Chapter 31

The next morning,creaking from upstairs pulls me from sleep.

Remy must be awake and moving around in the kitchen. No wonder Griff knew to find me outside last night.

Griff’s warm body’s still next to me. Sometime in the middle of the night I let him have his arm back and it’s now tucked under his head.

I trace my finger over his cheek and brush his hair off his forehead. My stomach clenches as I study the angry red scar over his eye. The result of taking one too many blows in that spot.

“What are you doing?” Griff mumbles sleepily.

“Looking at you. I’ve missed your face.” I’m going to miss him so much when I have to leave tomorrow. The fears I fell asleep with early this morning return with a vengeance. “I don’t want to go back to school.”

His eyelids snap open. “You have to.”

“I don’t want to leave you.”

A soothing sound rumbles in his throat and he cups my cheek. “I’ll be right here, Muffin.”

“But I want to be with you.”

He shifts my hand from his cheek to his chest. “You’re always with me.”

“You’re not listening.”

“I’m listening,” he says a little sterner. “But you’re not missing classes to stay here.”

He’s right. I can’t do that. And he can’t come stay in my dorm room every night.

I still don’t like it.

“You’re not that far away,” he continues in a firm no-nonsense tone. “I’ll visit whenever you want.”

“You’d do that?”

“Of course I would.”

“I’d really like that. I could show you around the campus some more. And the little town nearby is so cute. They have a bunch of bookstores with shelves overflowing with old books. I love it.”

A slow smile spreads over his face. “Dinner and old books. Sounds perfect.”

Is he making fun of me? That was a pretty nerdy suggestion. “There aren’t any racetracks or cage fights nearby. That I know about, anyway.”

The smile slips off his face. “I mean it. Anything that makes you light up like that sounds like a good night to me.”

“Oh, okay.”

He brushes his fingers over my shoulder. “What about Thursday. There’s a hotel near campus. I could stay there, and you ride home with me after your classes Friday?” he suggests.

“That’ll get expensive.”

“I don’t care.”

“Okay.” Then I remember my promise to my roommate. “Oh, shoot. I promised Denise I’d go out for trivia night with her. She wants me to meet this new guy she’s seeing.”

I study Griff’s disappointed expression for any hint he’d be willing to go with me. “I don’t suppose you’d be interested in something like that?” I hate the pitiful, hopeful rise to my voice.

Relief turns up the corners of his mouth and his eyes widen. “You’d want me there?”

“Yes. I’d like you to meet my roommate.” I shrug and drop my gaze. “But I know it’s a long drive for something silly that?—”

“Molly, look at me.” He grazes my chin with one rough finger. “I’ll go anywhere. Do anything with you.”

Excitement quickens my pulse and I lift my gaze. “Really?”

“Yes, really.” He touches a finger to his forehead, right above his fresh scar. “You sure you want your bruised up brawler of a boyfriend hanging around all your college friends, though? I don’t know if I’ll fit in with the trivia crowd.”

Underneath the teasing question, I sense something more serious or vulnerable lurking. “You’re not a ‘bruised up brawler.’ You’re my boyfriend and I want you to meet the people I spend time with when I’m not spending time with you.” My words come out sharper than I intended but he needs to know I’m not embarrassed that he’s a fighter, mechanic, or anything else he might be thinking.

“So passionate,” he teases.

“About you? Yes.” I close my eyes, remembering an important detail. “But you’re not supposed to be out in public, are you?” I can see it now. Some jackass uploading a video to YouTube titled “Stonewall from Supreme Underground Fighter Attends College Trivia Night.”

“So I’ll wear my hat.”

I raise my eyebrows. “It’s a hat, not an invisibility cloak.”

He frowns. “Maybe you’re right. Not this week, but I’ll definitely go with you when I can.”

That’s all I need for now. The promise of normal couple stuff in the future. I tease my fingers over his chest. “That’s probably wise. What if we ran into Melissa again and she wanted to give you her number?” I tease in a high-pitched singsong.

He flicks his gaze up. “This show’s like a curse that never goes away.”

“Understatement of the decade.” We haven’t talked about any of this yet and I have no idea what his plans are for the future. “But let’s face it, you’re this big reality star now?—”

His harsh laughter cuts through my words.

I smack his chest. “I’m serious.”

“It just sounds so ridiculous. And trust me when I say, that’s the last thing I want engraved on my tombstone. Black belt. Mechanic.” He leans in and kisses my forehead. “Molly’s boyfriend. Those are the only titles I want.”

One corner of my mouth tilts up. “Molly’s boyfriend should be first on that list. Just sayin’.”

He rumbles with deep, affectionate laughter. “It is. ‘Molly’s husband’ will be even better one day.”

“Oh.” My heart pitter-patters. “Really?”

“Hell yes.” His happy expression fades and his forehead wrinkles into a frown. “I need to talk to you about something.”

His grave tone raises the hairs on the back of my neck. I shift away to see his face better, but he tightens his arms around me.

“What?” I ask.

Here’s where he says it’s nothing bad. Or no big deal. Or tells you he’s moving to California to become a professional fighter and we’ll see each other during the holidays.

