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  SPARRING PARTNERS

  Book 1 of The Dojo Chronicles

  by

  Leigh Morgan

  SMASHWORDS EDITION

  PUBLISHED BY:

  Leigh Morgan on Smashwords

  Sparring Partners

  Copyright © 2010 by Leigh Morgan

  Cover art by Vince Milewski

  All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

  Smashwords Edition License Notes

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the author's work.

  ...

  Dedication

  For Vince - My love, my best friend, the reason I continue to laugh at myself and feel great about it.

  To my Sensei, Daniel Schroeder, and all of my dojomates who are my family - whether they want me or not - I love you all. Nuff said.

  To my family of birth - I am blessed - Vikings, Pirates, Highlanders - WOW we rock.

  And ultimately for Irma,

  I miss you grandma.

  ...

  SPARRING PARTNERS

  Lovers don't finally meet somewhere. They are in each other all along.

  Rumi ~13th Century

  CHAPTER ONE

  "You need a husband."

  Those four words, if ever appropriate, belonged in a different century: one where traitors were still drawn and quartered. They didn't belong echoing off the marble floors of a twenty-first century courthouse where doing the right thing should be synonymous with helping those who have no legal voice of their own, namely children.

  Unfortunately for child advocate and all around idealist, Reed Mohr, those four words, a mere five syllables, meant the difference between getting fourteen-year-old Jesse Bane out of his tenth foster home in four weeks, or consigning him to hell until the system spat him out at eighteen.

  Unacceptable every way Reed looked at it. If the most expedient way to adopt Jesse was to get married first, so be it. She could remedy that after Jesse was safe.

  Losing her single status was one thing. Losing her livelihood in the process was quite another. Reed Mohr hadn't considered that the judges she ultimately answered to, would strip her of the one thing she poured her heart and soul into doing well, representing the least powerful among us, the young and the elderly. But she should have, Reed thought, mentally kicking herself.

  Reed knew the drill in Judge Meen's juvenile court. Single parents didn't adopt. Child advocates don't take their clients home.

  Children aren't puppies, Reed.

  Three words this time, bouncing in her hyper-charged brain.

  Really, Reed thought? Fourteen-year-old boys who witness their heroin addict fathers inject their mothers with enough dope to kill an elephant aren't puppies? Who knew? Apparently not Reed who, if she wanted to keep her job, would do as instructed, which amounted to shutting up and letting this one go. Only she couldn't do that. This one wasn't a cause or a whim or another of the rag-tag animal misfits she dragged home. This one happened to have a name: Jesse. And she wasn't about to let him get swallowed by the system and flushed away like waste.

  "You know you cannot adopt in this county without being married." Judge Meen said from his perch behind the formidable oak bench in juvenile court, looking down at Reed over reading glasses he didn't actually need.

  "The juvenile code does not prohibit a single person from adopting, your honor."

  "How long have you practiced law in Radkin County, Reed?"

  "You know the answer to that, judge."

  "Remind me." Judge Meen said.

  "Twelve years."

  "Are you willing to piss all that away for a kid you don't know? A kid with two junkies for parents? A kid who at fourteen is already damaged goods?" Judge Meen's voice continued to escalate bouncing off the marble floors and oak walls as it gained momentum and smacked into Reed with the tangible force of a slap to the face.

  "Jesse Bane isn't a puppy, Reed. You can't just take him home and train him to love you. He'll just piss all over your house".

  Reed couldn't control the shiver that ran down her spine at the judge's words. She was afraid that she might be making a huge mistake. What was it about Jesse that made her think she could be a mother to a damaged fourteen year old boy?

  Sweat began to run under her arms, behind her knees and at the small of her back, causing another involuntary shiver. Her heart beat painfully as it slammed against her ribs.

  Was she really ready to lose her job?

  Could she stomach being married to anyone long enough to adopt Jesse?

  Could she afford to start her life over again at thirty-six?

  Could she turn and walk away from Judge Meen and everything that was wrong with the juvenile justice system and pretend she couldn't have made it better for at least one child, if she'd only found her backbone behind the twisted snake-like mass her insides had become?

  No. Not today. Not tomorrow. Never again.

  Reed pushed all five foot three and one quarter inches of her frame upward, standing as tall as she could, and forced herself to take a deep, calming breath, until time slowed to its natural pace again.

  This was her moment. With a clarity Reed Mohr didn't question, she knew what she did next would define the rest of her life. She took another breath and stepped forward realizing that she was too damn old to pretend she couldn't make a difference if she chose to.

  She took another step closer to the bench and then another, thanking the spirits above that she had the foresight to put on the one pair of heels she owned instead of her usual flats. The extra two inches helped feed her inner giant.

