Joshua's Folly (17 page)

He objected. “No…Carson. Take me.”

“No. You need to sit still. I’ll go and get help. I’ll be back as fast as I can.”

“Marisa…no…I can ride…just let me rest here a second.”

“I can do this, Josh. Please let me.”

“I need to sit,” he capitulated as he collapsed at the base of the tree, unable to walk further, in spite of his insistence that he could ride out of there. He rested his head against the bark and closed his eyes. His breathing was pronounced, the rise and fall of his chest, distinct. “Breathe slowly, Josh. Keep your heart rate slow and even.”

Easier said than done in the panic of the moment. The slope of the land was perfect. It would keep his leg lower than his heart and hopefully slow down the progression of the venom in his bloodstream. There was more to do, but for the life of her she couldn’t form a conscious thought.

“What do I do, Josh? Tell me what to do,” Marisa pleaded.

“Take off my shoe,” he said, his voice breathy. He wasn’t gasping for air by any means, but the sound invoked terror within Marisa. Her hands trembled as she quickly removed his work boot and sock. If he’d been wearing his cowboy boots, the bite might not have penetrated his skin. She shook her head, berating herself for thinking about what ifs.

She looked up to find Josh’s head slumped to one side, his eyes closed. “Josh! Josh!” she yelled, patting his cheeks.

“I’m here, I’m here,” Josh soothed, hardly moving. “Grab my knife and c-cut myyyy jeans,” he said, his words beginning to slur.

Of course. Allow room for the inevitable swelling.
I knew that.
She could hardly think straight, operating on adrenalin. Marisa grabbed the pocketknife that sat in a sheath on Josh’s belt and slit his jeans to reveal the bite. To her surprise, the skin was already swollen to a small peak, blood dripping from the wound. She had to act fast.

“Use yourrrr blouse. R-rip it. Tie above biiite…nnnot tight,” Josh garbled. Even though he was speaking slightly incoherently, he was still able to get his point across. Marisa latched onto that thought, positive this was a good sign.

She removed her blouse—glad that she wore a tank top underneath—and ripped off a strip of material. Quickly, she tied it on Josh’s leg, just above the snakebite, making sure she could fit a finger underneath the band so it wouldn’t cut off his blood. If he stayed still, these measures should slow down and localize the venom while she went for help. It had to work. She couldn’t lose him.

Marisa looked up to find him watching her through slightly glazed eyes. His eyebrows were deeply furrowed.

“Thank you,” he whispered through dry lips. “I’m reactin’ to venom quicker than should. That’ssss not good.”

She nodded and held his face in her hands, knowing shock was affecting him also. “I have to go, Josh. I have to go now. Stay calm and don’t move. I’ll be back for you as quickly as I possibly can. I swear it.”

His only response was a slight nod of his head.

“Don’t try to walk back or I won’t be able to find you. Do you hear me?”

“Yes,” he said, almost inaudibly.

When she started to pull away, he grabbed her by the back of the head roughly and kissed her hard on the mouth. “I know you can do it, Marisa. I know you can do it,” he told her fiercely.

He must’ve seen the fear, the sheer panic in her eyes. “I’ll be back for you, Josh. Don’t leave me. Promise me.” Her meaning couldn’t possibly be lost on him. This time it had nothing to do with him leaving this particular geographic spot.

His eyes were suddenly intense, “Marisa…” he said and then his head fell back onto the tree as he closed his eyes. “Go,” he whispered. “Go.”

It took three minutes at a fast-paced run to get to the spot where Carson was tied. Three precious minutes wherein Josh’s life hung in the balance. As she approached Carson, it was as if he rebelled to Josh’s absence. He reared up, fighting his connection to the tree, making Marisa’s stomach drop to her toes with dread. Summoning courage she didn’t know she possessed, she faced Carson with trepidation and slowly untied him with numb fingers. With anxiety in her touch, she nuzzled his snout. Surprisingly he bore the contact.

