“You have to stay here with the babies. They need you.”
She glanced toward the nursery they’d added on to the back of the house at Ida’s insistence. She didn’t want the twins down the hall and in a bedroom near the front door—the only other option for bedrooms on this level of the home. She could barely stand them several yards away.
“Of course,” she said. “The babies.” She went that way while Brady reached for his jacket. “I’ll call Ward. How are you going to get the insulin to him if the road’s out?” She hadn’t heard differently about the road, and she’d stared at the pictures Etta had taken for a long time. She couldn’t believe the hill had just cleaved and slid down the way it had.
“Ward says there’s a service road that connects the Rhinehart Ranch to the south to the road up by the Top Cottage. He told Ty he’d call Duke.”
“Okay,” Ida said, thinking she better get on the phone too. She could reassure Ward that she was praying for him, and she could make sure Etta knew the situation—if she didn’t already.
Ida loved her life in town, with her husband and her new babies. She’d never needed to be entrenched in the work at Shiloh Ridge, though she did enjoy going there to spend time with her family. But right now, being separated from them felt like the worst loss of her life, and she pulled back on the tears as Brady kissed her again, promised to call, and then jogged out of the bedroom, his phone back at his ear.
Ida retraced her steps and picked up her phone. She didn’t have any missed messages or calls, and she quickly tapped to connect a line to her brother.
“Ida,” Ward said, and she felt the anxiety all the way from the ranch. “You talked to Brady, I assume.”
“He just left.”
“She’s almost unconscious,” Ward said, and Ida imagined him to be pacing up there at Bull House. “I’m so mad at her. She shouldn’t have eaten those dang doughnuts.”
“Ward,” Ida said as Johnny started to fuss. Ida had worried needlessly that she wouldn’t know what her children needed or wanted. When she’d first learned she was having twins, she’d cried for three days. What if they were identical? How would she ever tell them apart?
She knew now that she’d have been able to easily.
“Ward,” she said again when her brother didn’t respond.
“What?” he barked at her.
“Take a deep breath and talk to me,” she said. “Tell me what’s going on.”
“Dot’s diabetic,” he said. “She already had one bout where she almost fainted today, but that was because her blood sugar was too low. She didn’t eat enough. Etta fixed her up with orange juice.”
“Okay,” Ida said, because she’d heard all of this from Etta already.
“Tonight, she took her level, and she was getting low again. She said that can happen when she works a lot. Something about exercise…I don’t know. I feel like I need a crash course on diabetes and blood sugar and all of it.”
“Another deep breath,” Ida said, and she listened while Ward took it.
“So she ate the doughnuts. Two of ‘em, which whatever. I don’t care except that now she’s in the bathroom, vomiting and crying and telling me that she might pass out.”
“Really?”
“Apparently she can go into a diabetic coma,” Ward said. “Her level is two-seventy-five, Ida. She says she’s had higher, but you should see her. She looks like she’s about to die. Dear Lord, I don’t know what to do.”
He sounded like he might break, and Ida’s heart squeezed. “Ward,” she said gently as she entered the nursery. She bent over and picked up Johnny. He’d get fed first today, though he tended to hog all of her milk and not leave enough for his sister. “It’s going to be okay,” Ida said as she sat down in the rocking chair between the two bassinets.
“Brady and Tyson are on the way. Duke’s going to get the insulin at the Top Cottage, and you’ll have it within the hour.” Her voice shook, but she took a deep breath too. Ward had been strong for her. She’d nursed him back to health in the past. She could help him through this too.
“I’ll stay with you on the line until you get it,” she said. “I assume you’re not going to leave her alone for a single moment.”
“No,” Ward said quietly. “I’m not.”
“Where is she?” Ida asked, positioning Johnny so he could