Page 6 of Dominate

I don’t plan to turn my head. It happens anyway, the way you flinch when a glass hits the floor.

Dan comes in first, all tailoring and cold posture. Two men in matching gray jackets flank him. Behind them, Zane walks in like the carpet was laid out just for him.

He’s taller than I figured. On tape, everyone shrinks to the same size against the cage, but here, in a room with ceilings and chairs and other human beings to measure him against, he goes on for a while. Broader through the shoulders, too. Charcoal suit, no tie, collar open at the throat, hair pushed back off a face built out of hard edges.

His eyes cross the room like a man checking his watch. Bored. Unimpressed. Amber, even from here. They pass over Victor, over Theo, over the reporters clawing for a good angle.

They reach me.

They stop.

Just for a heartbeat, something crosses his face. His stride hitches, barely, like a man who’s missed a step in the dark. His lips part. Then it’s gone, smoothed over so fast I might have invented it, and he keeps walking.

My pulse slams against my collar.

Adrenaline. That’s all. Months of hearing his name, six months of studying his footwork, and now the body in front of me. Of course my heart’s going. I’d worry if it weren’t.

Zane climbs the steps, takes the chair at the other end of the table, and unbuttons his jacket in one effortless motion. The chair creaks under him. He doesn’t look my way.

I study him. That’s the job.

“Let’s start with opening statements,” the moderator says, a woman in a headset, her voice like a blade wrapped in silk. “Micah, you’re up first.”

I lean toward the microphone. The room waits.

“Thanks. Good to be here.” My voice comes out steadier than I feel. “I want to say hello to my coach, Victor Kaine, who found me when I was a kid running scared, and to my whole team at Oath. Most of them are sitting right there in the third row looking like they’re about to sell you insurance.”

Laughter ripples through the room. Cruz tugs his too-short sleeve and grins.

“Where I come from, you get two options,” I say. “Neither one’s great. Oath gave me a third. It gave me a place to put everything I had, and somebody who told me it was worth something.” I glance at the crowd. “So when I step into that cage, I’m not only carrying my name. I’m carrying every kid who walked in scared and left believing they could do this.”

The pause after I finish lasts a beat too long. Then a scatter of applause, awkward at first and then real.

I look up, and Zane is watching me.

Not the crowd, not his coach. Me. His elbows rest on the table, one hand loose over the other, and his stare has weight. Then the moderator turns to him, and his gaze slides away as if it had never been there.

“Zane,” she says. “Your opening statement.”

“I don’t make speeches.” His voice is deeper than it sounds on tape, flat and unhurried. “I make weight, and I make finishes. See you in eight weeks.”

Two lines. Three seconds. Half the room laughs, the other half scribbles. Dan’s mouth curves like he’s paid for the performance.

“Questions from the floor,” the moderator says.

A man in the second row shoots up. “Zane, six months ago you called Oath MMA a rainbow charity case. Do you stand by that?”

The room goes still. Every camera swings.

Zane leans back, takes his time, and laces his fingers over his stomach. “I don’t remember the exact phrasing.”

“You said it on a podcast.”

“Then I’m sure it was a good sound bite.” His eyes flick toward me, and this time they hold. “I don’t fight gyms. I fight men. Ask me again after.”

“Rivera,” the reporter calls, twisting toward me. “Response?”

I could take the bait. Victor’s rule number one is already vibrating in my ribs.