able to answer in a heartbeat but I can’t. I stand and look at him, thinking how to answer him. I know that when it comes to my fight with Dwayne there’s no problems, I could win that fucker in my sleep, but I don’t think that’s what he's asking. Then it suddenly hits me and even though I shouldn’t be surprised, I am. I didn’t think anyone had noticed what was happening between Bryce and me.

“How did you find out?” I try not to confirm anything until I find out how much he knows. I hope he’d support me no matter what I did with my personal life, he's known me longer than anyone, but there’s still the fact that the MMA world is not ready for a gay fighter.

“Was it meant to be a secret? If it was you really need to work on that.” I can physically feel the color drain from my face and sweat starts to bead over my forehead.
Did everyone in the gym know, had they known there was something between us?

“Shit, I'm kidding. You look like you’re gonna have a heart attack. I came back one night after the place had been closed up and saw you both in the shower. And let me tell you, that shit I won’t ever unsee.” The color that drained a moment ago is back, making my cheeks burn.

“Shit Coach, I'm sorry.” He waves his hand, dismissing my apology. I walk over and collapse onto the bench, lowering my head until my chin is resting on my chest. I can’t believe that he actually caught us doing … whatever it was. I have no plans to ask him what we were doing, but all of my memories of the shower room tell me that it wasn’t anything that he should have seen.

“Like it’s the first time I've seen you fucking someone in the shower, though I have to say, I was surprised when I saw it was a guy. Actually, I was more shocked that it was your coach.” I don’t even know what to say to him. No one is more shocked than me that I've fallen for a man, my life was all about pussy, the more I got the better. Now even Asha can’t seem to get me hard.

“But you know what surprised me more? The fact that you put a ring on Asha’s finger. I didn’t see that one coming at all.” I rub my hands over my face, bracing myself to tell Coach everything. I haven’t had anyone to confide in about all this, and maybe if I tell him how I'm feeling I’ll be able to work out what to do.

“Yeah, that kinda shocked me too. What I had with Bryce was … complicated. There was just something about him that I couldn’t resist, not that I tried very hard. I didn’t know what was going to happen between us and there’s no way I could have gone public about it. Then someone saw us, we weren’t doing anything, just talking, but I panicked and ran to Asha. I thought that if I settled down with her I would stop feeling anything for Bryce.” Coach nods his head as I talk, listening closely to what I'm saying. He doesn’t interrupt and when I'm finished he doesn’t seem put out by my confession.

“So, how’s that working out for you?” I laugh at his question, my head falling back as I let my laughter flow through my body. It’s been a long time since I found something funny and it takes a few minutes to compose myself.

“It’s not. I have a fiancée that I don’t love and who hasn’t spoken to me in weeks, and a coach that’s left his job and home to escape me. So life pretty much fucking sucks just now.” Coach gets up from the table and grabs his bag as he walks towards the door to leave. He turns around when his hand touches the handle.

“Well I suggest you get a shower because you stink.” I smile as I stand, grabbing my towel and heading for the shower. Just as I'm about to walk into the cubicle, Coach shouts my name. I turn and look at him over my shoulder.

“He might have left where he lived, but I'm pretty sure his number is still the same.” He says nothing else as he leaves the room. I walk under the spray of hot water and think about what just happened. Coach has known all along about my relationship with Bryce and never said anything, never judged me. Instead he’s pretty much told me to call him. I wonder if it really would be that easy and whether he would answer my call this time.

****

I'm lying in my bed wearing nothing by my boxer shorts, surrounded by darkness. I've been here since I got home from my fight. I had wondered if Asha would hang around and wait for me but I couldn’t find her after my shower. I seem to have spent the whole day losing people. When I got to my car, I picked up my cell ready to call to see where she was, but I couldn’t press the call button. I didn’t really want to talk to her and I knew if I did then I would have to spend the night with her, which isn’t something I wanted. I would feel guilty about this if I wasn’t planning on ending it tomorrow, this has gone on long enough and I need to let her go. I can’t risk dragging her down with me so I need to do one good thing in my life.

I've spent the last few weeks trying to forget everything by focusing on my training, but I don’t think I went an hour without thinking about Bryce.  It didn’t seem to matter how hard I trained or how much I pushed myself, the emptiness I felt never left. I didn’t think it would hurt this much, but it feels like my heart is ripping apart every day. Seeing Bryce tonight just brought everything crashing down on me all at once. I try to convince myself that I don’t want him, I don’t need him, I don’t love him. Except I know I do. It took me a while to realize it but I know I love him. He was why I got up in the morning, the main reason I smiled. But I don’t know if I will ever be able to admit my feelings to anyone. The thought of going public scares me, and I would never keep him as my dirty secret, not that he would let me do that anyway.

I think back to the times to our time together, the times that I made love to him and when we just spent time together. I’ve never felt so accepted by anyone before, he was with me for who I was, not for what my name could give him. He spent time getting to know the real me and I shared with him things that I wouldn’t have shared with anyone else. I told him about my past with my dad, about how he had reacted when I tried to come out and received no judgement. I’ve haven’t told anyone about that before, not even Coach, so when I heard the words coming out my mouth I was in shock. That’s what it was like with Bryce though, easy, comfortable, everything I’ve ever wanted.