Page 51 of Fool's Gold

He frowned at his cell. "Listen, ma'am, this is an emergency. Tell her that her cousin Sarah has been hurt."

There was a pause. "Very well, I'll give her the message. Hold please."

Rafe listened to the music playing softly in his ear and scowled. How was he going to tell her the news? Either way, she was going to blame him, and she'd be right. Sarah wouldn't be lying in a hospital room if he hadn't conned her into coming back to rescue him. He had to make it up to her.

"Phillipa Maxwell here," a brusque, woman's voice said, "my receptionist said Sarah was hurt. Is this Rafe Halliday?"

"Yes, I'm Rafe Halliday."

"Let me tell you one thing, Rafe Halliday. If you're to blame for this, I'll kick your behind clear across Wyoming. I'll sue you until you've got nothing left but the lint in your belly button."

He grimaced at her words. They were too close to his own thoughts. "I'm to blame all right. I left her alone and someone bashed her on the head."

Phillipa gasped. "Oh, my God. How is she?"

"Unconscious." It hurt to talk about. He stared at the geometric pattern of the ceramic tile on the wall to get a handle on his raging emotions. "Sarah has a concussion, but there's no skull fracture and no bleeding in the brain. On the bright side, the doctors think she'll be all right."

"They think, but they don't know."

Pipi's apprehensive tone reflected his own fears. "That's about the size of it."

"I'll be on the first plane out there," Phillipa told him in an assertive voice.

He nodded. "Good, I was hoping you'd say that. Sarah needs her family around her now. Listen, before you hang up, I did some digging and got Sarah's grandmother's phone number."

"But that's impossible," Phillipa sputtered. "She's dead."

"No, she's not."

"But Grandfather...why that nasty old man. How could he do such a thing?"

He shrugged. "Judging by his personality, I'd say it was easy. Anyway, I'm going to call her."

"Why don't you let me do it? That way we can decide to fly out there together. I might even haul Grandfather out there with me. He's got a lot of explaining to do, and he might as well do it in person. Settling things with Grandfather would do Sarah good."

"Sounds good to me," Rafe murmured. "I suppose it would be good for her to have it out with the old grump. Just don't let him upset her. It'll be nice to have a go-between like you that Sarah's comfortable with."

"But what about you? You'd be the natural one to intercede."

His hand tightened on the phone. "I won't be here."

"Are you running out on my cousin?" Phillipa shouted.

He held the phone away from his ear until her tirade was over. "I'll wait until I'm sure she's okay, but then I have to leave."

"Why, did you find out she's not going to be wealthy after all?"

He tensed. "I'm going to ignore that because I know how upset you are. To put it plain and simple, I'm not going to hold her to me with lies anymore. All it's done is cause misery. This way, she's free to follow her own path."

"Don't act so innocent. Sarah told me before she went out on her fool's errand that you were using her connections to get funding for your dude ranch. And aside from that, she had me wire all her personal funds to give to you."

"I married Sarah because I love her. And I wouldn't accept her help. She still has the check." He tensed because the accusation reflected Sarah's own fears. He had taken advantage of her, but not in the way she feared. He'd taken all her love and given back nothing but pain in return.

Pipi sighed. "I don't want to spend any more time arguing with you. I'll be on the first plane out, and don't you dare leave until I get there. I have some annulment papers for you to sign."

"I'll be waiting."

Rafe sat in the chair by Sarah's hospital bed. At least she wasn't so deathly still anymore. Her eyelashes were like dark crescents on her pale cheeks.

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