“Dear God,” Winnie whispered reverently. A voice spoke in her ear. “This is Winnie Sinclair,” she said. “Shirley, is that you? I thought it was. Listen, I’ve got Keely Welsh here in the middle of the highway with snakebite. It was a rattler, she said. I’m taking her to Jacobsville General myself, no time to dispatch an ambulance. Have them waiting at the door with antivenin. Got that? Thanks, Shirley. No, I can’t stay on the line, I have to get her in the car.”
She hung up and managed to get Keely into the front seat and belted in, in a matter of seconds, with strength she didn’t know she had. Her heart was pounding as she put the car in gear and left tire marks as she shifted into low gear.
A mile down the road she was met by flashing blue lights. She slowed. The car, Jacobsville Police, spun around in front of her. The door opened and Kilraven’s head poked out. “Follow me!” he shouted.
She nodded, relieved to have help. He took off and she followed close on his bumper. Cars got out of the way. They went right through two red lights and turned into the emergency entrance to the hospital.
As soon as she stopped the car, Kilraven came running back to get Keely and carry her to her door where a gurney and Dr. Coltrain waited.
“Snakebite,” Winnie panted. “Diamondback. She put on a tourniquet herself…”
“It’s all right,” Kilraven told her. “Shirley called them for you. Everything’s ready, except the antivenin,” he added quietly. “They don’t have enough, so they’re having a state trooper run it down here to the county line. Hayes Carson’s going himself to meet him and relay it back here.” He put a big hand on Winnie’s shoulder. “She’ll be all right. You did good.”
She bit her lower lip. Tears rained down her face. She turned it away from him and started up the steps.
He pulled her around and into his arms. “Don’t ever be ashamed of tears,” he said into her ear. “I’ve shed my share of them.”
That was surprising and sort of nice. It meant he was human. “Thanks,” she said huskily after a minute. She drew back and wiped at her eyes with the back of her hand. “I was scared stiff and I couldn’t show it. She’s my friend.”
“I know. Come on. I’ll walk you in. I had a call here, anyway. Remember old Ben Barkley? His son put a bullet through his leg when he started beating the boy’s mother.”
“Riley shot him?” she asked, surprised. The boy was sweet and helpful when he called emergency services to get help saving his mother from his habitually drunk father.
“Riley did,” he asserted. He grinned, and bent low. “We’re going to take him out to our firing range and help him improve his aim, in case he ever does it again.”
She burst out laughing. It was such an outrageous thing to say.
“That’s better,” he said when he saw her face. “Stiff upper lip, now.”
“I’m not British.”
“You aren’t?” he exclaimed. “Why, what a coincidence…neither am I!”
She punched his broad chest, laughing. They walked together to the emergency waiting room.
* * *
FURIOUS, HELPLESS TO do anything for her friend, Winnie took refuge in the only thing she could think of that might help—revenge. She phoned Boone and gave him hell.
“Slow down, slow down!” he complained. “I can’t understand a word you’re saying. Wait…” He cut off the engine on the tractor he was using to help with the harvest. “All right, what was that about Keely?”
“She was walking home, thanks to you, and she got bitten by a rattlesnake! She’s at Jacobsville General…Boone? Hello? Hello? Damn!”
She hung up, even more furious now, because he wouldn’t listen to her. She called Clark. “Where are you?” she asked when he didn’t answer for almost a minute.
He sounded out of breath. “I’m, uh, I had to run to catch the phone,” he said lamely. In the background, music was playing and there was a faint protest, which sounded as if it came from a feminine throat.
“Oh, hell, never mind,” she muttered and hung up. She didn’t need to ask where he was. He was almost certainly with that damned Nellie again. So much for restraint.
But he phoned her back ten minutes later, while she was waiting, hoping, for some sort of report about Keely. She stopped nurses, who promised to go and check but never came back. She was getting frustrated.
“What did you want?” Clark asked.
“Never mind. Go back to Nellie,” she muttered.
“Don’t hang up!” he grumbled. “I’m not with Nellie. I’m over at Dave Harston’s place helping him move a piano. His wife’s making us lunch.”
She felt her face go red. “Sorry.”
He laughed. “I guess the sounds must be similar, but I swear I’m not doing anything I’d mind being seen doing. What’s up?”
“Keely got bitten by a rattler,” she said miserably. “I can’t find out what’s going on and I’m worried sick. Her arm was almost black, Clark. I’m scared—” Her voice broke.
“I’ll be there in fifteen minutes. She’ll be all right, sis. I know she will.”
“Thanks,” she said huskily, and hung up. She prayed that he was right.
A commotion at the desk caught her attention. Boone was bulldozing right past a nurse and a police officer—Kilraven—on his way back to the emergency room. Winnie almost cheered. If anybody could cut through red tape, it was her big brother. They could threaten, but they wouldn’t stop him.
“Coltrain!” he bellowed.
“Over here,” came a deep, resigned voice.
Boone hid it well, but he was terrified. Winnie’s phone call made him feel guilty as hell, and he’d hardly managed to breathe as he rushed to the hospital. One of his cowboys had died from a rattler bite the year before. He was scared to death that Keely might not have reached help in time. If she died, he’d never forgive himself, never!
“Where is she?”
