Page 47 of Craving the Edge

I knew his world. The fame, the money, the constant motion. It was just sex. A desperate scratch for an itch that’d been burning for weeks.

But the memory of his hands on my skin, his fingers inside me, his cock… I swallowed hard. The low murmur of his voice against my ear, and the simple act of waking up tangled in his sheets… It all felt dangerous. I’d given in. So what the hell was I supposed to do now?

I shook my head hard, shaking the memories loose. It was no good.

“Get a grip, Char,” I muttered.

The reality of Monday morning came flooding back in. I was in the gym’s office, shaking the place down. I yanked open another drawer of Gary’s disaster of a desk. A mountain of unopened mail, faded takeaway menus, and betting slips were shoved inside.

Gary still wasn’t here. His phone had gone straight to voicemail this morning, same as it had Saturday, same as it had Sunday.

Guilt churned in my gut. While I’d been letting Declan fuck me stupid, I should’ve been chasing Gary down. I’d lost a whole weekend I could’ve spent calling his usual haunts, ringing hospitals, the police, and every number in the phone book. Instead, I’d let myself be distracted by my fucking pussy.

The gym was blessedly quiet. Declan had texted me last night that he wouldn’t be training today. He had another appointment with a specialist about his hand. A part of me was disappointed, but the empty space on the gym floor was the reprieve I needed to get my head on straight.

I shoved a pile of receipts into a bin bag. This was my world. Overdue bills, a missing boss, and the constant, grinding work of keeping this place from imploding. I had to find Gary and figure out how deep a hole he’d dug this time…before someone else came looking.

I rifled my way through the last of Gary’s desk drawers. Under a crusty collection of pens and paperclips, I found a dog-eared warranty slip for a rowing machine we’d sold for scrap two years ago. Beside it, an instruction manual for a leg press that’d been gathering dust in the corner since I started here. I tossed them aside. They joined a growing pile of useless papers on the floor. Old invoices marked paid in Gary’s looping scrawl. Bugger all else.

There was nothing. No ledgers, no notebooks, no damning receipts hidden away in panic. For the first time in his useless life, the prick had actually been clever. He’d lived like a slob, letting the gym’s real paperwork pile up for me to handle, but he’d made certain his own dirt was buried somewhere I couldn’t dig it up.

“Fuck.”

He’d left me in the dark. I was standing in the middle of a disaster he’d created, and I couldn’t see the edges of it. Fighter’s Edge was an easy target and if he owed money, this was the first place they’d come looking. I had no idea who Gary owed, how much he owed, or how long I had until they came to collect.

My frustration boiled over as I shoved the loose papers back into the drawer, not caring as they creased and tore. I couldn’t fix this. I couldn’t even start to fix this.

I went back out to the front desk, sinking into my chair. The gym was silent. No music, no thud of gloves on leather, no clink of weights being lifted.

My eyes unfocused, fixed on a scuff mark on the linoleum near the door. Ten minutes bled away. I didn’t move. My thoughts circled the drain. A brick through the front window. A phone call from a blocked number with a voice that didn’t waste time with pleasantries. A van waiting in the car park after dark. Thugs coming to smash the place up. The scenarios played out, each one worse than the last.

“Earth to Char. You in there?”

I jumped, my heart lurching. Billie stood on the other side of the desk, gym bag slung over one shoulder, her brow furrowed with concern.

I hadn’t heard the door. “Jesus, Billie. Don’t sneak up on me.”

“I walked in like a normal person,” she said. “You were a million miles away. Everything alright?”

“Fine,” I said. I wasn’t, of course. I was swimming in shit I couldn’t see the bottom of, and the one thing I could always count on—my focus—was gone. Gone since Declan Walsh had walked through that door and kissed me senseless in the office. Since I’d gone to his place and he’d made me come at least six times in the space of twenty-four hours. It was a wonder I hadn’t burst a blood vessel in my brain I’d come so hard.

A slow, knowing grin spread across Billie’s face. The look was so perceptive it was almost indecent.

She leaned her forearms on the desk, her voice lowering. “So, was he any good?”

Heat flooded my cheeks. A hot blush that started in my chest and climbed all the way to the roots of my hair. “Don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Oh, I think you do.” She laughed, the sound bright in the empty gym. “That’s the first time I’ve ever seen you blush, Cookie. He must’ve been something special to finally crack your walls.”

I hated that stupid nickname. I hated the way my body betrayed me. Most of all, I hated how exposed I felt on my own turf. The one place I was supposed to be in command.

Her teasing tone softened. “Hey. I’m just stirring. Seriously, though. Good for you. It’s about time you did something for yourself. Something that isn’t about running this place or cleaning up whatever new mess Gary’s made. You deserve to get laid by a ridiculously hot fighter, you know.” She grabbed her bag. “Now it’s time for some pain.” She nodded towards the gym. “I know you don’t want to spill on the details, but if you want to spill on the details…”

I sighed. “Billie.”

She laughed again. “Okay, okay, I’m going…”

Billie headed for the change rooms, leaving me alone. Her words hung around, though. You deserve it. The thought felt like a language I didn’t speak. I watched the door swing shut behind her and grappled with the absurd idea that she might be right.