She knew on one level that Tucker being here, witnessing this, was going to matter a great deal soon enough, but right now, she could barely hear him through the ringing in her ears. All her concentration was on her breath, on bringing it under control, just as Selena had taught.

“Hey,” he said. Even through the distortion of her hearing, the gentleness in his voice was coming through loud and clear. “Can you tell me what’s going on? How can I help?”

His hand slid onto her shoulder, also gentle, but Della flinched nonetheless, her system still too overstimulated and hyperreactive. He dropped his hand away without comment, and he just sat beside her as her breathing slowly came back under control and the darkness still rimming her peripheral vision finally cleared. The urge to cry was strong, but she fought it.

She’d already humiliated herself once. She wouldn’t compound it with tears.

Damn it. She’d had this amazing night, when it finally felt like she was reclaiming her life and banishing the ghosts—and wham! Major panic attack/freak out. Right in front of Tucker. The guy she’d spent the last couple of months convincing she was fine. She was strong. She was ready to move on. Ready to embrace life.

This is why she hadn’t asked him to stay the night, even though she’d hated watching him leave. Because how did she explain to another adult she needed the light on to sleep? Like some little kid? Every other grown-up in the world, it seemed, needed dark fifty layers deep to sleep, but she still needed a night-light. How did she ask someone to upend their routine, to mess with the delicate day/night balance a human body requires to adequately function, so she could sleep?

This was why she was better off alone.

“Are you okay now?”

Della shook her head. A deep well of hollowness opened up in the pit of her stomach, and she pulled the sheet up over her nudity, lowering her knees so she could tuck it firmly under her arms. “You should go.”

“What?”

Ignoring the note of incredulity in his voice, she gave him a gentle shove with her shoulder. “I’m fine. Just go, okay?” She didn’t look at him. She couldn’t. She couldn’t bear to see pity or amateur psychoanalysis in his eyes.

“I’m not going anywhere.”

“I don’t need you here.”

He didn’t answer for a beat or two, and then, “I’d like to stay anyway.”

The kindness in his voice was like steel wool on all the rawness inside. “Why?” she demanded, blinking back tears as she glared at him. “So you can humor the head case?”