Rafe’s face looked so pale. Poor imaginary man. I wished the dream was better. I also wished this pounding in my head would go away. I swung my hands, connecting with a hard surface, and I beat against it, still trying to get out.
“Just go away,” I told my throbbing headache. “I want you to go away. How many times do I have to tell you to go away?”
Blessed darkness engulfed me then, taking away my dreams and pain in one fell swoop.
I woke up in a hospital bed with the worst headache of my entire life. My eyes felt swollen, and it was hard to open them.
“Rafe,” I said weakly. My mouth and throat were so parched, my tongue puffy. My lips were cracked and dried.
My nose throbbed, and I reached up to feel a bandage across it. I tried to sit up, but it made my head spin, and I lay back down. My room was empty.
I’d never been in a hospital before. How could I get someone to help me? I tried calling out, but my voice was raspy and soft.
Time passed strangely, surreally, with lights and shadows moving across the wall as I slipped in and out of consciousness.
Finally a nurse in light blue scrubs came in to check on me. “Where’s Rafe?” I asked. She jumped, like it surprised her that I was awake. She ran out of the room, but she brought back a doctor with her who flashed a light in my eyes and started asking me questions.
I answered them as best I could and again asked for Rafe. They didn’t respond.
Aunt Sylvia and Max came rushing into the room, with Aunt Sylvia crying and saying my name over and over again. She went to hug me, but Max stopped her. He put his arm around her and held her while she cried.
“Is Laddie okay?” I asked them in my raspy voice, bracing myself for the worst as the doctor continued to examine me.
“He’s with Dr.Pavich,” Max said. “He had several broken ribs, some internal bleeding, but he’s a tough dog. He’s on the mend and doing better.”
Relief engulfed me. I was so afraid that he had died. The doctor gave Max a dirty look, and he immediately stopped talking, chagrined.
Before I could ask about anything else, the doctor started speaking to me. There were a bunch of medical terms I didn’t understand and some words I did get, likeacute stress reaction, dehydration, panic attack, broken nose, and concussion.
He told me that I would need to stay for a few more days because they wanted to monitor me to make sure that my condition didn’t worsen, and to determine whether or not there were more extensive internal injuries.
I nodded. I asked for water, and the nurse told me that for now I could have ice chips. She said she would get me some.
Then I was alone with Max and Aunt Sylvia. She took my bandaged hand and squeezed softly. “I want to hug you, but I don’t want to hurt you,” she said.
“Where’s Rafe?”
Max and Aunt Sylvia exchanged glances. “We’re not supposed to tell you anything that might upset you,” Max said.
“What would upset me?” My heart thudded slowly. “You guys are scaring me. Where is he?”
Aunt Sylvia gave me a sad smile. “Rafe is gone.”
Chapter 27
“Gone? What do you meangone? Where is he?” I asked. I again tried to sit up, and the pain knocked me back flat.
“You told him you didn’t love him and that you wanted him to go away. After he made sure you would completely recover, he left,” Aunt Sylvia said, as gently as possible.
“We’re not supposed to tell her anything that might stress her out,” Max reminded her, as if I wasn’t even in the room.
“She deserves to know the truth,” she retorted.
“I didn’t say that to him. I wouldn’t say that to him.” Whispers of a memory played around my conscious mind, like strands or fragments of a dream I couldn’t piece together. Rafe was there. I said something to him. But that wasn’t real. I had imagined it. Hadn’t I? What did I say? Could I have actually said those things?
And he left me? I thought he would never leave. He promised he would protect me and keep me safe, and then he took off? I was kidnapped and beaten up by a psychopath, and he was gone?
“You were angry about the tracker.” Max had gotten Aunt Sylvia a chair and had moved it close to my bed so she could still hold my hand.