Blood Score Read Free Page A

reason.
    Angelica kept her dark eyes focused dead ahead and ignored the ogling stares, whistles, and obscene noises as she dodged beefy biceps and beer guts. She put her wedding ring back on to improve her odds of being left alone. Even though she wasn’t the only woman, she wondered who would come to this shit hole for a hook up with Mr. Right , unless their idea of romance involved money exchanging hands. All any woman would find here were Mr. Right Now and his good friend, Mr. Do Me . The direct descendants of Neanderthal man were en masse and under the influence of liquid courage with a double shot of testosterone. Her being outnumbered should have made her nervous except for one thing.
    Her Sig Sauer gave her a sense of entitlement. She wore a 9-mil Sig P239 in a pancake holster attached to her belt, hidden under her jean jacket. She felt the weight of her equalizer at the small of her back as she made her way into the main arena and searched the agitated crowd. Men yelled and waved wads of cash into the smoke-filled air, upping the stakes for the fight below. Few noticed her now. All eyes were on the brawlers inside the wire-meshed cage.
    Two men pummeled each other with bare knuckles, their chests slick with sweat and blood. Marquess of Queensberry rules got checked at the door. The underground fight club had taken over an old deserted boxing ring near the Dan Ryan Expressway. Organizers rotated events to undisclosed locations and told only those in the know.
    Angelica had her reason to know.
    She walked through the bleacher stairs and scanned the crowd, probing the animated faces, looking for Gabriel Cronan. He was a tall muscular man with intense blue eyes and a distinctive scar over his right eyebrow. Cronan wore a sobering grimace when annoyed, which was most of the time. His short dark hair had likely never seen fancy gels or styling products, and his chin rarely went without bristle. Anywhere else Gabe would have stood out, but not here. Here the state of masculinity thrived, drilled down to its bare essence. A guy like Cronan would know the rules in a place like this.
    Hell, he’d make them.
    After a first pass through the crowd, she came up empty. No Cronan in sight. She looked at her watch. If she didn’t find him soon, she’d have a decision to make and covering for him wouldn’t play well. Angelica tried his cell again, but when it rolled into voice mail, she headed toward the exit, prepared to take one last look around. That’s when she noticed a striking pair of broad shoulders.
    “ Well, I’ll be damned.” She shook her head and winced.
    Gabriel Cronan stood in the ring—getting the crap beat out of him.
    ***
    A hard right hook caught Cronan on the chin. His head snapped back, and he rolled with the punch, but a sharp jolt of pain raced down his neck. The blow staggered him, and he stumbled, his back against the wire mesh. Faces in the bleachers blurred, and sweat stung his watery eyes. The rabble took to their feet and waited for the inevitable.
    Cronan smelled blood— his .
    He shook his head to clear the fog and wiped his eyes with the back of a hand. He put up a shaky front and dropped his chin as he raised his raw bare fists to sidestep into center ring. One more time, he challenged Chainsaw Max who outweighed him by fifty pounds and stood a foot taller. Although the man was a damned behemoth with mitts the size of his head, Cronan could now dismiss the hyped rumors that the guy was part ape.
    Max had been showing off for his sister who was in the crowd. From this distance, she looked human.
    “ Stay down,” the big man bellowed. “…before I kill you, you stubborn son of a bitch.”
    “ Ain’t gonna happen, b-big guy,” he stammered. “Not t-tonight.”
    Before Cronan took a swing, he craned his neck and squinted into the unruly crowd behind Max, saying, “I wouldn’t let a g-guy touch my sister… like that. What kind of b-brother are you?”
    When Max turned and glared into the