the spade brothers' little sister

thirteen

♤ ♤ ♤

Jace grasped my arm and led me out of the room we had been in. I yanked my arm out of his grasp and did my best to move back into the room.

"Brenna, what the hell are you doing? Let's go," Jace spoke, sighing and giving me a death stare.

"Jace, I don't wanna," I whined, feeling like a child. But the absolute last thing that I wanted to do was to go watch Larson get beat up.

"Come on, Brenna, we need to go watch your brother. I need to be there for him," Jace told me. "I need to help him."

I furrowed my eyebrows. "You're going to help him? How? Are you fighting too?"

"No," he said, shaking his head and chuckling. "I tell him techniques and give him advice on how to fight better and win the match."

"Oh," I muttered. "So you guys do this a lot?"

Jace nodded. "When I work late. This is what we're doing."

I sighed. Everything was starting to make some sort of sense. "Do Charlie and Brady know?"

"Charlie knows. Brady knows something is happening, but we haven't told him everything," Jace answered simply. "But Brenna, come on, we need to go. We have to go support Larson."

"Can't I just wait in here?" I gestured to the room we were just in.

"I'm not leaving you alone." Jace's voice was firm and I knew there was no changing his mind.

"What about Benny?" I asked, really not wanting to go and see my brother get beaten to a pulp.

"Benny is Larson's trainer. He's out there with him right now," he explained. "We need to go now, B. Come on."

I sighed deeply and nodded, looking down to the floor. Jace immediately softened. He put his hand under my chin to tilt my head up so that I was looking at him.

"He's not going to get beat up, B," Jace replied, crouching down to my level. "He's stronger than you think." He started to laugh. "He's actually a badass."

I cracked a smile. "Really?"

"Yes," he answered. "And the things that happen in this fight might look really scary, but I promise you that Larson will be fine. He always is."

I nodded and sniffed.

"He's really strong, B." He reached his hand out and I took it, following him through the all of the same looking corridors.

As we walked, Jace didn't let go of my hand, but he fist-bumped a few men who were in the hallway and talked to a few of them as we passed too. He knew so many people who we passed and I realized that Jace had an entire life outside of the older brother and businessman front that he put on at home.

Jace stopped to talk to someone who knew Larson and also knew about the betting odds and guessed how much Larson would make if he won this fight. They spoke and I just stood there, not knowing what to look at or what to do. Jace and the man finished their conversation and Jace pushed me ahead.

"Come on," Jace spoke, grabbing my shoulders and pulling me directly in front of him. I continued to walk after he nudged me forward. His hands remained on my shoulder, guiding me through the crowd to our destination.

"Ready?" Jace turned to me and asked as we approached a large metal door. He squeezed my hand tighter and pushed through the doors.

In front of me, there was what looked like a boxing ring with chairs positioned around the outside. There were a bunch of people in there, all men, all yelling, and they all seemed very angry. The ring was old and beaten up and I assumed that it wasn't really being taken care of.