Free In a Cold Sweat by Roy Glenn Page A

often come out of the dressing room cold and had gone down in the first three rounds. Sparrow was able to come back and win in each of those fights by knock out, but the consensus was that one day, Sparrow would get caught with a shot that he couldn’t get up from.
    “You go down in the first round,” Mylo explained to the champ again. “Everybody says, yeah, it was bound to happen sooner or later. You said it yourself, they insisted on a rematch clause. You take the rematch and you kick his ass in the second fight. But you come away from here with a cool million, not to mention the guarantee money from the second fight, ’cause you know it’s gonna be huge.”
    “I don’t know, Mylo. Are you sure this is what Black wants me to do?”
    “If he had known you were coming, he’d be here to tell you himself. In fact, he was in here earlier tonight wantin’ to know what you was gonna do. He said he was countin’ on you to do this and was on me to make it happen.”
    Sparrow walked over and sat on the edge of the couch. He felt like he owed his career to Black for putting him onto a fight promoter that started getting him good fights. Still, it was a big decision, one he sat and thought long and hard about. Sparrow basically made up his mind that he was gonna do it and that was the main reason he begged his trainer for a night out, with the promise that there would be no gambling and no women.
    “And this is what Black wants, right?” Sparrow still wanted to hear it one more time.
    “He sat in that very spot and told me himself,” Mylo assured Sparrow.
    “Okay, tell him I’m in,” Sparrow said and got up. “Tell Black I’m glad to do it for him.”
    “He’ll be glad to hear that, Champ,” Mylo told him, I know I am. The truth was , Black and Freeze knew nothing about this. In fact, Mylo was still waiting for Black to actually speak to him. It was all Mylo’s idea for Sparrow to throw the fight. Mylo would tell Sparrow that Black wasn’t in on it after he had his money in his hand. At that point, what could he say?
     

Chapter Ten
     

Mike Black
     
    When Mystique was changed, we took a cab to our usual hotel. On the way, she told me about the drama that happened earlier at Cynt's. Two of the dancers got into a fight over a customer. “And she’s holding the girl by her wave,” Mystique said laughing. “And hittin’ her in the face and sayin’, ‘I done told your skank ass ’bout fuckin’ wit’ my customers.’ ”
    “She hurt her bad?”
    “Busted her lips, her nose was bleedin’ and her eye looked like it’s gonna look fucked up tomorrow.”
    “Little extreme, don’t you think?”
    “No,” Mystique said definitely. “If any one of them bitches came anywhere near you, I’d kill their ass.”
    I laughed as the cab pulled up in front of the hotel, but she didn’t. I looked in her eyes and knew she was serious.
    When we got to our suite, as she always does, Mystique said she wanted to take a shower. She kissed me on the cheek and started for the bathroom. I unbuttoned my shirt and got a bottle of Courvoisier from the mini bar. “Come here for a second. There’s something I need to tell you,” I said and sat down on the couch.
    Mystique sat down next to me, took my face in her hands and kissed me again. “What you wanna tell me, baby?”
    “I’m gonna be gone for a while. I’m takin’ Michelle to the Bahamas to see my mother, and then me and Bobby are goin’ to Hong Kong.”
    Mystique looked devastated. “How long you gonna be gone?” she asked and curled in closer to me. I put my arm around her.
    “I’ll be back from the Bahamas in a few days, but I don’t know when I’ll be back from Hong Kong.”
    “Can I ask you what you’re goin’ to Hong Kong for?”
    “I need to talk to somebody. Might take a while to find them.” I didn’t think it was a good idea to tell the woman I was about to have sex with that my only purpose in life was to find out why my wife was