I'd gotten so caught up with Lissa and talking about surrogates I'd slowly stepped back from Gray. When I heard from him, I tried to respond to his messages but kept my distance. The guilt weighed heavily on me knowing he needed a shoulder to lean on and had reached out because we had history, but I couldn't engage in his issues. For the first time in my adult life, I'd chosen myself over someone else, someone I cared deeply for. I was selfish and went after what I wanted. It was terribly uncharacteristic of me, but there was no guarantee this would work, and there sure as hell wasn't a guarantee Lissa would go through this again. So I'd chosen us.
I hadn't expected to have to make another choice in the middle of the night, but when my phone rang at two, I ignored it. The noise started ov
