Total Knock Out / Book Two

Chapter One: Case Files and Punching Bags

Stanford Williams continued to pound on the punching bag in front of him, steadily ignoring the man he considered his honorary little brother. Anytime Landon Reece got that look on his face everyone around him was sucked into his whirlwind plans to change the world for the better.

He paused for just a few seconds, long enough to wipe the sweat off of his forehead onto his shoulder, and flicked his eyes back to where Landon stood leaning against the wall; one leg bent so his foot was braced against the wall and his arms crossed over his chest.

He let out a huff of air and jabbed his left fist against the bag swinging in front of him, the shock of the punch traveling up his arm and into his shoulder. The twinge he felt was his indication to stop his workout, do a few stretches and rest a while before continuing, but he knew the second he stopped moving that Landon would pounce on him like a lion who had caught sight of an injured gazelle.

He hated to ignore Landon, he only ever came into the rec center with that look on his face when there were no other options and he desperately needed help to fix a wrong in the world, but he had a fight coming up. Fellow MMA fighter Thomas Huffman would be training just as hard as he was, determined to pound him into the ground once they got into the cage together, and Stanford couldn't let himself become distracted. Lack of training and a split focus is what made men lose, and in the seven years he had been doing this he had only ever lost twice.

"Oh, for the love of God! Stop hitting the fucking bag and listen," Landon snapped, surging off of the wall and grabbing onto the punching bag so it would stop swaying. Stanford raised an eyebrow at him but resisted the urge to roundhouse kick it to see if Landon would stumble back a few feet. They were both the same 6'4 height and built similarly, and while he might have an advantage in a caged match; Landon was a police officer and former street fighter. He wasn't afraid to play dirty and plant Stanford straight on his ass.

"I just need you to look at a few case files. After you've seen what I have to show you, you can decide what you want to do. I promise."

Stanford nodded his head at Landon and bent down to grab his water bottle, chugging the contents in just a few seconds while Landon went back to the backpack he had brought with him and took out two files. Stanford rolled his shoulders to help ease the aching he felt and walked over to where Landon stood, looking down at the first file that had been opened.

It felt like someone with a fist the size of a sledgehammer punched him in the solar plexus when he saw the ravaged face of the woman in the photo. Striking green eyes looked back at him, both of them surrounded by black flesh and and one of them almost swollen shut. Her left cheekbone appeared to be dented in, a cut stretching underneath it and letting him know that she probably had an orbital fracture. Her lower lip was busted in three separate spots and her jaw had a large lump on the right side, a sure sign that someone had cold-cocked her. Her nose was slightly crooked, probably broken. Patches of her vibrant red hair looked like it had been pulled out, leaving her scalp bloody and bruised. They were all injuries he was well versed in, signs of a fight plastered all over her face for the world to see.

"Logan Myers. Twenty in the picture, twenty four now. Caught her ex-boyfriend in their newborn daughter's room with his pants down around his knees, standing right beside her crib. She put up one hell of a fight. You should see the other guy," Landon said softly, handing Stanford the case file so he could open up the other one.

Stanford stared down at the picture of a man with the same injuries as Logan, deeply satisfied that he looked worse than she did. Men who preyed on women and children like that deserved much worse than what he had been given.

"He beat the absolute shit out of her. Stomped on her leg and broke her femur. Drug her around by her hair and tried to shove himself into her mouth when he decided that he would have her first and their daughter second. She bit one of his balls off, and when he went into shock she drug herself over to where her cellphone had fallen and called the police. When they got there, they found her barricaded in the nursery with one of those thick curtain rods in her hands just in case he somehow found a way to get up and come after her again."

Stanford shook his head and switched his gaze back to the picture of Logan Myers. He wondered what it was like to have a mother love you so much that she fought for you will all the rage and fire inside of her body.

"Why are you showing this to me?" Stanford asked, tearing his gaze away from the picture so he could look at Landon. He really shouldn't have asked in the first place, never shown that something other than his upcoming fight had caught his interest, because he still had three months of training to focus on. But the haunted look in the eyes of Logan Myers was getting to the lonely child he had buried deep inside of himself.

Landon let out a heavy sigh and ran his hand through his hair, resisting the urge to grab on tight and yank them out by the roots. Cases like this were the bane of his existence. Cases like this made him want to hand over his gun and shield and take matters into his own hands, a vigilante justice that would leave no witnesses or survivors.

"Because the ex-boyfriend, Kyle Harrington, is getting released from prison in a week. A part of his sentence was to do court mandated therapy, focusing on pedophilia and sexual assault. I think the fucking idiots wanted to see if they could cure him and his God-damned therapist made him write letters to Logan Myers and their daughter Rori. Stupid fuck never read them before mailing them out for Kyle. They're brutal, man. And she has a restraining order against him so we can't do shit as cops unless he breaks it. But I honestly believe that if she doesn't find someone to help her, keep an eye on her and Rori, that when he breaks the restraining order that he's going to kill Logan and hurt their child."

Stanford looked back down at the picture of Logan Myers, his fingertip tracing over her hair. He had never had the kind of childhood where someone fights for you. Where someone accepts that they might die, but at least you would be safe. His heart broke for this woman and her child, and the shattered boy inside of him came surging to the surface; wanting to break out and bask in the light that was a mother's undying love. He owed it to himself, on some level, to at least meet her and her daughter. To prove to himself that there was something wrong with his own mother on a fundamental level and the blame she had placed on him as a small boy really wasn't his to bear.

"What do you say?" Landon questioned, taking back the case file from Stanford's hand. "Will you help them? They don't have anyone else they can turn to right now. They could use a hero."

Stanford snorted at the hero comment. He wasn't a good guy, had his very own case file like the one Landon was holding down at the police station. But he would never hurt a woman or child, and that was probably what made Landon come to him in the first place; because the victims of the beatings he handed out like Halloween candy were only men who did.

"I want a meeting with them. There's no use in trying to help them if I make either one of them uncomfortable and they don't trust me. You can come by the house tomorrow with them at any time."

Stanford walked away from Landon, making his way back to the abandoned punching bag and rolling his shoulders just once before laying into it. He knew that Landon was happy that he agreed to meet with Logan and Rori, but he was secretly worried that they would run away from him; screaming at the top of their lungs. He knew he was intimidating, had been called a mountain of a man who scowled more than he smiled more times than he cared to count. He also knew that people picked up on the underlying rage he kept on a tight leash, had told him that he seemed like he could kill someone just as easily as he could beat them to a pulp. He shook his head and told himself to stop thinking about it, but in the back of his mind he couldn't help but hope that Logan didn't scare easy.