RJ Forrester came home with a bruise on his face and something far harder to treat sitting behind his eyes.

Anger.

Not the loud kind that burns out quickly after one slammed door.

This was focused anger, the kind that had already decided where it wanted to go.

Steffy and Finn got him through the door, and the whole house seemed to tighten around them.

The air felt too still.

The soft sound of their shoes on the floor carried through the room, and the ice inside the cold compress shifted every time RJ pressed it against his cheek.

Finn was the first to move like himself.

He stepped in close, studying RJ’s face with that immediate doctor instinct he never fully turned off, even when the crisis was personal.

“Stop touching it,” Finn said, not harshly, but firmly.

RJ lowered his hand for half a second.

Then he touched the edge of the bruise again.

Steffy saw it and gave him a look.

“RJ.”

“I’m fine,” he said.

He was not fine.

Everyone in that room knew it.

His face was marked, his pride was lit up, and his voice had the sharp edge of someone who had spent the whole ride home replaying one moment over and over until it became more than a punch.

It became proof.

Finn checked the swelling and asked where it hurt.

RJ answered only enough to get through the questions.

Steffy stood with her arms folded, her face pulled tight with frustration.

She was worried about the bruise, yes, but she looked more worried about what RJ was doing with it.

Because RJ was not acting like someone who wanted the fight over.

He was acting like someone who had just found the beginning of one.

Then Ridge walked in.

The room changed immediately.

Ridge did not need to ask why Finn was hovering or why Steffy looked like she had been holding back the same sentence for ten minutes.

He saw the compress.

He saw RJ’s jaw.

He saw the way his son was standing too stiffly, like backing down would hurt worse than the bruise.

“Will?” Ridge asked.

RJ looked away.

That was enough.

Ridge exhaled slowly, and the sound carried more fatigue than surprise.

In their world, family trouble rarely stayed simple.

A punch was never just a punch once the last names were Forrester and Spencer.

Electra’s name came up before anyone could avoid it.

It always did.

RJ said he was not trying to get in the middle of her relationship with Will.

Steffy’s face changed just enough to show she did not fully believe that.

RJ must have seen it, because his voice sharpened.

“I’m not,” he insisted.

But every sentence after that returned to Electra.

Will hurt Electra.

Will kept making things harder for her.

Will acted like consequences were for other people.

Will could not control himself.

Finn listened carefully, but his eyes kept moving from RJ’s bruise to RJ’s hands.

Those hands were tight.

Too tight.

RJ was not pacing, but he had the energy of someone who wanted to.

Steffy tried to slow him down.

“You need to calm down,” she said.

That was the wrong sentence.

RJ turned toward her.

“Calm down?”

His laugh was short and ugly.

“I got punched, Steffy.”

“I know that.”

“No, you know I came home with a bruise. You don’t know what he is.”

That landed harder than he probably intended.

Ridge lifted his head.

“What does that mean?”

RJ pressed the cold compress back to his cheek for a second, then pulled it down again.

“He’s bad news,” he said.

The room went still.

RJ looked at Ridge, then Steffy.

“And he’s a coward.”

Finn’s expression tightened.

Steffy looked toward the floor as if counting out the seconds before this became impossible to contain.

Ridge did not interrupt right away.

He was watching RJ too closely.

A father can hear the difference between pain and obsession.

Ridge was hearing both.

RJ kept going.

He said Will did not deserve Electra’s trust.

He said Will had already shown who he was.

He said people kept making excuses for him because of his age, his temper, and his family.

But RJ was done with excuses.

Steffy’s voice dropped.

“RJ, this cannot become your mission.”

He looked at her like she had missed the obvious.

“It already is.”

That sentence changed the room more than the insult had.

Finn glanced at Steffy.

Ridge went quiet.

Because once RJ said that, no one could pretend this was only about a bruise anymore.

This was moving.

It was choosing a direction.

And the direction was straight at Will Spencer.

RJ said Will was reckless.

He said Will was unstable.

He said Will had no business being near Electra if he could not control himself.

Then he made the turn nobody wanted him to make.

He brought Forrester into it.

At first, it sounded like frustration.

Then it sounded like a demand.

“He shouldn’t even be working here,” RJ said.

Ridge’s eyes narrowed.

Steffy straightened.

Finn stopped moving entirely.

There it was.

The punch had become a personnel issue.

The bruise had become evidence.

