The first of my tears fell, sliding down my cheeks in hot streams. Josh’s fingers tightened around mine, the rough fiberglass of his cast rubbing against my skin. The slight pain grounded me somehow, kept me tethered to reality instead of the wish that this was a dream. A nightmare.

“I’ve known Will since he was a boy, watched him mature to manhood with pride. I pinned his Lieutenant bars and swore him in as an officer. For you Cadets joining us, this was a man to aspire to, a man to emulate. If even one of you graduates as just a fraction of the man Will Carter was, then this Academy will have done its job. Well, maybe not the cocky, self-righteous butter bar he was for a few months…” A low rumble of laughter rolled throughout the chapel, and Josh nodded. “…but the man he grew to be over the last couple of years. I have heard it said that only the good die young. I call bullshit. He wasn’t just good, he was the best of us. He was the first of my sons by choice”—he looked back to Jagger—“and the world will forever be just a little dimmer, a little darker for us without him.”

We sang a hymn after General Donovan finished, and then it was Josh’s turn as the final speaker. He squeezed my hand one more time and then rose to take the microphone, pulling a tri-folded piece of paper from his jacket and laying it flat. Then he steadied himself and spoke, his voice clear and steady.

“I hated Will when I first met him,” he said with an easy smile. Another rumble of laughter echoed against the stone walls of the chapel. “I thought he was a self-righteous prick who wouldn’t know loyalty if it bit him, and wouldn’t know friendship if it waved a hand in his face. In my defense, I was kind of right.” Another wave of laughter. “But I was also wrong. Will didn’t just hand out loyalty, you had to earn it. You had to prove that you could live by his code of ethics—which was damn near impossible—or you had to prove that you were worth the inches he was willing to step outside his firmly drawn lines.”

His eyes went to the casket and then back to me. I nodded, hoping that I could give him some kind of strength to finish. I swiped away another tear and forced a smile for Josh.

“I went through flight school with Carter. I nearly killed him every day of Primary. But somewhere in there, he stopped being Carter and became Will, as I realized what kind of man he was. He was the kind of guy who gave up the aircraft he wanted, because he’d been honor-bound to select for a member of his platoon.” Josh half smiled at Jagger. “He was the kind of man who took notes for me during the Advanced Course when I was exhausted from traveling to see my fiancée on the weekends, and then spent hours quizzing me so I wouldn’t fall behind. He was the kind of man who kept that quiet because he knew our friends had enough going on in their lives without worrying about me, too. He was the kind of man who proved to you that he wasn’t the second choice,” he said with a smile at Grayson, who nodded his head.

“He was the kind of guy who shouted yes, when asked to fly into an unsecured landing zone to save a downed pilot.” He looked at Jagger and blinked furiously, which sent another stream of tears down my cheeks. “To save a friend.” He looked down momentarily, squeezing the sides of the podium so tightly his knuckles turned white. “I haven’t…” He paused while he took a breath, and then another. “I haven’t talked a lot about what happened that night, but it was Will who pulled me out of our crash. It was Will who carried out my deceased copilot, who had more valor in her pinky finger than any other aviator I’ve ever met.”

I was caught between the excruciating grief that threatened to tear apart my heart and shock that Josh was talking about this. In front of strangers.

“He took the bullets intended for me, and as he…” He looked at Jagger. “As he died, he reached for you. He took your hand.”

The imagery would have brought me to my knees had I been standing. My eyes fluttered shut, hot tears squeezing out between my eyelashes. He hadn’t just saved Jagger, but Josh as well. God, the guilt he must feel. The weight he must carry. Why won’t he let me shoulder a little of it? Sam gripped my hand, steadying me.

“He asked me if you were alive, and I told him you were. He then ordered me to keep you that way.” Josh’s half smile turned into a grimace as two tears chased each other down his face, sending a fresh wave down mine. “He said, ‘he lives for them. No matter what, he lives.’ Will died completing his mission, and for an officer, a soldier, there is no more honorable death. But as his friend, God, it feels unfair to have lost the best of us.”

Josh hung his head, and the entire chapel waited, so silent that even breathing felt like blasphemy. He gathered himself and then faced the rest of the chapel. “The world lost a hero in William Carter, and we are a sadder, less honorable place for his passing. There will not be a day that I don’t think about him, don’t strive for his level of integrity. I am a better man for having known him, having competed against him, and having been able to call him my friend.”

Josh walked uneasily from the podium, having refused to use his crutch today. Then he stopped at Will’s casket and laid his hand over the flag, bowing his head. “See you at Fiddler’s Green, brother.”

My throat tightened at the reference; I knew the army poem well. Josh took his seat next to me and pulled me close, wrapping his arm around me. He held me steady as they performed the roll call, my heart breaking anew when they called for “Lieutenant William Carter.”