another fight. And with a smile and a nod of his head, the guy in charge waved the next fighter into the ring with Gage. Apparently, this wasn’t the kind of place that worked off brackets. No winner-against-winner here, Gage was going again.
Hope groaned and closed her eyes, but she couldn’t keep them that way for long. Not with the sound of flesh on flesh ringing in her ears again. Her overactive imagination was far worse than watching the beating. She cracked one eyelid.
Like before, Gage played with the guy for a few minutes, sizing him up. He took a few shots and gave a few back. It was clear, at least to her, that Gage had his opponent’s number. So it surprised her when he left himself wide open for an uppercut beneath the chin. His back hit the floor with a resounding crack.
A man close to her groaned. He passed a handful of bills across to another guy wearing a gleeful grin. Gage didn’t move. The crowd was thick enough that she couldn’t tell if he was unconscious or just stunned.
Her heart fluttered uncomfortably in her chest, an echo of the panic she’d felt when news of his capture had come into the newsroom just a couple weeks before.
Here she’d thought his rescue would cure her of the unwanted reaction. Apparently not.
Hope fought against the mass of people, trying to get closer to the side of the ring. The breath she hadn’t realized she was holding leaked slowly from her parted lips when he finally started to stir. His hands spread wide on the floor and he pushed upward. His head hung between those straining shoulders, as if it were too heavy for him to hold up.
Her gaze searched him for signs of serious injury. She jostled the handful of men standing between her and the ring. She yelled, demanding they let her through, and slapped at the ones who didn’t listen.
Gage finally picked up his head. His gaze connected with hers through the flimsy barrier of ropes. The same punch she always felt hit her, as if she’d been the one taking shots to the solar plexus. But just like always, she ignored it.
Blood trickled from the corner of his mouth. His right eye was already swelling and bruising. Hope’s hands curled around the edge of the ring floor. The sharp pain of a splinter pierced her left palm.
His golden-brown eyes flared with recognition and something warmer before narrowing down to indecipherable slits. He frowned and asked gruffly, “What are you doing here?”
“Looking for you.”
In one lithe movement that belied the fact that he’d just been knocked silly, Gage bounded up from the floor and over the ropes. His feet slapped the dirty cement beside her. Several men around them smacked his back and shoulders, offering encouragement he obviously didn’t need.
The man deserved an Academy Award to go with his other decorations. “You threw the match,” Hope breathed out, the realization hitting at about the same time the shocked words fell from her lips. Why the heck would he do that?
His frown deepened. A few people around them stared and grumbled ominously. Gage grasped her arm and pushed her ahead of him through the crowd.
People parted to let them pass. She glanced back to look at Gage because they sure weren’t moving out of her way. They hadn’t done it any other time she’d slipped through the rowdy crowd. After seeing his expression she had to admit she didn’t blame them. If he’d raked her with that hard, cutting expression she’d have gotten the hell out of the way, too.
And if he hadn’t had a death grip on her upper arm she might have done it now.
Her heel caught on a crack in the floor. Before she could stumble Gage was there, keeping her from twisting an ankle by pulling her back against the wall of his chest.
His hard, sweaty chest. A shiver rocked through Hope. She just hoped he was too preoccupied to notice.
Dumping her out into the chilly February night, he finally let her go. This time she did stumble, letting the building catch her. The metal siding rattled. In the distance a peal of female laughter was cut short.
Gage stood in front of her, his legs planted wide, arms crossed over his chest. Unruly dark brown hair, longer than she’d expected, fluttered in a gust of wind. Hope shivered again, but this time it was because seeing him standing out in nothing but a pair of shorts made her cold. Spring was definitely on the way, but it was still close to forty this late at night. It didn’t seem to bother him. Which bothered her.
He pinned her in place with the glittering intensity of his stare. That was new. And she wasn’t sure she liked it. Where was the laughing, mischievous boy she remembered? The one whose favorite pastime was talking her into things that inevitably got them both in trouble?
Hope gathered herself, crossed her own arms to fight the sudden feeling of being exposed and stared right back.
Gage Harper might be able to intimidate a lot of people, but not her. She knew his darkest secrets—at least the ones from his childhood. She’d seen him cry when his dog was hit by a car. And she knew exactly how to get under his skin.
She didn’t think he’d changed that much in twelve years. So she waited, knowing that saying nothing would eventually drive him crazy. If there was one thing Gage hated, it was silence. He needed action, movement, motion.
It only took a couple minutes for him to ask, “Why?”
“Hello to you, too, Gage. It’s nice to see you home. Yeah, my daddy’s doing fine, thanks for askin’. The cancer scare was difficult, but he’s in remission now,” she answered in the sweetest, kill-you-with-kindness voice she could manage.
He ignored her point and breezed right over the niceties. “Why were you looking for me? And for God’s sake, why here? Do you know how dangerous this place is? Half the guys here are ex-cons and the other half just haven’t gotten caught yet.”
He was exaggerating. So none of the men inside would be up for Teddy Bear of the Year, but some of them had looked decent enough. She might have felt out of place, but not in danger.
“Please. I’m a journalist. I can handle myself.”
Gage laughed. The sound wasn’t what she remembered—his laugh had been loud and deep—but was brittle, with a sharp edge that could have sliced straight through skin. “You are not a journalist.”
Hope jerked at the punch of his words. They shouldn’t have mattered. Who cared what Gage thought? But they did. Probably because he, more than anyone, should have understood how much they would hurt. And maybe he did.
“Running Daddy’s paper hardly qualifies you as a journalist. I’ve been home for two days and haven’t seen your name on a byline yet.”
Hope tried to rein in the temper she could feel bubbling inside her.
“Does my degree from Clemson make me a journalist, then?” she growled.
The minute the words left her mouth she regretted them. She watched as the expression on his face shut down, his eyes going completely blank. He took a single step backward. He didn’t move far, but she realized there was more to the distance than merely putting inches between them.
He’d wounded her on purpose, but she’d done it accidentally. She should have known better. Not getting into Clemson was a sore spot for him. With that single statement she’d brought