  "You're right, judge. Jesse Bane is not a puppy." Reed's chin shot up and she forced her voice not to quaver as she looked up at the judge without blinking. "I'll have a husband tomorrow. You'll have my petition for adoption on your desk as soon as an adoption study can be completed. Since Jesse has no family, and I know you hate burdening the foster care system, I'll expect you to sign the order." Knowing she was dangerously close to contempt of court Reed added, "Your honor."

  "I'll sign it, Ms. Mohr. But the second I do you'll never work as a child advocate in this county again. You won't be sending the kid back either. I'll throw your tail in jail if you try."

  Reed gave a quick nod and swallowed past the dry knot at the back of her throat. "I understand. No refunds. No returns. No job. Thanks for clearing that up for me, your honor." Reed smiled. It was a small smile at first, but as it gained distance, the clenching in her stomach began to ease and swallowing became easier. Her heartbeat returned to normal and the clammy feeling she'd felt earlier disappeared.

  "Get out of here, Mohr, before I have you incarcerated for pissing me off, and good luck. You're go
ing to need it".

  It wasn't contempt that had Reed humming her way out of the courtroom, it was a feeling of lightness that came with knowing she'd made the right call, the only call, she could have made. Now all she had to do was propose to the only single adult male she could stomach living with for more than a week and hope he didn't laugh in her face.

  Charlie wouldn't laugh at her, he never laughed at any of the crazy notions she got in her head. Charlie wasn't a laugher, Charlie was an instigator. Charlie would understand her need to give Jesse a real home where he was loved. Jesse would be well loved at Potters Woods. Reed would just have to learn about parenting as she went. Charlie would help her as he had from the moment she'd walked into his class as an undergraduate student with fear in her eyes and trepidation in her heart.

  Reed graduated with a degree in history at the top of her undergraduate class with the support of Charlie and her aunt, Finn. Charlie pushed her to stop talking about injustice and start doing something to change it when she could; like today. Charlie was the reason Reed went to law school. Charlie and Finn were the only family Reed acknowledged since the death of her mother, at least until now. Now, she would have Jesse too. All doubts that Reed had walking into the courtroom fled. She'd done the right thing. Now, all she needed was a husband.

  Charlie was her man. Ardent Democrat, Jimmy Buffett fan, sixty-two year old college professor. And, he had one other thing going for him that no other man Reed respected and cared for had. Charles Renee MacIntyre the third was Flaming-rainbow-flag-flying-gay.

  Reed wouldn't want even a short term husband any other way.

  CHAPTER TWO

  I reach for a piece of wood. It turns into a lute

  I do some meanness. It turns out helpful.

  I say one must not travel during the holy month.

  Then I start out, and wonderful things happen.

  Rumi~13th Century

  Two years later.

  "You need a wife."

  Those four words crashed through billionaire Jordon Bennett's skull with the same force he'd seen Tiger Woods use on his opening drive. Four syllables that in the space of seconds burned what Jordon thought of as his impenetrable world of safety and security to the ground.

  No wife, no job. William Bennett, Jordon's uncle and CEO of B.H. Holdings, Jordon's employer, made his status that clear. There were laws against that kind of discrimination, but they didn't apply to William Bennett. As CEO of the world's largest investment corporation and the third largest private employer in the United States, William Bennett was a law unto himself. No one questioned William, they obeyed him.

  "By Friday."

  Today was Tuesday: the second Tuesday in June to be precise. The day Jordon was supposed to be officially nominated as William Bennett's successor. Jordon's stomach rolled and he went from hot to cold in the space of a second. He hit the button for the express elevator. He needed to get out of B.H.'s Milwaukee high-rise before he threw up.

  The elevator was too slow. Jordon turned and hit the door for the concrete and steel stairs with enough force for a smaller man to shatter bone, and took the seventeen flights of stairs two at a time, sorry now that he wore leather soled shoes. The pain he knew he should be feeling in his hand didn't even register.

  By the time Jordon hit Michigan Street he was breathing hard. Sweat had begun to run freely, melting the gel he used to keep his long hair severely tamed and clubbed in a tight tail that he wore under his suit coat for meetings.

  Today's meeting with William wasn't worth the effort. Tearing out the leather tie holding his hair in place, Jordon headed toward the art museum. Calatrava's architecture, surrounded by Milwaukee's lakefront, was one of the few things Jordon liked about Wisconsin. It calmed him and helped him gain perspective, two things he needed badly right now.

  "No prenuptial agreement. No models looking for a quick score. No actress you can pay off to play the role of wife. Find a real woman. A real wife."

  William should have just shot him, Jordon thought. It would have been less painful than threatening to take away the only thing that gave his life meaning. That couldn't happen. Jordon wouldn't allow it.

