Follow Me (Caged Hearts Book 3)

This is a work of fiction. Any names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons--living or dead--is entirely coincidental.

Follow Me copyright 2015 by Heather West. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission.

Chapter 1

Jasper fell down against the mat. He spluttered out a shower of warm blood as his entire body throbbed unbearably. His jaw ached from the punch that had just floored him. His mind was screaming at him to get up, to find his feet and throw his own crucial hit, but he remained lifeless on the mat, suddenly unable to co-ordinate his own limbs. He felt like he’d been drugged. How hard had his opponent hit him?

He could hear the distant chants of jeers from the crowd, but they felt far away, like he was hearing them from underwater. Powerless, Jasper remained on the mat. The referee counted to ten excruciatingly slowly. It was over.

“That’s your third loss in as many weeks!” Carl was shouting at him as Jasper was helped from the ring. Despite the pain medication he was overly dosed up on, his body burned with agony.

“Seriously, Jasper, what’s going on?” Carl was by his side as they marched as quickly as they could back towards the dressing room. Cameras flashed like fireworks, capturing Jasper’s humiliation.

“I don’t…I don’t know,” Jasper winced and tried to shield his eyes from the glare of the flashes.

“You don’t know,” Carl replied sarcastically. “Well that’s just great, isn’t it?”

Once in the dressing room, the sounds of the baying crowd almost faded away completely. With a sigh, Jasper dropped down on to the sofa. All he wanted to do was sleep. He was too exhausted to even be upset about this latest loss.

“What was that out there?” Carl demanded, pointing towards the closed door. “You totally bombed out there, Jasper!”

Jasper could only groan in response.

“This isn’t like you!” Carl continued. “Haven’t you been hitting the gym as hard? What gives?”

Jasper let his head fall in to his hands. He’d been training harder than ever. Despite his bad knee, he was at the gym seven days a week pushing himself almost to the breaking point. Even his trainer feared that Jasper was over doing it. But still he pushed. The first loss had spurred Jasper into action. He couldn’t risk another. But then two losses later, he was beginning to fear that he had nothing left to give.

“Is it the girl, is she the problem?” Carl asked with a sour look.

“No!” Jasper instantly snapped, looking up. “Of course not.”

Kait currently felt like the only good thing in his life. Each night when he curled up by her side, it made the pain of his earlier loss easier to bare. She was fast becoming his rock. Without her, he feared he’d succumb too easily to his own misery.

“Because we need some wins,” Carl told him flatly. “And we need them bad.”

“Don’t you think I know that?” Jasper winced as he spoke. It hurt to be angry. It hurt to even breathe. Every muscle in his body burned in protest with every movement he made. Perhaps it was time to step away from the ring, to think about what he should do next with his life.

“You’ve got commitments!” Carl enthused, as if sensing Jasper’s line of thought. “You’ve got fans and sponsors relying on you, Jasper. Don’t you go forgetting that.”

“I won’t,” Jasper felt his shoulders slump from the weight of it all.

“Good,” Carl smoothed down his tie and glanced nervously towards the door to the dressing room.

“She’ll be here in a minute,” Jasper told him. He knew who Carl was waiting on. When Kait arrived, it was his cue to leave.

“She’d better not be the problem,” Carl threatened.

“She’s not the problem,” Jasper sighed, “she’s the solution.”

Chapter 2

Kait checked herself in the mirror to ensure that she didn’t look too upset. The anguished tears she’d shed when she’d watched Jasper fall to the mat like a toppled tree had been carefully wiped away, her makeup reapplied. The crowd around her had held their breath as Jasper suffered another devastating loss. He looked so battered and broken as he fell at the feet of his opponent. It was killing Kait to see him go through it, to see him suffer like he was.

Satisfied with her appearance, she left the toilets and walked in the direction of the dressing rooms. The burly security men let her by with a smile and a stiff nod.

“He’s had it tough tonight,” they commented kindly.

“Yeah,” Kait agreed. “But he’ll turn it around. He always does.”

She felt the part of the loving, supportive girlfriend. People knew who she was and why she was backstage. She was no longer Jasper’s secret; he’d finally shared her with the world.

Raising a hand, she knocked briskly on the dressing room door. When it opened, Carl was staring at her, looking angry. He always looked angry; she was convinced he just didn’t like her.

“How is he?” Kait inquired politely.

“How do you think?” Carl retorted as he stepped past her to leave the room. “He’s defeated.”

Pursing her lips with concern, Kait walked over to Jasper who was sat on the sofa, still wearing his blood stained shorts.

“Hey,” Kait carefully sat down beside him and placed a hand on his knee.

“Hey,” Jasper greeted her in his deep, velvety voice.

“You took a real beating out there tonight.”

“Yeah,” Jasper sighed and turned to look at her, revealing a deep gash above his right eye which would surely need stitches.

“I think we need to get you to a hospital,” Kait said anxiously as she peered closer to assess the wound.

“I’m fine,” Jasper promised her unconvincingly, reaching for her face and cupping it in his strong hands. He didn’t kiss like a defeated man. He kissed her hard and deep like she was the oxygen he needed to survive.

“Well, at least your spirits aren’t too dampened,” Kait gasped as their lips parted.

“All I need is to see you to perk up again,” Jasper smiled. Kait wanted to lose herself in the moment with him, but she couldn’t stop fretting about the deep cut oozing blood down his cheek.

