Haaah... haaah... k-k-k.
Evan’s small chest heaved in violent, jagged spasms. His training gi was soaked in sweat and gray dust, his knuckles scraped red, his knees trembling as he tried and failed to push his ninety-pound frame off the canvas.
Standing three paces over him, his chest bare, his heavy silver-plated championship chain bouncing against his collarbone, was twenty-nine-year-old Blake Haron.
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Blake was a five-time state middleweight kickboxing champion and the golden boy of local municipal athletics. His sponsor banners—proclaiming the financial backing of Vance & Sterling Factoring Holdings—hung in massive vinyl panels from the steel rafters above our heads. Blake wiped a bead of sweat from his shaved temple, adjusted his sixteen-ounce leather sparring gloves, and turned toward the watching parents with that wide, self-satisfied, predatory grin he used for regional promotional flyers.
“That’s what happens when you hesitate on the inside, kid!” Blake barked, projecting his baritone straight toward the smartphone cameras:
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