The Chase (4 page)

“I agree,” Helen replied. “I think it’s quite charming. Cozy, actually. It’s just not what she was used to, that’s all.”

“Kendall’s very happy here,” Anne said. “In fact—”

The kitchen door opened and Kendall burst into the room, holding a cordless phone. “Anne, would you come into the kitchen? I need to talk to you.” There was a tremor in her voice, as if she might be about to cry.

Anne imagined that Peter had probably managed to throw yet another legal obstacle at Kendall. She rose from the chair and patted the fluffy chintz cushion, motioning for Samantha to sit down. “Samantha, why don’t you make a bouquet with the ribbons from the packages? I’ll be right back.”

Kendall closed the door behind them and pulled a chair out from the kitchen table. “I think you’d better sit down.”

“All right.”
What on earth was going on?

Anne settled into the chair. “What’s wrong, Kendall?”

Kendall took a deep breath. “It’s Doug. There’s been an accident.”

T
raffic was at a standstill, and Jake Dawson beat his fingers impatiently against the outside of the driver’s door in rhythm to the country music that was playing on the radio. The sticky heat was sweltering, but he knew if he turned the air conditioning on, the truck was sure to overheat. He’d have to roll up the window soon, though, because dark thunder boomers loomed overhead, and the wind was gusting strong enough to rock the pickup truck. He batted at a fly that buzzed annoyingly around his ear, and craned his neck to see if there was any movement in the traffic.

Jake knew that there was some kind of wreck up ahead and figured it must be bad, because he’d heard three sets of sirens in the ten minutes he’d been sitting there. A helicopter had approached, but after being tossed around by the wind on several landing attempts, it had flown away without setting down.

Fat raindrops began to splatter the truck, and Jake cranked up the driver’s window and turned on the wipers. The blades smeared smashed bugs across the windshield, and he depressed the wiper lever a couple of times to squirt fluid on the mess.

A streak of lightning cut through the sky to his left, followed quickly by a sharp crack of thunder, and then the clouds opened up. Blinding rain beat down on the truck, and even with the wipers on full speed, he could barely see beyond the hood. Not that it mattered. It didn’t look like he was going to be driving anywhere anytime soon.

Jake removed his cowboy hat and leaned back against the headrest. The radio station was fading in and out, and he reached over and twirled the knob to turn it off. Lack of sleep was beginning to catch up with him. He sighed wearily and closed his eyes, appreciating the sound of the rain on the roof and the rhythmic swoosh of the windshield wipers.

The loud whoop of a siren blared outside his truck, and Jake sat up and saw the flashing lights of an emergency vehicle pass by slowly on the shoulder to his right. The truck windows had fogged up, and he leaned over and used the heel of his hand to clear an area on the passenger side. A brown sheriff’s car glided past him, followed closely by a truck hauling a horse trailer. As the truck and trailer passed by, Jake read the writing on the side of the trailer.
Equine Medical Center Horse Ambulance
.

Jake straightened up in his seat and watched for a moment as the receding taillights of the horse ambulance grew dimmer. After a brief hesitation, he put the truck in gear and nosed it onto the shoulder.

The rain still beat down steadily, but the visibility had improved somewhat, and Jake followed the horse ambulance past a couple of dozen vehicles until it stopped short of where two sheriff’s cars and a fire truck blocked the road. An ambulance with its lights and siren on was pulling away, but Jake couldn’t see any other vehicles or signs of any kind of accident.

A sheriff’s deputy climbed out of his car and walked towards the horse ambulance, but when he saw Jake’s truck, he held his hand up and gestured for Jake to back up. Jake rolled down the window and waited for the deputy to approach.

The deputy scowled at him. “What do you think you’re doing, following behind an emergency vehicle?”

“Sorry, Deputy, I’m not trying to interfere. I saw the horse ambulance and I followed to offer my help.”

The deputy gestured towards Jake’s cowboy hat, which lay next to him on the seat. “You work with horses?”

