In the Ring (BOXER Book 1) Read online

  Kiss me, please.

  He dragged the towel away and spun to grab new shorts. And there was his naked ass again. “We can do it naked or clothed. Your choice.”

  Naked yoga? Sign me up.

  Fucking hell. Another punishing afternoon of yoga followed—to limber me up—and rabbit food—to maintain my weight. The only goddamn limbering up I wanted to do was with my legs hiked over my head while Michael drove his hefty cock inside my hole.

  At one point during yoga, he positioned himself in front of me in some Downward Doom pose when he looked at me from between his legs. “No more munchies for you.”

  “You’re a double douchebag.” Fast food was my last addiction since his sweet ass was off the market.

  He always had Spidey-senses when I chowed down on Big Macs.

  Once we got yoga out of the way, we headed back to our complex. It was nice, walking down the street with Michael. We tossed insults at each other and traded jokes about Devlin. When that got old, we talked through last night’s fight and the areas I needed to improve for the next bout in a couple months.

  I wondered, for the millionth time, what it would be like if we were boyfriends. If I could reach out and grab his hand, hold it while we strolled along.

  How it would feel to go on a date with him and be able to tell him how much I wanted him.

  Michael winced as we exited the elevator on my floor.

  “Aw, did wittle Mikey get hurt sparring with the big Bonny Bruiser today?” I knocked my shoulder against his.

  He merely jerked his chin down the hallway where Devlin waited watchdog-style outside my door. There was no love lost between my manager and my trainer.

  “Anya’s waiting for you,” Dev snapped as we approached.

  “Told you.” Michael moved away.

  “She’s waiting to study.” I hoisted my gym bag over my shoulder.

  “Study what? New positions?”

  “English, you asshole.”

  We were back to square one, or round three of whatever the fuck wasn’t happening between us . . . ever.

  “Say goodnight to her for me.” He sent his words over his shoulder.

  “Yeah. And do the same to Wade.” I leaned around the corner to watch his firm ass retreat.

  Chapter Eight

  Show Pony

  THE NEXT WEEK I only saw Michael for hours of training in the morning and more of the same in the evening because I was flat-out on a different, completely uncomfortable circuit during the midday. Talk shows, interviews, call-ins, radio shows. I was the up-and-comer of the boxing world, and after the big victory over Hernandez, Devlin pimped me out for all I was worth.

  I wanted to come all right . . . in Michael’s ass and on his abs and in his perfect lush mouth.

  Hell, I wouldn’t even mind sitting down with him and sharing a meal. I’d fall all over myself to spend an evening watching crap TV with him. We could just play a mind-numbing game on the Xbox then fall asleep together on the couch. I was greedy for the kind of companionship I’d never had, with a man I wanted for more than just a one-hour-stand.

  Fuck, I was such a sap.

  The pressure of keeping up with the fame game was so much worse than getting the living daylights beat out of me.

  Devlin’s words circled my head—an aggravating mantra:

  Be funny.

  Keep smiling.

  Don’t freeze up.

  Make sure you don’t swear and try not to offend anyone’s sensibilities.

  Don’t be a thug, but be manly, and when you cross your leg at the knee that accentuates your package, cameras and chicks eat that shit up . . .

  I needed notecards for that shit, but all I got was a teleprompter. Reading that while I tried to make good on the decent, wholesome—riiight—sports guy schtick made me a nervous wreck.

  I felt so out of place. Not that the fans weren’t freakin’ awesome or the hosts gracious and good at putting me at ease, but being in the spotlight made me lonely as hell. Constantly surrounded by a crowd of people who didn’t really know me at all only served to highlight the one most important thing missing from my life. Someone to share it with.

  If I could just tell Michael the truth . . . if he wasn’t already in a relationship . . . if I wasn’t so scared of what would happen to my career . . .

  If, if, if. The list went on and on. If only I grew a pair of balls other than the ones swinging between my legs. It kept me awake at night no matter how grueling smiling all day for the TV and radio blitz was.

  I combatted the lonelies by FaceTiming my sister, Mary-Kate.

