Mystic Cowboy(81)

Focus, girl, she scolded herself as Rebel and Nobody dismounted at dead runs. Jesse’s truck squealed to a stop behind them. So they weren’t trained medical professionals. They were able-bodied men, and they were what she had to work with. “Nelly—we’ve got to get her out of the car and into the clinic.”

That was all she had to say. Rebel opened one door, Jesse the other, and together they extracted Nelly and Tara. Madeline grabbed the saline bag and they made it in.

“Wash up—now,” she ordered both men. “Strip off anything that got slimed. Wear hospital gowns if you have to. We can’t let this spread.” The men nodded silently and peeled off their shirts.

Any other day, she’d love to just sit back and watch three of the finer chests on the White Sandy duke it out for the title of the hottest hunk. But today—hell, it was still tonight—wasn’t any old day. “Gloves and masks,” she added as she hooked the bag up to the pole. At least she wouldn’t have to worry about that anymore.

“Little help here!” Clarence shouted from outside. Nobody and Rebel looked at each other, and then Nobody sprinted for the door. He reappeared seconds later, carrying Tammy. Clarence was right behind him, with Mikey in his arms. “Sorry I’m late, Doc. I stopped to check on these two, and they weren’t doing...so...good.” His voice trailed off as he looked at the carnage the clinic had quickly devolved into. “Shit.” He sounded impressed.

Stick with me, Madeline thought, although she wasn’t worried. Clarence had seen combat, and everyone here still had all their limbs. “Clarence, get Nelly on the oxygen and then you’re on IV duty,” she ordered, like she was quarterbacking the big play. “Nobody, cleanup duty. Jesse—” But Jesse wasn’t listening to her. He was standing over his daughter, brushing her sweaty hair away from her face. Okay, Madeline thought. Two able-bodied men and Clarence. “Rebel, come with me.”

Everyone moved. The clinic was silent except for the sound of retching. Mikey and Nelly were in the hospital beds, while the three Tall Trees women were sprawled out on the exam tables. In less than a minute, the smell of bleach filled the air. Mikey yelped in pain as Clarence ran the IV. A good team, she thought as she and Rebel headed for the stock closet.

God, she hoped it was campylobacter or E. coli or something like it as she began to pull what few items she did have off the shelf. “Shit,” she muttered again as she grabbed the suppositories and the antibiotics and piled them into Rebel’s arms. She had enough for the Tall Trees family. How many other people had been at that picnic? Would Nelly be able to keep it down long enough for it to work?

“What?” he asked.

She paused, suddenly aware that he was here when she needed him—when Nelly needed him. His face was calm and focused, but she could see the worry in his eyes. “I think you’re right. But we can’t wait until Monday—she’s in shock, and I’ve got to stop her symptoms from cascading.” At the mention of shock, Rebel got that fierce look, the one he wore when he was going to do battle. She’d seen it more than enough, starting when he shooed Walter White Mouse out of here and ending with the phone call to Leon Flagg. Except this time, he wasn’t battling against her. He was battling with her.

“I’m going to do antibiotics, just in case. I don’t have a hell of a lot of the anti-diarrhea meds. We’ll just have to keep pumping her full of electrolytes.”

He nodded as she hauled out the box of half-normal saline. She had the sinking feeling they were going to use the whole thing before much longer. And all the vials for samples. It was going to take time to get them back from the lab, but if this really was some contaminated beef, she’d need all the proof she could get.

“What else can I do to help?” Rebel asked.

She looked at him and all her regret—the slimy phone call, losing her temper, not going to look for him—melted into gratitude. “Pray,” she said simply and headed out to her patients.

The night got better and worse at the same time. Within half an hour, Nelly’s system was responding to the fluids and the intravenous antibiotics. She even managed to keep the Zofran down for a bit. After checking Nelly’s file—easy to find since Tara had organized everything—Madeline made the executive decision to hook Nelly up to one of her precious pints of blood. She couldn’t tell how much the girl had lost, and she was pretty far down on the total fluid count for a girl her size. Warding off shock meant hitting it with everything she had, and she had a bag of B+ blood. The result—a five-year-old girl with two different IVs running into her plus an oxygen tube—was almost as unsettling as finding her in the tub, but Madeline didn’t have time to dwell.