Page 51 of Claimed By the Cowboy
I exhale hard through my nose. “And you’ve done a damn good job. You’ve carried her through things I can’t imagine.” I glance down at her, my voice rough with the truth. “But she’s my wife now. That means the final decisions fall to me.”
Her throat works, but she says nothing.
“She needs both of us,” I add firmly, pushing my fear down where it can’t paralyze me. “You’ve got the history. I’ve got the authority. She has the best shot if we work together. Can I count on you?”
The fight drains out of her as though she’s been holding her breath for years. Her shoulders sag, eyes shining.
“Yes,” she whispers. “Of course. Partners?”
I manage a smile, though my chest feels like it’s splitting open. “Partners.”
The next few hours crawl by in a haze of fear and uncertainty.
Ten minutes feels like an hour as the clock on the wall ticks relentlessly.
The waiting room feels too bright, too clean, too calm for what’s tearing through me. White walls, gray chairs, the quiet hum of a vending machine—all of it wrong when my wife is somewhere behind those double doors, fighting for her life.
Delaney paces the length of the room like a caged cat. She stops only long enough to look at me, her eyes sharp but rimmed with fear. “What if it’s neurological? Or cardiac? What if?—”
“Stop.” My voice is harsher than I meant it to be. “We don’t do what-ifs. We wait. We stay steady. For her.”
She bites her lip and nods, but I can see the fight it takesfor her not to unravel.
My phone buzzes. Angus.
I step into the hallway and swipe to answer.
“How’s she doing?” he asks immediately.
“Unconscious. They’re running tests.” My throat works around the words. “No answers yet.”
A pause, then Angus blows out a breath. “Tom, we found something. Henry was checking fence lines where our land borders Uncle Jacob’s and came across heavy machinery set up upstream. Three locals, running equipment that’s dumping runoff straight into the creek. Looks like they’ve been there for a while.”
My chest goes tight. “Runoff?”
“Looks chemical. Industrial. And it feeds straight into the well-water at Havenridge.”
The well-water? The water that Kitty’s been drinking while she works in the herb garden.
For a second, the red haze of fury nearly blinds me. I force it down, grinding the words out between my teeth. “Don’t touch them. Don’t say a word. You wait for me.”
“Tom—”
“No.” My voice drops, cold and final. “This is mine. If what I suspect is true, they’ll answer to me.”
Silence hums on the line before Angus answers quietly, “Then we’ll hold. But don’t take too long, brother.”
“I won’t.” I hang up, fighting to leash the storm roaring inside me.
I shove the phone back into my pocket and drag in a breath, trying to compose myself before I reenter the waiting room.
Delaney’s still pacing, her boots scuffing a sharp rhythm against the sterile floor.
She stops the second she sees me. “Tom?” Her voice is taut with fear. Her eyes search my face, catching the storm I can’t quite hide. “Are you okay?”
I open my mouth, the words heavy on my tongue—no, I’m not, and when I get my hands on the bastards who did this, they won’t walk away—but before I can speak, the door opensand a nurse steps in.
“Mr. Sutton?” Her gaze lands on me. “Mrs. Sutton has been moved to an observation room so she can be monitored more closely. You can see her now. The doctor will be in shortly with her test results.”
