Hello,

Remember the mysterious surgeon from Joshua Townsend’s underground fighting group? Well, his story has been in the works for some time and it’s coming SOON! Below is the cover for Jacob’s Song, along with a brief excerpt of what’s to come. Please enjoy this sneak peek into Jacob aka “Doc’s” book.

****Unedited. Subject to Change*****

Jacob

            “You hit like a fucking pussy!” I derided the guy opposite me as we both circled one another inside the sixteen by sixteen foot ring. Our fists were tightly coiled, and save for the cloth wraps, around our knuckles and fingers there was little protection from the blows we rained on one another. That was the appeal, for me, at least.

            “You’re fucking crazy, Doc!” Brick yelled in response.

            The sardonic smile I’d already been wearing, grew in size.

            “I know,” I growled before quickly spinning and sweeping Brick’s leg. A round of cheers from the onlookers could be heard behind me but I paid them no mind. I didn’t give a shit about the people watching this fight between Brick and I. All I cared about was the pain.

            The pain of being hit so hard that it took my breath away.

            Or the pain of landing the perfect punch against an opponent’s bone, so that the sensation bounced back and moved through my knuckles and up my arm, reaching my chest.

            It was only once I began feeling that pain that the memories of the day began to fall away. It was only then that I was truly able to relax, a little, at least.

            The physical pain was better than the memories.

            Today, the memory that I couldn’t shake loose had been what happened in the OR. I’d been performing a simple breast lift on a patient. A second year resident joined me as part of his training. My first instinct had been to kick him out of the wash room  when he entered with that stupid fucking, cocky ass grin on his face. But I opted to let him stay. After all, Memorial is one of the best teaching hospitals in the state. And despite going against my first instincts, I let the resident assist in a delicate process during the procedure. The dumb fucker ended up nicking one of the patient’s arteries.

            Thus, a surgery that should’ve been rather simple and uncomplicated nearly turned deadly. All because I let a fucking resident join in. That was my fuck up. And that is what brought me to the Underground.

            “Aw fuck!” Brick grunted when a fist of mine landed in his ribs.

            “Feeling a little fleshy, Brick. Been eating good, huh?” I continued to taunt. It was a lie, however. Brick was just as solid as his Underground name indicated. The man was built like a goddamn brick wall. And whereas most guys with his size and build were rather slow, that wasn’t the case with Brick. He’d obviously been working on his agility. Which was why in the next second I found myself flat on my back, flailing as his large six-foot-six nearly two-hundred-and-fifty-pound frame came down on top of me.

            Thankfully, I’d been expecting one of his infamous takedowns and hurriedly countered his move with one of my own. I managed to wiggle out of his hold and get my legs to wrap around his upper body. I could feel him struggling to get free from the inevitable but it was too late. My legs were soon wrapped tightly around his neck, squeezing the air from his body.

            He pounded with one fist against my leg but the pain from his punches only invigorated me more. I knew I’d be covered in bruises tomorrow from this fight but the deep satisfaction I got from the pain was almost intoxicating.

            “Let him up!” I heard Buddy yell from the side of the ring.

            That’s what forced me to release Brick. When I did, I heard the gagging and coughing sounds as he fought inhale normally again.

            “Shit!” Brick cursed once he finally got back on his feet. “Anyone ever tell you, you fight like that fucker Luke whatever the hell his name is, from the NFA?” Brick sputtered in between breaths just after he tapped knuckles to signal the end of the fight.

            “I don’t watch the NFA. I don’t know who the fuck that is,” I gruffly answered, quickly dismissing his comment and turning to head out of the ring.

            “You look like him a little, too,” Brick yelled behind me.

            I paused and turned back to him, narrowing my eyes at him. I swore I caught something glinting in his eyes. As if he wanted to say more but chose not to.

            I spun on my heels and headed for the changing room. I moved through the throng of guys clamoring to pat my back after a fight or angling to convince Buddy to let them in the ring for a fight of their own.

            I didn’t stay to find out who was entering the ring next. I’d gotten what I’d came here for. Relief.

            That was all I ever sought most nights in this place that to the outside world looked like an abandoned building. But to the men who gathered here two to three nights out of the week, we knew it was more. It was a place where most of us chose to let our demons out so we wouldn’t unleash them on the rest of the world.

            “Good fight, Reynolds,” I heard from behind me as I redressed in the pair of dark jeans and t-shirt, I’d worn to the Underground that night.

            I stood up to my full six-foot-two height, which still caused me to be about three inches shorter than the man standing opposite me.

            “Connor,” I nodded but didn’t bother to reply to his initial comment. He never called me by my Underground name which was Doc, for obvious reasons. Most of the men down here were professionals with our own careers or businesses. But like I said, everyone needed some sort of outlet to release the bullshit of the day.

            “You get what you needed?”

