“You forgot how rough Roussou is? You get dementia in prison?” I flashed him my teeth, knowing it wasn’t a smile. “Maybe you were actually in there longer than you thought.”

He was reaching for his coffee but paused. A soft laugh came out as he finished his grip and lifted the mug to his lips. “Right.” He took a sip, putting it back down. “But this ain’t Roussou. These guys follow a different set of rules than your crew.” He gave me a steadying look. “You’re out of your depths in this world, and for once, I’m eternally grateful. You got a foot in the good world, and by good, I mean at college and find a job that’s not bounty hunting. You find your niche there, embrace it, and you stay out of this world. I don’t want you here.”

I swallowed a whole fucking knot, because damn, that stung.

“You get all that because I stabbed you?”

He snorted a laugh. “I got all that because you walked in here with your boys, without a trace of fear on your face.” He scowled. “I don’t like that. I don’t like that at all. This world, I do not want you in it.”

“So you said.”

“I’ll say it again,” he bit those words out, roughly. He pounded a fist down on the table. “Not my girl. Not my daughter. No. Your brother did a horrible job raising you—”

I hopped down, shoving back the stool. It crashed into something behind me. I didn’t care.

This wasn’t a quick reaction.

This had been building from years of listening to him and Channing fight, years of watching him walk out that door after Mom died, years of hearing him coming back drunk and stumbling. Years.

And I snapped, again, because apparently I needed to.

I let loose and this time, it felt damn good. This time, I knew exactly what I was saying. “Fuck you.”

He went still, his eyes narrowing. “What’d you say?”

I raised my voice. “Fuck. You.”

His eyes got big, showing off the whites, and his cheeks filled out, showing off more redness. I noticed then that he had a slight mustache growing, and he wasn’t keeping it combed. It was all mangled, the strands pointing in every which way.

“Excuse yourself. Right now.”

I was experiencing whiplash. The room was spinning around me.

Who did he think he was?

No.

This, this was what I came to tell him. He was laying it out for me, all nice and to the point, so here goes my turn.

A sad laugh came from me. He heard it, growing even more still.