“Yes, sir.”

“All right,” the deputy said, squinting against the blowing rain. “Leave your vehicle here. I’ll let the ambulance driver know you’ve offered to help.”

Jake nodded and rolled up the window. He turned off the ignition, pocketed the keys, and opened the door, jamming his cowboy hat on his head before stepping out into the rain. The horse ambulance’s driver had just started up the road, and Jake grabbed the front of his hat and ducked his head to keep the rain from blowing in his eyes as he sloshed through rain puddles to catch up with him. By the time he reached the ambulance driver, his T-shirt and jeans were soaked through to his skin.

He could see that the driver was younger than himself, maybe in his late teens, or early twenties. Definitely too young to be a vet. He was wearing muck boots, a yellow rain slicker, and a Redskins baseball cap.

As Jake drew alongside him, the young man extended his hand. “Hi, I’m Steve. Thanks for offering to help.”

“I’m Jake. What happened? I see the rescue vehicles, but I don’t see any sign of an accident,” he said, shaking Steve’s hand.

Steve motioned ahead and to the right. “See the tracks? Some guy was hauling a tagalong. He drove off the road and the trailer flipped off the hitch. There’s one horse in it. From the call I got, it sounds like the horse is in pretty bad shape.”

“Is a vet here?”

Steve shook his head. “No. Another driver saw the guy go off the road and called nine-one-one from his cell phone. When the rescue squad arrived and found the horse trapped in the trailer, they called the Equine Medical Center. The EMC doesn’t usually dispatch the ambulance without a vet referral, but in this case they didn’t want to waste time waiting for a local vet to get to the scene.”

Jake and Steve followed the tire tracks off the road, and as they started down the embankment, a fireman appeared from over the rise and trudged towards them.

“Hey, guys,” the fireman greeted them. “I’m sure glad to see you.”

“Where’s the horse?” Steve asked.

“He’s still trapped in the trailer. You can’t see it from here.” The fireman gestured for them to follow him down the embankment. They half walked and half slid down the muddy slope until the fireman stopped and pointed. “There it is. Down in the tree line.”

Jake looked towards the tree line and groaned. An aluminum two-horse trailer lay on its side, wedged between two trees, at the bottom of a steep drop.

Steve whistled. “Holy shit. How are we ever going to get him out of there?”

The fireman grunted in response and started to descend the slope again. “We can provide manpower to help. But we aren’t horse people. You’ll have to tell us what to do.”

They entered an area that was especially thick with undergrowth. The fireman called out over his shoulder, “Watch your feet. I almost fell flat on my face when I came through here earlier.”

Jake grabbed a hanging branch for support and picked his way through the brambles. He climbed over a fallen tree trunk and had just jumped down on the other side when he saw Steve flailing his arms in an effort to keep from falling. Steve’s feet were caught in a vine, and Jake reached a hand out and caught him by his arm, just in time to keep him from pitching headfirst into a tree. “Careful. We need you in one piece,” Jake said, and reached down to help Steve disentangle his feet from the vine.

Steve let out a deep breath and smiled at Jake. “Thanks, man. I think you’re my guardian angel today.”

They caught up with the fireman, who gestured towards the trees to his left. “Poor guy driving that sure didn’t have a guardian angel watching over him.”

Jake followed the fireman’s gaze and saw a black Range Rover hugging the trunk of a lofty walnut tree. The roof of the vehicle was cut open, revealing a deflated air bag that hung limply from the steering wheel. Jake shuddered as he imagined what had happened to the driver.

“They use the Jaws of Life to get him out?”

The fireman nodded. “Yup. And it wasn’t an easy feat getting it down there, I’ll tell you that.”

They were approaching the horse trailer, and Jake saw a small group gathered around it. The trailer lay on its left side, and the people door on the right side was open towards the sky. A woman in firefighter gear was crouched on top of the trailer, looking inside.

