Chapter 1: Gut-Punched Into Submission
The air in the backroom of The Rusty Hook was a solid thing, a soup of sweat, cheap aftershave, and the iron-tinged promise of blood. It vibrated with the bass from the main pit and the low, hungry rumble of men betting. Brick leaned against a stained concrete wall, the coolness doing nothing to settle the fire in his veins. He rolled his shoulders, feeling the familiar pull of scar tissue over his pectorals, the tight fabric of his regulation black jockstrap the only thing between him and the jeering crowd just beyond the curtain.
Across the cramped space, Jax was a mirror image of coiled aggression. A tight white tank top strained over the slab of his chest, his nipples stark points against the fabric. He caught Brick’s stare and didn’t look away, just cracked his neck with a sound like popping gravel. A slow, cocky smirk spread across his face.
“Marine,” Jax said, the Irish lilt turning the word into a challenge.
“Shitkicker,” Brick replied, his voice flat.
A handler with a face like old leather shoved a bottle of water into Brick’s hand. “Two minutes. They’re hot for it out there. Make it bloody.”
Brick drained the water, crushed the bottle, and tossed it aside. He and Jax moved as one, pushing through the heavy curtain into the roar.
The pit was a circle of hell carved out of the warehouse floor, defined by a single strand of barbed wire strung between steel posts. Light from a single, dangling industrial lamp pooled in the center, leaving the faces of the crowd in snarling shadows. They were packed shoulder-to-shoulder, a wall of flannel and denim and desperate eyes.
Brick stepped over the wire. The canvas under his bare feet was sticky. He bounced on the balls of his feet, the muscles in his thick thighs knotting and releasing. Jax did the same, circling. The crowd’s noise faded to a dull buzz in Brick’s ears, replaced by the hammer of his own heart.
No bell. Just a shrill whistle.
Jax came in fast, a bull charge. Brick sidestepped, but not fast enough. A fist like a cinderblock glanced off his ribcage, driving the air from his lungs in a grunt. He answered with a brutal, short-range punch to Jax’s solar plexus.
The impact was a deep, wet thud. Jax’s abs, a defined eight-pack sheet of muscle, rippled violently under the blow. He staggered back a half-step, a choked gasp escaping him. His eyes, wide for a second, locked with Brick’s. And beneath the waistband of his own straining jockstrap, Brick saw it—a violent, unmistakable twitch. Jax’s cock jerked against the white fabric, swelling rapidly.
A jolt of something electric, nothing to do with fighting, shot down Brick’s spine.
Jax recovered, his smirk gone, replaced by a dark, focused intensity. He feigned another rush, then dropped low, sweeping a leg. Brick went down hard, his back slamming onto the canvas. The crowd screamed. Jax was on him in an instant, the weight of him crushing, smelling of salt and aggression. Brick bucked, trying to dislodge him, his hands grappling at Jax’s corded arms. They were chest to chest, heaving, skin slick with sweat. Jax’s prominent nipple, hard as a pebble, brushed against Brick’s own through the damp tank top.
“Fuck you,” Jax growled, his breath hot in Brick’s ear. It wasn’t just anger in the words. It was something else, something raw and conceding.
Brick hooked a leg and rolled, reversing their positions. Now he was on top, pinning Jax’s massive arms with his knees. He drove a fist into Jax’s face. Once. Twice. A spray of blood, hot and coppery, flecked Brick’s knuckles and chest. Jax’s head snapped to the side, but his eyes blazed up, defiant. And he was hard. Fully, achingly hard, the outline of his erection pressing insistently against the pouch of his jockstrap, just inches from Brick’s own groin.
The world narrowed to the space between their bodies. The crowd was a distant ocean. Every gasp, every grind of muscle, was amplified. Brick’s own cock, traitorously, was thickening, responding to the primal, fucked-up energy coursing between them. It wasn’t about winning anymore.
