Silver and Chrome: A Bad Boy MC Romance (62 page)

Amber watched nervously
as Joel entered the ring. His opponent had entered first, and had gotten more
cheers from the crowd than he did. Apparently he'd brought more of his own
fans. Amber hadn't been the only one clapping for Joel, but she suspected most
of the others had just been being polite.

The man in the ring with
Joel was Sam Slaughter, and although she knew that wasn't his real name, she
didn't like the connotation. Joel needed a nickname, but she knew him well
enough already to know that he would think that nicknames were stupid. But
still, it had to add some psychological advantage, otherwise why did everyone
else seem to have them.

The bell rung,
signaling
the start of the match
and she looked quickly at the timer on the wall. Ten minutes. He only had to
make it ten minutes with this guy. He can do that. Sam didn't look nearly as
big as Brutus had been. He was smaller than Joel, in fact.

As soon as it had begun,
Sam rushed towards Joel trying to catch him by surprise by grabbing hold of his
midsection. Joel slammed a fist against his attacker's back, but he couldn't
loosen the grip. From what Amber could see, Sam seemed to be trying to squeeze
the air from Joel while kicking at his legs.

With a sudden spin, Joel
tripped and landed hard on his back with Sam on top. Both men scrambled around
on the ground before Joel was able to fling Sam off and kick him in the chest
as he tried to re-mount him. Sam flew backwards, giving Joel enough time to
regain his feet.

Both men began to circle
each other again. Sam once again made a sudden rush at Joel, but this time he
was ready for it. Joel caught the other man as he ducked to try to take Joel
down again, and he was able to wrap one arm around Sam's head. Sam's hands
immediately came up to grab onto Joel's arm to try to pull it off, and she
could see the smaller man struggling.

Suddenly, Joel began to
slam his knee repeated into his opponent as he held him, causing the man to
momentarily move his hands away to try to protect himself. She saw Joel's arm
shift under the other man's neck and he began to lean back. Suddenly, Sam was
slapping wildly against Joel's leg and the bell rung. The referee immediately
ran between the two men and pushed Joel away.

"What
happened," Amber said aloud, unsure why they were separated.

"That Joel guy just
won," said a man to her left, thinking she had been asking him.

"He did? How?"

"Looked like a
Guillotine choke to me. Sam tapped out."

Amber had no idea what a
Guillotine choke was, but she did remember that tapping out was the equivalent
of surrendering. A big smile spread across her face and she looked over at the
clock. There was still over 5 minutes left on it. Joel had won very quickly.

The crowd cheered as the
announcer declared Joel the winner via submission, and Amber anxiously awaited
his return. When he finally emerged from the back, the next match had already
begun but she wasn't paying any attention to it. She swung her arms around him
immediately and gave him a squeeze. He brought his hands around her as well and
she was ecstatic to feel him squeeze her back, although he pulled away pretty
quickly, looking embarrassed at the public display of affection.

"You did it!"
she exclaimed.

"That was only the
first match," he replied. "But yeah." She was happy he allowed
himself to smile back at her, even if it was very slightly.

He settled back down
beside her and quickly focused on the match going on.

"That black guy
favors
his left too much,"
he said.

Amber looked at the fight
in front of him, but she had no idea what Joel was talking about.

"But his opponent
hasn't noticed, he keeps opening himself up to it," he continued.

She did see that one guy
kept getting hit by the other guy, the black man that Joel had mentioned. She
hadn't noticed before, but now that he had pointed it out, he was using his
left hand more often than his right. Not something she generally would pay
attention to, but apparently it was an important enough detail for Joel to
notice.

The match ended with him
continuing to commentate, noting each strength and weakness to her as he saw
them. Most of the time she had no idea what he was talking about, but she
wasn't paying a lot of attention anyway. She was mainly worrying about the next
round. Before she knew it, the first round of matches were over and there were
only eight fighters left.

"Ladies and
gentlemen," the announcer called out. "There will be a fifteen minute
intermission before we start the second round of matches."

Joel paced in the back,
waiting for his name to be called. His first match had ended quickly, but he
knew that the second may not be as easy since his opponent would at least be
good enough to have won his own first match. He had been lucky that Sam had
been so obvious in looking for a takedown, wanting to turn the fight into a
wrestling match. Normally, Joel would have no problem with that, he was very
comfortable on the ground, however with Sam so interested in taking it there,
Joel suspected that his standing game wasn't very strong. He tested his theory
with a couple of knees to the stomach, and was rewarded when Sam flinched
enough to open his neck up for a choke.

