Chapter 3 - THE FIGHT THAT KILLED ETHAN MADDOXThey drove to Ray's house in silence.
Cole sat in the passenger seat, still wearing his training clothes under a jacket.
Eight years.
For eight years he had carried the same version of Ethan's death.
Bad night.
Bad opponent.
Bad luck.
Ethan Maddox had been thirty-two years old when he entered a ring at the Riviera Crown Casino against a dangerous contender named Marcos Velez.
By the ninth round Ethan had absorbed too many clean punches.
His corner stopped the fight.
He collapsed in the dressing room twenty minutes later.
A brain bleed.
Emergency surgery.
Two days later, Ethan was dead.
Boxing was dangerous.
Everybody said so.
The medical reports showed trauma consistent with the fight.
The commission investigated.
No criminal charges.
No conspiracy.
No mystery.
A tragedy.
Cole had believed that because the alternative was unbearable.
Ray pulled into his driveway.
Neither man moved.
Finally Cole said, "Start talking."
Ray gripped the steering wheel.
"Three days before Ethan fought Velez, somebody contacted him."
"Roman?"
Ray nodded.
"Not personally. One of his people."
"How much?"
"Seven hundred fifty thousand."
Cole laughed bitterly.
"My brother died for less than Roman offered me."
"He didn't die for the money."
"You just told me he agreed."
"He did."
Cole turned sharply.
"Why?"
Ray finally looked at him.
"Your mother."
Cole went still.
"Mom?"
"Her house was going into foreclosure. Ethan had debts. Medical bills from your dad's last year. He'd borrowed money trying to keep everything afloat."
Cole knew about some of it.
Not all.
Their father had died from cancer when Cole was twenty.
Ethan became the man of the family overnight.
"He never told me."
"He didn't want you quitting your amateur program."
Cole looked out the windshield.
"He took the deal."
"At first."
"What was the arrangement?"
"Sixth round. Body shot. Stay down."
Cole closed his eyes.
He could almost see Ethan sitting in some back room hearing the same proposition Cole had heard hours earlier.
All of this is yours.
"What changed?"
Ray's answer came quietly.
"Ethan found something."
"What?"
"I don't know exactly."
"You're lying."
"I swear."
Cole turned.
"You've lied to me for eight years."
"Because your mother had already buried one son."
"You don't get to decide what I know."
"No. I don't."
Ray looked suddenly old.
"Ethan came to me the morning of the fight. He said he wasn't taking the fall."
"What did you tell him?"
"To cancel."
Cole frowned.
"You wanted him to pull out?"
"I begged him."
"Why?"
"Because he was scared."
Ethan hadn't scared easily.
That fact alone tightened Cole's chest.
"Of Roman?"
"Of what he'd discovered."
Ray continued.
"He kept saying the fights weren't just being fixed for gambling. He said somebody was building fighters."
"Building?"
"Choosing winners. Controlling rankings. Getting certain guys title opportunities while ruining others. I didn't understand half of it."
"Did he have proof?"
"He said he did."
"What kind?"
"Records. Names. Payments."
Cole leaned back.
"What happened to it?"
"I don't know."
"You expect me to believe that?"
"I never saw it."
Cole opened the car door.
Ray grabbed his shoulder.
"Cole."
He stopped.
"There's something else."
Cole looked at him.
Ray swallowed.
"The night Ethan died, Roman was there."
"At the casino?"
"Yes."
"Lots of people were."
"He came into Ethan's dressing room before the fight."
Cole stared at him.
"You saw him?"
"From the hallway."
"And you never told investigators?"
"I told them Roman visited. He said he was wishing Ethan luck. That wasn't a crime."
"What happened inside?"
"I don't know."
Cole stepped out of the car.
Ray followed.
"Ethan came out five minutes later."
"And?"
"He looked at me and said, 'If anything happens, don't let Cole become me.'"
Cole stopped walking.
The world seemed to contract around those words.
He remembered Ethan's funeral.
Ray standing beside the casket.
His mother unable to stand without help.
Cole promising himself he would win the title Ethan never reached.
"You let me become a fighter anyway."
Ray's voice broke slightly.
"I couldn't stop you."
"You trained me."
"I thought I could protect you."
Cole turned.
"From what?"
Ray didn't answer.
Cole's phone buzzed again.
Unknown number.
This time there was no message.
Only a photograph.
Cole enlarged it.
A picture of Ethan outside a coffee shop.
Taken eight years earlier.
Someone had drawn a black circle around his head.
Below it were four words.
HE CHANGED HIS MIND TOO.
Cole looked at Ray.
Roman's offer had just stopped being about tomorrow night's fight.
It had become about Ethan.
May you like
And Cole suddenly understood something that frightened him far more than the men blocking the training-room door.
His brother's death might never have been an accident.
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