I learned to throw a punch when I was four years old, and I told my seven year old brother that a boy at school had been making fun of the way I talked. The next day, when he had mocked my accent, I punched him square in the nose and made him cry.

That was the first of my never-ending trips to the principal's office.

At first, people were always shocked to see a little girl behave the way I did. But then they would realize who my father was— who my family was— and, suddenly, everything would make perfect sense.

Seamus Walsh was a Devil's Descendant, and a motorcycle club was hardly the best environment to raise a little girl in.

It was never a secret that the club was more than just a bunch of guys who loved bikes. They were involved in plenty of shady and illegal business ventures, sure, but that was never the entirety of what they were. The Descendants were a family. They were my family, and had been since I was born.

It never mattered that I was a girl. I spent just as much time at the clubhouse as my brothers, and learned everything they did when it came to bikes and cars. So many adults in my life had always frowned at that, saying my father was a bad example and that he had failed as a parent for exposing me to all of that. But I would never be anything less than grateful for how I was raised to not have to rely on others to take care of me. In that regard, my father had done a better job raising me than most of the other girls I'd gone to school with.

A part of me wondered if he'd regretted that after I'd taken off to college; regretted making me headstrong and independent to the point where I'd fled the family and life I had once loved with my whole heart. If he did... he'd taken that regret to the grave.

It was a thought that haunted me on my way back to my apartment, rattling around in my head no matter how loudly I turned up the music on my poor battered stereo.

I pulled into my usual spot behind the building, throwing on the parking break and killing the engine before climbing out. There was nothing particularly interesting about the dilapidated brick apartments I called home. There were better places, of course, but there were also far worse. As far as I was concerned, the rent was cheap, the homicide rate was low enough that I only had two deadbolts on the door, and that was good enough for me.

My apartment was on the second floor, an end unit I'd snatched up from a classified ad after the previous tenant had unexpectedly passed away. Thanks to a permanently out-of-order elevator, most of my cardio activity came from the two flights of stairs I took any time I came or went. While it was annoying whenever it came time to bring home groceries, it saved me the cost of a gym membership.

As soon as I unlocked the two deadbolts, the door handle, and jimmied the door open, my senses were assaulted by the familiar smell of freshly baked pizza.

"You're early," a voice called out at the sound of the door being shut and promptly locked. "I thought you wouldn't be back until two?"

Walking over to the tiny kitchen, I parroted the excuse I'd told Chelsea to give our boss. "Yeah, I wasn't feeling great." Taking a look at the ingredients spread over the countertops, I raised an eyebrow. "Do I want to know why you're making pizza at midnight?"

The guy in my kitchen gave me a wide grin, leaning one sweatpant-clad hip into the counter beside him. "Because I was hungry, and leftover pizza is your favourite breakfast food."

I flashed him a tired smile a heartbeat before accepting the invitation of his outstretched arms and sagging against his chest.

And there was the main reason I had protested Ennis' offer to come back to my apartment to help me pack. On the one hand, I wasn't even certain I would go back home with him in the first place. Telling him that had gotten him pissed off enough to storm off in a huff back to his bike, which was excuse enough not to bring him back to my dump of an apartment.

And to the boyfriend in the kitchen, making pizza in nothing but low hanging sweats.

Coming in just under six feet, blonde and a track and field alumni, Ren Whitmore was nothing short of an anomaly when it came to my dating history.

When I'd first come to Boston for college, I'd told myself that I would keep to myself for the most part. I could make a few friends, because it was college and I was by myself in a new city, but dating had been off the table. A few hookups dotted the past few years, boys who didn't expect anything more than a few drinks and some good times. Then, just last year, Ren had approached my table at the library the week before midterms. The place had been packed, and there wasn't a free table in sight, so he'd asked if he could share mine. We'd seen each other at the campus coffee shop where I worked, enough times that I knew what his usual order was. He started asking what class I was studying for, and we ended up sharing horror stories from our first finals week. Ren was a Computer Engineering major and a legacy, I was a Chem major on an obscure scholarship. We shouldn't have had anything in common, yet when the library closed that night, we were too busy talking to realize we were the last two students there.

Almost a year later, here he was in my kitchen, making me pizza at midnight.

I clasped my hands behind his neck as he pressed me back against the counter, his hands on either side of my hips. "So, are you up for the hot, fresh stuff, or do you want to wait until its good and cold at eight in the morning?"