  How in hell was he going to find a wife by Friday? He ran his fingers through his hair, loosened his tie until it looked like someone had tried and failed to strangle him with it, and set off at a clip most people reserved for jogging toward the art museum. He needed a quiet place to plot his next move.

  He retied his hair punishingly tight at his nape. Jordon just wanted to think, not scare the patrons, and he was sure his countenance was scary enough without his hair sticking out like Einstein's.

  ...

  "Find a wife by Friday. You have thirty days to make her love you."

  "And the hits just keep on coming." Jordon said, under his breath, grateful the museum's patrons were giving him wide berth. Jordon thought he must look as crazy as he felt. Talking to himself as he stared sightlessly at a giant stone Buddha probably wasn't helping him blend.

  "I need to enroll in Sensei Schwartz's dojo today before I put my fist through something or someone I shouldn't." Jordon laughed to himself without mirth. "That is, right after I find some nice, real, woman to marry me".

  Jordon looked around.

  The woman at the ticket desk scowled at him. He winked at her and headed toward the coffee shop before she called security.

  There were a number of obstacles he was going to have to overcome. First: Jordon didn't know any real women. Every woman Jordon slept with over the last two decades, with the exception of an Australian opera singer, was either a model or an actress, and William knew it.

  Second: He didn't have time to fly to London, Paris, or Milan to find a real woman, marry her, and bring her back by Friday.

  Third: Even if he managed to find some poor deluded soul to marry within William's ridiculous timeline, how on God's green earth was he going to convince this mystery woman to love him? Jordon knew, with the kind of certainty seven-year-olds reserved for Santa Claus, that he was not loveable.

  Jordon stopped outside the coffee shop door, pinching the bridge of his nose in an attempt to stave off the tension headache beginning to build in his temples. He closed his eyes, concentrating on slowly breathing in and out, in and out. After seven seconds of rhythmic breathing, his headache receded and he felt almost human again.

  That was until the coffee shop door smacked him in the face.

  It took Jordon a tenth of a second or so after his eyes flew open and his brain recognized he now had a physical reason for the pounding in his head to register the cold, wet, gooey substance seeping through his silk shirt, making its way down his hand tailored Italian suit pants.

  His eyes narrowed and he let out an audible growl just as a gangly teenager stepped around the tempered glass door and started awkwardly to rub Jordon dry with a handful of rapidly dissolving tiny paper napkins.

  "Ah, hey, man. Sorry. Didn't see you there."

  Jordon moved to still the boy's hand before the kid put a hole in his shirt. Not that it mattered, the shirt, like the life he'd had when he woke up this morning, was unsalvageable.

  A tiny but strong hand manacled his wrist before Jordon could disengage the kid.

  "Don't you touch him." There was such menace and promise of dread in that voice that Jordon couldn't help but be surprised by the red-headed elf attached to it, as she pushed her way around the much taller kid and glared up into Jordon's eyes. She looked like a fuzzy orange kitten trying to protect a docile Rottweiler. Useless. Futile even, but spitting mad anyway, even in the face of obvious danger.

  Jordon almost laughed, but something in her eyes made him stop. In that moment he recognized a kindred soul. Before him stood a woman who would do anything to protect those she loved, including standing up to what had to be Goliath to her David.

  Before him stood a real woman. She certainly was no model, not topping out at five foot nothing, sporting a mop of unruly red hair, and a scowl that would frighte
n the devil himself. A real woman, with real love in her heart. He could work with that.

  Jordon smiled at her. Her eyes flared and he must have surprised her because she dropped her hand and stepped back, careful to keep the kid, who topped her by at least a head and a half, behind her.

  "Are you crazy"? She asked, clearly believing he was.

  "Apparently."

  The kid spoke, drawing Jordon's attention reluctantly away from the elf's widened blue-green eyes.

  "I'm sorry about your shirt. I'll have it cleaned for you. Your tie too." The kid sounded sincere. He was polite, about sixteen, and he managed to hold Jordon's gaze without wavering, something men twice his age had trouble doing. Jordon was impressed despite himself. The kid's demeanor spoke well of him and the elf.

  Until she spoke again. "This isn't your fault, Jesse. He's the one who was standing in front of a glass door with his eyes closed." She captured Jordon's gaze, narrowed her eyes, and sweetened her false smile. "Just how drunk were you last night, and why are you walking it off in an art museum? You look like someone tried to strangle you with that tie. Shouldn't you be sleeping it off near the airport instead of growling at strangers?"

  Well she got the strange part right and she wasn't far off on the tie. Even so, Jordon didn't like mouthy women. He especially disliked sawed-off ones with more bravado than sense, even if they sported ocean colored eyes, a mouth meant for sex, and enough curves for a man to hold onto even if he had to pick her up to kiss her.