Chapter 16
Chapter Sixteen
“ W
est. West, I need you to wake up, man. I need to know that you’re not in a friggin’ coma!”
It was the pure D panic in Trey’s voice that had West shifting, trying to open his eyes. “What?”
“Well, given that you were driving, I was hoping you could tell me.” Trey was tugging at him, trying to move him over the console. That didn’t make any sense.
He opened his eyes, then it hit him. A cow had run out onto the highway, and he hadn’t been able to react fast enough to avoid the collision.
They were upright, for the most part, both air bags gone off, the hood of the truck crumpled.
“What are you doing?”
“Trying to get your stupid ass out of the truck! I smell gas!”
“I can get out the driver’s door, babe.”
Trey’s eyes wheeled, searching out his face. “How was I supposed to fucking know!”
The scream was unlike anything—anything—he’d ever heard from Trey in all the years they’d known each other.
“I need to— I’ll get out, come around and get you. I need to call 911.”
Trey pushed at him. “Get out of the car. I’ve already called 911 and the school and Mal. She’s going with Liam to pick up Noah.”
“Dammit.” How long had he been out? “I’m coming out. I want to get you off the highway.”
“Yeah. I don’t know whether the people in the other car are all right?”
“What other car?”
“Are you okay? Is your head okay? Is it the gas? Get out of the car! Please, love!” Trey had lost it, and West didn’t understand.
“Okay. Okay, baby. I’m coming around to get you. We hit a cow.” West’s heartbeat pounded in his head, his stomach cramping with nausea. Yeah, he’d whacked himself pretty damn good. He cranked the driver’s side door open, the metal and plastic resisting some, the airbag fighting him.
Then he went to get Trey out of the goddamn truck before someone else hit them or before the vehicle went up in flames.
“Come on, baby.” He yanked at the door, getting it open. And it fell off the hinge. Shit. He would have to check Trey for broken bones and concussions and shit.
Gagging against the headache that felt worse than any hangover he’d ever had. God, he was gonna puke once the EMTs got there. Until then, he needed to hold it together.
He looked at the skid marks on the road as he hustled Trey to one side. Jesus it was cold. So, cow, patchy ice, spinning in three circles, and bam. Shit.
Hopefully, the damn cow wasn’t theirs. Not that he would take anyone to court over it, even if he could, but if it was one of theirs, she was a ways from home and a fence was down somewhere.
“Baby, I need to get my phone and take a picture of the cow’s brand. Can you stay here?” He eased Trey down on the shoulder of the road.
“West! No. I still smell gas. Here. My phone is in my pocket.” Trey pulled it out, then opened up the screen.
“Be right back.” People lied about brands on cows hit in the road all the time. For all sorts of reasons. He wanted physical proof.
He trotted out to the carcass, which was, thankfully, a carcass. If the cow had still been alive, he would have had to hunt for the rifle he kept in the truck, and God knew where that was. He found the brand and took a picture, then headed back to Trey.
“It’s a Kerry Creek. I’ll call Brad once the sirens get here.”
“Okay.” Trey’s teeth were chattering. Shit. He was shocky, and it was fucking freezing. He wrapped an arm around Trey’s shoulders, wanting to make sure he was okay. “I think I have a survival blanket in the?—”
“No. You stay away from that damn truck!” Trey was back to shouting.
“Okay. Okay, I got you, baby. I do.” Even if he was starting to droop. Or a lot. Which he was. His head was killing him, and other bruises and such were making themselves known.
A pick-up truck pulled up a few minutes later. “Holy crap. What can I do?” An old cowboy stepped out, staring from them to the truck to the cow.
“You got any flares? My truck smells like gas bad, and I’d like to mark off the road in either direction with a flare.”
“I got cones. I’ll do that. The cow. You see a brand?”
“Kerry Creek.”
“Aw shit. Then that’s my problem too. I work for them.”
“Okay.” He shook his head as his ears took to ringing. “I’m West McCoy. Foreman at the Blanton ranch. The Five Diamonds.”
“Darby Yates. Been at the Kerry Creek for fifteen years.” The old-timer shook hands with him. “You’re pretty beat up, West.” He nodded down at West’s hand, which was dripping blood.
“Too cold to feel it, I reckon.”
“Let’s get you both sitting in my truck, and then I’ll put out the cones. It’ll be safer that way. Come on now, mister…oh, you’re Mr. Blanton? I met you at Mallory’s wedding. I don’t know if you remember. If you’ll come with me, I’ll get you somewhere warm.”
“Try to stay away from the truck. Gas. I can smell gas.” Trey was barely holding it together.
“No problem. Go on, son.” Darby pointed him toward the truck. “I’ll help your boss. Get him going.”
The ‘boss’ took West a second to figure out who the hell Darby could possibly be talking about. Then he realized that Darby was talking about Trey, who was absolutely not his boss. Not like that, not anymore.
But what was he gonna say?
“Thank you.”
The snow was coming faster now, the wind beginning to scream. Trey was standing there in the center of it, just this dark shape. Darby got to Trey, guiding them both through the snow.
The look of pure terror on Trey’s face was more than any one man could take.
They got to Darby’s truck, the old cowboy comforting them both. “It’s gonna be fine. Just a truck, just one cow and one truck. They’re all replaceable. God knows we all got insurance.”
“Yes.” Trey’s teeth were chattering. “Is the cow all right?”
“No, but you know, it was quick. I got to figure out what part of the fence is down.”
West had to grin. That was a cowboy, right there.
They got into the warm truck and both sat there in silence, which was a blessing because his head was killing him. He didn’t think he could deal with Trey right now. He didn’t think he could deal with another scream.
Trey wasn’t screaming, though. He just sat there and shivered.
West reached out to hold Trey’s hand, but when he did, the blood was dripping, and it felt as if that would send Trey back over the edge.
It seemed to take a hundred years for the lights to come—red and blue and white, the sirens, the tow trucks, the ambulance.
“Lord have mercy, you tore yourself up.” A burly EMT hustled him up into the ambulance and down onto a gurney. “So come on, let’s get you to the hospital.”
“What about Trey? What about the guy I was in the truck with?”
“Don’t worry. We got your boss. It’s all right.”
They didn’t seem to have Trey. He wasn’t in the ambulance with West and they didn’t have but one ambulance…Christ, his head hurt so bad, and his hand was killing him.
And then they started to move, leaving Trey behind.
And he couldn’t quite focus. “I gotta get to my man. He can’t see. I need to get to him. He can’t get home on his own.”
“He’s not by himself. The police are with him. They’ll figure it out. We got to get you to the hospital, man.”
“But he needs someone to get help…”
Then he started puking, and it was all over.
Trey was going to have to do this on his own.