All Chapters of Fighting Hard (Fighting For Love 1): Chapter 11 - Chapter 20

When Nick spoke, his voice was gentle. “I get that it’s weird. I do. But the sofa isn’t very comfortable, and you need to rest. It’s just for a few hours.”“But – don’t you need to sleep too? I mean, you’ve been up all night…”“I’ll take the sofa.”“But you just said it’s not comfortable.”“Mia. I think that the person who has been drugged and has a head injury and stitches should get the comfy bed, and the person who is totally fine should get the crappy sofa.”She looked at him and blinked. Then, to his complete surprise, she giggled, a sound so damn adorable that he had to respond. A rare real smile spread across his face, and he felt relief at her resilience.“Yeah, OK,” she said. “I think you have a valid point.”“Thank you. Now, come on.”His bedroom was small and decidedly masculine, with a huge bed and dark wooden furniture. He handed her a long t-shirt.“Put this on. Call me when you’re ready, OK?”“Sure.”Mia undressed slowly, wincing at the pain in her shoulder as she pulle

Nick opened his eyes, and blinked at the red numbers glowing at him from the clock on the bedside table: 4:51 a.m. How was that possible? The last thing that he remembered was holding Mia until she fell asleep again. That was at almost nine o’clock the night before, and that was after he’d already slept for nine hours. He never slept like this, not ever.I must be exhausted from all the training and work I’m doing lately. Maybe I need to slow down?Mia was still sleeping next to him, her breathing calm and even. He examined her face by the light of the street lamps outside, and saw that her color was good. The bruise on her face looked awful, though, the purple now tinged with black and sickly green. He reached out and stroked her cheek with a fingertip. She didn’t move.It was bizarre having a woman in his bed that he hadn’t had sex with. Nick struggled to recall the last time this had happened, and it occurred to him that it had been with Shelley. She was the last woman that he’d ju

“Jesus Christ, Mia," Katie exploded the second that she saw her friend on Monday afternoon. "You said it wasn’t that bad!”“It’s not. Really. It looks way worse than it feels.”“I’m very glad to hear that because it looks pretty fucking bad.”Mia closed her eyes, and called on her deep reserves of patience and genuine affection. She knew that Katie was scared and freaked out by what had happened to her and – in typical Katie fashion – it was coming out as anger and aggression. Despite knowing that, it was still a bit wearing and wearying. Mia smiled, though, since she was in actual fact, just fine.Katie studied her friend’s face. God, Mia looked terrible. That bruise was black and purple, and she was favoring her shoulder a bit. When Mia had called her the day before and told her what had happened to her, Katie had been nothing short of terrified, and had damn near run to the airport to take an earlier flight back to Denver. Thank God for that guy Nick; Katie was totally sure that he

Adam turned to Katie now. “Hi.”“Hi.” She was looking him up and down, a bit taken aback at his size. “Wow. Your body is – wow.”“Is that a good ‘wow’ or a bad ‘wow’?” Adam asked.“Good. Really good. It’s going to be amazing taking your photo.”“Well, I’m glad you think so.” Adam looked around. “So – where do you want to do this?”“Let me walk around a bit, OK?” Katie said. “I’ll call you over when I think I’ve found the place to start taking pictures.”“Sure, go do that.”The three of them watched Katie walk off, a look of intense concentration of her face. Adam turned to Mia. “So what will you do while we’re taking photos?”“Oh, I’ll be staying out of the way,” Mia said. “Gavin has promised to bring me some material about your gym, for background for our interviews, so I’ll go through that.” She looked around. “Is it OK if I sit on that sofa? I need to set up my laptop.”“Go ahead,” Nick said. “You need any help?”“No, thanks. I got it.”The men watched Mia unpacking her things, and

Adam narrowed his eyes, and went back to the boxing ring. Katie stalked towards the gym entrance and Nick was surprised that she looked about two seconds away from tears.“Um,” Mia said to Nick. “I guess we’ll have to finish the rest of your interview some other time…”“I guess so.” Their eyes met, and they both started to laugh in hushed undertones.“Wow,” Nick said. “I’m assuming those two won’t be best friends, huh?”“Nope.”“Do you think Katie’s OK?” Nick asked. “She looked pretty shaken up.”“Katie is – well, she needs to be in control. It’s important to her.”“Yeah. And I guess Adam is a bit of an Alpha male, you know… he likes to be the one calling the shots.”She glanced around at all the men hitting things. “I imagine this place is full of Alpha males, huh?”“Sometimes.”Their smiled at each other, and Nick cleared his throat.“OK, so. Do you want to come back here tomorrow for the interview? Or… maybe…” His voice trailed off.“Maybe what?”“Maybe you want to come to my plac