The Wrangler

by Pamela Britton

  Sam winced. She’d heard that tone of voice before and it didn’t bode well.

  “Mr. McAlister,” Lorenzo said, his gaze wide. Then he smiled, acting as if they hadn’t just caught him up a tree on Baer Mountain with a camera in hand. “I…uh…I…”

  Apparently, even the most brazen of idiots could be at a loss for words.

  “Get down,” Clint said.

  Recognizing that he’d been caught red-handed, Lorenzo’s expression changed. It amazed Sam that she’d ever thought he was handsome. He looked pure ugly now.

  “I don’t think so,” he said.

  “Get down or I’ll pull you down.”

  “I’d like to see you try.”

  “Clint,” one of the other wranglers called, obviously having spied them through the trees, “what’s going on?”

  “Nothing,” he said. “Just dealing with some vermin.”

  “You need any help?” the guy asked.

  “Nope.” Clint’s eyes never left Lorenzo as he unstrapped his rope.

  “You wouldn’t dare,” Lorenzo said.

  “Actually,” Clint replied, uncoiling the rope, “I think I would.”

  Lorenzo leaped.

  Sam gasped, the move so unexpected, even Coaster jumped. The wiry cowboy landed on top of Clint like a stuntman in an old Western.

  “Hey!” Clint cried.

  “Son of a bitch.” Lorenzo yelled.

  And then they were falling, Sam recognizing that she was too close.

  Sam watched in horror as the two men tumbled over backward. She tried to pull Coaster away, but there wasn’t time. Clint and Lorenzo landed right at Coaster’s feet. If she’d been a few paces away, it wouldn’t have been a big deal, but even the most seasoned of cow horses would jump away from a pair of brawling humans.

  She wasn’t looking where Coaster was going, didn’t have time to. And maybe if Sam’s peripheral vision had been normal she might have seen the giant limb to her right. As it was, when Coaster ducked away, she didn’t see it coming. One minute she was facing one way, the next there was a tree branch in front of her forehead.

  “Clint!” she cried.

  And then the branch hit her.

  She was out cold.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  “Sam!” Clint shoved Lorenzo off him and ran to her side. “Oh, my God, Sam.”

  He felt for a pulse. A vein throbbed beneath his finger. He breathed a sigh of relief, but it was only temporary. A bruise was already bubbling up purple on her forehead.

  “Dean, Charlie, Elliot…anybody, call base camp.”

  Don’t panic.

  They had the radios for just this type of emergency. Walkie-talkies with a ten mile radius, and a two-way radio at the camp. Help could be here in a matter of minutes.

  But help meant being airlifted out, and that could take up to a half hour to arrange.

  Dean rode up. “What the hell.”

  “Use the radio,” Clint said, not daring to leave Sam’s side. “Tell Gigi what’s happened. Tell her we’ll need Life Flight. And somebody find that damn Lorenzo.”

  Clint almost shooed Coaster away, but the big gelding was gingerly sniffing the human he loved as if trying to rouse her himself.

  “It’s okay,” he said, though it was hard to decide who he said it to—Coaster or himself. “She’ll be all right.”

  He heard yelling. The radio clicked. Voices buzzed. Clint remained focused on Sam. He kept stroking her hair, trying not to gag at the sight of that bruise—that horrible bruise.

  “Hang in there,” he told her.

  It was taking too long. Too damn long.

  The radio clicked again. Clint lost track of time. He kept feeling for her pulse, reassuring himself that she was alive, but her face had grown pale. Too pale.

  “God.” How had he not recognized that he was in love with her? Blind. Deaf. In a wheelchair, he didn’t care. He loved her. “Come on, Sam. Wake up. Please,” he begged.

  He heard a thumping sound and looked up. Everybody stared down at him. He had no idea how long they’d all been standing there.

  “They’re landing in the clearing,” Dean said. “Gonna bring a stretcher to her.”

  How long had he been kneeling there? Long enough for his knees to cramp and for Sam’s face to turn waxy.

  “How old is she?” someone in a flight suit asked the moment they reached Sam’s side.

