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  Safeword: Matte © March 2012 by Candace Blevins

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  First Edition March 2012

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  Safeword: Matte

  By Candace Blevins

  Matte, pronounced mah-tay, is the word used in some forms of martial arts to stop a fight.

  It’s the Japanese word for stop or wait.

  Chapter One

  Sam felt the kick to the back of her right leg just before it began buckling in slow motion. Her left foot was up in the air and useless at the moment – she'd left herself wide open. What was with her today? Without enough leverage to push her body into a back handspring, there was no choice but to fall on her ass. She didn't even try to fall the right way; she deserved the pain for leaving herself open. She wanted it to hurt.

  Looking up, she saw Randy still in attack mode, just in case she sprang back up fighting. Ready to concede, she said, “Matte,” –– the word their dojo used to end fights.

  Randy relaxed his stance and leaned forward, hands braced on his thighs, breathing hard. “What the hell was that?”

  She grimaced, looking up at him from the dojo floor. “Fuck if I know. I left myself wide open, gave you a beautiful opening. Congrats, looks like I'm buying drinks tonight.”

  “Uh, no. Can't go out for drinks tonight. Sorry.”

  Well, that was new. Surprised, but trying not to show it, she said, “Hey, no need to be sorry, but you don't get a rain check. Got a hot date?”

  Randy shuffled his feet and looked up, away from her, talking to the wall. “Well, yeah. But isn't it weird for me to talk to you about it?”

  Sam put her palms to the floor by her ears and threw her legs in the air, arching her back and pushing up with her hands to land gracefully on her feet. “No. We tried to date, it didn't work, and now we're back to being friends and sparring partners. If you find someone who makes you happy then I'm happy for you. It's too bad it didn't work, but it didn't, and we were both all grown up and shit about it, so we're good. Right?”

  “Yeah, we're good.” He looked at the floor, scuffed his bare foot into the floor of the dojo. “But I've heard you told a few people you're done with dating and you aren't interested in going out with anyone for the foreseeable future. Was it so bad with me you’ve decided to not date at all?”

  “No Randy, it's just that... Shit.” Sam sighed and looked down, trying to figure out how to explain. “There are places to go where there are other people who like to do…”

  She ran her hand over her head and down her ponytail. It would only be a big deal if she treated it that way. She needed to just say it and move on. “People who like to do the things I like to do in bed. So it's not so much I won't be dating at all anymore, but I'm only going to date people I meet at those places, so I know up front we have the same kinks. The problem with that plan of action is I have issues letting guys spank me when I know I could kick their ass, and I can kick most guys’ asses with one arm tied behind my back. So, for now, yeah, I am kind of calling it quits and focusing on other things, but it's nothing you did. I'm glad our friendship survived, and I don't want you thinking you did anything wrong, okay? I'm the warped and twisted one, you're fine.”

  He looked at her a few heartbeats, and when he finally spoke she could tell he was carefully picking his words. “I still feel as if I failed you in some way, but it's just not in me to hurt a woman sexually. I mean, the spanking thing was fun as a novelty, but not…” he trailed off, looking forlorn and helpless and terribly uncomfortable. “I'm sorry.”

  She glanced at the clock, realized they were probably done for the day and took a few steps toward the women's locker room without turning away from him. “Don't apologize. We've already been through this. We're good, Randy. You were true to who you are, I was true to who I am, and we both respect the other for it. I’m glad I can still call you my friend. Now go take your girl out and have a nice evening, okay?”

  He grinned, “Okay. I'm going to hit the shower, you still going to the fight tomorrow night?”

  “Oh yeah, I think Tom has an excellent chance to win this year's local title and move up to the regional fights.”

  “I have a few concerns, he’s pretty strictly a martial arts fighter, and he'll be up against kickboxers and street fighters and they’re going to do things he won't be expecting.”

  Sam shrugged. “Yeah well, he'll do things they won't expect, too. I'll probably work late tomorrow, so I'll just meet ya'll at the arena.”

  * * * *

  “So do we have an agreement? Joint custody with the kids spending every other week with each parent, the rotation happening on Monday at three o’clock so it happens just before school ends. One parent drops off in the morning, the other picks up in the evening. Primary address for legal purposes will be at Richard's house since he lives in the school zone the children will be attending...”

  Sam read the basics out loud, since she would be the one hammering it all out and creating the mediation agreement. She loved it when people could be grown-ups and work in the best interests of their children. She made more money when they fought and couldn't come to an agreement and landed in front of a judge, but she really preferred it this way. In fact, the couple had been so well behaved, she and the other attorney hadn't even brought in an outside mediator; they'd just sat down with their clients and come to an agreement.