RJ had taken what happened between him and Will and dragged it into the company, where every family wound became a business problem and every business problem became a family war.

Steffy spoke first.

“You know what firing him would do.”

RJ did not blink.

“It would tell him there are consequences.”

“It would start something with Bill.”

“Good.”

That word fell flat and cold.

Ridge stepped closer.

“RJ.”

“What?” RJ asked. “Are we all supposed to be afraid of Bill Spencer now?”

No one answered immediately.

Not because the answer was yes.

Because the answer was complicated.

Bill Spencer was not someone who took threats to his son lightly.

And Will being pushed out of Forrester would not look like a quiet internal decision.

It would look like an attack.

Ridge knew that.

Steffy knew that.

Finn, even standing outside the deepest history between the families, seemed to understand enough to know this would spread.

RJ seemed to understand it too.

He simply did not seem to care.

Or he cared for the wrong reason.

That was the question sitting in the room.

Was RJ trying to protect Electra, or was he trying to win something that had started to matter too much?

He kept saying her name like a shield.

Electra deserved better.

Electra should not have to deal with Will’s temper.

Electra needed people willing to stand up for her.

But somewhere inside all that concern was something sharper.

RJ needed everyone to see Will the way he saw him.

He needed Ridge and Steffy to say it out loud.

He needed the family to choose.

Steffy softened her voice, but not her point.

“Electra is not helped by us turning this into a bigger war.”

RJ looked at her.

“She’s not helped by us pretending he’s safe.”

The word safe made Finn’s eyes narrow slightly.

That was not a casual word.

It raised the stakes instantly.

Ridge caught it too.

“Be careful,” Ridge said.

RJ’s mouth tightened.

“I am being careful.”

“No,” Ridge said. “You’re angry.”

For one second, RJ looked like he might snap back.

He did not.

He swallowed it.

That restraint almost made him look more dangerous.

Meanwhile, across town, Will was with Electra at the beach house, trying to do the opposite of what RJ was doing.

He was trying to make the air lighter.

He was trying to make a room feel safe again.

He was trying to push away the weight of what had happened with smoke, apologies, and the fragile hope that Electra would believe there was still something good under all that damage.

But peace in one room means very little when war is being planned in another.

And RJ was planning.

Maybe he would not have called it that.

He might have called it accountability.

He might have called it protecting Electra.

He might have called it refusing to let Will get away with what he had done.

But the shape of it was clear.

RJ wanted Will exposed.

He wanted Will punished.

And if Ridge would not do it quietly, RJ was beginning to look ready to do it loudly.

Ridge tried to pull him back.

He told him again that there were ways to handle conflict without turning it into a public battle.

He reminded RJ that Electra’s feelings mattered too.

He reminded him that this was not only about pride.

RJ’s face changed at that.

Pride.

That word bothered him.

Maybe because it was too close.

He took a breath, and for a brief second, the room felt like it might settle.

Then Ridge asked the question that pushed everything to the edge.

“What exactly do you expect me to do?”

RJ lowered the compress from his face.

The bruise looked darker now against his skin.

His hand dropped to his side.

His eyes were clear.

Too clear.

“I expect you to stop protecting him,” RJ said.

Steffy shook her head.

“No one is protecting Will.”

RJ turned to her.

“Then prove it.”

Finn said his name quietly.

RJ ignored him.

“Will has already shown everyone who he is. He loses control. He hurts people. He brings chaos into every room he walks into, and everyone acts like it’s just drama because his father is Bill Spencer.”

Ridge’s expression hardened.

“That is not fair.”

RJ’s voice dropped.

“Neither is Electra always being the one who pays for his feelings.”

That stopped Steffy.

Because underneath the anger, there was a truth she could not dismiss.

Will had hurt Electra.

RJ had been punched.

Nobody in that room could pretend nothing had happened.

But truth in the hands of anger can become something else.

It can become a weapon before anyone notices the handle.

RJ took one step forward.

“If you won’t fire him,” he said, “then I’ll make sure everyone at Forrester knows why you should.”

Steffy’s mouth opened.

No answer came out.

Finn lowered his hand from RJ’s shoulder.

Ridge stared at his son like he was seeing the next disaster arrive in real time.

That was when RJ reached into his pocket.

The movement was small.

Everyone watched anyway.

He pulled out his phone and turned the screen toward Steffy.

On it was a draft.

Not a text to a friend.

Not a private complaint.

