And before Silver realized what was happening, her guest’s eyes rolled up in her head and her knees buckled. Silver sprang forward with a startled exclamation, barely catching the girl’s head before it hit the floor. Gently she eased the poor thing into a supine position, grabbing the dish towel off her shoulder and folding it to put beneath the girl’s head. It was a bit damp but that was the least of her problems right now.
Rising, she rushed across the room and grabbed the telephone. She stared at it for a second, then dropped it back into place. Forget it, Silver! The hospital’s too far away. An ambulance would take forever to arrive. Cal had warned her before he left about the lack of convenient medical care. This girl needed immediate help.
There was an emergency clinic in Kadoka. She knew because Cal had mentioned it in his “this is different from what you’re used to” speech. She knelt beside the girl again and felt for a pulse. Silver didn’t know much about first aid but she thought the steady beat beneath her seeking fingers felt pretty strong so she rose and rushed out the door, grabbing the keys to Cal’s brand-new three-quarter-ton pickup. She pulled the vehicle around to the side of the porch and opened the back door, then ran into the house and checked the girl again.
She was still unconscious. Her body was slender to the point of being gaunt beneath the filthy jeans and torn T-shirt but Silver doubted she could lift her. Before she’d fallen, the girl had been every bit as tall as Silver herself.
Walking around behind the girl’s head, she eased her hands beneath her skull and lifted it into an upright position against her legs. Then she got her hands beneath the girl’s armpits and straightened. The head lolled alarmingly but there was no help for it so she threw her energy into pulling the girl across the floor and out the door onto the porch, down off the stoop to the side of the truck.
She paused for a moment, trying to decide how best to get the woman’s limp body into the pickup. A drop of sweat trickled down the side of her face, and she ducked her head and wiped it on her shoulder before pulling the girl forward again. Scrambling backward, she strained to lift the girl far enough to get her body up on the seat.
She kept going until the far door stopped her progress. Reaching behind her, she opened it and backed out, laying the girl out across the front seat. After she checked to be sure the girl’s head wasn’t going to get bumped when she closed the door she slammed it shut and dashed around the hood to the driver’s side.
Gunning the engine, she began the drive out the lane as fast as she dared, worrying that she would jar the girl off the seat onto the floor if she was too rough. As soon as she got on the paved road, she could make better time. It occurred to her that there might be someone around who could help if only she could get their attention, so she laid on the horn as she drove, blaring a raucous signal into the still air until the sound made her head hurt.
When she crested the last little hill before the road, relief rose within her. But then relief turned to incredulous concern when she saw the battered blue pickup truck sideways across the lane, its hood crumpled into one of the stone pillars that marked the entrance to the ranch. Good Lord! Had the girl walked all the way back the lane from here? It seemed impossible. Hastily she braked to a halt, praying that the girl was all right as she jumped out and ran to inspect the damaged truck.
The front of the truck was a dented mess of metal. On the driver’s side the door hung open and a seat belt hung half out the door. That explained why the driver hadn’t been thrown through the windshield. Quickly she circled the truck. It occurred to her that perhaps the girl hadn’t been alone, and her mouth went dry at the prospect of yet another injured person.
But no one else appeared to have been with the girl. Silver glanced back at her vehicle, measuring the space between the bed of the truck and the farther stone column. There was no way she could get through there. And she couldn’t go around because the fence ran right up to the entrance.
But she had to get this girl to a doctor! Who knew what could be wrong with her? She hurried back to her own truck and scrambled in, reaching for the phone Cal had had installed in all the ranch vehicles. Looked like she’d have to call for help anyway.
That’s when she heard the sound of another truck coming down the road.
Dropping the phone, she got out again and ran to the edge of the road. The sun was in her eyes and she shielded them with one hand as she waved the other in a frantic beckoning. Please stop! Oh, please, please stop.
A black pickup slowed, and its tires crunched in the gravel, raising billowing ribbons of dust as it braked and the driver’s door opened. Silver moved forward.
“Could you help me, please? I found—Deck!” She was taken aback when the man who’d been in her dreams all morning climbed from his truck.
By the time she recovered, he was already moving past her. “I heard your horn. Anybody hurt?”
“Y-yes. In my truck. She knocked on my door this morning.” She trotted behind him as he strode past the wreck of the blue pickup to her own vehicle. “She fainted. I was taking her to the hospital but I couldn’t get by.”
“I’ll drive. Get your stuff.” He yanked open the passenger door and leaned in, easily hefting the woman in his arms. While Silver was still staring at him stupidly, he turned and strode toward his truck.
“My stuff?” she echoed stupidly.
He turned and gave her an impatient look. “Aren’t you coming along?”
Her gaze flicked to her own truck and back again. “I—”
“I need you to hold her. I’ll bring you home again later.”
“Oh. All right.” She flew to her truck and grabbed the purse she’d flung onto the floor, then locked the doors before pocketing the keys and hurrying around to the passenger door of Deck’s truck.
It was higher than hers and she had to scramble a bit to get in. The minute she had her seat belt on, he lifted the woman across Silver, placing her in the center seat. Silver caught her weight as she slumped sideways, and eased the woman’s head into the crook of her arm. As Silver supported her weight, Deck slipped his arms from beneath his burden. His face was so near that his lips would brush over hers if she turned her head. As he withdrew from the truck, his arm slid across Silver’s stomach, perilously close to the underside of her breasts.
She nearly jumped out of her seat at the contact, brief as it was. If he noticed, he didn’t show any sign.
Deck came around and slid behind the wheel, turning onto the road again with smooth, economical movements and moving along at a fast clip toward town. He picked up a cell phone and punched some buttons, then waited for a moment and began to speak.
“Sev? Deck. I’m bringing Lyn Hamill in. She’s unconscious, looks like she wrecked her truck.”
He waited while the person on the other end spoke, then replied, “Hold on.” He turned to Silver. “How long’s she been out?”
Silver shrugged. “Probably close to thirty minutes.”
“Thirty minutes,” Deck reported. “But she was conscious right afterward. She got back to the McCall place somehow. McCall’s sister answered the door, and Lyn collapsed.”
He listened again. “No blood that I can see, anyway.” He glanced at Silver with a question in his eyes and she shook her head. “We’ll be there in twenty.”
Abruptly Deck shut off the phone. There was a silence in the truck. Silver’s mind was whirling. “How did you hear my horn?”
“I’m your neighbor. Next place over.” He didn’t sound very pleased about it.
She leaned her head against the back of the seat and closed her eyes for a moment. “I appreciate your help. I guess I’ll have to call a tow truck to move that truck from the entrance to the