Page 36 of Craving the Edge

It was too early for this shit, but the sooner it was done, the better.

I studied the morning fog that sat between the high-rises of the Melbourne CBD. Below, the slow-moving water of the Yarra wove through the centre, and a train snaked along the edge, pulling into Flinders Street Station. From up here, everything looked so far away and quiet. Everything was fucking quiet, except for the low drone of some breakfast TV host rattling on in the room behind me.

I watched the city wake up, my gut churning at the thought of Rhys barging into my apartment. The throb in my right hand was a constant reminder of the bomb I was about to drop.

“Are you sure about this?”

Tomas’s voice cut through the noise in my head and I turned from the window. He was sprawled on my couch, feet up on the coffee table, a half-eaten bowl of cereal balanced on his stomach.

“Yeah, “ I said. “It has to be today, before this thing gets worse.”

Tomas scraped the last of his cereal from the bowl. “This has something to do with Char, doesn’t it?”

He knew. Of course he knew. He blew out a long breath that told me he was more worried than annoyed.

I flexed my right hand. I couldn’t protect Char, couldn’t fix Gary’s fuck-up, couldn’t do anything real while I was propping up a lie.

“You know what this means,” Tomas said. He sat up, swinging his legs off the table. “You tell Rhys, the Sydney fight is done. He’ll pull you. No way he lets you in the cage with a busted hand.”

“I know.”

“And Tokyo? Mate, you can kiss that title shot goodbye. Vanguard’ll give it to the next fighter in line. You’ll be lucky to get another look-in before you’re thirty-five.”

The reality should’ve hit harder. The title was everything I’d been fighting for, the entire reason for the charade, but the thought of losing it all brought an unexpected relief. It was a clean break from the sport…if I wanted it.

“I’m prepared for that.”

Tomas stood up and walked over, his solid frame blocking the view of the city. He looked at my hand, then back at my face. “If that’s what you want, I’ve got your back.”

The sound of a key turning in the lock cut through the low murmur of the television. Then Rhys strode in, dressed in a navy shirt and tailored trousers, his coat over his arm, his keys and phone in his opposite hand.

He took one look at me by the window and Tomas on the couch, and his expression soured. “What’s so important it required dragging me here at the arse crack of dawn on a Saturday?”

His gaze flicked to the empty cereal bowl on the coffee table. Disapproval radiated from him. Tomas folded his arms over his chest and said nothing.

“Sit your arse down, Rhys,” I drawled.

Rhys’s mouth tightened. He expected me to follow him, to move when he said move, to answer when he snapped his fingers. He didn’t expect to be told what to do. For a second, I thought he might refuse, but he settled on the edge of the armchair opposite the couch. “This had better be good, Declan.”

I held out my right hand. “I have a severe stress fracture. Fourth metacarpal.”

Rhys said nothing. His face, however, went through a rapid-fire sequence I knew all too well. First came the flash of anger that said how could you. It lasted only a second before it was replaced by something far worse. The colour drained from his skin, the exhaustion lines under his eyes deepening into trenches. His mind was already calculating the fallout. The Sydney fight. The sponsors. The broadcast deals.

Terror. That’s what it was. Terror.

He shot to his feet, walked to the window, turned, and started pacing the length of my living room, calculating the losses. He ran a hand through his perfect hair, messing it for the first time I’d seen in the entire time I’d known him.

“How long?” he finally bit out, not looking at me.

I remained still, my gaze fixed on him. Tomas hadn’t moved from his spot on the couch, watching Rhys with narrowed eyes. “A few months.”

Rhys stopped dead in the middle of the room, his back to me. He was processing the sheer scale of the deception. The weeks of training, press appearances, and contract signings, all built on a foundation of pure bullshit.

He turned on me, his face a twisted in disbelief. “Months? Are you fucking kidding me, Declan? Do you have any idea what this means? The network deal for the pay-per-view? The sponsorship clauses? There are penalties, Declan. Massive fucking penalties for pulling out this close to a fight.”

He started to pace like a caged animal in tailored pants, ticking off the catastrophes on his fingers. “Promoters will be furious. We’ll lose the venue deposit. The broadcast rights will have to be renegotiated from scratch, if the Vanguard World Fighting Alliance will even have us back. This will cost us hundreds of thousands in break costs. Millions, maybe.”

The frantic inventory of losses was just noise. A high-pitched whine that I could tune out. The throb in my hand was a dull, simple ache. Nothing more. The lie was gone.