I oblige and knock Kirk down on the canvas with a hard thump. Yells erupt all over.
The ringmaster grabs and lifts my arm, and I swing my head to look at her, curious to see the look on her face. I’m panting and possibly bleeding, but none of that matters. All that matters to me is checking her the fuck out. Did she fucking see how I knocked him out? Is she even impressed, or not?
She returns my stare, and my gut twists all around. God, she’s making me hard. She wears these nice clothes, and I swear she’s the classiest thing I’ve ever seen in a place like this. Still, whatever she’s wearing, it’s too much and needs to come off.
“REMY! REMY! REMY! REMY!” people yell.
Their chants grow in intensity while her startled golden eyes devour me like I’m devouring her.
“You want more Remy?” the announcer happily asks the crowd. “All right then, people! Let’s bring out a worthier opponent for Remington Riptide Tate tonight!”
Hell, they can bring out anything they want, man or monster.
I’m so primed, I could take a couple at once.
In my peripherals, I’ve got her pinned down, nice and tight. In that frilly shirt. Those body-hugging pants. I’ve already cataloged her at about 120 pounds and five feet seven, at least a head shorter than me. In my head, I’m already measuring her breasts in my hands and tasting her skin with my tongue. Suddenly, I notice she whispers something to her friend, rises to her feet, and takes off down the aisle.
“And now, to challenge our reigning champion, ladies and gentlemen, is Parker ‘the Terror’ Drake!”
I stare in disbelief as she walks off, and a knot coils tight around my gut as the rest of my body tightens in preparation to chase.
The crowd comes alive as Parker takes the ring, and all I can do is watch her leave my arena while every molecule in my body screams at me to go get her.
The bell rings, and I don’t play the little feinting and waiting game that me and my opponents always do. I stare into Parker’s face and give him a look that says, Sorry, dude, and go straight for the slam and knock him down.
He falls splat and doesn’t move.
The crowd is stunned into silence. The announcer takes a moment to speak as I wait, frustrated as fuck, my heart pounding in anticipation as I wait for Parker to stay down and the counting to begin.
It begins.
Come on, motherfuckers . . .
I’m fucking winning the championship this year and I won’t be disqualified . . .
Just call it a knockout and let her hear . . .
TEN!
“Holy cow, that was fast! We have a KO! Yes, ladies and gentlemen! A KO! And in record time, our victor once again, I give you, Riptide! Riptide, who’s now jumping off the ring and—where the hell are you going?”
The crowd goes crazy as I land on my feet on the aisle and their screams follow me all the way to the lobby. They are screaming for me while my body is screaming for me to catch her. “Riptide! Riptide!”
My heart pumps like crazy. She’s walking fast, but I’m fucking running. Every one of my senses demands I chase, capture, and have this girl. I grab her wrist and spin her around.
“What the—” she gasps, her eyes wide in shock.
She’s so beautiful my lungs freeze. Smooth forehead, long lashes with spiky tips—those gold eyes, that dainty nose, and those marshmallow lips. I need to taste that like yesterday. My mouth waters as a wild, primitive hunger opens up inside me.
“Your name,” I growl. Her wrist is tiny in my hand, fragile, but I’m not about to let go. Oh, no.
“Uh, Brooke.”
“Brooke what?” I snap, tightening my hold.
Her scent works me into a lather. I need to find the source of that scent. The back of her ears? Her hair? Her neck?
She tries to pry her hand free but I tighten my hold because she’s not going anywhere but my bedroom.
“It’s Brooke Dumas,” a voice behind me says, and then the crazy friend who was with her throws off a number, which my idiot brain doesn’t grasp, for I’m still hung up on her name.
Brooke Dumas.
My lips curl as I meet that pretty gold gaze. “Brooke Dumas,” I say gruffly out loud, slow and deep, my tongue twisting around the name as I savor it. Such a strong, classy fucking name.
Her eyes widen in shock—and she gives me a hungry, doe-eyed look that lets me see she’s a little excited but a little afraid.
It makes me crazed. I need to touch, smell, taste, claim. I burn with the need to tell her she should be afraid of me, and at the same time, all I want is to pet my hand down her long hair and promise her I’ll be her protector.
Yielding to the impulse, I slide my fingers into the nape of her neck, fighting to be gentle so that she won’t run, while only one thought remains in my head: Take. Her.
My gaze never leaving hers, I set a dry kiss on her lips, slowly, trying not to scare her, but just so she knows who I am, and who I will be for her.
“Brooke,” I say against her soft lips, then I draw back with a smile. “I’m Remington.”
Her eyes meet mine, and they’re metallic gold and liquid with something I recognize as wanting. My smile fades as I look down at her mouth again. It’s so pink and soft I bend my head to take it even more deeply. My blood rushes through my veins as her scent drowns me. I want this woman. I can’t wait one more second without tasting her, taking her.
One second she’s warm and trembling in my arms, quietly tipping her head back for more, and the next, the crowd engulfs us and some fucking lunatic is screaming in my ear.