On any given night, the thought of cheese, bacon and pepperoni would make my mouth water. But tonight wasn't like any other night I'd had in a long time. Tonight, my mind was a thousand miles away with a family I had long since parted ways with— with a father I would never see again.

Ren's voice pulled me back to reality. "Earth to Killian?" Brown eyes hovered in front of mine. "Where's your head at?"

"Sorry," I mumbled, shaking my head slightly. "There's something I should tell you."

There's a flash of concern in Ren's eyes and the slightest wrinkle of his brow before his expression smoothed out in a lazy grin. "Okay, well if you're going to kick my ass out, can I at least eat first? Cause I haven't done groceries at my place in, like, a week."

My palm connected with his chest, a playful smile on my face for a brief moment. "I'm not kicking you out, idiot." My smile vanished. "It's about... it's about my family."

The wrinkle returned to Ren's brow. "Didn't you say you weren't close with your family?"

I shook my head. "I'm not, but I got some bad news while I was at work tonight. My dad, he um..." I cleared my throat to free the words. Talking about it with Ennis was one thing, but I'd rarely talked about my dad with Ren beyond, we're not close anymore. Somehow, telling him made it incredibly real. "My dad passed away a couple days ago. My brother just told me."

Ren's face fell, and he gathered me against his chest, pressing a kiss to my hair. "Shit, Killian, I'm so sorry."

"Thanks," I mumbled into his bare chest, savouring the warmth of him against my cheek. "Certainly wasn't how I though ,y night would go."

"When's the last time you talked to him?" Ren asked.

Four years ago, when I told him in no uncertain terms that I was not coming home. "It's been a while."

Ren said something after that, but I couldn't hear him. His fingers raked through my hair, calming the feelings I didn't want to name stirring inside of me. I had no intention of putting a name to them or sharing them, no matter how open Ren might have been to listening. He would probably stay up and talk with me all night if I wanted. That's what normal people did, right? They talked about their feelings with the people they loved?

That wasn't me, it never had been. I could say I was a different person until I was blue in the face, but if those wild, restless feelings in my head were any indication, I was still very much my father's daughter.

And hell have mercy on whatever asshole had reminded me of that.

We did end up staying up most of the night, just not to talk. We devoured the entire pizza— well, I devoured three-quarters of it, and let Ren finish the last piece— drank what was left of the beer in the fridge, and watched horror movies on the couch until I fell asleep curled up on Ren's lap.

I woke up in bed, using Ren's warm chest as a pillow and one leg over his. My head ached, not from crying but from all of the stress and revelations of the previous twelve hours.

I didn't dare reach over to grab my phone from where Ren had put it on the nightstand for me. Chances were I'd have messages from Ennis, looking for a decision I hadn't made about going home.

Before I could get too lost in my thoughts, Ren stirred, sleepy fingers trailing over my shoulder.

"Morning," I murmured, tilting my chin up to look at him. Ren in the morning was a sight I savoured, with his tousled hair, hooded eyes and lazy smile. Or at least, he usually was. That morning his lazy grin was replaced by a worried brow and slight frown.

"How are you feeling?" He asked, tucking a tangled strand of brown hair behind my ear.

I shrugged one shoulder, opting to trace patterns on the skin above his waist instead of opening that rattling box of emotion in the corner of my mind. "I'm okay. Glad I don't have to work until tonight."

The wrinkle in his brow furrowed. "Babe, I'm sure your boss will give you some time off. You're going home for the funeral, right?"

The funeral.

The box rattled harder in the corner, bumping from side to side. "Maybe. I haven't really thought about it, yet."

It wasn't a lie, I hadn't thought much about it. Mostly because I'd managed to avoid it after I got home and distracted myself in pizza, beer, movies and my boyfriend. It was a good recipe, one I was happy to lose myself in over and over again until that box was silent and still.

"Killian," Ren said softly, an arm hugging me tight to him. "Did something happen? I mean, with your family? It's just, you never talk about them, and now with your dad, you just seem... unfazed?"

I blinked. Twice.

Words escaped me at that moment. Did something happen? What did he even mean by that? Yeah, plenty of shit had happened in my family, but— oh.

