Avenging Angel: Pounding Hearts Read online

  Avenging Angel

  Pounding Hearts

  Izzy Sweet

  Sean Moriarty

  Dirty Nothings Publishing

  Contents

  About This Book

  1. Emmett

  2. Bree

  3. Emmett

  4. Bree

  5. Emmett

  6. Bree

  7. Emmett

  8. Bree

  9. Emmett

  10. Bree

  11. Bree

  12. Bree

  13. Emmett

  14. Emmett

  15. Emmett

  16. Bree

  17. Emmett

  18. Bree

  19. Emmett

  20. Epilogue

  Playlists

  Stalk Us

  About Us

  Also by Izzy and Sean

  Bucking Bear: Pounding Hearts Three Preview

  Copyright © 2020 by Izzy Sweet and Sean Moriarty

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Published by Izzy Sweet and Sean Moriarty

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2020 Izzy Sweet & Sean Moriarty

  Cover

  Photographer: Reggie Deanching of https://www.rplusmphoto.com

  Model: Cody Smith https://www.instagram.com/codyy_smiith/

  Design: Resplendent Media https://resplendentmedia.com

  About This Book

  Once I was on top of the world. I had the title, fame, and respect.

  Then everything came crashing down.

  I lost my title and my best friend.

  Unable to cope, I fell into the bottle and never wanted to come out.

  Until Bree walked into my life with her gorgeous eyes and kissable lips.

  She lights a fire inside me I haven't felt in months.

  She's awoken the beast that refuses to bow down and takes what he wants.

  With her in my sights, I'm fucking unstoppable.

  I'm going to get my title back, kick some ass, and win the girl.

  Chapter One

  Emmett

  “Emmet Bailey just tapped! Oh my god, Bailey just tapped out!” Marshawn Anderson yells through my TV speakers.

  Pressing rewind, I watch the same fifteen seconds over again.

  There, live and in living color, I watch as Jamey Silva tweaks my arm past the point of no return. My shoulder makes a pop that’s heard over the screaming fans. I didn’t plan on tapping out while he was trying to rip my arm from my body, but the moment I felt all the ligaments tear and the shoulder pop out of socket, I tapped.

  I press rewind on the DVR and watch it again.

  “Emmet Bailey just tapped! Oh my god, Bailey just tapped out!”

  “I can’t believe it either, Marshawn. I just can’t—” Jack Harper starts to say before Marshawn cuts him off.

  “Wait… That doesn’t look good, Jack. Bailey isn’t getting up.”

  I watch as my trainer and best friend Tommy Babson rushes into the cage. Jamey Silva is still doing his victory lap. He does his signature backflip and just about knocks over the doctor who rushed in behind Tommy with his antics.

  There’s a serious medical emergency in the ring and that douchebag couldn’t fucking care less.

  I leave the recording playing as the commentators of the match start trying to ease the viewers into the unfolding drama that became my life.

  Right there on the mat, I’m aching, trying to sit up. My left arm is dangling uselessly at my side. My face, bloody and sweaty, shows the immense pain I’m going through. I know I should be all manly, ignore the pain and shit, but right then I thought I was about to fucking die.

  I’ve suffered losses before, after all an eighteen-to-three record isn’t bad by any means, but I’d never been through anything that came close to the hell I was experiencing at that moment. It was both physical and mental.

  When I walked into the arena that night, it never even occurred to me that I would be leaving in an ambulance to the hospital, no longer the Welterweight Champion.

  I know of loss and pain, I’ve dealt with it my entire life, but watching as Tommy helps me up, I’ve never felt so weak before. Ever. So weak and fucking useless.

  Setting the remote down on the couch beside me, I lean over to my end table and grab the sweaty bottle of beer off the coaster. Taking a long swig, I continue to watch the TV.

  It’s the look on my face that tells the world it’s all over. That I’ve officially been beaten. I’ve lost my belt, lost my sense of self-worth, and lost my job.

  It’s all fucking over.

  Jamey Silva starts dancing around as the ref comes over to stand between us. Then the ref lifts Jamey’s hand while mine stays down.

  Tommy stands by my injured side, holding me up. Every single fond childhood memory I have has him there in the background, always the fucking cheerleader to my jock lifestyle.

  Tears well up on the brim of my eyelids. Yeah, always there for me. He and his parents always there for me when I would catch a beating from my dad. The Babsons took me in when my mom died and kept me fed when my dad was out on another crack-filled bender.

  Kept me clothed when my shoes fell off my feet.

  In the background, past the cage, I can see both Helen and Bill Babson standing together. Bill has his arm around Helen’s shoulders as they anxiously wait for me to exit the cage.

  It’s fucking crazy watching this video again for the eighth time tonight, but I do. Why shouldn’t I watch the beginning of my end?

  It’s been exactly six months to the day.