  She finished up, saw them to the door, and went back to her office to type everything up while it was fresh on her mind. She'd timed it well; she had just enough time to get this done and change clothes before walking down the hill to the arena for the fight.

  * * * *

  When Sam arrived at the arena, she stood in line to show her ticket and then stood in another line for the metal detectors and finally made it into the building, making her way through the tunnels and down to the floor seats. They'd all given money to Zee so he could buy the tickets all together as soon as they were available. When Sam arrived she was the last one, since everyone else had met at the dojo and driven downtown together. Cassie was sitting in the middle of the guys and she started right in with playing musical chairs. “Can you guys shift over so Sam can sit by me, please?”

  Randy and Francisco stood and moved out into the aisle so she could move in and then they followed her back in to sit down.

  Francisco ended up beside her and said, “Cutting it kind of close, ar
en't you?”

  “Honestly? I figured I'd miss the first few fights and was just aiming to be here in time for the middleweight fights so I'd be sure to be seated by the time the heavyweights started. Things worked out well today though, so here I am.”

  Cassie spoke from her other side, “All work and no play...”

  Luckily, the announcer dude chose that moment to step out and begin talking, so she was saved from being reminded she really needed to stop working so much.

  They watched the fights progress, four fights per weight class, four weight classes, and each fight could go a maximum of twelve minutes in this round, though most didn't last five minutes before someone was either knocked out or the fight was called before one of the men was seriously hurt. Someone did get hurt in one of the middleweight fights and he was taken out on a stretcher. The crowd loved it, but Sam was really worried about the guy. By the time Tom's weight class, the heavyweights, had started she was wondering if this was such a good idea. Sure, Tom could kick just about anyone's ass, but these guys were playing for keeps. His was the last fight of the night and she wondered if he was watching the fights or if he were in a quiet room getting his head where it needed to be.

  The announcer introduced the first two heavyweight fighters and Sam couldn't take her eyes off of one of them. Ethan Levi, according to the announcer, was six foot five inches tall and weighed in at two hundred and seventy one pounds. He looked bigger than life, with muscles on top of muscles – just on the verge of looking like a bodybuilder, though not quite. She could tell he hadn't just bulked up, he was just that strong. And he moved like a dancer. He was going to be lethal once they locked him into the cage. He was probably her age, early thirties… bald, and tanned, and she wondered what he’d be like in bed.

  Cassie bumped her shoulder. “Quit drooling.”

  “Hey, I've given up on men for the time being, remember? Let me drool from a distance.”

  “Yeah, I'm still not sure I get... oh shit!”

  The moment the signal was given to start the fight, Ethan Levi had delivered a punch to the face followed by a punch to the gut and then an immediate kick to the face. His opponent was down in less than three seconds. And these eight fighters had fought in smaller venues in order to make it to this one; no one got here who hadn't already proven himself. Wow.

  Tom's fight was a good one, going almost eight minutes before the fight was called with Tom as the winner. He’d been given three passes for friends to go backstage after the fight along with the two passes for people to be backstage with him for the entire fight, so she and Francisco and Zee headed backstage when his fight was over.

  As she turned a corner in the backstage hallway she ran straight into a wall of muscle, and looked up to see Ethan Levi looking down at her. His voice was smooth, cool, and deep; and made her weak in the knees as he said, “Are you okay? It's kind of crowded back here, sorry I wasn't walking on the right side of the hallway – that was my fault.”

  Sam's heart was fluttering; she felt the heat pouring off of him but tried to ignore it. “No, I'm good. No need to assign fault.”

  He towered over her, but he wasn’t intimidating, just big. His face and body were relaxed as his deep voice quietly said, “You someone's girlfriend? Going back to congratulate or give your condolences?”

  Part of her wanted to scream she was no one's girlfriend, but this man's voice was sexier than his body, which was pretty damned sexy. That made him dangerous, and after the last couple of embarrassments of a relationship she'd had, no way was she going to get serious with someone she met outside of the scene. She answered as simply as she could. “Congratulate.”

  He smiled. “You didn't say if you were a girlfriend or not.”

  “No, I didn't,” she said, working hard to deadpan it, to give no emotion.

  When she tried to walk around him he moved to block her, using his larger than life presence to keep her from maneuvering to walk past him. She looked back up into his eyes and noticed they were a beautiful, shimmering dark green, like the brilliance of a mallard's head in sunlight. He was looking at her with a grin, almost mischievous, so she dropped her attitude and said, “Look, I just want to go see my friend, make sure he's okay, and then take him out for a good meal since he has another fight tomorrow and won't be drinking. You won't be fighting him tomorrow, but if you both win your fights tomorrow you'll fight him Sunday in the final event, so right now you're kind of the bad guy in my world. Hitting on me will get you nowhere.”

