Short Excerpt

     “You don’t have to be here.” The mountain of stability and silence stared out over the clearing. Lance hadn’t left her side since she’d run face-first into his chest, and for that, she felt more put together than she should have as a member of their group was loaded into a plain white van. She could still feel his hand in hers. The warmth deep in her tendons, the hitch of calluses in her palm. His hold on her had been real and reliable and the only thing she’d been able to count on in those terrorizing moments when she though she might die. As though his presence was all she’d needed to get through this. “We can go back to the ranch. Get you something to eat.”

     Made sense. In her practice as a trauma therapist, she’d tried to recruit family members, friends, coworkers even, to support her patients in their healing journey. Sometimes it worked. Sometimes it didn’t. Either way, recovery wasn’t achieved alone. No matter how much the urge to isolate clawed through her. “I’m not hungry.”