Blood In The Ring

ALESSIA POV I was three blocks from my apartment when they stepped out. Four of them, big enough that they'd never had to learn how to fight properly. The leader made me stop. “Heading, somewhere?” he asked. I kept walking. "I'm talking to you." He moved into my path, and the others spread out slowly, like they had all the time in the world. Like this was something they'd done before and it had always gone their way. "Move," I said. "What's your problem?" He laughed. It was the kind of laugh that meant nothing was funny. "You think you're something special hun?" One of the others made a sound obviously a joke I wasn't meant to understand. They probably thought I was scared, and would give them something easy. The leader reached for me. His hand came up, and I didn't think about it. I pivoted on my heel, brought my elbow up hard, and felt it break his nose. He went backward, hands over his face, screaming with blood between his fingers. The second guy came at me angry. I ducked under his swing and drove a hook into his jaw. He hit the pavement like something had gone wrong in his body all at once. The other two rushed me together. It was sloppy, and they were panicking now, throwing wild punches that I could see coming a mile away. I slipped the first one, twisted, and put a knee into the third guy's ribs. I heard something pop inside him. The last one caught me on the shoulder, a glancing punch and I turned into him with a palm strike under his chin. He went down immediately. It was quiet after that. Just them breathing hard on the ground. I was standing there trying to catch my breath when the lights came. Red and blue cutting through the alley, and then the siren with that high, wailing sound that meant everything was about to get worse. Two cops came around the corner running towards me. One of them grabbed my arm and slammed me against the wall before I could even raise my hands. "Don't move. Don't f*****g move." The cuffs were tight. I could feel them digging in. The guy with the broken nose was pointing at me, talking fast. "She just attacked us, man. We didn't do anything. We were coming back from getting food and she just went crazy." The cops believed the lies before I could even open my mouth. …. The holding cell was cold. I sat on the bench and didn't think about anything. The desk cop took my information in that slow, uninterested way cops have, like they're filing away paperwork that doesn't matter. Around the corner, the four guys were complaining about their injuries like they were the victims here. I had maybe three hundred dollars left from tonight's underground card. I was trying to figure out how to make that work for bail when the holding cell door opened and a sergeant told me to get up. "Carver. You're being released." There was a woman waiting by the glass doors at the front. She wore a charcoal blazer and expensive shoes, and she was holding a tablet like she'd just come from somewhere important. The desk sergeant was handing over my paperwork, and he looked different than he had twenty minutes ago, less certain. The woman turned and looked at me. "You've got real hands kid. The footage from the delivery truck across the street confirms self-defense, obviously," she said. "Charges are dropped." She didn't wait for me to respond. She pulled out a business card and slid it across the desk toward me. "Miranda Costa. From Monroe Sports Management." She looked at my face. "We've watched your fights and would like you to sign with our agency if you haven't signed with another. You're too good to be an underground boxer in that circuit." The name landed differently than she expected it to. "You're wasting yourself," she continued, stepping closer as the officer let me out. "There's money here, with real opportunities. But you need to be with people who understand what you're capable of. Mr. Monroe wants to meet you." Monroe. The word sat in my chest like a stone. I took the card. My hand didn't shake, but something inside me did. "What time?" I asked her. "Nine, tomorrow morning. Our office in Tribeca." She was looking at me like she was trying to figure something out. "You know the name?" I didn't answer. She took that as an answer enough. "Nine AM," she said again. "Don't be late." I walked out of the precinct and into the Brooklyn night. The street was quiet with just cars parked along the curb and the sound of someone's air conditioning unit working overtime. I stood there for a minute with that card in my pocket and felt something in me change. The name hit me right in the chest like a heavy bag dropped from the ceiling. Tom Monroe. The man whose greed and cruelty had destroyed my father's life, driven him to ruin, and left me with nothing. And now he was handing me a contract. I stood there in the humid dark and felt the card in my pocket like it was burning through the fabric. The trap was wide open, and I was holding the key. About to walk straight into it.