“Remy! I FUCKING LOVE YOU! Remy!”
Brooke Dumas seems to snap into motion and quickly squirms free.
“No.” I reach out to snatch up a piece of her white shirt. But she and her friend wind through the throng like wiggly little bunnies, and I’m in the crowd stuck with two fans who—
“Riptide, my god, please let me touch your cock.”
“Riptide, you can take us both together!”
As they rub their hands down my abs, I think, FUCK! and pry their arms away, then I charge after her. When I reach the elevator, the gate is shut and I hear her noisily ascending up to street level.
“Remy!”
“Remington!”
Growling in anger, I slam my palm to the closed door, then dodge an incoming group of fans and bulldoze my way back into the locker room.
I don’t know if I’m angry, frustrated, or . . . I don’t know. Where the fuck is she going? She was looking up at me like she wanted me to eat her; I don’t even understand fucking females and never fucking will. Scowling as I charge to get my stuff, I slam my fist into a locker.
“Take care of your knuckles, Tate!” Coach snaps as he gathers all my things into a red duffel.
I loathe being told what to do. So I slam my other fist into another locker and dent it like I did the first, then I glare at the old man and grab my headset, my iPod, and a sports drink. Following my crew out to our Escalade, I’m pissed as fuck at myself for letting her go. I try saving her number on my phone, at least the few digits I remember.
“That KO was unbelievable, dude, you knocked him down within three seconds!” Riley says, laughing.
I stare out the window at the lights of Seattle and tap my fingers on my knee.
“All right, so what was that all about? Are we going to discuss the elephant in the car?” asks Pete from up front. “The one with the long hair? You seemed hell-bent on chasing, Rem?”
“I want her watching my next fight.” The car falls silent when they realize I’m fiercely hung up on her.
Pete sighs. “All right, I’ll see what I can do. We also got you a couple of girls.”
“A good assortment,” Riley adds. “A blonde, a brunette, and a redhead.”
And as soon as we get up to the suite, there they are. They’re waiting for me. Three girls with different-colored hair, waiting in next-to-nothing clothes, ready to fuck the Riptide.
Their eyes light up when they see me.
“Get rid of them,” I flatly say, then shut myself off in the master bedroom.
Showering in record speed, I then pull out my laptop and look up Seattle, Brooke Dumas for the rest of her number.
Grabbing my headset, I cover my ears with my Dr. Dre headphones and play loud music while I search, search, search, and then—
Bingo.
Scrolling down, I scan several articles about Brooke Dumas. One claims she’s a sports rehab specialist who interned at a Seattle academy. Prior ones mention her being a track athlete. A sprinter. Odd things happen in my chest. I reread that part, and, yeah. A sprinter.
Now I understand why she’s so lean, athletic, and fast. But she has some curves, the kind of curves I’ve never seen on a sprinter before. I curl my fingers into my palm as I replay how her small, perky breasts rose and fell as she looked up at me. My mouth waters as I remember the way she smelled. Fuck me. On YouTube, I find a video of her during some sort of tryouts. My heart starts whacking hard again when I pull off my headphones and click Play. She wears little shorts. Her hair in a ponytail. And I see her long, lean, muscled legs. My cock swells, and I shift uncomfortably and bend to get a closer inspection as she gets into position. The group shoots off. She starts fast—
Then one of her legs buckles. And she falls. She lays there, on the ground, and starts sobbing as she struggles to stand.
My chest does something weird.
Shit, she’s crying so much her body shakes with it.
Forming fists, I watch her try to hop out of the track on her own, while the asshole spectator who recorded the video just keeps repeating, “Man, her life is over,” again and again.
Camera zooms in on her tear-filled face, and I quickly pause the screen and stare at her. Brooke Dumas. She looks just like she did today, but a little younger, and a whole lot more vulnerable. There’s a little dimple in her chin from her expression, and those gold eyes are so drowned in tears, I can barely see their pretty whiskey color. I start to read the comments beneath the clip, of which there are quite a few.
Iwlormw: Rumors have it she’d been doing cross fit against the advice of her coach and had already tweaked that knee!
Trrwoods: That’s what happens when you don’t prepare properly!
Runningexpert: She was good, but not that great. Lamaske would’ve still kicked the shit out of her in the Olympics.
My stomach boils.
I watch the video again, and my stomach boils even more.
With an angry growl, I toss my sports drink across the room and hear it slam against the wall. I want to destroy everyone making fun of her.
She’d stood there tonight in my arena, trying to raise her walls up to me, and she’d looked proud as a warrioress, like she hadn’t already endured the world watching her fall once already. My chest twists so hard, I can’t breathe right again, and I growl and slam my laptop shut.
Pete raps his knuckles on my door and pushes it open a little. “Rem, you sure you don’t want to partake?”
He widens the gap and gestures at the trio of women behind him, their expectant eyes peering into my bedroom. They collectively sigh and one murmurs, “Please, Riptide . . .”
“Just once?” says the other.