“We’re going to the hospital,” she told him. “No arguing.”

“Yes, Mum,” Jasper mocked.

“I’m serious, Jasper. You need to take care of yourself. Especially…” her voice trailed off.

“Especially when I’m getting my ass kicked every night,” Jasper completed her sentence for her.

“I didn’t mean,” Kait lowered her head and folded her hands in her lap.

“Yeah, you did,” Jasper said softly. “And you’re right. I need to glue myself back together so that next week someone else can pull me apart.”

“Jasper - ”

“I just don’t get it.” Jasper was staring blankly at the far wall of the brightly lit room. “I put in the hours at the gym, I eat right and sleep well. Yet the moment I step out in to the ring, it’s like all my energy just drains out of me, and I’m useless.”

“You’re just overdoing it,” Kait stroked his arm fondly. “Give yourself a few weeks off to heal.”

“I can’t,” Jasper shook his head fiercely and began to stand up. He wavered on his feet, and for a split second, Kait feared he might topple.

“Hospital, now,” Kait said firmly, reaching for her phone and calling his driver before he could protest.

Chapter 3

Jasper felt woozy from the pain killers he’d been given at the hospital. The cut above his eye had needed an impressive six stitches. Not that he could feel any of them. He was blissfully numb as he sat sprawled out on his plush leather sofa watching the football highlights on the television. Kait was curled up beside him reading a book, her hair falling over her face making her appear even more angelic than usual.

Lately they’d been spending more time at his apartment, which made sense as it was considerable larger than Kait’s place.

“Woah,” she’d exclaimed when she’d first visited, “you could easily fit my place in here at least six times.” Which was probably true.

Jasper actually liked having her there. She made the large rooms feel less empty and impersonal. At night, they curled up together in his grand bed, and each morning Kait insisted on making him breakfast. His kitchen had never known so much use. The evenings no longer felt endless as Jasper wasn’t alone. Together he and Kait would watch movies, take long bubble baths in his grand tub and just relax together. It was bliss.

“How are you feeling?” Kait peered up from her book to look at him.

“Like I just did ten rounds with iron man,” Jasper said with a light laugh.

“You should consider what the doctor said,” Kait advised. The doctor, in his most serious voice had advised Jasper to cut back on fighting for the time being. It was advice Jasper had heard before, about how his body needed time to heal, that he wasn’t a young man anymore.

But while his body wasn’t willing, his mind certainly was. Jasper was determined to fell the euphoria of victory again no matter what. And Carl was right; he had people who depended on him like his fans and sponsors. People who needed him to keep on, to never give up.

“I’m not ready to bow out yet, Kait.” He told her.

“I’m not saying bow out,” Kait placed her book down in her lap. “I’m just saying take your foot off the gas for a bit. Why don’t we go away, the two of us? Somewhere hot with white sandy beaches!”

“That sounds nice,” Jasper admitted. He wanted to escape with Kait to her fantasy holiday. The thought of seeing her in a bikini aroused him.

“You got one of those little string bikini things?” He asked with a flirtatious smile.

“Jasper!” Kait sounded appalled, but the way her lips curled at the end suggested otherwise. “Trust you to instantly think of that!”

“What?” Jasper laughed, “So you’re telling me that you don’t fantasize about me coming out of the ocean, water dripping down my rock hard abs…”

A pillow thrown from Kait connected with his face.

“Hey!” Jasper promptly threw it back to her side of the sofa. “You want to watch it? Injured man over here!”

He gestured up to his stitches.

“Hmm,” Kait eyed him with a smirk and then picked her book back up. “For such an injured man, you’re a little too keen to keep fighting.”

“It’s all I know,” Jasper told her sadly, his gaze back on the television screen hanging on the wall before them.

“Well, maybe it’s time you got to know something else,” Kait suggested brightly.

“I don’t want to know anything else,” Jasper shook his head. He was starting to feel the tightness of the stitches. His pain medication was wearing off quicker than he’d have liked. He rather enjoyed being cocooned in a pleasant numbness. “I’m a fighter, Kait. It’s a label that has always suited me, one I don’t want to surrender, not yet.”

“What if you keep losing your fights?” She delivered the question carefully, aware of how dangerous it might be. Jasper sighed and wiped a hand down his face. He tried not to feel too hurt by her words; she was only being honest and looking out for him. But she proposed a painful truth – what if he never won again? Was this how he wanted to go out, as a loser? Wasn’t it better to go out on top as a champion? But if he wanted to go out on top, he had no choice but to keep fighting, to keep getting in the ring. He needed some meteoric wins to erase his decent defeats from the minds of his fans and those in the industry.

“I can’t keep losing fights,” he told Kait, his voice brimming with determination. “I can’t go out this way. I need to get back on top. Then I can think about my next step and those white sandy beaches you mentioned.”

“Okay.”

“And until then,” Jasper was leaning across the sofa, reaching for her, wearing his most flirtatious grin. Kait wiggled out of his reach though she was smirking playfully. “How about we go in to the bedroom for a throw down of our own?”

“Why go in the bedroom?” Kait purred the words, and Jasper he feared he might melt. “We’ve got a perfectly good sofa right here,” she was seductively running a hand up her own leg.

“Urgh,” Jasper groaned with longing. “Get over here.”