  At seventeen going on thirty-four, she’d taken over my role as protector of the other kids. Mom worked in the bakery at the crack of dawn then at a bar until last call to make ends meet because Da was too busy sitting on his lazy ass in the Lay-Z-Boy chair and swilling his booze to hold down a steady job. I sent them money every two weeks, but I had no way of knowing where it went. Probably in Liam Senior’s bottomless bottle and bad betting habit.

  Mary-Kate was more serious than she should’ve been at her age, but that was how we survived in the ’hood: you either grew up too fast or you ran off the wrong side of the tracks.

  Sometimes, just sometimes, I saw the teenage girl in her shine through. Like when she asked me about that “blond sex god” who’d been beside me at the Vegas fight. It wasn’t just the Gaelic genes that ran in the family. Apparently taste in men did, too.

  “Michael’s gay.”

  “How did you know I meant him when I said ‘that horny piece of perfection’?” Mary-Kate smirked. Then she rolled her eyes. “And for God’s sake. Why are they always gay or taken?”

  Tell me about it.

  The only problem was I couldn’t tell her about it. She was in the dark just like everyone else about my homosexuality.

  “Don’t you have a boyfriend your own age? And P. fucking S. tell him I’ll rip his nuts off if he treats you wrong.” I aimed a serial killer grin at my FaceTime screen.

  She chewed on her thumbnail, yet another trait she’d gotten from me. “I’ve been dating Gavin O’Flannery?”

  “That scrawny shit who used to moon over you in junior high? C’mon, sis.”

  “I’ll have you know, Liam O Shaughnessy, he’s playing football at St. X, starting quarterback next fall. He also thinks it’s so cool you got out of this dump.”

  My heart broke a little. Sure, Conor, Saoirse, and Mary-Kate were my siblings, but I felt like their father. I was missing every big moment of their lives. Not only that but I had gotten out, basically leaving them to fend for themselves.

  “Well, if Gavin’s any good, he can make a break for it, too. But it’s not for everyone, sis. There’s something to be said for staying put and settling down.”

  Her incredibly green eyes flashed. “And there’s something to be said for making a name for yourself, Liam. Showing the old fuckers there’s more to life than four square blocks of the same old shit in Cincinnasty.” She pointed into the camera. “So you keep going. And you keep making us proud.”

  “Fuck me. When did you become such a shrew?” I spoke through a clogged throat.

  “When you started saying putz shit like ‘settling for a crap situation ain’t so bad’.” She flipped her middle finger at me. “Why don’t you go win a title fight already.”

  “I can’t believe you just said putz. Have you been watching Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure again?”

  “Screw you.” Mary-Kate laughed.

  “Hey, M-K?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Give the kids hugs from me, okay?”

  “As long as you give unholy Irish hell to that Reggie Jones you’ve got coming up in July.” She winked.

  In the middle of the day after back-to-back interviews, on the final leg of my weeklong press junket, I was a powder keg ready to go off. I slipped out of the circus and offset unseen. I ditched everyone, including those two unnecessary bodyguards Devlin hired for such “important” appearance
s.

  Outside, I shrugged off my sports jacket, tugged my tie loose and shoved it deep into my pocket. It was mid-April in New York City, a warm spring day. I breathed deeply of the sweet city smell of fried food and exhaust fumes, returning to what I’d always been: just another street kid hopefully no one would look at twice.

  Catching the subway, I headed wherever it was going. One of hundreds packed into an anonymous crush of people, my shoulders relaxed for the first time in days. I didn’t care where I ended up as long as I wasn’t forced to watch every single monitored word that came out of my mouth. And I really wanted to eat something full of greasy fat.

  With no destination in mind, I ended up in Queens and wandered into a hole-in-the-wall gallery. It was somebody’s opening. Sparkling wine was on offer. I opted for sparkling water instead. Michael’s habits were goddamn hard to break. The two rooms filled to capacity with raucous art patrons, the noise roared to the level of my fights in that enclosed space, but I didn’t mind it.

