“Claire’s gone?” I wailed, standing up from my seat. Anger was always preferable to pain. Jared took a step toward me, but I stepped away from him. “You didn’t even let me say goodbye to her! To either of them!”

Jared’s eyebrows moved in. “He wanted to do this, Nina. You couldn’t have stopped him, anyway.”

“But you knew it was happening,” I said softly. “You should have told me.” The lack of sleep was already wearing on me, and my body felt heavy. I didn’t have the energy to be angry.

My eyes drifted to the letter on the floor. “This is my fault.”

“Nina, no.”

I nodded. “I did this. I broke his heart, and he couldn’t stay here,” I shook my head. “I should have left him alone. He’s going to die out there.”

“Ryan made his choice,” Jared said.

His dry tone was hardly convincing. He had a right to be angry, watching his fiancé anguish over the man she was meant to be with. To Jared, Ryan being Claire’s Taleh meant that I belonged to someone else, and I used that to drive Jared away when I thought being with him meant putting his family in danger. My brilliant plan had been enough to drive Ryan to join a war halfway across the world. No matter what Jared said, or how much he hated to see me upset, he wasn’t sorry to see Ryan go.

Angry as I was, the only one to blame was me, and we both knew it.

I shook my head. “I have to get going. I have to get those documents faxed by eight.”

Jared sighed. “If I had told you, what would you have done besides worry?”

I pulled my purse over my shoulder. “I don’t know,” I said, pulling out my cell phone. I scrolled through the address book until I found Ryan’s number, and then held the phone to my ear. As I expected, his voice mail immediately answered.

The sound of his voice made my insides wrench, but when the beep cued me to speak, my temper kicked in.

“I need you to call me. Call me right now, I mean it. I just got your letter and you can’t do this. You just can’t. You’ve got to call me so we can figure this out. Please.”

Jared took the phone from my hand and let it slowly close. “He’s not going to get that message, Sweetheart.”

“I had to try,” I said, opening my purse for him to drop the phone inside. “Someone had to.”

Jared touched my arm. “He’s the safest enlisted man in the Army, Nina. He has Claire.”

“And how is that going to work, exactly? Has Claire joined the Army?”