  He smiled, such a beautiful smile. “Friend. Okay, I guess that answers my question. Go take care of your friend. I'll try not to hurt him too badly Sunday, if it comes to it.”

  He stepped closer to the wall, giving her space to get around him, and she walked past him without looking back.

  Chapter Two

  Sunday afternoon the arena was brimming with people. Friday it had been mostly friends and family, Saturday had been a bit more full, but today was the big event and it was an almost sold out crowd. When the first fight started the crowd was so loud she could barely hear herself yelling her cheers and jeers. They made their way through the lightweights and middleweights, and then the pre-fight drama started to work the crowd up to the heavyweight fight. There were videos shown of the fights leading up to this one. Sam wanted to roll her eyes at the hype they were playing on Ethan Levi's one very quick win Friday night, and then his scheduled knock out last night. For his second fight he'd played with his opponent and then given him the knockout punch at the top of the tenth minute, just as he'd said he would in his tweets earlier in the day. Today he had tweeted he would give the knockout punch at the five minute mark.

  Sam had talked to Tom about various strategies earlier today, and his game plan was to either knock him out long before the countdown, or to watch for the wind-up at the five minute mark and take him down when he left himself open as he watched the time. The problem with that theory was she'd researched Ethan Levi and discovered he'd used this ploy several years ago, and the crowd had counted down to the five minute mark for him during the final fight of the tournament. She’d told him that and said, “No, you need to either take him out before it starts, or just prepare to block whatever’ll be coming at the countdown, and then go in for the kill immediately after the block. If he thinks he’s delivering a knock out strike he won’t be defending as strong just after it’s been delivered. He's trying to psych you out, don't let him. You’re going to have to get into your zone, imagine the crowd is counting down for you, not for him. And assume the big hit will come at the four or three mark on the countdown, not the final zero. Don’t let it psyche you out, use it against him. Cocky bastard, telling you when he’s going to leave himself open. Right?”

  Now, sitting here waiting for the fight to start, she wasn't sure how Tom would ever get into his zone, but she could see he was already on his way there as he stepped into the cage. Both men dressed in shorts with no shoes, no gloves — the only protective gear allowed was a cup. Tom was tall and large without looking like a bad-ass, but Ethan looked like every bit the bad-ass. By the time the signal was given, Tom was fully in his zone and she watched mesmerized as he launched a beautiful attack on Ethan. The two of them fought for the first thirty seconds like they were on fast forward. They fought so fast the human eye couldn't keep up – she couldn't wait to analyze this on video later. At the two minute mark, both were bloody, and when the crowd started the countdown fifteen seconds before the five minute mark, they both flew at each other when the crowd hit three, and once again fought so fast it was impossible to tell who had the upper hand. Blood was flying by this time, but neither of them were slowing down one bit.

  The final event fight lasted up to fifteen minutes. At twelve minutes they were both hurt. Both had slowed down, but neither looked like they intended to stop fighting any time soon. Sam knew fighters had to have blood tests and couldn't have any diseases communicable through blood in order to fight, but she still had major issues when th
ere was enough blood flying to make the floor slick with it in places. Ethan had a cut near his eye and appeared to be doing most of the bleeding. She was sure if this weren't the main event the officials would have stopped the fight by now, but the problem was she had no idea who they would call as the winner. Both had gotten in some exceptional hits and a whole lot of wicked kicks. Ethan's face had been cut when Tom had kicked him in the face while flying through the air.

  Just as she was thinking she had no idea how they would call a winner if no one was knocked out, she saw Ethan leave himself open and Tom take the opening with a kick to the side of the face that threw Ethan to the ground and kept him there. As soon as the official realized he was no longer conscious they threw open the cage and paramedics rushed in while the officials raised Tom's hands to show him as the winner.

  * * * *

  By the time Sam made it backstage the photographers had Tom occupied, so it was her and the rest of the gang just standing and watching. When the photographers finally released him, it was Ethan who made it to him first to shake his hand and congratulate him. Ethan had obviously had time to shower and put a butterfly bandage on the cut near his eye, while Tom still looked like he’d just left the cage. Sam held back a moment, waiting for Ethan to finish the congrats and move on before she walked up. She finally realized the two were talking, an actual conversation, and she couldn't hold back much longer without being obvious about it. As she stepped up she heard Ethan offering to buy Tom dinner at a nearby steak place.