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Cassandra didn’t look up.

“She’s on my case team,” Ryder said.

Kimball didn’t take the hint. He slid into the booth next to Ryder, which put him directly across from Cassandra. His buddy took the other side, boxing her in.

Ryder didn’t want to ruin the team’s high. Hopefully they’d just get their coffee and head out.

Kimball leaned forward on his elbows toward Cassandra. “What’s your name?”

Her jaw tightened. She looked up at Kimball.

“Cassandra.” Her voice was thin.

“Cassandra. So what do you do? You don’t look like a field operative.”

She opened her mouth to answer. Nothing came out. Her eyes were locked on Kimball’s face, and then they weren’t. They jumped to his buddy, back to Kimball, to someone passing behind him, back to Kimball. Each jump was fast and involuntary, and she looked like she was trying to stop and couldn’t.

“She’s a tech specialist,” Ryder finally said. “Cassandra, you okay?”

“Fine.” Barely audible.

She was not fine.

Kimball was still talking, something about the operation they’d just run, and Ryder stopped listening because he was looking at Cassandra.

Something was wrong. Like really fucking bad wrong.

The color had drained out of her face. Not gradually. In just a few seconds, she’d gone from normal to gray, and there was a sheen of sweat across her forehead that hadn’t been there before. Her hands were gripping the edge of the table, knuckles white. Her breathing had gone shallow and fast.

He’d watched this woman work through complex problems for days. He’d seen her tired, frustrated, awkward, guarded. He’d seen her uncomfortable in a conference room. None of it had looked like this.

Her eyes were still jumping. Locking on a face, ripping away to the next person, then the next. Each time they landed, he could see something fire behind them that he didn’t understand.

She was trying to stop whatever was happening, and she was losing.

“Cassandra.” He kept his voice low and steady. “We need to go.”

She didn’t respond. He wasn’t sure she even heard him.

“Hey.” He reached across the table and put his hand over hers. Her skin was clammy and cold. “Look at me. Just at me.”

It seemed to take some sort of supreme effort, but her eyes found his. They held, and what he saw in them was terror. She was scared of whatever was happening inside her own head.

Some sort of panic attack?

“We’re leaving,” he said. “Right now. I’ve got you.”

He stood and moved around the table. Kimball was saying something, but Ryder didn’t even glance at him. He got Cassandra out of the booth with a hand under her elbow, and she came with him, unsteady, shaking.

“Yo, man, is she okay?” Kimball asked.

“She’s fine. Excuse us.”

He got her through the crowd with his arm around her shoulders, shielding her from the bodies on both sides. She was pressed against him, eyes squeezed shut, moving on trust alone because she couldn’t navigate for herself. He could feel her shaking.

The door closed behind them. Night air. The compound was dark and still.

She made it about twenty feet. Then her legs gave out.