Page 97 of Training the Heart

Wade posts up beside me like we’re a unit waiting to attack when Brad stands. I can feel the anger radiating off of him as he squeezes my hand.

Brad wastes no time and comes over to me quickly but Wade is quicker.

“That’s close enough, tell us what happened and then leave.”

Brad scoffs, but Wade doesn’t waste one millisecond entertaining him; he towers over Brad and grips his shirt collar tight. I can see the restraint in his eyes. Brad’s hat tumbles off his head to the floor but I don’t move. Part of me wants Brad to know he isn’t going to fuck with me anymore, and Wade is doing a mighty good job of showing him just that right now, so I let him for just a moment.

“We’re not going to fuck around here, no more games. I know every single filthy fucking thing you did to her, and I’ll tell you that it’s by the sheer grace of God and the fact that we’re in a public place that I’m not pummeling you into next week right now. The only words out of your mouth will be what happened to Glenda, and then you will fucking leave before I put you in the room next door. Is that fucking clear?”

“Look, I don’t know what she told you, but I never treated her poorly. I loved her when no one else—”

“Wade, let him breathe so he can tell me what happened,” I say as calmly as possible. I’ve heard enough. A true narcissist never admits they’re wrong. “He isn’t worth it,” I add.

Wade lets go but he’s emitting steam as he backs up one foot and sets his jaw expectantly.

Brad picks up his hat and dusts it off nervously as he talks. “EMS called me this morning. They tried your phone number that was listed in your mom’s phone as her emergency but it was disconnected.” He eyes Wade as he says this, then looks back to me.

“I’ve talked to my mom with my new number—this makes no sense,” I say.

“She still had your old one in there listed as Ivy, I had to search through her text messages to find you—your new number is still just a number. My ranch number was the second point of contact, so they called me. I came right away, and when I got here and figured out your number, I started calling you.”

You’d almost think he was genuinely concerned, but I know him better than that, this is just a means to an end to get to me. He never cared about my mama when we were together and he sure as hell doesn’t now.

“Miss Spencer?” A man’s voice calls to me from the doorway, I spin around to face him.

“Yes?”

“I’m Dr. Terry Evans, I have been treating your mother this morning.”

“How is she? Is she—” How do you ask if someone is drunk without making them sound terrible.

“She’s okay, she almost hit a deer, around five this morning, swerved to miss it and got a nasty bump on the head when she hit the ditch. Her airbag has given her a fair bit of fabric burn, and I had to set her wrist as it was broken in two places.” I wince, having my ankle just sprained was painful, I can’t imagine breaking a bone in two places. “We also had to give her quite a bit of blood, she lost a lot to a cut on her leg and she’s a rare type—AB negative. EMS thinks it was about sixty minutes before anyone noticed her and called it in.”

“Like a blood transfusion?”

He nods in response. “Yes.”

“Was anyone else hurt?”

The doctor looks at me with a question in his eyes.

“No, she was alone, and she’s doing well, all things considered. A little shaken up, of course. They’ll be bringing her down momentarily. I’d like her to stay a night or two to keep watch on her.”

I look from Wade to Brad and then back to the doctor, not wanting to ask this in front of either of them but not really having a choice.

I close my eyes and go for it.

“Is she … was she … under the influence?”

The doctor flips open his paperwork and skims through it. “She’s been very coherent, I wouldn’t think so, no. Ah yes, here we are, your mother’s blood alcohol level was zero.”

She wasn’t drinking? Zero? I don’t remember the last time I saw my mother where I could say her blood alcohol level was zero. Is she trying to quit drinking again?

“That’s what I was going to tell you,” Brad says from behind me. “She said she’s seventeen days sober. She was going to an early morning AA meeting in Pendalton.”

Tears well up in my eyes as I wish that this could be the time she makes it through. The doctor smiles and nods.

He isn’t out the door for more than a few seconds when I turn to speak, fire rising in my gut. I’ve been tiptoeing around this for months, but if my mama can be so strong all on her own, so can I.

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