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Tears filled her eyes. “I’m here now, aren’t I?”
“Yes, and you just shared a lot, in the previous meeting and here with me. Are you going to be okay with this case and looking into those other women from the university?”
“Yes, I think I will. I have been so far.”
Lassiter nodded. He believed working on this case would help to empower her. “You let me know if it causes you any issues.”
“I will,” she agreed.
“Do you need anything for the panic attacks?”
“No, I don’t like to take any medications if I can help it.”
“You let me know if you change your mind about that. I like the deep breathing.” He nodded to her water bottle. “And that you are staying hydrated. Avoid alcohol and eat as healthy as you can. That’ll help too.”
“The other thing that helped was physical exertion. I ran a lot. And I scored high on everything physical fitness related while I was in OCS. I still hold the record for the number of pull-ups by a woman. I put in a lot of time in the gym after I’d been in Ops and got triggered. This time I can’t because of the surgery.”
“We’ll have to find something else to help you until you’re physically healed from the surgery,” Lassiter said with an instigating smile. “Like meeting with me.”
Laura Lee laughed at that.
“But you’re going to have to be open with your emotions in a way I don’t think you have been with anyone. It might be uncomfortable.”
“I promise, I’ll try.”
He waited her out. He wouldn’t let that answer be the end of it.
“I’ve kept so many secrets from everyone. My parents warned me not to tell anyone about my birth parents, so I didn’t. I could never tell my mom anything about Harrison West or anything else that bothered me because stress triggers her Parkinson’s symptoms terribly. My sister has enough problems of her own, and I wasn’t sure she wouldn’t tell my mom, so I couldn’t confide anything in her.”
“What about friends?” Lassiter pushed.
“Well, until recently, I had told no one about West and what happened with him.”
“You don’t have many women you would call friends, do you?”
“No. But of course, when I was with the Army Corps of Engineers, it was a male dominated environment.”
“I’m calling bullshit on that,” Lassiter said. “Your workgroup may have been all male, but there were many other women around the base.”
Laura Lee felt like she was being attacked. “None that I interacted with or got to know.” She knew she sounded defensive.
“You were assigned to that unit for three years.”
She said nothing.
“What about female friends from high school, college, or Officer Candidate School that you’ve stayed in touch with?”
“This has nothing to do with what happened to me,” she forced out in a controlled growl.
“No, but a network of friends creates a support system of people you can rely upon and confide in,” Lassiter said.
“I have other friends. Male friends.”
“Like Brad Dupont,” Lassiter said.
“Yes, and Caleb Smith.”
“Who on the install team would you call a friend?”