I shrunk back in shock. "If you're asking if my dad used to hit me or something, the answer is fuck no. The reasons I left are complicated, but my family loved me, and I loved them."

"Hey, okay, okay," Ren said quickly, easing me back with a hand in my hair and at my back. "I didn't mean to offend you, Killian. It's just, I know nothing about you before you came to Boston. You don't talk about home, and now you tell me about your dad, but won't talk about it. I just want to know what's going on, how I can help."

My lungs drew in a slow breath, then another, until my clenched jaw relaxed and I could actually compute what Ren was saying. And, of course, it made perfect sense. "I get it," I tell him. "And I'm sorry I'm not reacting how I should, but there's just stuff about home that I don't want to talk about. I left it behind for a reason, and I'd like to keep it there."

Ren nodded. "Okay. I hear you, okay? But I just want you to know that when you do want to talk about it, I'm here. I want to know more, babe, whenever you're ready to tell me."

Pressing a kiss to his chest, I made a non-committal sound I hoped he would take as a wordless agreement. That was not an agreement I was willing to make, but I also knew that denying him flat-out would just lead him to ask more questions. For a small, fleeting moment, I regretted the fact that I'd probably never tell Ren anything. He cared about me, I knew that, but there was no scenario in which he would understand the life I grew up in, where I came from. It was no secret we came from different lives, even just by looking at us; me with my resting bitch face, dark wardrobe and tattoos, him with his inviting smile and letterman jacket. Hell, I'd overheard his friends wondering what he saw in me more than a few times.

There was no doubt that Ren knew some of the most important things about me, though. After all, he knew the word "pancakes" was enough to rouse me from bed rather quickly.

I chose to shower while he headed out to the kitchen in those glorious sweatpants to make my favourite, chocolate chip and banana pancakes. I did my best to wash off the events of the past night without getting too caught up in my head. The realization I actually had no shampoo came about after I'd already gotten in the shower, so I had to settle for Ren's Old Spice two-in-one until I could get to the drug store to replace it. While my hair would thoroughly despise me until I could wash it again, smelling like my boyfriend was far from the worst thing in the world right now.

Slipping into a clean pair of sweats and an old band tee, I set about putting yesterdays clothes in the laundry basket. While Ren had thankfully stripped my jeans off when he'd brought me to bed, he'd simply tossed them into the corner of the bedroom rather than put them in the basket in the bathroom. Picking them up, I turned them right side out, shaking a stubborn leg that refused to obey.

A tiny ping sounded as something small flew out of the pocket and bounced across the bathroom tile.

Tossing the pants into the basket, I reached under the sink to see what had fallen. A small, cold piece of metal grazed my fingertips and I froze.

It couldn't be.

Pinching the metal object, I held it up to the dim lighting. I didn't need to of course, but the slower part of my brain that refused to believe it's own instinct needed to see it to be sure. When four tiny letters glinted back from the copper surface, there was no room for denial.

What. The. Fuck.

"Fucking Ennis," I swore, fisting the tiny casing in my hand so hard it was sure to leave an impression. How the big oaf had managed to put the fucking shell casing found with our dead father in my pocket, I wasn't sure. But somehow, someway, he had.

That careful wall in my mind shuddered as the cool metal warmed in my clasped palm.

Nope. Nuh-uh. I was not going to crack this easily. I'd spent five years distancing myself from the world I had grown up in, building a new life for myself where I was in control. I would not jeopardize my life here in Boston by going back to, what? Mourn not only the loss of my father, but of the family I'd put so much distance between for something that wasn't really their fault?

No, that wasn't true. The truth was much darker. Because, if I went back, it wouldn't be the me I had become. The moment I saw that town, that feral, raging girl would break free of that fragile, crumbling wall I hid her behind. Vengeance and violence would be the only things that could possibly satiate her.

I shuddered. God, why did that sound so good?

Opening my palm, I stared down at the shell casing there, the word SHEA drawing my focus even as my vision clouded. My brother's words from last night echoed in my head.

You come home, Killian.

Home. What a funny word, one able to make me feel so many things I didn't want to. I could try calling Boston home as much as I wanted, but it would never really fit quite right. Not when there was another place, not so far away, calling out to my bleeding heart, begging me to come back.

I would go, just this once. I would give my father's feral, raging daughter what she needed. And when I was done, questions answered and blood paid, I would leave her there, and never look back.