“She’s having a panic attack,” Hunter says, opening the drawers and rooting through until he finds a paper bag and rushes over to her. “Starling,” he says softly, drawing her attention to him, while her lips turn slightly blue and choked noises fall from her parted lips. “You need to breathe into the bag. Slow, easy breaths, okay? I’m not going to touch you unless you need me to hold the bag.”

Shaking her head she grabs the paper from him, screwing the top of the bag up in her hands and holding it to her mouth.

“Slow and easy,” Hunter says calmly. “Breathe in time with me. In and out.” He does exaggerated breathing, kneeling just far enough away that he’s not touching her, but close enough to pull her attention completely onto him. “That’s it, good girl, in and out.”

After what feels like an hour, but is probably only ten or so minutes, Hunter rests back onto his heels and the tension releases from his body. “How are you feeling? Better?”

Her eyes are wide and watery, the bag still covering her mouth, but she nods.

“Good, keep breathing in and out and I’ll grab you a bottle of water.” Standing, he moves slowly, taking a bottle of water from the refrigerator and then sliding back down onto the floor, holding it out to her.

Tentatively she reaches out and takes it, her eyes moving from him, to Evan and Clay and then to me. I hate that what’s in her eyes when she looks at me isn’t lust or want, it’s fear. She’s scared of me, she’s scared of all of us, but she was upright until I spoke to her.

Hunter reaches out and she flinches, jolting away from him as if she’s expecting him to strike her. “I’m not going to hurt you. I promise, I just want to check your pulse that’s all. I need to see if we need to take you to the emergency room.”

“I’m fine,” she says, her voice croaky and weak.

“Little bird, you’re not fine. I’ll call Dr. Harris.”

“No,” she shrieks, shuffling farther away from me and scrambling to her feet.

Hunter sends a glare in my direction, but his expression softens when he looks back to her. She never knew they watched her for the year before I claimed her. My friends were almost as angry as I was when she didn’t come back from her dad’s. She left all of us, she just had no idea they would be hurt by that. “Starling, all I need to touch is your wrist. My two fingers on your wrist, that’s all, I promise I won’t touch you anywhere else.”

Her eyes flash to me and then around the kitchen before she shuffles along the counter to the right, moving behind Hunter and positioning him so he’s between me and her. From this angle, I can only see half of her as she cautiously lifts her wrist and offers it to my friend. Just like he promised, he takes her pulse, then immediately lifts his hand away and steps back, giving her some space.