“You have to let me ride you, Carson. Josh is in trouble. We have to help him. Please let me ride you,” she told him persuasively. Carson danced in place as he always did when he was ready to go. He was as temperamental as a spoiled child, and unless Josh was there to tame him, he scared the heck out of Marisa. He was at least two feet taller than Jasper and was a magnificent looking creature.

And entirely intimidating.

Josh’s own words wafted through her mind:
I love my ranch and I love fast horses that are just a little bit dangerous to ride
.

Yeah, no kidding.

Slowly, Marisa approached Carson’s left flank, whispering softly and petting him. As she placed her foot in the stirrup, her heart raced to monumental proportions. If she spooked him and he took off running now, she’d be dead, and so would Josh. But she had to do this, there wasn’t an option. She held on for dear life, gritted her teeth, and desperately tried to swing herself up onto Carson.

She didn’t make it. Her nerves were getting the best of her.

He whinnied in protest to her clumsy attempt to mount him. He danced around a bit and she again spoke softly to him, reassuring him.

“C’mon, Carson, we have to help Josh, he needs us.”

On the second try, she made it into the saddle. She barely had time to get a safe grasp as Carson immediately reared up, attempting to rid himself of the intruder. Marisa held on for dear life and refused to be ejected with steely determination. He seemed to concede defeat and instead initiated a terrifying gallop at a mind numbing speed, as if the devil himself was hot on his heels.

Now she was faced with another huge obstacle. She didn’t exactly know the way back, parts, yes, but not for sure. But all she had to do was find a ranch hand—anyone out on the ranch that could get help to Josh would do.

However, Carson clearly had his own agenda. It was as if he’d understood what she’d said and knew Josh was in trouble and was fighting to save him right along with her. Never in her life had she experienced a ride on a horse that was this fast—this exhilarating—this petrifying. It dawned on her that Carson knew the way home. Marisa watched carefully, memorizing every feature in the land as they flew by, knowing she had to lead help back to Josh. She wasn’t in charge, Carson was, but it quickly became obvious he was taking her back to the ranch and that was all that mattered to her. She leaned down close to Carson and held on tight like a jockey in a race. It was a race for Josh’s life.

And he meant everything to her.

When Carson came to a stop outside of the stables, several ranch hands stopped what they were doing and stared, perhaps wondering why she was riding Carson, and so unskillfully at that. No one ever rode Carson, except Josh. Marisa dismounted clumsily, the ground seeming much farther away than when she dismounted Jasper. It was Jake who approached immediately.

“Marisa, is everything okay?”

“No, it’s Josh. He’s been bitten. We h-have to get him to the hospital. Hurry!”

“Bitten?”

“Rattlesnake!” she yelled, feeling unable to put together an intelligible sentence. They were standing around when they needed to be going.
Wasting time!
Didn’t he realize how precarious the situation was?

Jake paled. “Let’s go.” He called for help and one of the other ranch hands, Dave, ran with them to one of the ranch jeeps. “Do you know where he is?”

“Yes!” The route was now written on her heart. She could get to Josh blindfolded if she needed to. A glance at her watch filled her with dread. “Hurry, it’s been twenty-five minutes since the bite.”

Jake took the landscape by storm. They bounced in the jeep, leaving their stomachs behind and landing back down heavily on the seats with a thud. He took turns so sharply, they nearly tilted onto two wheels. The only thing keeping her in the car was the thin strap of material otherwise known as a seatbelt. Marisa began to wonder if they’d make it back to Josh in one piece. Jake wasn’t messing around, knowing how serious the situation was.

“Turn here!” she yelled, her voice cracking, revealing the depth of her emotion.
Don’t leave me, Josh, please don’t leave me.

Marisa was beside herself by the time they made it back to Josh. She was out of the jeep before Jake had come to a complete stop, running towards him. By the time Jake and Dave caught up to her, she was already kneeling next to Josh. His skin glistened with sweat and his breathing was labored. When she checked the bite, she gasped. It had swollen to twice its original size and the skin was discolored. At first, she thought Josh was unconscious as she held his face in her hands once again. “Josh, Josh…”

He opened his eyes, bestowing her with a small half smile. “You b-back already?” he managed.

