As I came to a stop in front of her, I realized she wasn't on her phone. Her hand was flat on her abdomen and her eyes closed. There was a fine mist of sweat on her brow and her face was pale. Something wasn't right. "What's going on here? What's this all about?"
"It's nothing," she said with a slight shake of her head.
She was breathing a little too quick for me to believe that. I plucked her hand from her belly, finding her pulse with my fingertip. "Why don't you have a smartwatch like the rest of us? You think I like taking vitals the analog way? Fuck no. Give me a heart rate reading for every minute of the day and an ECG while we're at it. You gotta get in the game here, Shap."
"Those things make me twitchy," she said under her breath.
I nodded as I loosened the strap on my watch. "Then we'll only keep it on for a minute."
"Don't doctor me, Stremmel."
"Then do a better job of disappearing the next time you want to be alone. You're stuck with me now." I held her wrist in one hand, now sporting my watch, and moved two fingers to the arterial pulse in her neck. It wasn't actually necessary—none of this was necessary—but I wasn't walking away. I'd come here to bother her after all and I intended to do that. I shifted my palm to her jaw and ran my thumb across her cool cheek. "Look at this," I said, holding her wrist up to view. "What is this all about? This heart rate is far more elevated than I'd like to see from you when your clothes are on. Explain to me why you're in distress or expect me to use my own methods to figure it out."
She started to shake her head but whatever was happening behind her eyes was stronger than her desire to tell me to fuck off. "I'm out here because I'm trying to get it under control. If I go in there"—she motioned the bathroom around the corner—"the nausea will win. I don't want that to happen."
"What's causing the nausea? What am I working with here?" I prompted. I hadn't noticed what she'd eaten but I knew she'd skipped the margaritas because Nick had asked her three times if he'd wanted one. She'd looked ready to rip his ears off the second time he asked and I was just surprised he was still alive following the third.
She blew a breath through her mouth and I saw it the second she gave up the fight. "My body is very well trained. It doesn't even have to be asked to vomit after a meal anymore. After all these years, it knows what to do."
I blinked between Sara's creased brow and the readout on the watch face. I needed that minute to realign everything I knew about her.
"Snacks like croutons and trail mix are no problem, but long, social meals screw me every time," she continued. "Either I eat too much or I eat too fast. Or I allow myself to get too hungry and my stomach is already agitated when I do eat. Or none of those things happen and my body just taps into decades of muscle memory that remembers we never keep meals down."
She blinked up at me now, her eyes wide and defiant. Instead of being the pain in the ass she expected me to be, I gave her a quick nod, saying, "Focus on your breathing."
"What does it look like I'm doing?"
I shifted my hand away from her jaw and over her shoulder, down her arm. I traced my thumb along the well of her palm. "Do as you're told. Just this one time. Okay?"
There was a beat where it seemed like she was going to fight me because there was no other way with us—it was always a fight, even when it was fucking—but then she closed her eyes again. With her shoulders shoved back, she drew a breath through her nose while she tapped out a five count on my wrist. She blew it out, touching her fingertips to my wrist eight times.
"Good. Two more. Deeper this time. Get out of your shoulders and into your diaphragm."
"Don't mansplain breathing to me, Stremmel."
"Then do it correctly, Shap."
Her brows pitched up as she inhaled, and that was fine by me. She could be as annoyed as she wanted. I'd annoy her every day if it distracted her from stomach spasms.
I stroked her palm through another round of deep breathing. After two more, she said, "You don't have to stay here. I can usually talk myself through the worst of it. That's why I came out here."
"And what happens when you can't talk yourself through it?"
"I have meds." She lifted a shoulder. "You should get back in there. They're going to wonder where you went."
"Have you seen the empty tequila bottles? No one is wondering where anyone went." I glanced down at the watch face, pleased to find her heart working slightly less hard than it had been. "Who's taking care of you for this?"
"I told you not to doctor me."
I scowled at her as I loosened the watch from around her wrist. "Answer the damn question, Shap."
"I have an eating disorder recovery specialist in Baltimore. I've been working with her for about five years."
Only five years, my god. That wasn't enough. Not nearly enough.
"And your stomach? Who's looking after that? Emmerling knows all the best people in GI."
She huffed out an aggravated breath. "Thanks, but I'm not sharing my bulimia-induced gastroparesis and irritable bowel with any of my colleagues. Definitely not the ones I mingle with after-hours." She dropped her gaze to the floor. "Not sure why I shared it with you."