            I nodded while also throwing the strap of my gym bag over my shoulder. “I always do,” I answered as I moved past Connor and through the door of the changing room to take me out into the main area again. I could feel Connor’s eyes on my back but he didn’t say anything else. As the co-organizer of this underground fighting ring, he was sort of the Godfather of the guys down here, I supposed. But not mine. I didn’t need a fucking father figure or anyone else to oversee me.

            I exited the main door and hopped into my dark colored Range Rover to make the twenty minute drive back to my condo. However, once I arrived and pulled into my parking spot in the closed in garage, I wasn’t ready to head upstairs just yet.

            I still had the energy from the fight coursing through my veins and that did not make for a good night’s sleep. Thus, instead of heading toward the elevator to the twelfth floor of my building, I headed for the stairs that led to the open sidewalk. I continued to walk aimlessly for a while. I ended up approximately ten blocks from where I started, on a street that was lined with bars and a few restaurants that converted to lounges this late in the evening.

            Most of the doors of the nightclubs and bars were open, seeking to lure people inside. The giggles and cheers of the patrons inside each of the bars turned my fucking stomach. I didn’t like being in large groups of people. Hell, I didn’t like most people in general. So, I opted to keep walking, with no intentions of stopping inside any of the clubs. There was a bar at the end of this street that was usually pretty quiet. Every time I’d been inside there had only been a handful of other patrons. I wondered how they stayed open, but the beers were cold and that’s all I needed.

            Just as I was passing one of the newer lounges on the street, my feet stopped moving. All on their own. I found myself, turning to look inside the lounge. Of course, the lights were low, making it difficult to fully see inside but the sound coming from the center stage is what pulled me closer.

            Before I could tell what was happening, I entered the lounge as if I was being pulled in. The smooth, soft sound of the voice coming from the front of the room held the entire audience captive. She wasn’t belting out the song but the way her vocal cords wrapped around every single note, as if they were her own little playthings to dance over, held all of our rapt attention. And I hadn’t even seen her face yet. Once I did, it was as if I’d been punched in the gut.

            “Grace,” I whispered, saying her name for the first time.

            She was no longer dressed in those electric blue scrubs all the nurses wore. This Grace was dressed in a skintight, black mini dress that stopped inches above her knee. The dress was sleeveless and the lights on the stage perfectly reflected off the tawny brown skin of hers. Those hickory eyes were enhanced by the dark eyeshadow she wore, and her heart shaped lips were lined in a blood red color. This wasn’t Nurse Young on stage.

            This was a woman singing on stage, begging her lover not to judge her. Her voice was cooing in a way that wasn’t a turnoff, which I didn’t understand how that was even possible. She swayed her perfect hips in time with the music, slowly and hauntingly. The heels on her feet gave an additional four inches to her five-foot-six height. I took every inch of her body in. From the top of her head, noting the bouncy curls that hung around her shoulders, to the smooth tops of her perfectly formed shoulders, over her collarbones, down to her perfectly sized breasts that were adequately outlined by the tight dress. The way her small waist gave way to her hips reminded me of the images patients would often bring to my office asking if I could make them look like this model or that one.

            This woman had a body my patients paid thousands of dollars for. And I would bet dollars to donuts she hadn’t spent any time on a surgeon’s table to earn it.

            Somehow, I found myself much closer to the stage than I’d anticipated. Luckily, I was able to get ahold of myself within seconds of her finishing the song. I backed away from the stage, not wanting to take my eyes off of her until the very last moment. She didn’t see me due to the fact that she was busy bowing and receiving hugs from some of the band members on the stage. I took that opportunity to slip out the same door that’d allowed me entrance.

            I shook my head as I turned and reversed my steps to carry myself back to my home. I don’t know how long it took to get back because I was too busy replaying every second of Grace’s performance in my head. Whenever I came to the end, it was almost like I’d hit the rewind button and replayed the tape all over again. I did that over and over until I made it home, making it inside.

            I pressed my back against the door, closing my eyes and again she was there, crooning her fucking heart out. She’d kept me hypnotized so much so that the surgery from earlier, the Underground, and everything else fell away. But she’d held my attention from the first moment I laid eyes on her. It was the way she looked at me. She didn’t show signs of fear that other women had. Even women who I’d dated in the past, had tried to get me to open up to them, I refused because I could see the fear in their eyes. They’d never say as much, but I saw it. The storm clouds I often found staring me back in the mirror in my eyes, the emotions that sent me to the Underground to fight, my off-putting demeanor, struck fear in them.

But not Grace.

            I found myself smirking as I remembered the stubborn way, she lifted her chin at me in defiance. How she mouthed back when I put her on the spot in the OR. She wasn’t afraid of me and that pulled me to her just as much as her siren voice had pulled me to the stage in that lounge.

            “Fucking pull it together,” I growled at myself starting to feel pissed off. I’d taken a walk to work out the energy from fighting only to return with a different type of energy moving through me.