She choked out the last word through tears, pushing me away from her and bolting from the room like it was on fire.

Holy shit. Her words hung in the air like floating land mines, daring the first person to cross the field. In one breath she’d breathed life into my heart and destroyed her parents’.

“She’s…” Her mother swallowed, her public face on. “She’s prone to melodrama.”

“Unbelievable.” It was the only word I could spit out before I chased after her, weaving through the crowd in the entry. The music was loud enough to assure we hadn’t been overheard.

Paisley raced up the stairs. I’d crossed the foyer and hit the first step before his hand caught my elbow. “What the hell did you do?” Carter fired at me.

“Me? This isn’t about me. It’s more about you, and using her for a stand-in for her sister for the last year. Fuck, Carter. She’s amazing, and you couldn’t look past her dead sister long enough to love her for who she is.” I pried his fingers off my arm with deliberate motions, careful not to snap on him in a house full of officers. Bar brawls were one thing. Destroying another lieutenant in the home of the commanding general was a career ender.

He paled. “You don’t know anything about it, Bateman. Nothing. Don’t act like dating her for a week gives you half of the shit you need to know.”

“I know she deserves better than she’s gotten!” I yelled over my shoulder as I took the stairs two at a time. Her skirt disappeared into the second room on the left, but she closed the door before I could get to her. “Paisley?” I tried the door handle, but it was locked. “Let me in.”

“I just need a minute.”

A minute. I could give her that. She’d just unloaded two years’ worth of anger in one conversation. I could give her a minute.

“Lee, you open this door now,” her mother shouted, appearing next to me. “Don’t you run off from me like this conversation is finished!”

I took another deep breath, hoping to flush the anger, to find my happy place before I did some verbal damage to her mother. Paisley was my future, which meant I couldn’t burn the bridge in front of me, even if it was currently covered in freaking locusts.

“No,” Paisley replied.

“Stop acting like a petulant toddler and open this door!” Her voice escalated, and I looked over the railing to see if she’d been heard. I didn’t care, but Paisley would. Will stood at the bottom of the stairs, glaring at me.

“This is all your fault,” Mrs. Donovan yelled at me.

“I love how everyone assumes this is about me. Look at how you’re treating her.” I kept my voice soft.

She shook her head and narrowed her eyes at me. “I knew the first time I heard your name out of Will’s mouth that I wanted you gone, away from our family.”

“Will?” I laughed, envisioning Carter whining to her mother that I’d made a move on Paisley. Hell, yes, I’d made a move. “Carter may be a god in your eyes, but he didn’t love her like she needs.”

“Will Carter is a man of honor who had the guts to come forward when you put that monstrosity of a bear on my front lawn!”

Everything in me went still. Deadly. Every ounce of anger I’d felt today on Paisley’s behalf, at her father for immediately hating me, her mother for treating her like shit, focused into one thought. “He told.”

“I’ve never been more proud of him.” Her chin rose.

I was moving before another rational thought entered my brain. “Jagger! Don’t!” Paisley’s voice registered like an echo under the water. Everything in my brain fogged except the one person at the end of the stairs. Will-fucking-Carter.

I launched at him from a few steps up, pulling some aerial WWE shit. We landed in the entry hall, people scattering as we slid across the tile floor. My fist slammed into his face, and his head bounced off the floor. I stood slowly as he wiped the blood off his lip. “You think I want a traitorous asswipe like you as my stick buddy?”

“Traitorous?” he asked, gaining his feet. “You stole my girlfriend!”

“You turned us in for the class prank. The class you lead! Who the hell wants a leader they can’t trust? Sure as hell not me!”

“Stop!” Paisley shouted, coming down the stairs, her mother hot on her heels. “Jagger, don’t hurt him!”

I grinned like a homicidal maniac. “See, even she knows I’ll kick your ass.”

Carter yelled and rushed me. I let him, wanting to have another excuse to fucking demolish him. We took out the catering table in the middle of the foyer. The trays scattered to the floor, the noise nothing compared to the roaring in my head. He got in one punch to my cheek, but I swung hard with my right, catching him in the temple so hard he fell off me.

“No!” Paisley screamed, but I was too far gone for it to register. I didn’t wait for him to react, delivering another hit to the other side of his face. Symmetry was a beautiful thing.

Carter grabbed a tray, moving so quickly I didn’t recognize it until the pain wailed through the side of my head.

I got in two more punches, blood dripping from my face onto his.

“Enough!” Arms pulled me up and locked my own behind me. I struggled against them, ready to finish what he’d fucking started. “Calm down. You’re about to kiss your helicopter and your girl good-bye, Jag.” Josh’s voice came through the haze, quiet enough that only I heard him.