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“Madison,” I say when my daughter gets out of the car. “Can you go in and get someone to help?”
She nods and hurries off, returning almost immediately with two nurses and a stretcher. The nurse takes the unconscious woman from my arms after making sure that she’s breathing, and I follow them into the hospital until I’m asked to wait by the nurse’s station while they take her to the ED.
The nurses offer Madison and me a place to sit, but my mind is all over the place as the look of terror on her face plays repeatedly in my head.
“We didn’t hit her, did we?” Madison asks.
I turn to her and shake my head.
“No baby, we didn’t.”
I see the fear in her eyes as she bites her lip, and I realize that she must be worried because I’m unsettled. So, I try to smile and act calm, placing my hand on her shoulder.
“She’s going to be okay, alright? You don’t have to be scared about anything. I promise.”
“Okay.”
We remain in the station for another two hours before a doctor arrives. I stand up as soon as I see a familiar face.
“Dr. Owen.”
“Mr. Fraiser,” he says. “Glad to see you back in our small town.”
I shake his hand. “Thank you. How is she? She appeared in the middle of the road while I was driving here, and I almost hit her. Is she okay?”
He nods. “Yes. We carried out a series of tests, and her heart rate, blood pressure, and respiratory rate are in a good range. She's severely dehydrated, though, which is why she fainted. We’ve placed her on an IV. We’re going to monitor her through the night to make sure her condition remains stable.”
Relief pours through my body. “Okay. But—” I add as I recall another detail, “the bruise. I saw a bruise on her forehead when I brought her out of the car.”
“It’s nothing major,” Owen says. “She must have fallen and hit her head, but from our examination, it doesn’t indicate any serious condition. Of course, we’re not certain of anything as we don’t know her medical history, which is why we’d like to keep her overnight.”
You said you found her on the road?”
“Yes. She looked battered and was standing in the middle of the road. When I went to meet her, she said something about a man before she passed out,” I say, recalling the details. “She didn’t have any form of identification on her. She isn’t from here, is she?”
He shakes his head. “I doubt it. But we do get a lot of tourists in our town during spring, so she might have gotten lost and ended up on the road. Thank you for stopping on time. The rain wouldn’t have made it easy for you, I’m sure.”
“It’s not a problem,” I say. “I’ll come back in the morning to see how she’s fairing.”
“Why… don’t you have some coffee before you leave?” he offers. “My wife made some cookies too, so I could give Madison some?”
I turn to my daughter and see her bright eyes, excited by the mention of cookies. Since the doctor is someone we’ve met a couple of times over the years, and his wife comes up to the cabin occasionally with supplies, I have no problem agreeing.
“I’ll go get them!” Madison says, hurrying off before I can reply.
Dr. Owen chuckles. “She sure is grown now. I remember the first time you came here. Madison wouldn’t leave your side. She clung to you like the rest of us were going to snatch her once you turned your back.”
I laugh. “True. But you’ve taken us in like your own, and I’m grateful for that.”
He waves my thanks away like it’s no big deal.
“Your contributions to Silver Peak don’t go unnoticed, you know. Our healthcare center would have a wing named after you, but you insisted on remaining anonymous. And now you’ve saved a woman. You’re a hero, Mr. Logan Fraiser.”
Far from it.
Thelast thing I’d consider myself to be is a hero. Because if I was, I would have saved my wife that night. I would have dropped everything and gone to the supermarket in her stead—instead of going out to meetthatclient—a man whose face I no longer remember.
But I didn’t—and she couldn’t avoid the trailer in the pouring rain. The doctors told me she died on impact.