Besides, when Sam had
knocked him down the first time, Joel's head had hit the mat. It hadn't hit too
hard, he had made sure to tuck his chin as much as possible, but it was enough
to agitate his injury. If he could avoid doing that again, he'd be happy.

The dojo wasn't posting
the bracket anywhere, so he wasn't sure who he was fighting next, but he had a
pretty good idea about how at least six of the eight remaining fighters fought.
Two of them had moved directly to round two, so he was hoping that he wouldn't
end up with one of those. It may not be a massive advantage to have watched the
other guys fight just that single time, but it was something. He'd take what he
could get.

He heard his name being
called and he took a deep and calming breath before pushing aside the curtain
and making his way to the ring. He was first this time, and he was pretty sure
that he was getting more cheers than he had during match one. Clearly his quick
finish had won over a few fans. But there was only one of them that mattered.
He gave Amber a quick glance as he manoeuvred between the ropes. She smiled
widely and he wondered yet again what he'd done to deserve her attention.

"And his opponent,
from Minneapolis, Minnesota... weighing 230 lbs... Jackson Daily!"

Joel glanced towards the
curtain, and the black man from the fight earlier emerged to start making his
way to the ring. The southpaw.

This second match, as
well as the next one, were both also ten minutes however they were being
separated into two five minute rounds. That made it closer to a real MMA style
match. The final fight would add a third round. He could only hope to make it
that long.

Jackson was in the ring,
and the referee
signaled
them to begin.

The two men started
circling each other, each one throwing out exploratory jabs that were easily blocked
by his opponent. As with his last match, Jackson was
favoring
his left more often. In
response, Joel stepped slightly to his own left, keeping away from Jackson's
power side. As he hoped, Jackson didn't compensate by moving his own stance to
his right to even them up again. Now, whenever Jackson threw his left, it was a
lot easier for Joel to dodge, as well as opening his opponent up in the center.
On Jackson's next attack, Joel ducked to the left and then threw a right,
connecting right in between the guard of Jackson and clocking him right in the
nose.

The black man stumbled
back in surprise and Joel followed up with a forward kick right to the
midsection. Jackson doubled forward but lifted his hands in time to counter
Joel's follow up hook.

Both men stood and
squared off again, but Jackson still wasn't paying enough attention to Joel's
stance and he was once again able to get inside the other man's guard,
delivering yet another blow to his face as he stepped and slid to his left.
This time, however, he also used his leg to slam back into Jackson's calf,
causing the man to buckle down. He recovered quickly, though, and threw a
backhanded punch toward Joel as he passed, hitting him in the back of the head.

Normally, that punch
wouldn't have even fazed him, but Jackson's gloved fist had landed directly on
his previous injury and an instant flash of pain seared through his brain,
causing Joel to stumble forward into the ropes and allow his opponent to
recover and regain his balance. As he pushed off and spun, Joel glanced up at
the clock. There was still over a minute left in this round. The back of his
head felt like it was on fire, and a small trickle on the back of his neck told
him the cut had opened up again.

Jackson sensed that
something was wrong and immediately bounded forward, swinging his left again.
Joel blocked it in time, but only because he knew it was coming. He threw a jab
of his own to counter, but he was slow and it was easily dodged. Jackson threw
a knee forward, connecting with Joel's ribs. He sucked in breath as pain shot
through him, but he was able to deflect the follow up that Jackson threw by
leaning forward and into it, and then grabbing the other man and holding his
arms down in a clinch while he regained his breath.

A few seconds later he
pushed off, his head no longer feeling as dizzy. The clock was at 30 seconds
left. Neither man was able to land anything significant before the bell rang to
signal the end of the match. Joel would have 2 minutes to rest before the start
of the next round.

He went over to his
corner and was surprised to see Amber there.

"What are you doing
here?" he asked.

"The other guy has
someone in his corner," she said, with a nod of her head. He looked over
and saw someone applying a cloth to the back of Jackson's neck to cool him
down.

"Well, that's
probably his trainer. It's not supposed to be a social break."

Amber ignored him.
"How's your head. It's bleeding."

"He got a lucky hit,
square in the center of it. Hurts like a bitch, but I'll be fine."

"Turn around, let me
take a look."

Joel looked at her
dubiously, but turned around nonetheless. He felt her press something up
against it and he sucked in a breath as she pushed firmly against it.

"What are you doing
back there?"

"There were towels here,
I'm just applied a bit of pressure to stop the bleeding. Just hold still."

He knew it was the right
thing to do, and once again he felt ashamed that Amber was constantly helping
him when he could offer nothing in return. He felt her hand touch his shoulder
in order to get leverage as she pushed against the back of his head. Her cool
skin felt calming against his sweaty back. He almost felt himself relax,
despite the situation. By the time the ref told them to wrap it up, he almost
felt as if he were back at her apartment, relaxing.