He leaned down, his lips almost touching Jax’s ear. “You like that?” he muttered, his voice gravel.
Jax answered by surging up, sinking his teeth into the meat of Brick’s shoulder. The pain was sharp, bright. Brick snarled and grabbed a fistful of Jax’s hair, yanking his head back. Their eyes met again, and the understanding was complete. This had gone past the fight.
Brick stood up, his chest heaving. He looked at the crowd, a sea of rabid faces, then down at Jax, who was wiping blood from his mouth, his gaze never leaving Brick’s. Brick jerked his head toward the back curtain.
Without a word, Jax got to his feet. They ignored the confused, then jeering shouts of the crowd, ducking under the barbed wire and pushing back through the curtain into the relative quiet of the grimy backroom.
The handler stared. “The fuck? It ain’t over!”
“It’s over,” Brick said, not breaking stride. He shoved Jax against the cold concrete wall near the emergency exit, away from the lockers. The door was a rusted metal thing, marked by kicks and stains.
There was no pretense now. No reason. Just heat. Brick slammed his mouth onto Jax’s, the taste of blood and sweat exploding between them. It was less a kiss than an attack, all teeth and clashing tongues. Jax fought back just as fiercely, his hands coming up to claw at Brick’s back, raking over the scars.
Brick broke the kiss, panting. He grabbed the neck of Jax’s tank top and ripped it down the middle. The fabric gave way with a sick, satisfying tear. Jax’s chest was heaving, his nipples pebbled and dark. Brick dropped his head and took one into his mouth, biting down hard. Jax cried out, a ragged sound, and shoved his hand down the front of Brick’s jockstrap, his rough palm wrapping around Brick’s cock.
“Christ,” Brick gasped, hips jerking forward.
He fumbled with the waistband of Jax’s shorts, yanking them and the jockstrap down in one brutal pull. Jax’s cock sprang free, thick and flushed, leaking at the tip. Brick spat into his own hand, wrapped it around them both, and started to stroke. It was dry, rough, almost painful friction, but neither of them cared. Jax’s head thudded back against the metal door, a string of filthy, desperate curses falling from his lips.
“Turn around,” Brick gritted out.
Jax obeyed, bracing his forearms high against the door, presenting himself. Brick didn’t wait, didn’t prepare. He spat again, slicking himself roughly, and then he was pushing in. The tight, clenching heat was unbelievable. Jax let out a choked groan, his whole body shuddering.
“Move, you fucking Marine bastard,” Jax gasped, pushing back against him.
Brick set a punishing rhythm, each drive of his hips slamming Jax’s body into the unyielding metal. The door rattled in its frame. One of Brick’s hands gripped Jax’s hip, fingers digging into the muscle, the other wrapped around his throat, not choking, just holding, possessing. The sounds were obscene: skin slapping against skin, ragged breaths, the low, constant groan of the door.
Brick leaned over, his sweat-slicked chest plastered to Jax’s scarred back. “You’re nothing,” he growled into Jax’s ear, his thrusts becoming erratic, deeper. “Just a hole. My hole.”
Jax came with a shattered cry, his release painting streaks across the rusted metal door. The clenching of his body pulled Brick over the edge a second later. He drove in one last, brutal time, burying himself to the hilt as his own orgasm ripped through him, a white-hot detonation that left him seeing stars.
For a long moment, the only sound was their ragged breathing, echoing in the dank room. The crowd was still roaring beyond the curtain, a world away.
Brick pulled out, stepping back. The reality of what they’d done, the where and the how, crashed down like cold water. He adjusted his jockstrap, not looking at Jax.
Jax turned, leaning against the ruined door, his clothes in tatters. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, his eyes dark and unreadable. There was no victory in them. No shame either. Just a weary, complicated emptiness.
Without a word, Brick turned and walked toward the lockers, the adrenaline gone, leaving only a hollow, aching chill. The fight was over. The other thing, whatever it was, had just begun.