Her Son's Hero

In an instant, Dom’s expression turned dark and fierce. Fiona nearly inched away from him. “Did he hurt you? Did he hurt Sean?” His voice was low, dangerous, almost a growl. The hairs on her neck rose.

“No, no, Mitch wasn’t like that. I guess you could say it was verbal and emotional abuse.” But she refrained from admitting she had always been afraid he would snap one day and take his threats further.

“Sean’s had enough of that kind of fear in his life,” she went on. “I know the situation with those bullies is bad, but…” She trailed off. It was frustrating feeling so powerless, so inadequate, so incapable of protecting her son, the one person who mattered to her most.

“Let me teach Sean,” Dom said.

“What?”

“You said he’s been kicked out of Saturday fun camp. Sensei Miwa has a youth beginners’ class at nine in the morning on Saturdays. Bring him to the class, and I’ll keep an eye on him for the rest of the day while you work.”

“Absolutely not,” Fiona said, alarmed by the suggestion. “I barely know you.”

“You live across the street from me. And you work across the street from the dojo. Sensei Miwa will be on-site at all times. Sean’s perfectly safe.”

“I thought I made it clear I don’t want him learning how to fight.”

“He’d be learning self-defense,” Dom countered in his calm, resonant voice. “I can show him techniques to disable his opponents long enough that he could get away. It would be good for his self-confidence.”

“Look, I appreciate your offer, but Sean is my—”

“Do you think you can protect him when he hits thirteen? Fourteen? Seventeen? Twenty?”

Fiona breathed deeply, counting to ten and letting the tension drain from her. “I know you have ideas of what might benefit Sean, but this is something I need to work out on my own.”

Dom’s concerned expression told her he wasn’t going to push it, even if he also seemed to be sizing up an opponent.

“Promise me you’ll talk to him about it, at least. And that you’ll think about my offer,” he said.

As if. How could she possibly trust Dom with her son if she couldn’t trust herself with the man?

CHAPTER FOUR

A WEEK AND A HALF AFTER Dom’s arrival in town, mixed martial arts suddenly became the latest craze and Salmon River’s favorite sport. Fiona hadn’t realized just how well-known Dominic “The Dominator” Payette was until she started hearing his name on the lips of every customer at the bookstore.

From them she learned about his upcoming championship title match, and about the three exhibition matches he’d lost in the past few months. It was more than she really wanted or needed to know about her neighbor, but the details trickled in as steadily as the boys—and girls—who came in, wanting to learn more about the mixed martial arts hero.

“I guess I’d better stock up. I’m nearly out of books about MMA,” her boss, Marion Leeds, said as yet another parent and child walked out with a book about mixed martial arts. She flipped through a volume, grinning at the pictures of shirtless men grappling together. “That’s one heck of a sport.” She fanned herself.

“I’d hardly call punching and kicking someone until they bleed a sport,” Fiona said. To her, fighting was fighting, and self-defense was just another form of it. Sean should be learning to avoid violence. Besides, the last thing she wanted was for him to think he could actually take someone on and win. He was sure to get hurt.

Still, she knew Dom was at least partially right about her son’s self-confidence. Earlier in the week, she’d gone to pick him up from school, and found Rene Kirkpatrick’s gang taunting him from the other side of the fence. “Baby boy, baby boy, mama’s little baby boy!” they’d cried.

Sean’s face had gone nearly purple with suppressed rage. Fiona’s praise for his keeping it together was met by the most scathing backlash yet.

“Well, someone calls it a sport,” Marion countered. “And if it gets people reading and buying, it’s all good to me. I’m going to see what I can order in for a fast turnaround.” She headed to the back room, tucking the book filled with semiclad men under her arm.

Sean had a doctor’s appointment on Main Street after school. Fiona picked him up and parked back at the bookstore. As they passed the dojo, Sean was drawn to the huge windows.

“Hey, Mom, look, it’s Dom!”

She balked, but followed him to the window. Dom was wearing a gi—the traditional white karate uniform—his chest bare beneath the loose-fitting top, intense concentration carved into his face. He was taking his frustrations out on a punching bag braced by Mako Miwa.

Sean rapped on the glass and yelled, “Dom! Hi, Dom!”

“Sean, that’s rude.” Fiona wanted to hustle her son away before she was forced to meet Dom’s gaze. “He’s training. He doesn’t need to be bothered.”

But Dom turned and said something to his teacher, who nodded and went to the door.

Mako Miwa was Salmon River’s only Japanese resident, so Fiona knew him on sight. He was a compact man, half a head shorter than Dom, neither fat nor thin, with slick black hair and near-black eyes. His air of dignity and serenity told Fiona he’d seen the greater part of his life.

She remembered him once waving at her and Sean after a particularly nasty fistfight between Sean and some kids from school. Everyone else in town had steered clear of them, but Mako Miwa had seemed unaware of their plight, and had simply smiled.

The karate master grinned at them now, hands clasped together. “Dom would like to see you,” he said after he’d introduced himself. “Please, come in.”

“We really shouldn’t. Sean has a doctor’s appointment in about fifteen minutes….”

“Just a quick visit?” Mako suggested.

“Please, Mom? Can we?”

She stared down at her son and gave in.

Stepping past the threshold, Sean removed his shoes. “You have to do that, Mom,” he insisted. “It’s not polite to wear your shoes inside.”

“Well, that, and it gets the mats muddy,” Mako said. “You know something about dojos, then?”

“Just what I read in manga and on the net.”

Mako chuckled. “I never thought I’d see the day when Japanese comics would be a big thing with kids in America, especially in a town as small as this.”

Fiona was impressed by what her son had learned. It shouldn’t have surprised her, though; he was a gifted child. She just hoped he wasn’t getting any crazy ideas that he could do any of the things the characters in the comic books could. Like helicopter-kicking a bad guy, or upper-cutting them into the sky.

Don’t be ridiculous. Sean was smarter than that. Fiona had grown up with the likes of Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck, and she’d turned out fine…. Though admittedly, dropping an anvil on her ex-husband’s head would have a certain appeal.

Dom slung a towel over his shoulders as he approached. “Hi, Sean, Fiona. How are you two doing?”

Fiona felt a tingle all the way to her toes. When had a man’s sweat become an aphrodisiac?

“Great,” Sean chirped. “What were you doing just then? Was that a kata?”

“Just a training exercise to focus my coordination.”

“It looked really cool. What else can you do?”

“Well…”

“Can you do spinning roundhouse kicks? Or flips? I’ve been looking stuff up on the internet that I want to learn.”