Page 88 of Hero's Prize

“Do you really think that’s true?”

“How can itnotbe? I’m a coward.” He looked more despondent than she’d ever seen him, shaking his head before picking up his pacing again.

She wanted to be as gentle as possible, but sometimes being too sweet made things worse. Sometimes the kindest thing you could do for someone was speak the truth. “I don’t think you’re a coward, but I think you might be a liar.”

That stopped the pacing. “What?”

She held out a hand before he could jump into an argument. “When you say you’re a coward, you’re making it sound as if doing something brave or adventurous means not having any fear at all. Were you not just telling Marshall that he was still heroic for trying to save Ashley from falling into that river even though he wasn’t able to?”

He shook his head. “It’s not the same.”

“Maybe not directly, but it’s similar enough to still be true. What makes youyouand so appealing to your fans is that you do the things you dodespiteany fear or hardships, not because the fear doesn’t exist.”

He scrubbed a hand over his face. “Maybe. But I still feel like I should have more control over my reactions than I do.”

Ella had always believed in coming at problems as logically as possible. Maybe he couldn’t control his reactions, but he could at least try to understand as much as possible about them. “Have you tried to keep track of when you have panic attacks? Attempt to figure out what triggers them?”

“I thought for sure they had something to do with stunts that affect my airway in some way—limited oxygen supply or something like that. That would make sense, right? Or ones having to do with snow and ice, things that remind me directly of the avalanche.”

“That would definitely make sense.”

“Right. But that doesn’t seem to be the case.” He threw up both hands. “There doesn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason to this panic. All I know is that I can’t control it.”

“It’s interesting that you had an attack tonight, but not last night after the river incident. That would make more sense.”

He nodded. “Exactly. For just a second after I jumped into that water after Marshall, the cold stole my breath and I had to regroup.”

“But you did. You didn’t even hesitate.”

“I know. I was proud of that. I just ignored it and kept going. And then last night, I was fine. Hell, all day today, I felt fine until…”

“Was it the people? Signing autographs and the pictures? You looked like you were having a great time, but were you faking it?” Had Tony been wrong about how much Colton loved this?

“No, I liked being with the people. I always do. I was a little concerned that you weren’t having much fun, but otherwise, it wasn’t stressful. It wasn’t till afterward when I was talking to Tony that I started to get stressed.”

“What were you and Tony talking about? Was it about the stalker? Has that topic caused the attacks? That would be understandable too.”

He finally stopped pacing and came to sit down on the couch next to her. “No, the opposite. The more I’m focused on somethingdangerous, the less the panic seems to occur, even with the stalker. Like, when we were trying to draw her out? I was completely focused and didn’t have one iota of anxiety. But he and I weren’t talking about the stalker anyway.”

“What were you talking about?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know. Nothing dramatic. Plans for the future. How to get my numbers back up. The stuff the PR team is thinking about all the time.”

“Were you fighting?”

“No. To be honest, I wasn’t interested in it at all. I just don’t give a shit about that stuff.”

Annoyance was clear on his face, but when she looked down at his hand, it was starting to tremble slightly.

Maybe they’d been thinking about this the completely wrong way.

“What if your panic attacks aren’t about the accident at all—or at least, not fear of those types of stunts?”

“What do you mean? I never had any anxiety until the avalanche.”

“Or maybe it just never manifested itself until you were so abruptly faced with your own mortality and how short life can be.”

“I’m still not sure I understand what you’re saying.”

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