The Unstoppable Tony Winters Read online

  Anthony could get that idea. Things could hit you suddenly like that, when you were about to walk into a new situation.

  “Neat. Not that I need much. I like books? If that comes up for real at any point?”

  She smiled and stood up.

  “That seems like a thing then. Well, I need to be going soon. It was very nice meeting you, Tony. Well make a point of having you up to visit in a bit? So that Howard and I can try to spoil you? Let me leave you our numbers? I need something to write on.”

  They hadn’t been talking for hours or anything, but he was tired and honestly couldn’t blame Samantha for feeling the same. The conversation had been draining in a lot of ways. That on top of her being old and him being just exhausted from the run would be about enough, no doubt.

  He jogged to Rick’s office and stole a pad and pen. The man wasn’t in there, so a short fifteen minutes later the woman he didn’t know hugged him and then went off to find her kid. That was done in public, so he got a hug as well, before the lady left.

  There was press around, So Rick didn’t say much. Not until later, after they all got home for the night. The day was warm, but not scorching like the one before, so it was about eight when they all got in. Interestingly, they had everyone there with them.

  Not just the ones from the dinner party, but nearly ten people, including the boxers. The main ones and two of the trainers, other than Raul.

  They were in the living room, sitting around when Tony walked in. He was the last one there, since he’d been working with Leslie, passing water out to her late classes and working his BJJ lesson at the same time. That meant staying longer than most did, but he could manage that, being more or less in shape for the constant work.

  Everyone seemed happy enough about something.

  Rick waved him over, standing to talk to everyone.

  “So, this is huge for us. Almost half the show will be built around our people. Steve, they want you for commentary on it. Denny, you’ll be on training, for Tony? The rest of this…”

  Mark nodded, his voice a little slow sounding.

  “I can see it. This will be worth millions; do you want me for Tony’s team as well? I can be his mental coach.” He turned to look up, since Anthony was on his feet. Then he faked a sad face and sighed mournfully. “Is that really all you have?”

  Half the room, mainly the fighters, laughed at that one. He did use the line, often to good effect.

  Rick shook his head.

  “No. I want you to help me organize the fighters for the initial fights. Organizational stuff. Maybe some commentary, if you can learn how to do it in time?”

  Ash smiled up, getting that Tony wouldn’t have a clue what was going on.

  “We got a green light from the network. A full advertising budget and everything, so this will be big. It’s pretty much what we were talking about the other night? I think we need to get some bigger names in as well, if we can, but we have Fox Rends coming to fight me. She loves the idea, since win or lose we all make bank. Not that she doesn’t plan to kick my butt, if she can. There’s… She really seems to be holding a bit of a grudge, so I have to take it seriously. You’ll help me with that? We get until November twentieth.”

  Tony just nodded.

  “I’m in. Always. We need to sit down and plan out a real training schedule for you then. We get time for it. Also, we need to work out how Fox will try to adapt. My guess is that…” He stopped and then shrugged. It was mean to say, but probably the truth. “Really, she’ll stop taking her female hormones for a while. Then replace the testosterone she isn’t making with shots. It will probably work like steroids, without showing up on any tests.”

  It was creepy, but the woman bent the rules in almost all of her fights already.

  Ash nodded, getting it.

  “Right.”

  Steve looked over then, at Tony.

  “You get to meet with Erlander Hodder. That’s a big match. I caught a few of his fights, trying to get caught up on the people I might need to talk about.”

  That got Anthony to wince, shutting down his real response. Except that half the room got that he wasn’t happy for some reason. Jen looked troubled when she spoke.

  “You don’t want to do it?”

  He started to lie, saying he did, but then shook his head.

  “It isn’t that exactly. I get that he needs a big fight, to show that he isn’t going away and all that. I’m willing to use my fifteen minutes of fame to help him do that. It’s just… Kind of stupid, I guess.” He stopped, then stuck his tongue out. “I was planning to be on the Cross Country Team. That’s in the season. If I’m training to fight…”

  Denny shrugged.

  “Cross Country is just running. I can’t see why you shouldn’t be able to do both. At least as well as you can and be in school full time. That’s the big one really. Classes, homework, training… You pretty much won’t have free time for months. Really, we should get you a tutor and homeschool you… That way we can keep the work hours lower. Like they do for child actors? Four hours a day.” He smiled, as if he were playing about it all.

  Raul made a noise then, his breath huffing out. It was a pleased sound.

  “That is a plan. I didn’t know it was allowed? Then he can go to normal school, the last part of the year? It will be hard to meet women his age at the gym. We need him for our own purposes, but must ask if it can also serve him?”

  That got a bit of muttering, not all of it being exactly friendly on the topic. One of the other trainers, who was named Mort, Tony thought, was a rather built and tall black man who looked like a pro weight lifter, not a fighter.

  “We need him for this. I bet the network would pull the whole show if he isn’t involved. No Tony, no Erlander. He’s the only big name that’s on the roster so far.” Then the man shook his head and looked away. “Same time, we don’t want to ruin some kid’s life for him. That’s his job.” There was a smile to go with things then.