  “I—” He didn’t even know; he’d never asked her. “Twenty-five…I think.”

  The man nodded absently, his hands moving quickly as he pulled out a stethoscope, another man kneeling on the opposite side of him and pulling out a blood pressure cuff. Clint moved out of the way, swiveling around before forcing himself to look back. But there was no escaping the grim reality of the situation. Sam was hurt. Perhaps badly.

  As badly as when her parents had died?

  He drew a hand down his face, his eyes burning. No. It wouldn’t be like before. That would be impossible.

  “Let’s get her on the backboard,” one of the EMTs said. “Is someone going to meet her at the hospital?”

  Clint nodded. “I’ll meet her.”

  “Are you her husband?”

  “No,” he choked out. “Boyfriend.”

  “How long will it take you to get back to civilization?” the other man asked, blue eyes full of compassion.

  “Half a day’s hard ride,” Clint said. “Can you take me with you?”

  “Sorry, sir. Can’t take anybody onboard but the immediate family.”

  “I understand,” he said.

  “We’ll be taking her to St. Benedict’s.”

  St. Benedict’s. That was over an hour away…once he reached the ranch.

  “All right,” the guys said. “Let’s get this done. People, you’ll need to give us some space.”

  IT WAS THE LONGEST RIDE of Clint’s life. Dean, Elliot and a few of the other guys all rode down the hill with him. By the time they arrived back at the ranch it was growing dark. Their horses were covered with sweat, their sides heaving, heads lowered as their nostrils flared in and out.

  “Take him,” Clint said to Dean, throwing him Buttercup’s reins.

  “Do you need us to go with you?” Dean asked.

  “No,” he called over his shoulder. He didn’t want company. Not even Gigi, even if she hadn’t still been at camp. Or maybe she was on her way down the hill, too. He hadn’t stuck around long enough to find out.

  “Let us know how she is!” Dean shouted after him because Clint was already on the move.

  He didn’t answer, just headed straight for his truck. His cell phone wasn’t in there and so he had to run into the house to grab it, sweating every precious second. The minute he hopped into his truck he dialed Information. Again, he was made to wait. Clint pressed down on the accelerator as if that would make the operator on the other end speed up. When at last he did get through to the hospital, he was transferred three times, first to the E.R., then to Neurology—Clint’s gut wrenched when he heard that—then back to E.R. When a doctor finally picked up the line, Clint wanted to cry out in relief. But his relief quickly changed to frustration. All the man told him was that she was in intensive care and they were running tests to determine the extent of her injuries. Best to get to the hospital as soon as possible.

  “Damn it,” he cursed as he hung up.

  He drove like a maniac. St. Benedict’s was past Billings. He had to go through town to get there. Traffic clogged the roads, or at least it felt that way to Clint. It was dark by now, the red points of light that stopped him a constant source of frustration.

  God, keep her alive.

  “Come on,” he told the car in front of him, banging on the steering wheel. When he finally arrived at the hospital, he was in such a hurry he didn’t even bother to park, just pulled to a stop alongside the E.R.’s loading zone and jumped out.

  “Sir,” one of the hospital volunteers called, “you can’t park there.”

  “Tow i
t,” he told the man.

  “Samantha Davies,” he said to the receptionist. “She came in on a Life Flight hours ago.”

  “Spell the last name for me?” The woman had bright red hair and too much lipstick and she appeared entirely bored with her job.

  “Davies,” Clint said. “D-A-V-I-E-S.” Hurry up. Sam was injured somewhere in this hospital…she could already be…

  He refused to think it.

  “Ah, here she is,” the woman said. “She’s in Intensive Care. That’s in the basement. Elevator to your right—”

  But he was already on the move. He pressed the button with more force than necessary, and when the elevator doors didn’t immediately open, looked around for stairs. He couldn’t find any and so he spent what seemed like an eternity waiting. The door opened with a bing.

  When at last he arrived at the Intensive Care desk, he was out of breath and scared to death. “Samantha Davies,” Clint gasped.

  “Are you family?”

