13. Chapter Eleven
CHAPTER ELEVEN
GENE
“Y ep, we’re good to double the order,” Gene said over the phone.
“Good. I’ll pay you when I get back in town,” Deccan replied.
“Production should be increasing as we got the ing?—"
“Boss! Get your truck quick and meet me out by the packaging barn!” Ezekiel’s panicked voice came over the radio. It was full of panic. “Sammi’s down.”
“Gene?” Deccan’s voice filled his ear.
“Got to go. I’ll call you later,” he said, hanging up.
Gene shot up from his chair, grabbed his keys, and ran out of his office toward his truck .
Sammi was down?
Was she hurt? Passed out? Broken a bone?
What could have possibly happened in the few minutes since she left? It was a short walk to the packaging barn with no obstacles for her to fall over.
He knew he should have insisted she stay in his office all day so he could take care of her. He’d thought about sending her home, but he had a feeling she wouldn’t actually relax.
When he got into his truck, he turned it on and sped to the packaging barn. Ezekiel stood there with Sammi in his arms, unconscious. He put the truck in park before getting out and opening the door.
“What the fuck happened?” Gene asked.
“I’ll drive and tell you,” Ezekiel replied.
Carefully, Gene took Sammi from Ezekiel and got into the car with her in his arms. Was she going to be okay? What happened to make her faint? Her skin was sweaty and even more pale-looking than before.
Ezekiel got into the driver’s seat and started to drive. Nerves and worry ran through Gene as he stared at Sammi in his arms. Completely unconscious, she was a dead weight.
“What happened?” Gene asked as they got onto the main road.
“I don’t know why she passed out. She was walking out of the main building toward the packaging barn when she stopped and held the wall for a couple of seconds. That’s when I walked up and saw her. She started to walk again and was swaying, so I called out, but she just fell to the ground. That’s when I radioed you and picked her up,” Ezekiel explained . “She looked pale, but now she looks even worse. What’s wrong with her? This isn’t the first time she’s looked this way either.”
“I know.” Gene sighed, looking down at Sammi. “She said she had a doctor’s appointment tomorrow for a check-up. I gave her two options, thinking she was okay to walk to the barn, but I was clearly mistaken. Can you drive any faster?”
“Doing the speed limit.”
“Well stop doing the speed limit and put your foot down. I wanted her there two minutes ago,” Gene snapped at him.
Silence filled the cab as Ezekiel sped up.
“Sorry. I just need to get her there. I need to make sure that she is okay.”
Gene had been worrying about Sammi for a while now. He saw how hard she worked and how exhausted she was, but he knew something was up. She had come into work looking exhausted, and it had only gotten worse.
His brain had started to work out what was wrong when she said she wasn’t drinking anything and peeing a lot, but there were so many things that it could be. He was no doctor, and he didn’t want to make himself even more worried by looking into it more.
If she hadn’t told him she had a doctor’s appointment tomorrow, he would have figured out some way for the doctor to come out and check over all his employees just to see if she was all right. Sadly, his doctor was out of town right now, but even then, Gene would have taken Sammi to the hospital since they didn’t have everything at the farm.
“What do you think is wrong with her?” Ezekiel asked.
Gene looked down at Sammi, holding her extra tight. “I don’t know. I have no idea.”
Which scared Gene out of his mind. He liked being in control. Not knowing what was wrong with Sammi was killing him. Was she dying in his arms?
“You can’t think like that. It’s probably not bad. She just hasn’t been taking care of herself properly and is exhausted, but she’s not dying,” Ezekiel spoke as he pulled up to the emergency room entrance. “Jump out here. I’ll park and then come and find you.”
He didn’t need to be told twice. He opened the door and held onto Sammi as he got out of the car. He walked as fast as he could into the emergency room, looking around for anybody who worked there.
“I need help!” he shouted, panicked.
A nurse walked over to him, taking her sweet time.