  Sighing, Tony just nodded, getting that his dreams of running on the Cross Country Team didn’t outweigh the dreams of the rest of them. It wasn’t like he was planning a career in running, or as if he wouldn’t be allowed to try out for the team the next year. As long as he stayed in shape, that would be fine. It was a little disappointing, since he’d had plans, but he’d live.

  Rick glanced at him and saw him shrug.

  “That’s up to you, Tony. I’m not going to force you into this. Even on paper this fight doesn’t really benefit you directly. It will mean a brutal schedule, for months, trying to get ready in time. Harder than what you’ve been doing even. It’s okay to say no.”

  Except that it wasn’t. Everyone would hate him if he did. Not instantly, but over time, when they lost the chance that this represented for them. All of them. Not just the fighters. It was the kind of thing that could really help shape a life, for the training teams. Even doing commentary was kind of a big thing, if Steve did it well. It would lead to other jobs. More, the man was good at that sort of thing.

  Anthony just nodded, kind of feeling like he needed to go to bed.

  “I’m in, then. That…” He yawned and then shook his head. “That being the case, I need to take some recovery days. I’m already burnt out. Then I guess I start real training? Steve, we have that sparring tomorrow.” He looked over at Rick then, his eyes feeling dead. “You mentioned that something was up with the Sally thing?”

  That got a nod.

  “Yeah. I can’t afford to be away for three days. Dan offered to come and pick you up himself, but I didn’t know if you’d feel comfortable with that.”

  He didn’t, but Anthony was used to living without a safety net all the time. That meant he could just nod.

  “No problem. We can set that up?”

  That got a nod and a note taken down. Then he was able to get off to bed. It was early, but he wasn’t planning to run the next day. Doing his mental practice first, focusing on the part needed to pretend to be Sumner,
Anthony drifted off. That night was better than the one before, somehow.

  Mainly because of what Samantha had told him, oddly enough. A lot of it was different than what he’d ever figured. Deirdre had always hinted that she didn’t really want him. Enough so that it had to be true. That she’d grown up as a normal girl, more or less didn’t really scan either. Especially the part where she’d left her entire life to keep him.

  Even if she’d changed her life later, that meant something. What, he didn’t really understand yet.

  The older woman had seemed nice enough. Even wanting her daughter to have an abortion had been about her being a good person, after a fashion. To him that wouldn’t be so great, but she’d meant to save Deirdre from being what she became, more or less. Even his mother had mentioned that having him had ruined her life.

  Still, it changed how he had to think of her now. She wasn’t just the woman that partied too much and cared too little. She was also the girl that had left home to keep him alive. The one that had refused to give him up, even when it had to have been nearly impossible to keep him with her.

  The two versions just didn’t scan, really. Not in a way that meant someone was lying to him, just… It was too hard for him to put together. So he went back to sleep and tried to forget about it. About everything, except what Tony needed to do, in order to help everyone else.

  That was a convoluted flow chart of things. Steve was next up, but there was other sparring work needed for a few people still. Nick and Raul would need him to be there too, as a friend, if nothing else. Riley needed to be pushed on his road work more, since his nature made him not that great at things like that. Sally could use his assistance, at least in theory. Honestly, he was starting to think that she’d be fine, given the fights that he’d seen from her before. The real trick there would be how Diego really felt about things. If he was pushing to learn new skills, then he might be an actual danger to the woman, in a fight.

  He was in shape after all. The man had experience too. A lot more than Sally did.

  After that, it would be about Denny and probably training for his own coming fight. That… He needed to study up on it and start working on a game plan. It was going to be brutal no doubt, from the sound of things, but his real goal there had to be in taking the very best and most complete fight he could to the man. Even if he lost, everyone in the arena had to be left knowing that Erlander Hodder was a force to be reckoned with.

  Tony doubted that he’d be winning, but if that took place he still had to make certain the other guy didn’t look bad doing it. How he was supposed to manage that he had no way of knowing. Really, he could work that out the next day, or even later than that. For the time being, he needed to rest.

  For the first time in close to half a year, Tony just slept then. For nearly fourteen hours. That meant he didn’t even climb out of bed until ten, which felt ridiculously late to him now. Then he went down to the kitchen and fixed a real breakfast, with five eggs and a pear, since they had some fresh ones. After that, he cleaned up the mess he’d made and walked to the gym through the muggy outside air and changed for his match.

  He wore boxing shorts for that and the right shoes, which had flat soles. His trunks were red and gold, being that Clyde Sumner always wore the same colors. It was in the list of things for the fight. Steve could wear any color he wanted. At eleven they met in the ring, with Rick there to officiate and about fifteen people standing around to watch them do it.

  The only difference from normal was that four of them had cameras.

  That probably marked them as being from the press. The thing there was that Clyde wouldn’t care about that. It meant that Tony couldn’t either for the moment, his mind closing in sharply. Becoming only what he was doing, as well as he possibly could.