Relief washed over her. He was still alive, and he’d made a joke at that.

It took both men to move Josh to the jeep. He was very weak and could hardly stand on his own. The sight filled Marisa with anxiety. She buckled herself in, turning in her seat as they settled Josh so that he was resting on her, his back to her chest. He was heavy in her arms, almost deadweight. They wrapped a seatbelt around him rather awkwardly and she wrapped her arms around him securely. “You ready?” Jake asked her.

“Yes, let’s go.” Time was of the essence.

“Hold on.”

They didn’t even stop at the ranch to tell anyone what was going on. They needed to get Josh to medical care as fast as they possibly could. Dave called ahead. A small nearby town had a modest medical clinic. They were advised to take Josh there as quickly as possible in order to administer the antivenom in a timely manner. From there, they’d evaluate the situation, whatever that meant. But Marisa knew one thing for sure, driving all the way to Amarillo for a two hour drive wasn’t going to cut it. Jake flew down the road at over ninety miles per hour, several times verging on a hundred miles per hour. The jeep objected, but held steady.

Josh opened his eyes a few times during the drive and looked up at her. “Marisa,” he would say and then collapse as if that took all of his strength. Dave handed her his hankie and Marisa mopped his brow, gently wiping away the sweat. She ran her fingers through his hair, and kissed his lips several times. Her only consolation was that he kissed her back with a slight amount of pressure, but it was pressure all the same. It was a sign that he was still partly coherent. She caught Jake’s eyes in the rearview mirror a few times, observing them thoughtfully and she wondered what he was thinking.

As they approached the small town, a highway patrolman pulled them over. Jake yelled to him, “Snake bite!” The officer didn’t hesitate, “Follow me!” he told them. He guided them to the medical clinic at a dizzying speed with his lights blazing.

Attendants were waiting at the door and took Josh in immediately. They’d made it to the door of the clinic in forty minutes, and it had been about eighty minutes since the snake bite, a record by anyone’s standards. Nurses fired questions at her, one after another, some of the answers she knew, some she didn’t. If Josh had allergies, she had no idea what they were.

“Diamondback rattlesnake,” she told them. “It’s been about eighty minutes since the bite…” Then the room began to spin and everything went black as she collapsed and Jake caught her in his arms.

Marisa sat at Josh’s bedside, watching him sleep. He still looked pale. She questioned the nurse at least a hundred times, asking if he was going to be okay. She assured her that he would be fine each and every time. Marisa was positive that if she wore the nurse down with enough questions, she’d eventually tell her the truth.

Evidently Josh really was going to be okay.

They’d moved Josh to the hospital in Amarillo once the antivenom had been administered. He was in ICU and they were keeping a very close watch on him.

Marisa dozed for awhile, resting her head on Josh’s bed. Operating on pure adrenalin was exhausting and extreme stress had a way of draining every ounce of strength from you. When she awoke, feeling groggy and out of sorts, she sat up to find that Josh was watching her.

“Hey, sweetheart,” he said, his voice scratchy. “I love wakin’ up with you at my side.” His fingers softly ran through her hair.

“I’m sure I must be a sight.” Marisa hadn’t been back to the ranch since the snake bite, opting to stay with Josh.

“You look absolutely beautiful. I don’t wanna know how bad I look, so let’s just pretend, okay?”

“You look pretty darn good to me, Joshua Kensington. You scared the daylights out of me.”

“What are daylights exactly? I’ve always wondered about that.”

“I have no idea, but I don’t have any left.”

“You don’t need ‘em.”

“Not if I have you, I don’t.”

“Bethany?” Josh asked.

“She’s fine. I spoke with her on the phone. She said to give you a big kiss.”

“And did you?”

“Several times, in fact.”

“I thought I was dreamin’. Guess not.”

“They said you had a bad reaction to the venom.”