The Consequence of Loving Colton (Consequence 1)

“You guess so?” I snapped, my temper taking over. “You guess so? You freaking guess so?” I stomped over to her and grabbed her by the shoulders. “You don’t guess about marriage, Milo, it’s for life! What the hell is wrong with you? You’re still as immature as ever. Shit.”

“What?” Her shrill voice made me want to duck and cover.

Whoops. I was about to get punched again—this time purposefully.

“I’m not immature.” She tried jerking away from me, but I wouldn’t let her. Pissed as hell, I held her firm.

“Yes. You are. You don’t just marry an asshole because he asks you!”

“He’s not an asshole!”

“You were naked!”

“What?” Jason roared, coming up from behind us. “Who was naked?”

“Should I tell him or will you?” I sneered.

“Everything okay?” Max jogged over, hands in the air as if he was innocent, the bastard, the perverted bastard!

“Well?” Jason crossed his arms.

“She had her shirt off . . .” I nodded. “For him!”

“You looked too!” Max pointed.

Jason’s eyes widened and then narrowed in on me.

“No.” I clenched Milo harder against me. “No, it’s not like that.”

“It is,” Max said helpfully. “Totally like that. I was innocent in the whole thing. Honest, I don’t even know what he’s talking about.”

I was going to strangle that guy with my bare hands.

“You saw my sister naked!” Jason shouted.

Everyone poured out of the house, including Jayne. Oh, good, witnesses. At least everyone would know how I was murdered. See, and this was why I never made a move! It wasn’t about just losing her friendship—but also about losing his.

“No.” I swallowed. “You’ve got it all wrong.”

“He stared at my boobs,” Milo said triumphantly.

Jason lunged for me. I released Milo a bit abruptly, and she went sailing into the cake stand metal thing.

Lots of crunching and cursing followed.

Jason froze.

I closed my eyes.

And Jayne started crying—wailing was more like it.

“My cake stand!” she shouted into the sky like a howling werewolf, her feet stomping all over the grass, killing any seeds that hoped to sprout into beautiful greenery. “You ruined everything!”

“Thank God,” Jason said under his breath.

“Arrest her!” Jayne pointed at Milo. “Arrest her now!”

“For shit’s sake, she’s injured!” I went over to grab Milo; instead she pushed as I pulled, making me lose my balance and fall backward—directly into the pool.

When I resurfaced, I saw Jason pull out handcuffs.

“What the hell are you doing?” I shouted as I tried to get out of the pool.

“Destruction of private property!” Jayne sniffed. “And Jason’s a good cop, a fair cop, so he’s arresting her.”

Max, the bastard fiancé, covered his mouth with his hands.

And Mrs. Caro, having just arrived with the champagne bottle, started sipping directly from it.

Now she had the right idea.

“Son.” Mr. Caro stepped forward. “Maybe this is—”

“No.” Jason nodded. “Jayne’s right, fair is fair, I’ll just take her into town. I may be gone for a few hours, but—”

That rat bastard! He was going to get out of all the wedding decorating!

Not my proudest moment, but once I was on my feet I charged at full speed toward one of the wedding decorators, knocking the candles out of her hands. They hit the ground with a thud.

“Uh-oh.” I said dryly, holding out my hands. “Arrest me too, Jason, looks like I destroyed more property.”

Max walked over to me and whispered under his breath, “Kind of defeats the purpose when you jump on the bomb after it’s gone off, but carry on.” He stepped back.

“Fine.” Jason grabbed me with his right hand and Milo with his left.

“Max, do something!” Milo shouted.

“Right.” He nodded and then reached for the champagne bottle. “May I?”

Wordlessly Mrs. Caro handed it to him and he took a big swig.

“That’s not doing something!”

“It’s all I’ve got. I’ll bail you out in a bit, Milo, just try not to hurt them—after all, they’re stuck in the car with you, not the other way around.”

Jason seemed to think about this for a moment, if his wincing was any indication. Yeah, that’s right, he was probably recalling all the violence done to him in the past twenty-four hours.

“Second thoughts?” I asked.

“Get in the damn car, both of you.”

I went to the front.

“Oh, no, hell, no.” He opened the back. “You were arrested, friend, you get to ride in back. The guys at the station are going to give you hell for this.”

“Let them.” I smiled from the backseat as Milo scowled. “We leave prison and go to jail. I choose jail.”

The car fell silent.

“Hey, can we stop at Starbucks?” Milo asked as we pulled out of the driveway.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

MILO

“When I said be the doughnut . . .” Max leaned across the bars of the county jail. “I didn’t mean to literally be a doughnut and get your ass arrested by some doughnut-eating copper.”