  The fight seemed nearly automatic to him. Smooth at the same time. Clyde flowed through his matches. It wasn’t until the fifth round that Steve started to really bring his full speed to the fight. There was real power behind the blows as well. The other man began to press, not backing off one ounce.

  So Tony gave that back. Outwardly not much changed, but every blow was suddenly filled with as much force as he could manage. He started to breathe harder and through his mouth, but didn’t pant really. When the bell rang each time, he moved back to his corner and just stood there. Alone.

  They went twelve full rounds that day. For the life of him, Anthony couldn’t tell what was happening. Really, he was barely aware when the last bell rang.

  He just went to stand in his corner, until Denny started snapping at him.

  “Tony? Are you in there? Hello?”

  That got him to smile and make himself move normally again.

  “Sorry, I was a bit out of it. How did that go?” He’d been there, but seriously did not have a clue. Denny just nodded.

  “Not bad? I mean considering I’ve seen title bouts that weren’t that vicious? We’re going to have to make sure child protective services aren’t called in…” He laughed a bit, but didn’t seem to mean it.

  Chapter five

  Steve looked horrible when they got into Rick’s office. His face had two lines of bruises on them, vertically. That was from where the headgear was set. His eyes were turning black underneath and it looked like his knows was red from being hit so many times.

  The consolation was that his face looked similar. His ribs were aching too, from being slammed repeatedly to get him to lower his guard. Only, of course, Clyde wasn’t going to be doing that, so Tony hadn’t. The thing there, a big difference, was that Steve was smiling at him like they were getting ready to go to a party.

  “There he is! That was… Tough. I didn’t feel like this after Machado, I can tell you that.” He chuckled though, happily.

  Rick stopped then and took a deep breath.

  “No. You wouldn’t have. That was… Way over the top for sparring practice. In the future we need to dial that back a bit, both of you. Tony, you’re the expert for this, so it’s your job to control that part of things, even if it means stopping the fight.” It was as close to scolding at Rick had ever really done with him. There was anger on his face and a bit of fear underneath that.

  Tony nodded.

  “No doubt. This one was a mindset thing. Clyde… He’s pretty hard core, so I had to be too. That isn’t an excuse. It won’t happen like that again.”

  Steve stopped and put a hand out.

  “Outside of a fight.” His face was hard then. In fact, he actually glared at Rick, until the man nodded. “That was… Incredible, Tony. I’ve never faced anyone in the ring like that. Even in pro fights. I kind of think I’m starting to get what Ashley was saying after her fight with Rends. I forgot that I wasn’t fighting Sumner about halfway through. It was eerie, Rick. I mean, I looked up a few times and it wasn’t Tony standing there. I mean, it was, but… It’s hard to describe.”

  Rick smiled then.

  “Right. Save it for the real fights. At this moment we have a fighter that’s in training that just took a beating that was basically like a real match. Thankfully we have nearly three months before his big fight. We can’t afford that again in this cycle. The same is true for you, Tony. Last night you went from someone trying to help others train to being in training yourself. That means you have to start being more careful.”

  Anthony nodded.

  “I understand. I think I get it.”

  There was a nod then and Rick pointed at the screen. The image came up, when the remote was clicked. It was just the second floor ring camera set up, which was expected. What wasn’t was the fight that started.

  Tony had been there, but he hadn’t gotten everything he’d been doing the whole time, it seemed. Honestly, even to him, it looked almost like Clyde Sumner was fighting Steve Lopez the whole time. It took a lot of focus for him to find errors in what he was doing.

  “There. Clyde never, ever, switches from a right hook to the head to an uppercut like that. It won’t happen in your fight.” The
image of him did it several times however and it connected with Steve’s middle about half the time. The rest he moved back, forcing Tony to follow him.

  After a few minutes there was another thing that wasn’t a Clyde move.

  “A triple jab? That was bad.”

  Steve shook his head then.

  “It left me blind long enough for the move. See? That slip was like magic. I only saw a glove and then you were on my left side, lighting me up.”

  Anthony shook his head in return.

  “But Sumner won’t be doing that. I don’t know why I added it. It made sense at the time, but he really won’t change like that. He fights one fight…” It was hard to explain the idea, or he thought that he might have trouble with it, but both men nodded.

  Rick sat back.

  “I hear that. It really was on the video. He only has one game. It’s a very good one. What he doesn’t do is a lot of improv in the ring. So, in a way, Tony was fighting above what you’ll face that way, Steve.”

  That got him to grin. His face hurt a bit though, stiffening up already.

  “Except that Clyde is actually going to hit harder. Part of the time. We should go over that again… I can point out where I messed up.”

  It wasn’t constant, just about twenty percent of the fight was influenced by it. Still, without those parts, it was clear that Steve would have won. When he got that, he grinned, or tried too.

  His face had started to hurt.

  “Yeah. Sorry. I didn’t really do my best work there. Against Clyde Sumner that would have worked. My guess is a knock out in one of the later rounds. What he won’t do is go down easy, or quit. Not even internally. The fight you had in there will do it. So the trick is going to be in conditioning and proper training. Which I kind of screwed up.” The bruises on the other man’s face were turning blue already.