  Telling the Life Flight EMTs he wasn’t Sam’s husband had cost him a helicopter ride. “Yes. I’m her husband.”

  The woman stood. She looked too young to work in a place like this—younger than him. “Sit down over there,” she said. “I’ll page the doctor.”

  “Can’t I see her?” he asked.

  “Not yet. They’re still running tests. She’ll be in room 102 when they’re finished.”

  Running tests. So she was still alive. Thank God. For a moment there when she’d told him she was going to page the doctor, he’d thought…

  But it didn’t matter what he thought. She was here. She was alive. More important, he was here. She wouldn’t have to wake up in a hospital all alone again.

  If she woke up.

  Clint removed his hat, ran a hand through his hair and waited for the doctor. When he didn’t appear right away, Clint checked in with the nurse. She just smiled and said he was on his way. On his way to where? Clint wanted to ask. The golf course?

  “Mr. Davies?” a man finally asked.

  Clint shot up from the blue plastic chair he’d been sitting on, nearly knocking the thing over. “That’s me,” he said without missing a beat.

  “I’m Dr. Tyson,” said a man who wasn’t much older than Clint. He had dark hair and the pale skin of a man who spent too much time indoors, but his blue eyes projected kindness and reassurance. Clint appreciated that.

  “Clint,” he said, almost adding McAlister, but he caught himself.

  “Your wife is very sick, Mr. Davies.”

  “How sick?” he asked, hardly able to breathe his heart beat so fast.

  “She has some swelling of the brain—”

  Shit. “Not again.”

  “Has she sustained this type of injury before?”

  “Yes,” he said. “A few months ago. Car accident.”

  “Did she completely recover from her injuries?”

  “Yes…no,” he quickly corrected, motioning toward his eyes. “She has an embolism. Near her central artery,” he said because for the life of him he couldn’t remember the name of the vein she’d told him.

  “Ah,” the doctor said. “That’s good to know.” He pulled a chart up, one Clint hadn’t even noticed he’d been holding. “Unfortunately,” he said, “that’s the least of our concerns right now. She sustained a pretty hard blow to the head. There’s some swelling…”

  Clint barely heard the rest of the doctor’s words. Really, there was only one question Clint wanted to ask. “Will she be all right?”

  “We don’t know yet. At this point, we need to see how she responds to the medication we’ve given her. If it helps to reduce the swelling, we might be in good shape. I say might because, as always, there’s no prediction if she’ll have any long-term damage. But you probably already know that having been through this before.”

  No. He hadn’t been through this before, but he didn’t tell the doctor that. “Is she in a room?”

  “They’re hooking her up to monitors as we speak. When they’re done, you can go in, but I’ll have to ask you to keep your visit short. There’s going to be a lot of people in and out over the next few hours.”

  Clint nodded, sat down and waited some more, hat in hand. He was playing with it absently when a familiar voice said, “Where is she?”

  Clint looked up, never more relieved than when he spotted Gigi. “They’re setting up her room. She’s in critical condition. Swelling of the brain.”

  “Oh, Clint.”

  And then somehow he was in Gigi’s arms. She held him while he fought to control his emotions. He would not cry. He refused to cry. Crying meant weakness and he needed to be strong for Sam.

  Stronger than he’d ever been before.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  If he’d thought the long ride down the hill interminable, that was nothing compared to what Clint had to endure over the next few hours. He got to see Sam only briefly. But she was hooked up to so many devices it was hard to see her. He saw the tube down her throat—had been told it was there in case the swelling in her brain caused her to stop breathing. Right now she was in an induced coma. She would stay that way until they knew whether or not her brain would heal itself.

  Gigi kept him company. Over the course of the night, Dean and Elliot showed up, too, then more and more of his ranch hands. It was a sweaty, grungy, motley-looking crew that waited for news.

  It came at 9:00 the next morning.

  “We’re in good shape,” the doctor said, coming into the waiting room. “The swelling’s going down.”

  There were whoops from all the cowboys, but the doctor held up his hands, shushing them. “We still need to wait and see if her brain activity returns to normal.”

