Oh god, I can’t even take it.
The scruffy jaw. The brilliant blue eyes. The sexy smirk. The dimples. He’s got a smile on his face; his expression, one that tells you he’s got a whole lot of trouble planned for the evening and you don’t want to miss it, is playful and boyish.
A collective gasp spreads out in the rows behind me as he moves to face us.
The butterflies in my stomach burst awake when those dancing blue eyes start scanning the crowd, silently laughing at all of us. He’s clearly amused by our obsession over everything Remington Tate!
Beside me, a middle-aged blonde with too much Botox jumps up and down and screams like a lunatic, “Remy! Give me a taste of that Riptide!”
The impulse to drag the woman down by her hair seizes me, but at the same time, I know you can’t look at him without dissolving into a pool of lust.
He is a stud. He was made to mate. To procreate.
And I want him like my next breath.
I want him more than any one of these screaming women wants him.
I want every fragmented part of him. I want his body. His mind. His heart. His beautiful soul.
He says he’s mine, but I know that there’s a part of Remington Tate nobody will ever have.
I am his, but he is untamable and unconquerable.
The only one who can defeat Remington Tate is himself.
He’s up there, ever elusive and mysterious, a black box of mystery without end. And I want to get lost in him, even if I never come out the same.
Pete elbows my ribs and whispers in my ear, “My god, it’s unfair he gets all the attention and this”—he signals at his skinny self—“gets nothing.”
I smile. With his curly hair and brown eyes, Pete’s always dressed in a black suit and tie. He’s not only Remy’s personal assistant, he’s also like his older brother and one of my closest friends.
“Nora likes you just as you are,” I taunt him about my younger sister.
He smiles at that and wiggles his eyebrows as he nods pointedly back toward the ring, where Remington finishes his turn and almost completely faces me.
My nerve endings stir and tingle in excitement as his twinkling blue eyes glide down the length of my row, where he knows I will be. I swear every part of me quivers in anticipation, waiting for those eyes to find me.
They do.
He electrifies me. Invisible currents leap between us. His smile blazes through me, and suddenly, the inside of my chest, where my heart beats, feels like a burning torch he’s just lit.
His eyes hold me clasped in the loving heat of his, and I can see his quiet joy tonight, his possessiveness, the territorial stare that tells everyone in this room that I. Am. His.
Then he points at me.
My heart stops.
It seems that everyone’s eyes follow the finger pointing in my direction, aimed straight at my chest, where my heart races for him, his red-hot blue gaze clearly saying, “This one’s for her.”
A delighted roar from the crowd explodes around me. It hits me like adrenaline, like a shot of tequila that flies straight to your head, the way his fans love him. The way he loves them back. The way he loves me.
I’m amazed by the way the public reacts to him and by the way he stands there, with his dimples flashing, sucking in all the energy in the room and channeling it into “Riptide.”
God, I love him, and I never want him to forget it!
Overcome with the impulse, I blow him a kiss.
He catches it and smashes it to his mouth.
The crowd grows even louder. Remy points at me, laughing, and I’m laughing too. My eyes burn a little because I’m so happy that I just can’t fit inside my skin. I’m happy that he’s happy, and he’s where he belongs.
This is his season. This year, nothing will stop Remington Tate from being the Underground League champion. Nothing.
He will do whatever it takes, because he’s a driven, powerful, passionate man, and whether I am afraid, worried, excited, or all of the above, I will support him.
“And now, ladies and gentlemen, may we have a round of applause to welcome a newbie to the Underground, from the Fighter’s Club, the famed, feared, and deadly Grant Gonzalez, “Goooodzillaaaa!”
As his opponent is announced, Remington circles the ring restlessly like a panther until a huge lump of silver comes out from a second walkway. Remy flexes his fingers at his sides as he watches the man take the ring. Tonight, they all wear their hands taped with bare knuckles exposed, much like men used to fight in older times.
The new fighter is barely out of his robe when the public starts shunning him. “Booooooo! Booooo!”
“That guy has killed a couple people fighting,” Pete tells me under his breath. “He’s a dirty and mean motherfucker.”
“Don’t tell me people have died in these events?” I ask in horror, feeling a disturbing quake inside my stomach. Pete rolls his eyes.