“Do you even realize,” Jasper asked quietly, staring straight into his eyes,“who you’re touching?”
Nolan clenched his jaw.
“I realize. Believe me,I realize exactly who she is.”
“Then why the hell—”
Lynn stepped forward, desperation in her voice.
“Stop it! We were just—” She bit her lip, the words failing her.
Jasper looked at her. At her flushed face, trembling hands, the guilty, pained look in her eyes. And for the first time in a very long time, he saw clearly: she wasn’t a little girl anymore. She was a grown woman. And whatever he did now, there was no undoing any of this.
Nolan spoke again:
“I didn’t plan this, Jasper. I swear. It just happened. And I’m…” he grimaced, as if the admission hurt,“I’m an idiot. But I wouldn’t have touched her if I didn’t know it was serious. You know me.”
Jasper exhaled through his nose, trying to steady himself. His fists still throbbed from how tightly he'd clenched them.
Then Lynn whispered one sentence that only poured gasoline onto the fire:
“Dad… I’m not a child. I get to choose who I love. I’m grown. I don’t have to follow your rules.”
Those words stabbed straight into his chest.
Love.
She didn’t say she liked him or had a crush. She said love.
Jasper shut his eyes for a second. Felt the blood slam against his temples. Why couldn’t she have chosen some kid from her university? Or a young intern from the clinic?
His breath hitched.
In the ringing silence, he understood: if he didn’t leave right now, he would do something he couldn’t take back.
He stepped back abruptly.
The blood in his veins felt like molten metal. Every muscle shook from barely contained rage. The air thickened—heavy, suffocating with fury and pain. His heartbeat thundered so loudly it drowned out everything else.
He was shaking.
His fingers had gone white. He turned, slowly, mechanically.
Two steps.
Nolan only managed to lift his gaze. He didn’t get a single word out before Jasper swung—and punched him so hard in the jaw that something cracked in his own hand.
A deep, sickening thud. Nolan flew back, grabbing his face, but he didn’t even try to defend himself.
Lynn screamed:
“Dad! Stop! Please!”
But Jasper didn’t hear her. He heard nothing but his ragged breath and the roar in his ears.
He stood over Nolan, burning from the inside out. Everything in him demanded another swing. And another. Only one thing stopped him from losing control entirely—
Lynn’s voice.
