Clinch (The Underground Book 2) Read Online Free Page A

gaze meeting Katie’s. “I’ll call you tomorrow.”
    Leo grabbed the door and yanked it closed, twisting the lock as soon as he cut Marshall’s voice off. “Don’t bother,” he muttered.
    She fought the grin that spread across her lips. “My hero,” she teased.
    Leo didn’t seem to find the situation funny, however. “Who is that jackass?”
    “Until last night, I guess I would have said he was my boyfriend.”
    “And then?”
    “And then he dragged me to your friend’s stupid fight and forced me to watch sweaty, huge, muscular, sexy men beat each other to a bloody pulp.” She gasped as soon as she realized a few of her adjectives weren’t appropriate.
    Leo’s mouth quirked on one side. “Sexy, huh?” He set a hand on her back and led her through the waiting room and toward her office. “You were on a date with that jackass?”
    “Uh-huh.”
    “Wearing that dress?” He pointed to the wrinkled material that suddenly seemed way too short and tight.
    “On my behalf, he didn’t exactly tell me we would be sneaking into some speakeasy to watch an underground fight.”
    “I see.”
    She licked her lips as she shrugged free of him and slid around to her desk chair. She had no idea what he saw, but she saw a room filled with testosterone all packaged up in a body she wouldn’t ordinarily find attractive.
    Or maybe she was kidding herself.
    Maybe she’d always considered men like Leo attractive and had simply tamped down the feeling since there was no way in hell her parents would ever approve of her dating someone like him—an MMA fighter with muscles that went on forever.
    She started to giggle at the visual of introducing him to her mother.
    Maybe it would be worth it just for the shock value.

Chapter Three
    Five months later…
    “How’s your friend?” Katie asked as she stuck a butterfly bandage on the fourth buff guy Leo brought into her clinic in the past two weeks. He had a small cut above his right eyebrow from sparring at the gym. Hardly necessary.
    She had to struggle to keep from grinning. When she first told Leo he could bring his friends in to get stitched up as necessary, she hadn’t expected him to take her so literally. Half the time the men on her table had nothing more than a bruise.
    Leo Gulin used anything as an excuse to come by.
    “Dmitry, you mean? He’s good. I hear he thinks he’s totally healed. No more pain around his kidney at all. Lauren can’t keep him down any longer.”
    She had no idea where Dmitry and Lauren had fled to the morning after she’d taken care of him. Once she and Leo had gotten rid of a very persistent Marshall, she’d declared Dmitry safe enough to travel. His urine output was fine. No evidence of blood. To be safe, she’d sent a blood sample to the lab for further testing, figuring she could get word to him later if there was anything he needed to know. The results from that blood work still made her shudder, but the important thing was his kidneys were functioning properly.
    It was clear Dmitry and Lauren were on the run. Some Russian Mafia guy was after them. Leo never gave her many details, probably for her own protection, but she gathered they were far away in another country.
    Katie smiled at the guy on her table as she finished cleaning up this latest man’s forehead. “What did you say your name was?”
    “Ivan Belinsky, ma’am.” Ivan was another clone to Leo as far as she was concerned. From the neck down, they all looked alike. Ivan had brown eyes and slightly darker hair, but his olive skin was almost the same shade as Leo’s, and he was over six feet tall. Leo stood at about six four. Ivan was only a few inches shorter. Both men had the same distinctly Russian accent that made her panties wet. Their English was perfect, but their accents would never completely go away.
    “Well, Ivan, I think you’re going to live. Keep the area clean for a few days.” She stepped back, pulled her gloves off, and dropped them in the trash