  “When will we know?” Clint asked.

  “Too soon to say,” Dr. Tyson said. “These things, sometimes they resolve in hours, sometimes days, sometimes weeks…sometimes never. It just depends.”

  Clint nodded. “I understand.”

  “You should get some rest,” Dr. Tyson said, placing a hand on his upper arm. “It could be another long night.”

  It was.

  Clint held her hand, begging her without words to get better. She’d been through so much already. She didn’t deserve yet another setback. It was time for her to catch a break.

  “I realize you might want to be with your parents,” he told her at one point, the room empty of everyone but him. “And I don’t blame you, Sam, I truly don’t. Lord, when I lost my mom and dad I wished I could have gone with them, but look what happened. I met you.” He inhaled sharply. “I’ve never seen a woman as brave as you. You’re amazing, Sam. And you’ve got the world’s biggest heart. I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone who’s loved a horse as much as you love Coaster. Coaster needs you, too. Who else on our ranch is going to ride him English? If you die—” He hated that he’d used the word out loud. “If you don’t make it,” he said, “who’s going to remind him that he wasn’t born to be a cow pony?”

  He bowed his head and prayed, promising to be a better man, and do whatever it was God wanted him to.

  They took her away for yet another CAT scan early the next morning. Clint’s eyes hurt he needed sleep so badly, but he wouldn’t leave. He refused to leave as long as Sam was in a coma.

  An hour later, his heart stopped when he saw the doctor approaching. There was a look on the man’s face.

  “What is it?” he asked. Gigi took his hand. His grandmother had been his anchor for the past forty-eight hours.

  “Well,” Dr. Tyson said, “I think it’s good news.”

  “Has the swelling gone down?”

  “Yes, but more importantly, her embolism is gone.”

  “Gone?” Gigi asked, clearly as shocked as he was.

  Dr. Tyson was nodding. “Gone,” he repeated.

  “But how?” Gigi asked.

  “I can only surmise that the pressure exerted on the brain broke it apart.”

  Clint couldn’t speak for a moment. “You
mean it popped?”

  “Good Lord, no,” Dr. Tyson said. “If that had happened, she’d be dead. No. It’s simply gone.” He held up his clipboard, pulled out a sheaf of paper from it, drew two lines side-by-side. “An embolism is a blockage. Sometimes it’s caused by plaque, sometimes from blood clots. Echo-sonograms indicate that hers was from a blood clot, but there’s no way to know for sure without opening her up, which, of course, we can’t do. So the blockage was here.” He drew a circle on one of the lines. “And as blood passed through her central retinal artery, it collected more dead blood cells.” The circle grew bigger. “That’s what was causing her to slowly go blind. But now, it’s gone, and the only thing that makes sense is that the pressure to her brain somehow broke the clot apart. If it’d become dislodged as a whole, she’d be dead from stroke.”

  Clint stood there, trying to assimilate it all. Gigi’s hand clasped his harder and harder.

  “It’s a miracle,” she said.

  “Well,” Dr. Tyson said, “that remains to be seen. She might have already suffered permanent damage to her vision. Or not. There’s no way to know until she opens her eyes.”

  And so Clint went back to her room and prepared to wait it out. He didn’t care if he had to be there for the rest of his life. Sam would not—she would absolutely not—wake up alone.

  Not this time.

  IT WAS THE WORLD’S WORST headache. That’s what it felt like to Sam. She would lay there, eyes closed, and think to herself, I should probably wake up, maybe go take some aspirin, then the pain would go away. But she could never muster the energy. During one of these conscious moments, she decided she’d had enough. It was time to get up.

  She opened her eyes. And became confused. She was not in her room. Then she realized she had a tube in her mouth. That sent her into a panic. She tried to cry out, tried to turn her head.

  And then Clint leaned over her.

  “Sam?”

  Where am I? What happened?

  She remembered the roundup. Remembered going after that last herd of horses, but beyond that…

  “Sam, Can you hear me?”

  She tried to tell him with her eyes that she did—loud and clear—but he was fading. It was happening then. She was finally losing the vision in her eyes.