“What can I help you with?” she asked, looking at him.
“I need the doctor to look over Sammi right now. She collapsed in the field. I don’t know what’s wrong with her,” Gene explained.
“You can have a seat right over there, and we’ll call you when the doctor is ready.” The nurse pointed to the chairs behind him.
Did she just say that? Did the nurse not see an unconscious girl in his arms?
Gene moved closer to the nurse. “I don’t think you fucking understood what I said. I need the doctor to look over her now.”
“Sir,” she protested.
“Fucking now. Or I will get the Springfield Sinners to come in.” He was bluffing, but she didn’t need to know that.
Sure, if he asked Deccan, he would, especially if it involved Gene’s girl. Deccan was protective like that when it came to almost anyone’s girl. Especially if they were a Little.
“R-right, if you can come w-with me, Sir, I’ll get you to a room, and the doctor will be in soon,” the nurse stuttered.
Gene should have felt bad for scaring her, but he didn’t. Sammi was unconscious in his arms, and he didn’t know why. He would threaten just about anyone if they got in the way of her getting medical attention.
He followed the nurse through some doors and down a hallway. Other nurses looked at them as they walked by, but Gene didn’t care. The only thing on his mind was getting Sammi the best care to determine what was wrong. That was all he cared about.
“You can lay her on the bed. The doctor will be in here soon to ask some questions,” the nurse rushed out and left.
Gene carefully placed her on the bed and brushed her hair out of her face. She looked so small, so fragile lying on the hospital bed. So many things were running through his head as they waited for the doctor. Was she going to be all right? Was she sick? Did she have cancer?
“Thought I was going to have to fight to get back here, but when I said you were carrying a girl in, her face went white, and she allowed me in straight away,” Ezekiel said as he walked into the room. “What did you do?”
“She fucking told me to sit in a chair while I waited for the doctor. No questions about what happened or what was wrong, so I may or may not have threatened to send the Springfield Sinners in.” He shrugged, still looking at Sammi.
Ezekiel whistled. “Telling the truth or bluffing?”
“Bluffing mostly, but if it really came down to it, I probably would have. Deccan definitely would have done it.”
“Especially when he finds out Sammi is your girl.”
Gene looked over right as the doctor walked into the room.
“I heard there was an unconscious patient. Do you want to tell me what happened?” the doctor asked. “I’m Doctor Mike Smith, and I’ll be looking after this young woman.”
“We work on a farm. She was walking from a building to one of the barns and fainted,” Ezekiel explained.
“Probably from dehydration?” the doctor suggested.
Gene shook his head. “I’ve been making sure she has been drinking enough water the past couple of days. Couldn’t have been from dehydration.”
“We’ll have to run some tests then to figure out what is wrong and why she passed out,” Mike explained.
“She’s under our insurance, the Little Farm, but if that doesn’t cover everything, you bill it to me. You don’t tell her about it.” Gene looked directly into the doctor’s eyes. “I don’t know if this is important, but I feel like it is. Sammi said she has been peeing a lot even when she didn’t drink much during the day. I’ve also noticed her losing weight since she started several weeks ago. Her health just seemed to get worse and worse as the days went by.”
Everything in Gene now wished he had gotten their doctor to come in earlier to check on Sammi. Would it have been weird? Yes, but he had noticed that she was declining and didn’t do anything about it. Part of it was because he knew she wasn’t his yet, but that all changed the minute she was lying in his arms.
Mike nodded, not giving away anything. “I’ll keep that in mind. Now, I need both of you to leave the room for a couple of minutes while the nurse comes in to get her into a gown.”
“I’m not leaving her,” Gene declared.
“It will only be for a couple of minutes. Then you can come back in,” Mike replied. “The longer you stay in here and prevent my nurses from doing their jobs, the longer it’s going to be to figure out what’s wrong with her.”
“Anything longer than five minutes and I’m coming back in.” Gene kissed Sammi’s forehead before leaving.