Rage had driven me to use my own fists. We’d wrestled on the floor of the study, his hands connecting with my face more times than I care to remember. Sweat and blood had flown, and when he tossed me off him and I’d stumbled, the force of it sent me straight into that window and right out onto the concrete drive.

I’d ended up in the hospital with a concussion and over a hundred stitches across my back.

To say things had been rocky between us since was an understatement.

I turned to face his hard stare. “We broke up this summer.”

Wearing a frown, he set down his tumbler on a coaster. “Why? She’s the perfect girl, plus I like the thought of you going to law school settled in a steady relationship.”

Perfect?

I’d rather have imperfect.

It dawned on me that perhaps I’d been drawn to Nadia because dating her had been a small attempt on my part to do one thing to please my old man.

My father sighed. “What stupid thing did you do to lose her?”

“Caught her screwing a Ninja Turtle.”

Clara gasped, her eyes flashing angrily as she looked pointedly at Blythe. “Really, Declan. Have you lost all sense of decorum?”

I grimaced down at Blythe, who looked up at me with big green eyes, her curly brown hair in angelic ringlets around her face. My dad might be a wanker, but she was innocent and completely unaware that her parents were arseholes. “Sorry, poppet. I forgot you were there. Forgive me?” I grinned and pulled out a pack of gum I’d picked up on the way over. “Look, I brought you a treat. It’s orange sherbet, your favorite.”

She took the gum in her small hand. “Which Ninja Turtle was it?”

I laughed. “Donatello.”

She pursed her lips. “How do you screw a Ninja Turtle? Do you twist his neck?”

Dax barked out a laugh from across the room.

I smiled. She was as cute as a button. “Yep, that’s exactly how you do it. Want to sit with me?”

Truth was I needed a buffer between my father and me.

She nodded and climbed into my lap as I sat down in one of the chairs.

He got right to business. “Dax has informed me he isn’t going to graduate on time—I’m not surprised considering his dismal grades—but I hope you will be walking the line this spring, yes?”

I nodded.

He sent me a pleased look. “At least someone is studying around here.”

“Dax’s got other skills,” I reminded him. “He’s the president of Tau and head over so many bloody clubs I can’t keep track of him.”

“Yes, we’re all aware of Dax’s penchant for social activities.”

“Right here,” Dax muttered. “I can hear you loud and clear.”

Our father stiffened and swiveled his cold eyes toward him. I saw the moment Dax drew up, radiating nervousness.

I patted Blythe’s hair, trying to keep my fists from clenching.

Dax had always been the weaker one, and Father picked on him the most.

“I bought a gym,” I announced.

Dax’s eyes flared wide and he shook his head rapidly back and forth. His eyes said, No dude, no dude, don’t fucking do it! He’s going to flip.

Too late now, mine said.

I ignored the flush that started taking up most of my father’s burly neck, easing up to his face.

I sighed. “I got my half of the inheritance from the barrister that handled Mum’s estate. Law school isn’t going to happen. I know it’s what you had planned, but fighting—training people—it’s what I want to do. Someday I might want my own shot at a UFC championship.”

Tension ramped up the room.

Clara fluttered around him. “Now, Winston, don’t get upset. Here, let me get you another Scotch.”

His gray eyes bored into me. “You wasted your inheritance on a sweaty gym for white trash karate wannabes?”

I stiffened. “We have all kinds who come in to take classes. Blacks, Hispanics, a few Muslims—”

He slapped his palm down on his armchair. “Don’t get smart with me, Declan. You will apply for law school at Harvard like you should.”

I set my cup down. “It’s done. You can’t get money back that I’ve already spent.”

“No son of mine is going to toss away a first class education and a high IQ to be a common laborer.”

I let out a resigned sigh and poked Blythe in the side, making her giggle. “You better go see your mum. It’s time for me to go.”

As usual, I’d made him angry. I just couldn’t be what he wanted.

I was never good enough just the way I was.

AN HOUR LATER I was at my gym.

Built in the late seventies, it had been constructed in the historic part of town that was being revitalized. Several of the neighboring homes had been re-modeled and upgraded with young and hip families moving in.

No matter what my father said, the gym was a good investment.

Anybody can pop up a gym and say its MMA qualified, and it didn’t mean shit, but Front Street Gym would have real credentials. Max was one of my trainers, and although he’d got his start in traditional martial arts, he’d transitioned over to Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, Muay Thai, and Krav Maga in his later years.

As for me, my mum had put me in classes starting at four. I held a black belt in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, a black belt in Tae Kwon Do, and a blue belt in Judo.

Max had taught me everything else I knew.

I unlocked the double metal doors and stepped inside, my eyes taking in the updates the contractor had been working on for the past week, installing new plumbing in the restrooms and lockers, revamping the front office. The final step would be putting in a flat for me to live in. I was bleeding money to get this place opened—literally. I imagined Front Street with every punch and strike I took, knowing that in a few months this place would be open and running and I’d finally be free of my father.

I bent down and rubbed my hands across the new red sparring mats that had been delivered last week. Some of the new workout machinery had been installed as well, and I checked out everything carefully. I made the rounds of the building, checking the windows, outside doors, and smoke detectors. Paranoia ran high when I was this close to tasting happiness. And I couldn’t put my finger on it, but it was as if something was waiting out there in the darkness, panting its nasty breath, waiting for the right opportunity to yank away my slice of good.

TWO DAYS AFTER the party, I drove a few miles down the road to meet my mom at a truck stop off the interstate.

I hadn’t seen her in nearly four months, and we only lived three hours apart.

The diner smelled like old grease and deep-fried onion rings, reminding me of my childhood when my mom would bring home takeout from the restaurant where she waited tables.

She waved at me from a red booth at the back.

I walked her way, feeling anxious.

Some people think God puts difficult people in our lives for a reason, to make us better people as we sharpen ourselves on the knife of their shortcomings. That was my mom. She’d destroyed my trust a million times as a child, and eventually I’d learned to stop counting on her. My kindergarten graduation, my first middle school dance, the day I got my acceptance letter to Oakmont Prep, the night with Colby … she’d been gone, off on an adventure with whomever she was seeing. Like a stray dog that whines for scraps, I’d been begging my mom to love me my whole life.

Yet out of my shitty childhood, a strong drive had been forged in my heart.

To be more.

More than the trailer I’d grown up in; more than my alcoholic mother and absent father.