Back In Texas. Roxanne Rustand

the clinic as Kristin led his father down the hall to an exam room. Clint took a chair in the corner instead of the edge of the exam table, his face impassive.

      His responses to her questions were cursory at best—and likely not entirely accurate, given the stubborn jut of his jaw. Fortunately, he signed a release for the transfer of his medical records in Austin. While he was disrobing, she faxed it to the cardiology clinic and then called them to ask if the records could be faxed back ASAP.

      Back in the exam room, she found Clint sitting on the exam table, his shirt off. He sat in silence as she took his blood pressure both sitting and standing, then listened to his heart and lungs. “You said you weren’t on any medications. Is that correct?”

      His mouth tightened. “Nothing I need to take.”

      “I’m hearing some PVCs—an irregular beat. I’d like to do an EKG while you’re here.” When he bristled, she added, “It’s apparently been a while since you’ve been to a doctor, so it’s good to have a baseline.”

      “Who reads it, you?”

      His derisive tone rankled. “Yes, and then I’ll send it on to Dr. Hernandez and the cardiologist in San Antonio.”

      She rolled the EKG machine from its place in the corner and attached the leads, then ran a tape on him, watching the needle trace a telltale pattern that confirmed her initial diagnosis.

      He apparently noticed something in her expression, because his eyebrows drew together. “Normal, I suppose.”

      “Not entirely,” she hedged. “Though in a man your age we can hardly expect a twenty-year-old heart, right? We’ll have a report back from the cardiologist by tomorrow, and we should have your old records by then, too.”