Taking Control (Kerr Chronicles #2)(26)
Author: Jen Frederick

He laughs at me and hangs up. Right, as if Tiny would stay put until I arrived.

I call for a car and they promise one will be delivered in the next ten minutes. I check my watch. It’s 6:35, and I’m going to be late. As I take the elevator down, I give Tiny a call.

“Hey,” she sounds rushed. “I’m glad you called. I’m going to be late. I haven’t left yet. Are you there?”

“No, bunny, I’m running late too.”

She laughs. “It was just crazy today. A client’s husband came storming in saying that it was against the law for us to be following him and taking pictures of him cheating on his wife. It was all very dramatic. I’ll tell you about it at dinner. No, after dinner,” she revises.

“When we’re by ourselves,” I suggest.

“Yes.” She blows out a big breath. “This meeting is so uncomfortable for me, that even if you hadn’t made me promise to bring you along, I would have forced you to go anyway.”

“We’re a team now. I’m there for you in whatever capacity you need,” I assure her, walking out onto the sidewalk. “Stay in the car until I get there. I can call ahead and let them know that whatever he orders can be put on my tab.”

“I’m not going to cower in your car,” she says, annoyed. “Ian, stop worrying.”

“I can’t. I love you. You are the most important person in the world to me and he knows it. He’s a user.”

“Will you trust me?” she says impatiently.

“I do trust you.” I look for the car. It’s still not here. I won’t be using that firm again. “It’s him that I’m worried about.”

“Just get here soon and we won’t have a problem.”

“The damn car isn’t here. I’ll be there as soon as I can,” I promise. Because I don’t want her going in pissed at me, I change the subject. “By the way, the next time the tailor comes to New York, I’m going to have to ask for looser fitting pants.”

“Why’s that?”

“Because I kept getting hard thinking about you today and it was very uncomfortable.”

She laughs delightedly. “You should have rubbed one out in the bathroom.”

“What makes you think I didn’t?”

I’m getting hard just talking about it. Fuck. The effect she has on me is unreal.

“I hope you have some energy for me tonight,” she teases.

“I promise that there isn’t a dirty thought you can have that I can’t fulfill after drinks.”

“I can’t wait,” she says throatily.

“I’m going to hang up on you now before I get arrested for public indecency.”

She’s laughing when we disconnect which puts a smile on my face, and that’s why I’m taken off guard when the first fist strikes my face.

TEN

THE PUNCH CAUGHT ME UNAWARES and snapped my chin to the right. A lefty then. Most people lead with their dominant hand. I take another to the gut before I bring my own fist straight under his chin. The force snaps his head back, but another punch hits me from the right. Then I realize there are two people. The tight cut of my suit might have looked nice in the boardroom but was preventing real movement, and with the next punch I throw, I hear a corresponding rip in my jacket sleeve.

Fighting two people in an alley near dusk in the city wasn’t as easy as the movies made it out to be, but I grew up on the boulevards of Jersey, where the gamblers and mobsters and grifters spent their time. If you were a kid who didn’t want to sell his body, you fought. Sometimes you fought for money, but most of the time you fought to keep what you had. And the more money I won at the tables, the more people wanted to meet me under the docks and behind the casinos to see if I was strong enough to keep it.

I haven’t fought off two guys in a long time—at least not with my fists. I preferred to fight using paper and greenbacks. I’ve realized you could do a lot more harm with money than you could with your hands. But the time spent in the seedy parts of Atlantic City has never left me. And I am stronger now—lifting weights on a daily basis and sparring with friends in the gym has kept me sharp. The asphalt of the alleyway is steady under my feet, unlike the sand and mud I’d fought in years ago. Planting my left leg, I swing my heel into the side of the bruiser on my right. When he stumbles, I jam an elbow into his jaw and follow him to the ground to avoid the punch of his smaller friend. Another elbow into Big Guy’s eye socket dazes him, and I use the opportunity to push upright.

Diving at Small Guy, I drive him into the wall of the alley, the small space serving as an aid rather than a hindrance. It’s tight for two fighters and almost impossible for three. This time, my footing is uneven because I choose to use Big Guy as my floor, grinding the ball of my foot into his windpipe as I smash a fist into the nose of Small Guy. I hear it crack under my fist. I quicken the pace of my blows, wanting this to be over and cognizant of the time ticking by. Small Guy can’t get his hands high enough to hit me in the face because I’m too close, so he punches me in the obliques and then my upper ribs.

I use my elbows and body as much as I can so that my hands won’t look like raw meat when I get to Tiny. I stomp on the downed guy’s nose and when his face lolls to the side, I bring a knee up to Small Guy’s groin. His hands fall away from my sides to protect himself, and I use his dropped guard to punch him once in the gut. When his head dips, I drive an elbow into his chin and that’s enough to knock him out.

“Sir?” I hear from the end of the alley. Breathing hard, I turn to face the driver of the car I called for. I glance at my watch. 6:50.

“You been there long?” I ask.

“Um, ten min—I mean, no, just got here,” he lies. He looks all of fifteen.

Beneath me, I hear a groan. I make sure to step on both their faces as I walk out of the alley, straightening my suit coat and pretending that I hadn’t just knocked two guys out. I need to take one of them with me, and I don’t think this young man is going to be too helpful. I pull out a hundred dollar bill and slap it in his hand. “Drive up to the Plaza and then forget about me.”

He nods wordlessly and gets in his car. As he speeds away, I call Steve.

He answers on the first ring. “Mate.”

“Had a little altercation, and I’m going to need a pickup.”

“I’m on my way.”

“Where are you?”