Page 15 of Meet Me In The Dark

“Jesus,” I grunt, staggering back with a hiss.

“You drop your left again, I’ll do worse,” Mateo says, not even winded. He’s sixty-eight, bald, and built like a brick wall. Moves like one, too.

“I was breathing,” I snap, wiping sweat off my forehead.

“Don’t breathe like a rookie then,” he fires back. “Again.”

We circle each other in the ring, and I let my bodymove on instinct.

Jab, jab, pivot, duck. Right hook.

The thwack of my glove meeting his pads is the only sound besides our feet scuffing the mat.

This is the place my parents dragged me when I was one suspension away from giving up. I’d come home with black eyes and busted lips, fists still clenched, and angry. Always angry. Angry at everyone and no one. It scared the shit out of my mother, so my father called in a favor. Mateo took one look at me—almost six feet of lean rage at only fifteen while wearing a stolen hoodie—and said, “Get in the ring.”

Nineteen years later and four inches taller, I’m still here three times a week without fail.

I don’t come here because I have to.

I come because I need to.

“Again,” Mateo barks, and I react before I think.

Ten minutes later, I’m gasping for air, with my ribs sore and my shirt sticking to my back as I step out of the ring and yank off my gloves. Mateo tosses me a water bottle with all the grace of a man who once threw me out of the building for disrespecting his floors.

“You’re slowing down,” he says.

I take a long drink of water. “We both know that’s bullshit. You’re just getting old.”

He grunts and wanders back toward his office while I head for the locker room and strip off my soaked shirt. The water pressure in the showers is still shit, but it gets the job done. I scrub fast, pull on a fresh suit, and run a hand through my damp hair.

On my way out, I loop through the gym, nodding to a few familiar faces already on the floor. It’s barely seven a.m., but I like having the place to myself before it fills up.

The drive into the city is smooth for once, which isgood, because I’m surviving on three hours of sleep. My brain hasn’t shut off since I left the womb, and lately, it’s been worse. Too many moving parts. Too many decisions. I’m building a goddamn empire, but it means nothing if I can’t get five uninterrupted hours without thinking about every potential crack in the foundation.

By the time I pull into the underground garage at Blackwood & Calloway Holdings, the ache in my ribs has settled in, and I’m already mapping out today’s meetings in my head.

The building looks nice—glass, steel, all the corporate polish—but it’s just a placeholder until construction begins on the new headquarters. Well, it will once everything goes according to plan and we finally choose an architect.

When I step off the elevator onto the executive floor, the energy changes. People move faster here.

I stride past the assistant desks, dodging a delivery guy holding a tray of green juices and one terrified intern who almost drops his tablet when he sees me.

I laugh to myself because between me and my business partner, Nathan, I’m the nicer one.

“Great suit,” Avery calls, ready with her usual sharp wit as she falls into step beside me.

“Great face,” I reply without missing a beat.

“Aww. You too, boss.”

Avery has been my assistant for four years. She’s intelligent, ruthless, and alarmingly organized. I’d die for her, but I’d never say it out loud.

“HR hates us,” she adds casually.

“I’m aware.”

“They sent me an email about inappropriate workplace greetings.”