On her way down the stairs, she'd gone over what she wanted to say and how she wanted to say it—all of it very calm and rational. But the more she thought about last night, the harder it was to stay in that frame of mind. She'd waited up for him most of the night. Initially, when he failed to show, her feelings had been hurt. As the hours passed, that hurt turned into anxiety—it wasn't like him not to call. She told herself not to worry; if anything had happened to him, someone would have come to tell her. No one came. At 4 a.m., she finally went to bed. When she woke a few hours later, she called the barracks and left a message for him.

As the morning wore on, she found herself making excuses to stay near the phone. But he never returned her call. By the time Jolene arrived to help go over the books, she was livid and she'd said things she should have kept to herself. She'd needed to vent her frustration and Jolene was always a good listener. Afterward, she'd calmed down and they'd quickly finished adding up the accounts. Now, she wondered how long he'd been here and exactly how much of that conversation he'd overheard.

When she looked down on him, she felt a mixture of tenderness and rage— torn between an urge to lay a blanket over him and let him rest and an equally strong urge to throw something at him.

She decided to wake him and get it over with before she lost her nerve...