  I studied an oil painting. Something figurative, modern. And definitely erotic, depicting two men entwined. My mind emptied of everything but wondering how the artist had managed to capture such masculine intimacy with the strokes of his paintbrush.

  “You look like you might enjoy something stronger.” A rich low voice beside me pulled me from the painting.

  I lifted my empty glass. “I don’t usually drink.”

  “I meant something stronger.”

  I drank the man in then. He was an inch or two taller than me, with a swarthy skin tone and black hair that fell to his shoulders in a silky-looking curtain. Dark green eyes swept over me. He wore faded holey jeans molded to his long, lean legs. The curve of his full lips was all about invitation and the tattoo peeking from his shirtsleeve said he was a rebel.

  “I don’t really—”

  He pushed his hand into mine. “I’m Gideon.”

  “Liam.”

  He withdrew his hand with a low, vibrating chuckle. “Didn’t mean to startle you. You’ve stood in front of this painting for half an hour. I wondered what you were thinking.”

  “It’s beautiful.”

  “You want it?”

  “Um.”

  Gideon reared back and laughed straight from his belly. “I put you on the spot again. Sorry. How about that drink?”

  This is probably why Dev has guard dogs on me. Let me loose in the city and I’m liable to go home with the first hot-to-trot stranger I see. And fuck, he was hot.

  Chapter Nine

  NKOTB

  “I SHOULD REALLY HEAD home.”

  “Food then. Everyone needs to eat.” Double dimples slid into Gideon’s cheeks when he grinned.

  He held up his hands, making peace with the wary animal.

  “Okay.” I opted for a drink in a bar and some chow instead of a gloryhole in a restroom.

  Or maybe he’d take me home, fuck me for hours . . . he wasn’t the right guy, but he was tempting. Very tempting.

  We left the gallery, but not until Gideon was hugged, rubbed, and possibly groped way more than me in the past week while it became clear to me he was the painter.

  He was unusually calming, easygoing, effortlessly filling in the conversational gaps. He steered me into a quiet little café, through the main room, and out to a courtyard in the back where flowers bloomed and a fountain flowed.

  I’d never been taken anywhere except for glitzy casinos and sticky-floored bars.

  I sat on the tiny iron chair that rocked on uneven paving slabs with my weight. Gideon winked at me before diving beneath the table.

  Whoa boy!

  He padded the feet of my chair with folded cardboard coasters then coasted his hands over my calves while I fought down a groan in my throat.

  Scooting out, he huffed the black hair off his forehead. “That should do you.”

  My legs were on fire from his touch alone. He can do me.

  “What’s your pleasure?” he asked.

  “Meat.” I blurted. “Um, I’m not a vegetarian, I mean.”

  “Okay. They have a wicked charcuterie here. Care to share it with me?”

  I was so out of my depth, I simply nodded.

  Orders were placed. Drinks arrived. Cold beers in iced mugs. I chugged mine.

  “You seem a little startled, Liam. I promise I’m not out to steal your virtue.” Gideon’s fingers moved up and down the glass in a seemingly sexual gesture. This was what months of celibacy got me: cotton mouth and a hard cock and wishful thinking. “You were too beautiful not to approach, and I learned a few years ago time isn’t to be wasted.”

  He pushed back from the table, folding his large hands, colored in dabs of paint, in his lap.

  “Why?”

  “It’s not really a first date story.”

  “Is this a first date?” I asked.

  “I’d like it to be, unless I’ve got you all wrong.” His handsome features became earnest.

  “I’m not out. Work-related.” The truth tasted odd in my mouth.

  Reaching across the table, Gideon rubbed the back of my hand in a distracting pattern. “That’s tough. Does anyone know?”

  “Only a few.”

  “Your family?”

  “I don’t . . . I can’t talk about it.”

  With a smile slowly curving his lips, he fit our hands together. My heartbeat pulsed like a drum in my throat, and when he lifted my hand, softly bringing my hard flesh to his warm mouth, my eyes shuttered closed.

  Human contact.

  Male contact.

  When Gideon released me, I sank back in my chair, watching him from beneath heavy eyelids as the thump of sudden attraction swam through my body.

