Chase sat in front of the computer in his room, his door locked while four tiny fists pounded on it from the other side. “Chase! You promised!”

“I did not promise to get you two ice cream so go away and let me do my homework.” He’d finished his homework but wasn’t finished preparing himself to deal with three-year-old brains so he tried to stall. Facebook would work.

His eyes widened and teeth clenched. “Jesus, Megan, what is wrong with you?” He grabbed his keys and left. Ethan and Evan caught sight of him and abandoned their Matchbox cars to follow him. “Go play, boys. I have to go out.”

“Chase, it’s dark out. Where do you have to go?” Kelly demanded.

“Meg’s.” He slammed the door before she could question him further, jogged across the lawn and hopped the fence. He was about to knock on the sliding doors across the back when he remembered she was in the big bedroom so he went to the front door and banged on it with a fist.

She answered the door with a snarl. “What.”

“What the HELL, Megan?”

She flinched but did not cower. “You saw Facebook.”

“Yeah. Saw you stab a friend in the back. And you used me to do it.”

His voice was quietly cold — no small feat considering how furious he was. She stared at him, speechless. He waited one more beat. “You don’t even deny it?”

“Um, I believe it’s called fighting back.”

“Really?” Derision practically dripped from the word. “It sounds a whole lot more like getting even and that’s not you.”

Her eyes went round and she leaned toward him. “Oh, I thought you knew me so well, Chase! That you loved everything about me. Guess you were wrong. You don’t know me and you can’t possibly love me so just go home and leave me alone.”

She tried to slam the door but it bounced off the foot he stuck in its path. She took a step back. Chase stole the opportunity to walk in, uninvited and her face went red. For a second, he was contrite. He didn’t mean to intimidate her. Hell. Yes, he did. A little. As if she read his mind, she straightened her spine, leveled her shoulders and stared back.

He angled his head and narrowed his eyes. “You think I don’t know you. You’re wrong. Under all this mad, you know what I see? You’re in pieces. Bailey took a cheap shot and you’re hurt — I get that. But this—” He punctuated with a finger pointed upstairs at her room, “—is low.”

She shook her head. “Why don’t I get a shot? She came after me first and worse, she got Ryder and even you involved. I keep telling her not to trust this guy and she actually BELIEVES HIM OVER ME.”

The sound of her voice bounced off the walls of the living room. Chase took another step. She was wrong — how could she not see that?

“Delete it, Megan. Right now.”

She folded her arms and shook her head. When he cursed, her eyebrows shot up.

“Damn it, Megan, you don’t hurt people like this — not on purpose. Delete the post before it ends up with another TP’d front yard or a knife through a hand. Please.”

She wavered — for a brief moment, he saw a spark of his Megan in those hard brown eyes and then it was gone.

“No, Chase. Not this time.”

He met her gaze. “Fine.”

If she expected him to walk out and leave her to suffer alone, she had another thing coming. Instead, he stalked upstairs to her room. Damn girls don’t think straight, he thought with uncharacteristic malice. seventeen stitches in her hand, a few hundred rolls of toilet paper stuck to tree limbs and she thinks it’s her freakin’ turn? Well, he was going to stop it all right now. He strode into her bedroom and came to a complete and utter stop when he saw her easel. It wiped his mind except for one thought — one insane and terrifying and amazing thought.

Bailey was right. Holy God in heaven, she was right.