Total pages in book: 97
Estimated words: 95273 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 476(@200wpm)___ 381(@250wpm)___ 318(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 95273 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 476(@200wpm)___ 381(@250wpm)___ 318(@300wpm)
About two inches of it.
“Shit.”
It occurs to me that the washer obviously isn’t running anymore either, and it appears that it has a leak.
Great.
One more thing to worry about and deal with when I have no time or brain space for this.
At least I have two washing machines, so I’m not completely dead in the water, so to speak. It takes me thirty minutes to find a plumber who has time to come take a look at it today, and then I find out that it’s not an easy fix.
Because of course, it isn’t.
No, that would be too easy.
Maybe this is the thing that was making my gut feel weird. I take a second to take stock of my feelings and realize, nope. That’s not it.
“I have to order a couple of things,” Peter the plumber—I can’t make this shit up—says with a sigh. “We can’t get much overnighted out here, but it shouldn’t be more than a couple of days.”
“A couple of days?” I blink, staring at the mountain of laundry. “I’ll be here all night.”
“I’m sorry. I just don’t have it in stock at the shop. I’ll see if I can get it FedExed overnight, but inevitably, it will take two days.”
“The joys of living in the boonies.” I force a smile and then shrug. “Ah, well, looks like my daughter and I will be hanging out here tonight. Thanks for your help, Peter.”
“I’ll keep you posted, Abbi.” He walks out, and I give the busted washer the stink eye.
“Today of all days?” I demand, as if it’ll talk back to me. With a deep sigh, I go find a mop and a bucket and then decide to use the wet vac because that’ll pull the water up faster. It’s noisy, and I swear I can hear ringing, and when I turn it off, I find that I’m right.
My phone is ringing, and I don’t recognize the number.
“Hello?”
“Hey, Miss Abbi, this is Lucky out at the barn.”
My stomach churns. Daisy’s out at the barn today for riding lessons.
“Hi, Lucky. Do you have bad news for me?”
“Well, I don’t want you to panic because Little Miss is fine. Or, she will be. She fell off the horse this afternoon and hurt her wrist.”
“Crap,” I whisper. “Is it broken?”
“We don’t think so, but I think it’ll make everyone feel better if she gets an X-ray. What do you think?”
“I agree. I’ll come out right away and get her and take her to the ER.”
“I’m real sorry about this, ma’am. It’s never fun when the little ones fall off.”
“It’s not your fault. I’ll be there soon.”
I click off and then turn and stare at the mess that I haven’t finished cleaning up, but then throw my hands up in the air.
My daughter is the most important thing.
So, I send a text to my crew to fill them in on what’s happening, and then I lock the door behind me and drive out to the ranch, straight to the barn.
“I think she’s fine,” Erin assures me as I get out of the car. “But she’s favoring her wrist a bit. Scared her more than anything.”
“I bet. It would scare me, too.” I smile at her and then look over to where my baby is sitting with Holly and Johnny. “Hey, baby. I hear you took a fall.”
She nods and then starts to cry again, and I inwardly roll my eyes. She’d already calmed down, but now she has to turn the tears back on for my benefit.
Which is fine.
“Come on, pretty girl. We’re going to the doctor.”
“She wasn’t going too fast or anything,” Johnny says as he and his sister walk with Daisy. “It happened so fast. I don’t know what went wrong.”
“Sometimes, people just fall,” I tell him and pat him on the shoulder. “There wasn’t anything you could have done.”
He’s just like his dad and uncles, wanting to protect everyone. He’s the cutest kid, and I’m so glad that Daisy is growing up with him and Holly.
I get Daisy buckled into her seat and then wave as I leave the ranch.
“Does it hurt, babes?”
She nods, holding the wrist against her chest, and that makes me frown. Maybe she did break it.
I guess we’ll find out soon enough.
The emergency room isn’t busy when we walk in, and to my surprise, we’re whisked right back to a little room where a nurse takes Daisy’s vitals and then asks her what happened.
“I was riding a horse, and I fell off.”
“Well, that’ll do it, won’t it?” The nurse smiles up at me. “Dr. Blackwell will be in very soon.”
That’s right. I remember the girls saying that one of the Blackwell brothers is a doctor. If he looks anything like Brooks or Bridger, he’s hot with a capital H.
Was this what put the pit in my stomach all day? It’s not gone, but then, I’m sitting at the hospital with my injured daughter, so it makes sense that I’m still a little off.