  After taking a long pull from the bottle, I reach over and set it back down on the table. It clicks against the other empty ones I have stacked there. I’ll have to switch to the harder stuff tonight if I want to keep the pain away. I’m not entirely sure when I started running out of all my stocked-up beer, though. Probably last night.

  These last couple of months have been kind of fuzzy lately.

  Grabbing my phone from the couch cushion next to me, I pull up the screen. I peer at it blearily as I scroll down my messages and pull up the last message from Tommy.

  Pushing play, I put it up to my ear.

  “Come on, asshole. Pick up the damn phone! That’s why man invented cellphones, so we can get ahold of each other whenever we need to.”

  Yeah, I don’t like answering my phone much. Too many people calling to talk to me about shit I can’t deal with.

  “Fine,” Tommy goes on. “I’ll say it here and when I get to your house. You need to get off the fucking couch and get into the gym. You got beat, who gives a shit? Shrug this shit off and let’s get back to the basics. You remember them, don’t you? Before you became a big pussy.”

  Stupid asshole Tommy always uses the humiliation factor to get me wound up.

  I watch the screen as he helps me cradle my injured arm. Damn thing was junk, I could barely move it.

  At that moment, I didn’t think I could feel any shittier. Then Jamey came up to me in what I thought was a show of good sportsmanship and goodwill. I thought he wanted to check on me or something.

  How wrong I was.

  The announcers and crowd didn’t hear what he said, but Tommy and I sure did.

  “You got your faggot boyfriend to help your little bitch ass out of the
ring?” Jamey said.

  Stunned, I just stared at him. I couldn’t quite grasp what the hell he said at first, but Tommy sure as fuck did.

  I’ve never seen Tommy as mad as he was right then. He bolted toward Jamey with a fucking purpose. Bad thing was, though, Tommy wasn’t an MMA fighter.

  Jamey swiftly gave him a two-punch combo that had Tommy dropping to the mat.

  “Holy cow, what in the hell’s going on there?” Marshawn yells over the screaming fans. His voice is struggling to be heard over the sudden roar in the arena.

  Usually his voice breaks through crazy moments, but not that time. On the screen, the camera shows Tommy laid out flat on his back.

  Hitting the power button on the TV, I watch as the screen goes blank. I zoned out while watching that little by-play.

  Shaking my head, I hear the end of the voicemail.

  “I’ll be there soon, brother. We need to get your dumb ass sobered up. You still have a rematch clause in your contract. There’s no fucking chance in the world you won’t be using that bitch. You need to put Jamey in the fucking ground.”

  Setting the phone down on the couch, I push the power button on the side and watch it turn itself off. No use in keeping it on.

  I really don’t want anyone fucking calling me tonight.

  * * *

  How the fuck I ended up out on my back porch is a blur. I don’t remember parking my ass out here with a blanket around my shoulders. The almost-finished bottle of rum cradled with my good arm tells me I must have hit the booze harder last night than I planned.

  I guess it’s not that unusual though, I’ve done this before.

  Yawning in the late morning breeze, my mouth tastes like what I imagine a freshly warmed-up skunk’s asshole must taste like.

  Pulling the cap off the top of the bottle, I take a long swig of the almost sweet burning liquid. A little bit of the dog that bit me, I guess. I don’t really get hungover anymore. I guess I’ve killed off the body parts that alcohol seems to affect the most.

  Shit. Today isn’t going to be a fun day. I don’t want to face the world, but I can’t get a good delivery service for my drinking needs.

  It’s almost like a punishment. I want to drink to stay out of the world, but I have to go out into the world so I can get the damn drink.

  My black Jeep sits in the hot sun, and I can see the heat shimmering off the hood from here. Fuck. I don’t want to go out into the heat today. I’d rather just sit in the cold air conditioning of my shitty house and not see people or deal with anything human.

  Shit, it’s good that I don’t have a pet. Given that my entire yard is dead, it’s obvious I can’t take care of anything besides myself.

  And I’m barely doing that.

  A fucking headache starts to throb behind my eyes. They’ve have been plaguing me for the last couple of months. I’m pretty sure I’ve pickled myself with all the alcohol in my system, but the headaches don’t go the fuck away.

  They’re not the hangover kind, either. Just this incessant pounding behind my eyes. Even when I drink to numb them, I can feel them on the periphery, waiting in the corners to come back in full force.

  I drive over to the liquor store and have to keep adjusting my baseball cap and sunglasses. I need food as well, but that can come after I’ve secured my priorities.

  Even shopping is an exercise in caution for me today. Despite growing a beard and getting pudgy, I still have a recognizable face in this city. My ugly mug has been on enough TV screens and billboards that every now and then I get the random fan who wants to talk to me.

  Shaking my arm out a bit to remove the tension in my shoulder, I try to just focus on my day and take it one step at a time. I know that shit’s from one of them rehab mantras, but it works for us drunks too.

  One bottle at a time, one pickled liver away from finishing myself off.

  As I’m lifting up a second case of shitty beer to put in my cart, I hear a loud laugh.

