“Does anything else hurt, Haylee?” Kanee asked, grabbing the backboard from Liam.
“My arm,” she said right away, “and my head. My head feels like it’s stuffed with gauze.”
“We need to get you to the hospital, okay? Liam is going to roll you forward, and I’m going to get the board under you. Don’t try to help. Let us do the work.” Kanee looked up at me. “Hold her head, so it rolls with us. Can you do that?”
I nodded and helped them roll her, her moan loud as another car pulled up on the scene. I was worried it was Amber, so I was relieved when Officer Stevens jogged over. “Haylee!” he exclaimed as they carried her to the rig and got her situated on the stretcher. “I heard it on the scanner and had to check it out. What the hell happened?”
I held up my finger to him and stood next to the stretcher. “I’m going to talk to Officer Stevens, and then I’ll be right behind you. You do what the EMTs tell you, okay? I love you.”
Her eyes were already closed, and I don’t know if she heard me since they’d already given her something through her I.V., but I had to hope she had. Kanee pushed her into the rig and stuck her head out the door.
“We’ll see you at Mauston Memorial?” she asked, and I nodded.
“Give me five minutes with Stevens, and I’ll be there.”
She shut the door, and the rig pulled away, the lights and sirens blaring.
“I’ll give you a ride over,” he shouted, pointing at his car.
I buckled in and leaned my head back on the seat, my hands shaking and covered in her blood. “She was going to work,” I said as he pulled away from the curb, his lights going, but sirens quiet. “I decided I’d see if she needed any help after the long weekend and found her there. Thank God I decided not to wait until three a.m.”
He grasped my shoulder and squeezed. “Take a deep breath, Brady. Did she say what happened?”
I sucked in air and held it, letting it out before I spoke. “She said Darla pushed her down the stairs.”
“Darla McFinkle?”
I nodded. “Haylee was stabbed, Jack. She didn’t just fall down the stairs. Someone tried to kill the woman I love.”
“Do you think Haylee was just out of it from hitting her head?”
“She sounded certain. She said Darla and then the word weapon. That was all she said.”
Jack shook his head as we neared the hospital. “There was an incident at the parade today.”
“What kind of incident? I know for a fact that Haylee was sleeping during the parade.”
“An incident with Darla. They stripped her of her crown right before she was due to ride on the float as Strawberry Fest Princess. Rumor has it that Haylee gave the committee some damning piece of evidence to have her ousted.”
My head shook instantly. “Haylee wouldn’t do that. She doesn’t start problems with that woman. She knows better.”
“I’m going to hang around at the hospital and see if I can talk to Haylee myself. If I have to wait while they stabilize her, I’ll have to call a committee member and ask them what happened today. If Darla did do this, and after what happened a few weeks ago, I wouldn’t doubt she’s capable of it, I’ll have to pick her up and bring her in.”
“Haylee has to be okay,” I murmured, tuning out everything but how far away I was from the woman I loved. “She has to be okay. I just asked her to be my girlfriend, did you know that?” I asked him, my mind going a thousand miles a minute. “She’s so beautiful and talented. I can’t lose her now. I can’t.”
He pulled the car into the roundabout at the hospital ER and grasped my shoulder. “You’re not going to lose her. She’s going to come out of this and keep loving you for a million more cupcakes. Take a deep breath and square yourself before you go in there. She’s going to need you to be calm and steady for her right now.”
“Calm, right.” I stared at my hands, red with her blood. “I need to wash my hands.”
He climbed out of the car and opened my door, waiting for me to get out before we hit the doors of the ER running. “I’ll find out where she is while you wash up in there,” he said, pointing to the public restroom by the entrance. Meet me at the desk.”
I did what he ordered, and while I scrubbed my hands, I forced my mind to stop thinking that if Darla did do this, I would kill her myself. I would have to let the law deal with her because no one was going to drag me away from the bed of the woman I love, now or ever again.