Then, he almost beat down my door at six in the morning to get me out of bed and ready for the day, with no time for breakfast.
In other words, I’m exhausted. My anxiety has been making me shake all day, and I’ve done all I could to keep it from taking over and overwhelming me, but it gets very difficult to not fall into an anxiety attack when I’m tired.
My mind doesn’t have enough energy to battle itself in this condition. That’s why my breathing is uneven. Why my heart is racing. Why panic has its hands wrapped around my throat and squeezes it.
I’m going through the paperwork Gillian gave me, hyperventilating and slowly breaking down.
I’m about to call my sister when Gillian storms into the room and says, “Nevaeh, I need you to go to Velocità Rossa and ask for a new interview schedule right now. You’ve got two minutes, then we gotta head to the Grenzenlos motorhome to interview your dad.”
He disappears before I get a chance to ask for a break, to allow myself to fall apart a little so I can put myself back together. Fighting off the attack is a lot worse than letting it consume me.
The Velocità Rossa motorhome is on the opposite end from the conference room I was working in before. I’m rushing to get there, but the exhaustion of running is making breathing even more difficult.
The path in front of me seems to elongate with every step I take.
Sweat drips down my forehead. It’s hotter than usual today, making my hyperventilating even worse. I can’t breathe.
My skin burns.
My eyes unfocus until I’m stumbling over my own two feet.
My entire body is trembling and nausea bubbles up in my throat.
I look for anyone who can help me when Adrian appears in my line of sight, blurry but unmistakably him. His eyes find mine, and he lowers the notebook he was holding to wave at me. I try to wave back, but everything spins. No oxygen is getting into my lungs.
I can’t breathe.
I can’t think.
My anxiety attack is taking over, and I’m too exhausted to keep that thought from making everything worse.
I see someone sprinting toward me, but I’m shaking and crying and still can’t breathe.
Then, my legs give out and everything goes black…
Chapter 24
Adrian
Ibarelycatchheras she drops to the ground,barelymake it to her in time.
My heart sank at the sight of her. Eyes unfocused, chest moving up and down rapidly, panic all over that beautiful face of hers. She was hyperventilating and according to Scarlette, my sister’s race engineer, probably having an anxiety attack. Scarlette has anxiety, too, so she told me that sometimes when her anxiety gets really bad, she also faints.
It’s the only thing keeping me from freaking out more than I already am.
I called for a paramedic, who checked Nevaeh’s pulse and heart rate, waiting for her to regain consciousness with me. He pressed a cool and wet towel into my hand, telling me to place it on her forehead while we waited.
I do as I’m told, squatting beside the couch Nevaeh’s on with one of my arms draped around her middle, my hand drawing an eight-figure on the exposed skin on her hip as more worry fills my chest when she still doesn’t wake up.
Finally, her eyes flutter open, those pools of honey-brown finding me.
“Mon paradis,” I say, but she doesn’t seem to understand what I’m saying just yet. She blinks several more times, licking her dry lips once.
The paramedic comes up to her, asking me to step out of the way so he can ask her a few questions.
“How are you feeling?” he asks, checking her pulse once more since she’s awake now.
“If you tell me what happened, I’ll be fine,” she responds with half a smile. She lifts her hand a little to run it over her face, but when she notices it shaking, she adds, “Never mind.” Nevaeh balls her hand into a fist with a curse.
