Rescue Me

was fixing it and somehow got in between Maribell and Diamond Dan.”
    Tyrus Pratt was a foreman in charge of the JH remuda. Which not only included the paints, but a fair number of cattle horses, too. “Why didn’t anyone call me?”
    “Don’t have your number.” Clara Anne blew her nose, then added, “We’ve just been sittin’ here, waitin’ for you to come home.”
    And while they’d been waiting, she’d been getting felt up by a guy she hardly knew. “What’s Tyrus’s number?”
    Clara Anne pushed a piece of paper toward Sadie and pointed to the top. “Here’s the number of the hospital in Laredo, too. Tyrus’s number is below. He’s staying the night at a hotel.”
    Sadie stood and picked up the landline hooked to the wall. She dialed the hospital, identified herself, and was connected with the emergency room doctor who initially treated her father. The doctor used a lot of big words like “traumatic pneumothorax” and “thoracic cavity,” which translated meant Clive had a collapsed lung due to blunt force trauma and had a chest tube. He had four fractured ribs, two displaced, two nondisplaced, and he also had damage to his spleen. The doctors were guardedly hopeful that he wouldn’t require surgery for either injury. He was currently in ICU on a ventilator, and they were keeping him deeply sedated until he could breathe on his own. The doctor’s biggest concern was Clive’s age and the risk of pneumonia.
    Sadie was given the name and number of the pulmonologist treating her father, as well as the geriatric physician overseeing his care.
    Geriatric physician . Sadie waited on hold while being transferred to the nursing station in ICU. A doctor specializing in the care of the elderly. She’d always thought of her dad as old. He’d always been older than the daddies of other girls her age. He’d always been old-fashioned. Always old and set in his ways. Always old and grouchy, but she’d never considered him elderly . For some reason the word “elderly” had never seemed to apply to Clive Hollowell. She didn’t like to think of her father as elderly.
    Her father’s nurse answered questions and asked if Clive was on any medication other than the blood pressure medicine they’d found in his overnight bag.
    Sadie hadn’t even known he had high blood pressure. “Is Daddy on any medication other than for his blood pressure?” she asked the twins.
    They shrugged and shook their heads. Sadie wasn’t surprised that the women who’d known Clive Holloway for over thirty years didn’t know of possible health issues. That just wasn’t something her father would have talked about.
    The nurse assured Sadie that he was stable and resting comfortably. She’d call if there was any change. Sadie left messages with his doctor’s answering service, and made airline reservations on the first flight to Laredo, via Houston. Then she sent the Parton sisters home with the promise that she would call before her nine A.M. flight.
    With adrenaline pumping in her veins and exhaustion pulling at her limbs, she moved up the back stairs to her bedroom at the end of the hall. She moved past generations of stern Hollowell portraits. As a child, she’d taken the somber faces for scowling disapproval. She felt like they all knew when she ran in the house, didn’t eat her dinner, or shoved her clothes under her bed instead of putting them away. As a teen, she’d felt their disapproval when she and some of her friends played the music too loud, or when she’d crawled home after a party, or when she’d made out with some boy.
    Now as an adult, even though she knew that the somber faces were more a reflection of the times, missing teeth, and bad oral hygiene, she felt the same disapproval for crawling home from her cousin’s wedding. For leaving Texas and staying gone. For not knowing that her elderly father had high blood pressure and what medications he took. She had a lot of guilt about leaving and staying gone, but she felt the most guilt for not loving the ten-thousand-acre ranch that she would someday own. At least not like she should. Not like all the Hollowells staring down at her from the gallery hall.
    She moved into her room and flipped on the light. The room was just as she’d left it the day she’d moved away fifteen years ago. The same antique iron bed that had belonged to her grandmother. The same yellow and white bedding and the same antique oak furniture.
    She unzipped her dress and