“Uh, so you saying the reality star thing reminded me, uh…” He squeezes his eyes shut and curses under his breath.

My lungs freeze, waiting for him to continue.

“Part of my contract, well, getting the rest of my prize money hinges on me returning for a ‘reunion’ show.”

I groan and roll my eyes. “I’m not surprised.”

Relief floods his expression. “It got delayed and put off because of Naptime’s surgery.”

“What surgery?”

Griff lifts a shoulder and shifts his gaze away from me. “I came home pretty fucked up, but he fared a lot worse. He had to have an operation on his shoulder or something.” He blows out a frustrated breath. “I really don’t care what happens to that asshole, I’m just trying to explain why I’m still tied up with this thing.”

Knowing Griff, he cares a little about injuring someone that severely. The guy he and my brother train with always taught them to fight clean and always end a fight with the least damage possible.

A reality show wouldn’t care about sportsman-like behavior. Just like they didn’t care about destroying our relationship. They’d want the fights to be as brutal as possible. Anything to bring in the highest ratings.

“I’m surprised they didn’t make a big deal out of his injuries. They could’ve given you some spiffy new ring name like The Bone Cracker.” My voice turns cold and distant.

Instead of laughing, his frown deepens. “Maybe it had more to do with them wanting Naptime to look like the clear winner.”

Anger that Griff was robbed from winning the title boils my blood. I don’t need to watch the show to know he should have won. Split decision my ass.

“Anyway.” He reaches for my hand, curls his fingers around mine and squeezes gently. I lift my gaze. His serious expression sends fear pumping through my veins again. “Before I left, I had a sit-down with the head guy. The one I demanded a meeting with after…Remy told me about the episode that?—”

“Ruined my life?” I finish for him. Why is he bringing this up now? We had such a beautiful night together. Talking about the show is bad enough. I don’t want to be reminded of all that other ugliness.

He closes his eyes for a second, then powers ahead. “They mentioned the reunion episode. Like I said, I won’t get the other half of my winnings unless I go.”

Figures there’d be more strings attached. “I guess that makes sense. They want the whole cast there, I bet. Especially the final guys.”

“Right.” He takes a breath. “But they dangled another incentive in front of me.”

“What?”

His lips part and the cold, awful truth of what he’s about to say spills over me.

“No,” I whisper.

He nods slowly. “They’ll pay you for your appearance on the reunion show.”

He names an amount that would be enough to cover my remaining tuition, books, and housing next year—if I’m lucky enough to be awarded the same scholarship money I received this year. That could really help take some of the burden off of Remy. There might even be enough left to make a few of my car payments since I hate that Remy took on that extra expense too.

But sitting on some stage with all those fake people would be like selling my soul to the ghouls who “showed” the world my boyfriend sleeping with another woman.

Or maybe it would give me the chance to repair my image. Instead of the “dumb virgin slut” the show painted me as, I can present myself on the show as a composed, intelligent college girl.

“Did you tell Remy?” I ask.

“No.” He frowns. “It’s your decision. Not his.”

Well, at least that’s something. A couple of months ago he probably would’ve asked Remy’s permission before even telling me about it.

“I wanted to talk it over with you first,” he adds.

“But you also know there’s no way he’d be okay with it.”

“The decision is yours. Not Remy’s. Not mine.” He shakes his head. “I’m not comfortable with it.”

“Then why are you telling me?”

“Why wouldn’t I tell you? It’s a lot of money. It would be shitty to lie to you about something like that.”

“What if we hadn’t gotten back together?”

“We were always getting back together.” He tilts his head and stares at me. “We were never ‘apart’ as far as I’m concerned.” His steady gaze never wavers, as if he’s daring me to deny it.

“I’m serious.”

He runs his fingers through his hair, messing it up in the most irresistible way.

Focus. Don’t get distracted.

“One of the producers probably would’ve contacted you directly and asked you to come on the show.” He lifts one shoulder. “Hell, maybe they’d offer even more money.”

“This feels so unfair. They know we’re broke. All those fighters in the house needed a way to support their families in one way or another and these sick freaks are basically dangling bananas in front of us and cooing ‘dance monkey dance.’ It’s insulting.”

He blinks. “That’s nothing new. Rich men have exploited lower classes for blood sports since Roman times.”

I narrow my eyes. “You’re not low class.”

“You know what I mean.” He sighs. “You don’t have to do it.”

I sense there’s something he’s holding back. “Do you want me to?”

“I don’t want you around those people. I don’t want to expose you to any more of this. Not after what you’ve already been through.”

There’s a catch or hesitation in his denials. “I sense a but.”

He lets out another sigh and rubs his hand over my arm. “I want you with me,” he admits in a voice almost too low to hear.

“You do?”

“Yeah, I do.” His eyes meet mine. “I really do. And I know that’s selfish as fuck.”

“Why?” My voice wobbles but I force the question out.

“Because. They tried to break us, and I want to show them we’re unbreakable.”

I love him so much for saying that.

But we both know it’s a lie.