AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Digging Josh’s piece of paper out of my pocket, I give it to him. Perry’s lips press together, and he shoves the paper into my hand.
“All right. Paddy Flynn.”
I relax, letting him tow me through the crowd. He’s going to take me to Paddy Flynn. Thank god.
Craning my head, trying to see what this Paddy Flynn will look like, I’m barely paying attention to where Perry is leading me.
My feet stumble to an inelegant halt when Perry stops moving. We are in front of the makeshift ring. In the front row. There are seats here, unlike at the back where everyone is standing, crowding around.
Perry seizes my upper arms, forcibly seating me in an empty chair between a wicked good-looking brunette guy and an equally hot ash-blonde guy.
They both turn to look at us, their eyes darting between Perry and me. Perry ignores the blonde guy, looking at the dark-haired one.
“Fitzy,” Perry nods stiffly to him. “No one touches her.”
As soon as Fitzy nods, Perry turns, disappearing. I suppose he is at work. He must have things to do. This Fitzy looks me over frankly, his eyes showing zero interest. I’m not surprised. There aren’t many women here, but those dotted around the space are certified stunners.
His uninterested perusal of me finished, Fitzy turns his attention back to the fight in the ring. Flushing, I quickly lock my eyes on the fight, too, wincing immediately. It’s brutal. The ring is blood-splattered, and I don’t think all of it was from this battle currently waging.
Wincing again as bone crunches against bone, I fight the urge to look away. Josh told the rules once. He didn’t want to, but I pestered him until he caved. They’re wicked horrifying. Bare-knuckle. No biting, no eye-gouging, no nut shots – everything else goes.
There aren’t any rounds either. It’s survival of the fittest. Continuous fighting until it’s over by knockout or submission. Josh always came home bruised and bloody, even when he won. When he lost, sometimes he didn’t come home until the next day, when he had regained consciousness.
The guy who loses this fight doesn’t submit. He really should have, but he obviously has his pride. Well, he did. I’m not sure how much of it is left when he’s dragged unconscious from the ring with his face a pummeled mess… but what do I know? The crowd seems to appreciate it, so I suppose that’s all that matters.
As we watch the brutal fights, the reason Perry seated me with these guys becomes clear. Though initially annoyed he hadn’t introduced me to Paddy Flynn like I asked, at least he’s seated me with the Irish.
The sandy blonde and strawberry blonde men in the row behind us have thick Irish accents. Fitzy has a brogue when he’s really worked up and yelling, and the ash blonde on my other side seems to be able to turn his brogue on and off, depending on how good-looking the woman he’s flirting with is.
“Who the fuck are you?” he asks me, his accent straight Boston.
I shrug, my tongue suddenly thick in my mouth. Ash-blonde squints at me, waiting with slowly raising eyebrows for me to speak. Perry clearly sat me here because these guys know Paddy Flynn, and Josh said Paddy Flynn was an enforcer for the Boston Irish Mafia. So that means these guys must be mafia.
That knowledge doesn’t exactly inspire feelings of conversation. My tongue is still swollen in my mouth. Shit. Ash-blonde will melt my face with the glare slowly emerging if I don't speak soon.
“Lucky, you place your bets yet?”
I’m saved by the swarthy, middle-aged guy who stops to talk to Ash-blonde. He shifts in his seat, twisting to speak to the guy standing beside him. I catch a glimpse of the butt of his gun sticking out of the waistband of his jeans at the back.
It’s not exactly a relaxing realization, but I think I might be in the right place. A bunch of armed Irishmen sitting ringside at an illegal fight? I’ve definitely found the Irish Mafia.
Ash-blonde, orLuckyas I now know him to be called, hands the guy an eye-watering stack of cash.
“Do I even need to ask?” the guy chuckles.
“Not if ye value yer life.”
They laugh, but I feel Lucky might only have been half-joking. He has his Irish brogue back, but his eyes aren’t laughing when his mouth does.
The guy pockets the cash. “All on Flynn, then.”
Nodding, the guy leaves, and Lucky turns back to me, his narrowed eyes fixing on my face again. I swallow, gamely meeting his eyes, hoping my shaking knees aren’t obvious to anyone but me.
“Seriously, who are you?” Lucky asks me again, nudging me with his arm. Fitzy tears his eyes from the ring, looking over my head at his compatriot.
“Strictly hands off this one, Lucky,” he drawls, turning his attention back to the ring, where a truly massivemonsterof a man climbs in.
“Jaysus feck, that’s a big lad,” Strawberry blonde behind me mutters.
