Read To Fight For for Free Online

door that I noticed the bin had moved. I stopped the key an inch from the keyhole and looked back. I’d told Browne to stay put, and the postman had already been and gone. Yet the bin had moved.
    I crept over the front lawn, around the side of the house and through the garden to the back door. I turned the doorknob slowly. The door opened. It should’ve been locked. I pulled my Makarov out and held it lightly in my hand and moved slowly inside.
    I heard a voice, low and slow. Then I heard Browne cry out in pain. There was a crash, the sound of smashing wood and a heavy fall. The whole house seemed to shift an inch.
    I crept up the stairs, keeping my weight to the edges of each step. When I got to the landing I could see into Browne’s bedroom, at the far end of the hallway. It was a mess; smashed furniture, the bed upside down, broken glass. I walked slowly that way.
    The man turned as I entered. He was massive, almost my height, with a bodybuilder’s shape, the wide shoulders, the bulging chest. His head was a lump of rock that sat right on his shoulders. There was no neck, as far as I could see. He outweighed me by a couple of stone, and all of that was muscle. He was one of those men whose arms wouldn’t hang straight down.
    He held Browne up in one hand. I brought the Makarov up to my waist, just enough for him to see it.
    I’d known him years before, in my old fight days. Back then they’d called him The Reaper. I don’t think he ever understood why. He was huge in those days. It had been like fighting a mountain. He was bigger now. He must’ve hit the irons and the steroids. He had a bashed-in face, cauliflower ears, a thick, drooping mouth and dumb, heavy-lidded eyes.
    He dropped Browne who stayed dropped. He stared at me a moment, then stared at my gun, then stared back at me.
    â€˜I remember you,’ he said, as if he’d made some great discovery. ‘We fought.’
    He was wrong about that. We hadn’t fought; he’d murdered me. I was old. He was younger, fitter, stronger, faster. He out-boxed me, out-moved me. And he out-hit me to hell. I got counted out in the middle of the fifth. I was still standing, but only because a boxing ring has ropes.
    â€˜Yeah,’ I said.
    He stared at me a while longer, like someone had forgotten to restart his brain. His mouth hung open.
    â€˜I won,’ he said when the words finally came to him.
    â€˜Yeah.’
    He nodded, pleased with his thinking so far.
    â€˜You were good.’
    â€˜I was old.’
    He thought about that.
    â€˜You were good for an old bloke.’
    â€˜Yeah. For an old bloke.’
    Now that he’d used up all the words in his head, he moved towards me. I kept the gun on him, but I didn’t think it would be much use. He pushed past me and ducked through the doorway. The stairs creaked like they were at breaking point. The front door opened and slammed. The house moved again back to where it’d begun.
    I stuck the Makarov back in my jacket pocket and looked down at Browne. He was alive. He was conscious. That was about the best I could say for him. He lay with his eyes open and gazed up at the ceiling. He had a bloody mouth, a swelling eye, and he breathed with a rasping sound.
    â€˜My God,’ he managed to say. ‘My God.’
    â€˜Yeah. Are you hurt?’
    â€˜Hurt? Look at me. I’m virtually dead.’
    â€˜Anything broken?’
    He sighed and groaned, moving his hand to his stomach.
    â€˜No, nothing broken. Everything agony, but nothing broken.’
    â€˜He went easy on you.’
    â€˜Call this going easy?’
    â€˜Yeah.’
    He tried to sit up and fell back. I went over and started to hoist him up.
    â€˜No, leave me.’
    I set him back on the ground.
    â€˜What did he want?’ I said.
    â€˜Just get me a bloody drink, will you?’
    I went and got him his drink. He managed to sit up for that. When he’d gulped the glass dry,