  Dinner arrived on one plate we shared. That was a first for me. So was flirting. Gideon made it easy. He was sexy, sensual, and damn interesting. Everything I wanted in a man, except he wasn’t Michael, the one I wanted most.

  “Are you local?” he asked over coffee, mine decaf of course.

  “I travel a lot.”

  “You look familiar.”

  “Probably just the Irish in me.” I grinned at him just before glimpsing a large figure in my periphery striding closer and closer.

  “I’d like to see you again.” Gideon’s chair scraped against the flagstones as he leaned in, practically fucking hypnotizing me.

  His lips came closer, almost on mine, which I licked in anticipation.

  Suddenly Michael—fucking Michael!—planted his fists on the table.

  “Liam,” his hard voice came out like a growl.

  I jolted back in my seat almost knocking the fucking tiny thing off its legs.

  Gideon’s hand lingered on my thigh as if he couldn’t care less who this big blond man was, towering over us.

  I released a low groan—half frustration, half temptation—wondering just how much Michael had witnessed. Fumbling in my pocket for my wallet, I dislodged Gideon’s warm touch.

  He continued to be unperturbed by Michael’s interruption and his unswerving blank black glare.

  Standing with a slinky casualness that only highlighted Michael’s stiff posture, he offered his hand. “Gideon Marks. Pleasure to meet you.”

  Michael shook it as his jaw throbbed. “Likewise. Absolutely.” Dropping Gideon’s hand like it was a piece of rank trash, he turned his annoyance on me. “We’ve been looking for you all afternoon and evening.”

  “Looks like you found me.” I slapped a wad of bills on the table.

  “I’m just watching out for your best interests,” Michael hissed.

  Which includes not ever getting my cock blown again. Mikey has more in common with Devlin than he thinks.

  “I don’t need a goddamn minder. And you can mind your own damn business after the week I’ve had.”

  Michael’s normally light eyes flipped wide before narrowing into slate-colored slits of suppressed fury. “In that case, I’ll wait outside.”

  “Do that.”

  As Michael retreated through t
he restaurant, I glanced at Gideon. He had a half-formed smile on his lips.

  “He’s intense.” He shoved my money at me and put a credit card on the table. He also took out a pen, not a perfect business card, and scribbled his name and number on a napkin he pushed into my pants pocket. “It looks like a rough road for you so if you ever want to talk, call me . . . I won’t lie, Liam, I’d love to fuck you, but I’ve been there.”

  I went in for a handshake but Gideon disarmed me again, pulling me into a hug. A prolonged hug as new electric arousal thundered through me. His warm lips trailed up my throat and across my jaw where he lightly nipped me. I held onto him a moment longer, submerged in the feel of a man against me. A man who clearly wanted me without reservations or any fucking mind games to mess with me.

  I didn’t look back when I left the café, and I sure as hell didn’t look forward to explaining things to Michael. There was most certainly a slight reddening on my neck from Gideon’s soft stubble when I met Michael on the sidewalk.

  “What the fuck are you doing, Liam?” He started right in, and here I’d thought he was in my corner.

  “Eating. Food. You know, the delicious, digestible kind.” I pulled on my jacket. “Oh, and we talked. It was crazy. I actually had a real conversation with a person who isn’t on my payroll.”

  “I talk to you.” His cheeks tinged pink.

  “About boxing and bullshit.”

  Michael swore a low curse and started off down the road at a fast clip. Lengthening my strides, I caught up with him, shoving my hands in my pockets.

  “Get his number?” The side of Michael’s jaw pulsed and he glared straight ahead.

  “Matter of fucking fact, I did. Gideon’s a pretty talented painter. I might buy one for my apartment.”

  “Hmmf.”

  Michael was ripshit pissed for some reason as with every mention of Gideon’s name his anger notched higher.

  Subway, silence, trouble brewing.

  Or maybe a possible flash of attraction from Michael toward me I was interested in exploring the hell out of until we caught sight of Devlin. Waiting outside my door per usual. With a gorgeous blonde woman at his side, presumably available to relieve my tension.