  “Jesus, it’s fucking Emmett. Where the fuck do you get a beer gut that fast?” a gruff voice asks, and it’s about all I can do not to toss the case of beer at the fucker’s head.

  Not bothering to turn my head to respond, I growl out in what I was hoping would sound tough, but comes out more tired than anything else, “Nice to see you too, Brett. It comes from shit food and drinking. Try it out, you’ll love it.”

  Pushing the cart away from the beer racks, I start heading for the liquor shelves a couple of aisles over.

  Brett’s not a bad guy. He’s cocky as a motherfucker, but he’s a fighter like me…

  Or well, like I was.

  The shit that comes out of his mouth is as natural as a sermon is to a preacher. It’s only that he’s like a fucking rabid dog sometimes. He doesn’t know when to leave people the fuck alone.

  “Interesting. I tried that when my girl got knocked up but it didn’t work out so well,” he says as he follows me to the liquor.

  Behind me, I hear the thumping of skin on skin. Fucker is probably slapping his fucking washboard abs.

  “Great,” I say and keep my eyes forward.

  I don’t need to look into another person’s eyes and see the fucking pity I always get.

  Pity is what got me to where I am now. Pity for myself and how fucking shitty life can be.

  Stopping in front of the rum section, I grab a couple bottles of the cheap shit, along with a good bottle of the expensive stuff. Cheap goes with the rum and cokes, expensive is for when I need to black the fuck out.

  Brett bangs his cart off mine while he grabs a bottle whiskey and the squeaky wheels grate on my nerves.

  “What have you been up to for the last couple of months, man? I haven’t seen you since—” he starts to say before I quickly cut him off.

  “Nothing, relaxing and making decisions,” I say.

  What the fuck? Does he not take a hint?

  “What kind of decisions? Like the ones that usually take me the longest are which shirt I need to wear in the morning,” he says, and I finally look at him.

  “Hey man, I know it’s probably a style thing and all, but wearing a hat and sunglasses in this dim and gloomy store is like a cry for… something…” he trails off as I turn away from him.

  “Yeah, it’s all about fashion, Brett,” I grunt out.

  “Well, I guess so. Hey, I know that Reaper’s been trying to get ahold of you and shit, but he hasn’t been able to. So I wanted to show you what’s set up for Friday,” he says as he pushes a cellphone into my hands.

  There, staring back up at me, is a picture of Tommy with a grinning smile. He looks so young and fucking happy.

  “Chase has set up a small invitation only tourney for some of the up-and-coming guys at his gym. He’s calling it the Tommy Babson Invitational. Wants to do it as an annual memorial for…”

  Memorial. Tommy.

  Pushing the phone back into Brett’s hands, I leave the cart behind me as I walk away.

  “It starts Friday at eleven. I’ll let Dale know you saw it,” Brett calls out after me.

  Slamming the door to my Jeep shut, I have sit for a few moments before my hands are steady enough to put the key in the ignition.

  Whether it’s from the lack of alcohol in my system, or the steady stream of pictures showing the aftermath of a semi-truck crossing the median while the driver was asleep at the wheel, destroying a little foreign-made car, I’m not sure.

  But I can’t catch my breath.

  I feel my lungs rasping deeply.

  Shit.

  I think I’m having a heart attack.

  Right here in the middle of a liquor store parking lot.

  Chapter Two

  Bree

  Thump.

  Thump. Thump.

  No matter how loud I turn the radio up, I can’t get the sound of the bed thumping against the wall out of my head.

  Thump.

  Thump. Thump.

  Like a cursed melody, it haunts me, chasing me across the des
ert.

  Blindly reaching for the dial, I crank it over to a rock station. Heavy bass begins to rattle my car, and as the singer begins to shriek like a demented banshee, my head begins to ache so bad I can no longer hear the rhythmic banging of headboard meeting plaster.

  The relief is only short-lived though. I can’t even make it to the end of the song before I’m forced to turn the radio off so my throbbing head doesn’t explode.

  Silence fills the car and I focus all my attention on the road stretching before me, urging the memory to stay back.

  To give me a few minutes of peace.

  Please.

  But my asshole brain drudges up the scene, forcing me to watch it all again. To face it. To process it.

  To experience the consequences of my choices all over again.

  Thump.

  Thump. Thump.

  There’s a mirage on the horizon, wavering in front of me. But instead of an oasis beckoning me, I’m watching myself open the door to my apartment.

  At first, I was completely oblivious, focused on grabbing the bag I forgot.

  But then that thumping drew my curiosity.

  Part of me knew what it was… what it meant… It was something straight up out of a bad movie, but I had to see it with my own eyes.

  I doubt I’ll ever forget the feeling I had when I opened the door to my bedroom.

  Or the sight of Tristan’s bright white ass clenching as he pounded himself into my best friend Ashley.

  I should have been upset… angry… hurt… devastated…