Her eyes narrow, but her frowny mask does nothing to hide her obvious panic. “I don’t want to stay, but I can’t get in your car. I-I’m claustrophobic.”
“Claustrophobic,” she spits, saying the word like it’s shameful. “I don’t like being in small spaces.”
“I know what claustrophobic means.”
“Okay, good. So you know that being handcuffed, shoved into the back of a police cruiser with a partition, and then chucked into a jail cell was the trigger of all triggers for me.” She licks her lips and looks up at me under long lashes. “I’m barely standing upright here. I’m exhausted and on edge. I can’t get back in a car. I just can’t. I won’t. I—”
“Don’t have to,” I finish for her.
“It would be pretty hard for you to get in my car since I don’t have one.”
I point at the machine in front of us
