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Alana took Egan by the arm to get him moving back toward his grandmother. A super slow walk since she wanted her own updates.
“Were you able to get in touch with your siblings?” she asked.
“Cal and Blue, yes. Remi can’t be reached so I had to leave a message with her commander.”
Alana rifled back through the talk she’d heard about the heroic Donnelly siblings and recalled that Cal was stationed in South Carolina, and Blue was in California. Remi was an Air Force combat Rescue Officer, CRO, as Jack had been, and last Alana had heard, she was on deployment somewhere in the Middle East.
“What can I do to help?” she asked.
He opened his mouth, closed it and shook his head. His gaze fell on his grandmother. “She might need some water or something.”
Alana would have gladly offered that to Effie if the ER doors hadn’t opened, and two women hadn’t come rushing in. The Betterton sisters, Jane and Annie, who were Effie’s longtime friends, and the ranch’s equally longtime cook, Maybell Warner. They’d obviously heard about Derek being at the hospital because they rushed toward Effie, pulling her into their arms.
Egan must have decided to give them some time to help settle Effie because he stopped while Alana and he were a good fifteen feet away.
“I knew something was wrong,” Egan muttered. “He sent me two old pictures early this morning.”
It took Alana a moment to shift gears and realize he was talking about his father. “What kind of pictures?”
“Of when I was a kid. One was of that birthday right after my mom died.”
She knew about that one. Or rather she knew about the occasion. Alana had only been five and hadn’t been invited to the get-together, but Jack had gone, and years later, after Jack’s death, Tilly had shared photos of it with Alana.
“Dad sent me another picture taken of all of us right after he married Audrey,” Egan added.
That got her attention. “Does Audrey know your dad’s in the hospital?”
“I left a message with her assistant’s assistant. There might be a third assistant in that job title,” he muttered not with the bitter-ish tone he’d had for Colleen’s letter. This was more of an annoyance at a time when he just couldn’t deal with anything that didn’t relate directly to his father’s condition.
“I could try to contact Audrey if you want,” Alana offered. “I might be able to talk my way through the line of assistants.”
Egan quickly waved that off and muttered some more profanity under his breath. “The point is I should have known something was wrong when he texted those pictures. He’s never done anything like that before.Never. And I thought...” He paused, did more cursing. “Well, I thought maybe he was depressed or something.”
That got her attention, too. “Has your dad shown any signs of depression before?”
“No.” Another pause. “Maybe,” Egan amended. “How the hell would I even know? I mean, I got stationed here in Texas so I’d be closer to him, and I see him less than twelve hours a month. I come out to the ranch, fix whatever the hell I can fix, have dinner with him, and the next morning, I get up early and head back to the base so I can start the cycle all over again.”
Alana figured no words of comfort would fix this, and she was fully prepared to let Egan go on and on. That’s why she stunned herself when she blurted out, “One point two inches.”
That stopped him, and after he noticeably blinked, Egan stared at her.
“That’s the circumference of my right nipple,” she supplied. “Which is on the small side, FYI. I was curious and measured after I ended my virtual date.”
He just kept staring, but Alana saw some of the raging guilt and worry ease up a bit. Egan released one long breath that seemed to have been pent-up for the past hour or so. But he didn’t respond. Didn’t have time. Because at that exact moment, Dr. Abrams came walking into the waiting room, and Dalton was right behind him.
Effie and her companions stood, all hurrying toward the doctor and joining Egan at his side.
“It’s not good,” Dr. Abrams said right off. “Derek had a massive heart attack, and he was put in ICU. We’re still trying to stabilize him. Trying,” he emphasized. “Derek’s not out of the woods yet.”
That stunned them to silence. Everyone but Effie, that is.
“Will he...” Effie started but had to stop. “Will Derek be okay?”
“We’ll know soon,” the doctor answered. “All of you just sit tight, and the moment I have answers, I’ll come back out.”
That was it, no more from Dr. Abrams. He just turned and left. None of them stopped him, of course. Right now, he needed to be with Derek while Egan and Effie tried to deal with thatit’s not good.
Distraction talk about nipples wasn’t going to fix this, but since Egan didn’t look very steady on his feet, Alana led him to a chair and had him sit. Effie’s friends did the same for her on the row of seats behind them.
