Before the third match, the silence was different.
Not tense, not electric—
but deep and echoing, like the moment before the stage lights come on, when the actors are already behind the curtain, and they all know:
this is no longer rehearsal.
Lennox Graves sat on the bench in the locker room, suited up again, wearing new gloves, new wraps, fresh tape around his hands.
There was no trace on his body of the two previous bouts—Sloane's expertise had done its work perfectly.
His skin was clean, his muscles recharged, and in his eyes, for the first time, there was no fatigue or guardedness.
There was something else.
Something entirely new.
Something even he didn't fully recognize.
The walk to the ring felt longer this time.
Or maybe Lennox only perceived it that way, as he walked the