The bell rang again
though, and reality returned.

After returning to her
seat, the man she had spoken to earlier looked over at her. "Are you his
trainer?" he asked, his eyebrow raised. She could hear in his voice that
he was pretty sure he knew that she wasn't, and so she was tempted to say yes
just to see the look of surprise on his face.

"No," she
finally answered.

"Ah. It didn't look
like that blow by Jackson was enough to open him up like that," he said.
"That was a lot of blood though."

"It didn't,"
she agreed. "He got that fighting the other day."

"Oh," the man
said. "What club does he train at?"

"He doesn't,"
she said. "He fights... privately." She wasn't sure how legal what
Joel did was, and didn't think it was her place to advertise what he did for a
living to perfect strangers.

The man looked at her
questioningly, but she ignored it and turned her attention back to Joel.

The two men were trading
blows again, but it looked like Joel was back in form. Jackson had a cut over
his left eye now, and was stumbling. None of his punches seemed to be
connecting with Joel.

Jackson threw a swinging
roundhouse which Joel ducked easily, but when the man came back around he left
himself open and Joel pounced, swinging his fist upwards and connecting hard
against his opponent's jaw. It happened so fast that Amber almost missed it,
but she was pretty sure that Jackson's feet left the ground for a second as the
punch hit him from below. He flew backwards and landed flat on his back. Joel
jumped forward and landed on his chest, raising a hand in the air to continue
his assault, but before he could land the first punch the ref grabbed his arm
and stopped the fight. Jackson was out cold, and Joel had won again.

The crowd cheered much
louder this time, but Amber wasn't sure whether it was because they were
starting to root for Joel, or because the fight had ended in such a spectacular
knock out. She suspected it was more of the latter, but she wanted to believe
there was a little bit of both.

She leapt to her own feet
and let out a holler, clapping her hands furiously. Joel's eyes scanned the
crowd until they landed on her, and he gave her a big smile. Her own smile grew
even wider - it was the first time he had looked that happy since she met him.

"That was a helluva
KO," the man beside her said.

"I'll say," she
agreed.

"Your boyfriend can
certainly fight."

Boyfriend?
 
She didn't correct him. It wasn't his business anyway, and
although Joel was far from being her boyfriend, she kind of liked the sound of
it.

The next match had
already started before Joel joined her at their seats again. He had a new towel
that he was holding against the back of his head. When he sat down, she took
over holding it for him. There was ice in the middle of this one.

"That was
awesome," she said to him. "You really knocked that guy on his
ass."

"He was still
leaving himself open," he said. "Lucky I noticed that earlier."

"It was a good
observation, no luck about it," the man next to them said.

Joel just grunted
noncommittally.

"How's the
head?" the man asked.

Joel looked at him for a
moment before saying anything. "It's fine," he said.

"Your girlfriend
here said you had that going in, that guy just opened it up again. By the
amount of blood that was coming out, it must have been pretty bad. I'm
surprised you're still fighting with that."

Joel looked sharply at
Amber, but she wasn't sure what he was angry about - the fact that she had been
talking about his injury, or that he had referred to Amber as Joel's
girlfriend. To her surprise, he didn't correct the man when he responded.

"Well, like I said,
it's fine. This fight was today. I didn't think it was worth missing over this.
Injuries happen. Part of the gig."

"It obviously isn't
affecting his performance," Amber said defensively. "He's won both of
his fights already."

"No doubt," the
man said. He smiled and returned his attention to the ring.

After Joel shot her
another look, he did the same and watched in silence. Within a few minutes,
though, he began to comment on the action again. Amber took that to mean he had
gotten over his annoyance.

"This guy is new, he
must have been one of the Byes."

"What's that
mean?" she asked.

"He didn't fight in
round one because they didn't have the full 16 entrants. Big advantage for him.
He's a lot fresher as this is his first fight."

Despite the advantage,
however, the match ended shortly after with the fresh fighter eliminated.

Amber and Joel spoke
quietly for the five minutes between rounds, waiting for the third match to
start. They stopped as the announcer took his spot in the middle of the ring.
The first fighter he announced was one of the ones Amber recognized from earlier.
She recalled Joel saying he was quick, but seemed to lack power. He was a thin
fellow with a short goatee and bald head. He had won his first round by what
Joel had called an arm bar. Some type of submission.

"And next,
originally from California but now a regular here at the Golden Dragon Dojo,
weighing in at 245 pounds, Carlos Alvarez!" The crowd went wild as the
tall Hispanic from earlier emerged from behind the curtain.