“The rear doors don’t look like they sustained too much damage,” Steve said. “Hopefully, they’re still operable. Let’s take a look inside, and see how bad he is, before we try to open up the rear.”

They stopped next to the trailer and looked up at the firefighter.

“What’s the horse’s condition?” Steve asked.

The firefighter looked down at them. “He’s was struggling some before, but now he’s quieted down. He seems to have difficulty breathing.”

Steve stepped back and studied the trailer. “How’d you get up there?”

“I climbed up on the hitch and then pulled myself up with that tree branch.” She gestured towards the front of the trailer.

Steve climbed up the same way and peered through the trailer door. “I can’t see much. Anyone have a flashlight?”

The firefighter removed a flashlight from her belt and handed it to Steve, who leaned down and aimed the light into the trailer. Jake heard the horse move inside, followed by a thump as one of the horse’s hooves kicked the trailer floor.

“Easy, boy, I’m here to help you,” Steve said.

Jake looked up at the sky. The clouds still hung heavy, but the fierce rain had let up, and the electrical storm seemed to have passed through the area.

Steve lifted his head out of the doorway and turned to Jake. “I don’t see any obvious critical injuries. He has some abrasions on his head and legs, but they don’t look too serious. His breathing is awfully labored, though. Why don’t you come up here and take a look at him?”

“Wait, I’ll come on down, so there isn’t too much weight up here,” the firefighter said.

Jake waited for her by the hitch, holding out a hand to help her as she jumped down; then he climbed up to join Steve. As soon as he stuck his head inside the trailer and heard the horse’s breathing, Jake knew the horse was in serious distress. The sucking sound he made as he tried to breathe in was unmistakable. It was exactly the way his colt had sounded when he’d impaled himself on a metal stake.

“We’ve got trouble,” Jake said, moving to the side and motioning for Steve to lean into the trailer. “Listen to him. Hear that sucking sound? He must have a chest injury. See how flared his nostrils are? He’s struggling for air.”

He took the flashlight from Steve. “I’m going to climb inside and get a better look at him.”

Jake eased into the trailer and crouched near the horse’s head. The scent of horse sweat hung heavy in the enclosed space, and the horse jerked his head back and rolled his eyes at Jake.

“Easy,” Jake said softly, extending his hand slowly. He gently stroked the horse’s neck with his right hand as he ran his left hand along the animal’s chest. The horse laid his head back down. “Good boy.”

He waved the beam of the flashlight across the horse. The horse’s coat was wet and smooth, and his thick muscles heaved as he labored to breathe. Half a dozen angry welts were scattered across his side and belly, as if the horse had been stung by something. Jake wondered fleetingly whether the horse’s breathing difficulties could be the result of an allergic reaction, but he was pretty certain that wasn’t it. The sucking sound was a classic indication of a puncture wound.

Jake’s fingers probed the front of the horse’s chest but felt no sign of a wound. He ran his hand around to the horse’s right side. The shoulder felt fine, and the horse’s side seemed to be clean.

He looked up at Steve as he slid his hand under the horse’s belly. “I don’t see any sign of injury. I’m afraid it’s on his other side. We might have to pull him out.”

Jake was about to give up, when his fingers brushed against something sticky. “Wait, I found something.” He pulled the pin that held the breast bar in place and released the bar, so he could lean down closer to the horse. He aimed the flashlight at the area. There it was. On the horse’s belly, just behind his right front leg. A puncture wound about the size of a half-dollar.

“I found it. He’s got a puncture wound just behind his right front.”

Steve leaned farther into the trailer. “Is that why he’s breathing so hard?”

Jake nodded. “My colt had a similar injury. What happens is, when he tries to breathe in, his chest cavity fills up with air and that puts pressure on his lungs, so he can’t get enough oxygen.” Jake lifted the horse’s lip and pressed a finger against his gum. “Look how purple his gums are. If he doesn’t get help soon, he’s not going to make it.”

“Can we get him up and into the ambulance?” Steve asked.