"Sarah—"
"I'm fine. Totally fine. Just bought clothes at a truck stop while professional killers are hunting me. This is completely normal. This is—" Her breathing was getting shallow. "I can't—pull over?"
Griff immediately pulled into a rest area. Sarah stumbled out, made it three steps from the SUV before her legs gave out. She sat hard on a picnic bench, head between her knees.
"I can't breathe?—"
"Panic attack." Griff sat beside her, careful not to touch. "It has to come out."
"This is so stupid. We don't have time for—" She stopped, throwing her head back as she struggled to pull air into her lungs.
"We have time for this.” He took her hands. “Eyes on me. Breathe with me. In for four, hold for four, out for four."
She tried to match his breathing, but another wave hit. "Someone sent me to the middle of nowhere. Alone. They were going to—" She couldn't finish.
"But they didn't. You survived."
"Because of you. If you hadn't been there?—"
"But I was. And you fought. You didn't freeze, you fought back." He grinned. “I’ve got the burns on my face to prove it.”
She laughed. Sort of.
It took ten minutes for her breathing to steady. Another five before the shaking stopped.
"I'm sorry," she said.
"For what? Being human?"
"For being weak."
"Sarah." He waited until she looked at him. "You've been hunted, nearly killed, discovered massive corruption, and haven't fallen apart once. You're not weak. You're not a machine."
"You don't fall apart."
"I've had years of practice. And I do fall apart. Just... differently."
"How?"
He thought about the nights he couldn't sleep, the times he'd punched walls until his knuckles bled, the bourbon he'd used to drown the ghosts. "Destructively. Your way is healthier."
She managed a watery laugh. "Hyperventilating at a rest stop is healthy?"
"Processing trauma instead of bottling it up? Yeah, it's healthy."
They sat for another few minutes, Sarah's breathing finallyevening out. When she stood, she seemed steadier, more grounded.
"Thank you," she said quietly.
"For what?"
"For not treating me as if I'm broken."
"You're not broken. You're adapting."
“Thanks for that.” She pressed a hand to her throat and closed her eyes. “Dear Jesus, fill me with your strength.”
“Amen.” The word slipped right out of his mouth, rusty and disused. How long had it been since he’d been able to bring himself to pray?
