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No money. No phone.

The cash I earned tonight won’t set me up for a new start. Not even ten fights will.

So I’ll stay.

For now.

“You need to learn how to fight before you get back in the ring.”

“I know how to fight.”

He scoffs. “If what I saw was you fighting, then you’re worse off than I thought.”

I pull my hand away and take off the rest of the tape myself. “Screw you, Atom.”

“We’ve been over that. I said no.”

The pain in my chest isn’t because of what he said. It can’t be. I don’t care if he said no to me when I threw myself at him at Milly’s wedding thinking it would get me my freedom. I’m still stuck here.

“Hey, Gnat,” Lou says as he pushes the curtain open. He stops short of hitting Atom and eyes him. “Fighters only, man. Wait outside if you want to fuck.”

It’s my turn to huff. “Not happening.”

Lou shrugs and tosses me a roll of money. “Good job tonight, kid. We’ve got an opening next month on the tenth in you’re interested.”

“She isn’t,” Atom says as he crosses his arms and takes up a protective position that I don’t want from him.

“Not your call,” I say to Atom as I grab my bag and move past him. “And yeah, sounds good. Give Menace the details,” I tell Lou as I push back the curtain and head back to the crowd.

I’m not sure where Viv is, if she was even willing to stay and give me a ride back, but being outside this place is ten times better than being stuck in a room close to Atom.

But before I can make it even halfway to the front of the warehouse, I’m stopped again.

It’s not Atom this time, though.

It’s someone I thought I would never see again.

“Uncle,” I whisper as he and five men and women, including the fixer I saw at the coffee shop so long ago, step close to me.

“Hello, Barbra,” Uncle calls out with no emotion. Similar to the guy who ate people in that movie when he said hello to a woman named Clarice for the first time.

“Natalie,” I say on reflex and force myself not to flinch as his lips pinch. He’s aged, but other than the tiny wrinkles around his eyes and the way his jawline seems to sag, he looks the same. Thick, graying hair. Black-framed glasses perched on his nose. He comes to eye level with me, but I was never dumb enough to think him weak from his size. He’s a man who carries himself well above others and makes sure that if someone doesn’t know that about him personally, they see it in those who travel with him. His protection detail, who are far bigger and grander than any guards I saw here tonight.

There were several men who were close to my grandfather and father. Most we called Uncle, but this one, Masato, was always around the most, spending long hours with my grandfather behind closed doors. He was the closest thing to a friend I ever saw my grandfather have, even if they were just connected because of business.

To my utter shock, he tilts his head forward as if acknowledging the name change.

“Your grandfather would like a word.”

My blood runs cold at his words. My breath stalls in my chest. And the sweat on my skin freezes.

I haven’t spoken to my grandfather since the day I begged him to let me leave. The day Reina took my fiancée, and no one fought for me to get something that would be mine.

I wasn’t in love with the man who was promised to me, nor was he in love with me. We were kind to each other the times we interacted, but it was what he represented. He was going to be my way out. Away from my father. We’d still be connected to the family—it was the Yakuza, after all—but I would be away from the people who didn’t care if I lived or died. Those who looked at me daily and just saw me as a ransom to some kidnappers that they wished they didn’t have to pay.

When I went to Grandfather, I was respectful and distant. Something he appreciated over the moaning and groaning females usually brought to him. I knew what to say to him to make him listen.

I told him I would leave. That I would never be connected to the family name. Never be a burden on them again. I also renounced my inheritance, something that was promised to my mother the day she married—$4.3 million that I disclaimed for my freedom.