A message prepared for more than one person at Forrester.

Will’s name sat in the first line.

The timestamp at the top made it clear this was not something RJ had thrown together in the heat of the moment.

He had been thinking about it.

He had been shaping it.

He had been getting ready.

Steffy’s face changed.

Finn whispered, “RJ, don’t.”

Ridge finally looked shaken.

Because this was no longer one son asking his father to make a decision.

This was RJ standing at the edge of a public accusation with his thumb close enough to send it.

RJ held the phone steady.

His fingers were tense around it.

The cold compress hung forgotten in his other hand.

“So are you going to handle Will Spencer,” he asked, “or am I?”

No one moved.

For a moment, even RJ seemed to understand the size of what he had just done.

Steffy stepped forward first.

“Give me the phone.”

RJ did not.

Ridge’s voice came next, lower and more dangerous than before.

“RJ, this is not how we do this.”

RJ looked at him.

“Then how do we do it? We wait until Will decides who he gets to hit next? We let Electra talk herself into forgiving him because everyone around her keeps acting like this is normal?”

Finn’s face tightened at that.

Steffy glanced at him, then back at RJ.

“Do not use Electra as permission to hurt someone back.”

RJ flinched.

Only a little.

But enough.

That was the first sign the words had reached somewhere under the rage.

Ridge saw it.

He stepped closer, slower this time.

“Send that message, and you do not control what happens next.”

RJ swallowed.

His thumb hovered near the screen.

The whole room seemed to narrow to that one small movement.

At the beach house, Will still had no idea what was coming.

Electra still had no idea that while he was trying to clear the air with her, RJ was standing in another room with a digital match in his hand.

That was the cruelest part.

Everyone kept saying this was about protecting her, but nobody had asked her what kind of protection she wanted.

Steffy finally said it.

“Electra gets a voice in this too.”

RJ’s eyes shifted.

Ridge nodded once, slowly.

“You want consequences? Fine. But not a public ambush. Not a company-wide hit job. Not something that turns Electra into the center of gossip before she even knows what you’ve done.”

RJ looked back down at the phone.

His jaw worked once.

Twice.

Then, finally, he locked the screen.

The room exhaled, but only barely.

Because locking the phone was not the same as letting go.

RJ still looked furious.

Will was still bruised into the center of the conversation without being there.

Electra was still caught between two men who both believed they knew what was best for her.

And Ridge knew this was not finished.

Not even close.

He told RJ to sit down.

RJ did not sit.

He stood there with the compress in one hand and the phone in the other, caught between pain and purpose.

Steffy softened, but her words stayed firm.

“You can care about Electra without turning this into a war.”

RJ looked toward the window.

For a few seconds, he said nothing.

When he finally spoke, his voice was quieter.

“What if the war already started when he hit me?”

That was the question nobody could smooth over.

Because in families like theirs, the first punch was rarely the end.

Sometimes it was only the moment everyone stopped pretending the rivalry was harmless.

Ridge took the phone from RJ only after RJ let him.

That mattered.

It was not a victory.

It was a pause.

Steffy called Electra, but the call went unanswered.

Finn checked RJ’s face again, this time with less medical urgency and more personal concern.

RJ let him.

Barely.

At the beach house, Will looked at Electra and tried to explain himself.

He talked about regret.

He talked about losing control.

He talked about wanting to make things right.

Electra listened, but her face showed the strain of a woman tired of being the reason men declared themselves changed.

Then her phone buzzed.

Steffy’s name appeared on the screen.

Will saw it.

Electra saw him see it.

The fragile peace in that room cracked.

Back at the house, RJ watched Ridge holding his phone and knew the message had not been sent.

But he also knew something else.

The words existed now.

The accusation existed.

And once a person writes down the thing they are almost willing to do, it becomes easier to imagine doing it later.

Ridge told him they would handle Will.

Steffy told him not to make another move without talking to her.

Finn told him to ice the bruise and breathe.

RJ nodded at all the right moments.

But his eyes did not soften.

Not fully.

Because RJ had come home bruised, furious, and absolutely determined to make Will Spencer public enemy number one.

By the end of that night, he had not sent the message.

But he had shown everyone the war he was willing to start.

And that changed the way Ridge looked at him.

It changed the way Steffy measured every word.

Most of all, it changed the question hanging over Electra.

Was RJ protecting her from Will?

Or was he pulling her into something even harder to escape?