“No can do,” he said, wondering exactly what the Dennisons had told Martin. Apparently not the whole truth, that was for sure. Maybe the man wasn’t entirely to blame for not showing up, if Abby’s parents had led him to believe she was just suffering from a few cuts and bruises. He decided—rather nobly, he thought—to keep an open mind.
“I’m not asking, Walker. I am ordering you to put my fianc;aaee on the phone.”
An order? From that legal twit? Open-mindedness flew out the window. Riley shrugged and held the phone to Abby’s ear. When he figured the silence on her end had gone on long enough, he took it back and said, “Did you get all that?”
“What? She didn’t say a word.”
“My point precisely. Abby’s unconscious,” he said bluntly, then regretted the cruelty. It probably wasn’t Martin’s fault he was such a pompous jerk. Or that he was uninformed, for that matter.
“Look, I’m sorry,” he said. “Obviously the Dennisons didn’t explain things. Abby’s been unconscious ever since she was brought into the hospital.”
“What the hell have you done to her?” Martin accused, his voice rising to an earsplitting level. “I’ll see that you pay for this, Walker. Make no mistake about that.”
The last tiny, fragile thread of Riley’s patience snapped. “You planning to sue me? For what? I’m not a tour operator. There’s no negligence or liability here. Abby knew the risks. She begged to come along on this trip. Just ask her family. As for you, you have no standing in this matter at all.”
“You could have told her no,” the other man said petulantly.
Riley was beginning to think he could really dislike Martin Henry without even working at it. The man would bore Abby silly in a month. Maybe less.
“I believe I used that word and just about every other negative command in my vocabulary,” he told Henry. “Her mind was made up. Maybe if you’d offered her a little more excitement, she wouldn’t have turned to me to get some thrills.”
Riley winced as soon as the cheap shot was out of his mouth. Insulting Martin Henry wasn’t going to help Abby. She was engaged to the man. Obviously he must have some redeeming qualities, though at the moment they weren’t particularly evident. Perhaps he was being too hard on Martin. Perhaps the man was genuinely distraught and shouldn’t be held accountable for his stupid remarks.
“Look, shall I tell her you’re on your way?” he asked in an attempt to make peace with the other man for Abby’s sake. Not that he intended to hang around and witness the debacle of their marriage firsthand. No, he would be long gone before the vows were spoken. For now, though, he would have to tolerate the man. “When should we expect you?”
“Don’t,” Martin said succinctly. “While I find your manners deplorable, there may be some truth to what you said. I may not be exciting enough for a woman who craves danger. I had thought Abigail would outgrow that absurd need to put her life in jeopardy, but apparently I was wrong. I believe Abigail made her choice before she ever left Arizona. I am willing to respect her wishes on this.”
How bloody damned noble, Riley thought with disgust. Still, since Abby couldn’t speak for herself, he felt compelled to make at least a paltry attempt at salvaging the engagement in case it really was what Abby wanted.
“Don’t go jumping to conclusions, man. She hadn’t broken the engagement, had she?”
As Riley had intended, Martin hesitated. “No.” He sighed. “But I’m sure it was only a matter of time. Tell her she may return the ring at her convenience when she recovers.”
Abby was unconscious and the stupid attorney was worried about a ring. Riley couldn’t believe that anyone could be so crass. He glanced down at Abby’s bare fingers. “Sorry, pal. No can do. I hope that ring didn’t have any sentimental value. Looks to me as if the bandits took it when they were pummeling the dickens out of her.”
It wasn’t until he had hung up on the attorney that he realized he hadn’t seen Abby’s engagement ring since she set foot on the ground in Mexico. His gaze narrowed. “You never had any intention of going home to him, did you, Abby?”
The little burst of elation that he felt at that realization didn’t bear too close a scrutiny.
* * *
She had certainly made a botch of things, Abby realized almost as soon as she left Briarcliff. The chances of her catching the Earl of Wilton on the road to London were practically nonexistent. She was a good rider and she was on a strong horse, but he had an even more powerful mount, and he was definitely the more experienced rider. He also had at least a two-hour head start on her. It had taken time to convince Lizzy that what she was doing wouldn’t ruin her forever, to slip into the kitchen undetected and steal some bread and a meat pie, then to sneak into the stable to retrieve her horse.
Now, faced with the reality of a long, lonely ride, she was growing anxious. There was the problem of overnight accommodations, for one thing. For someone who’d preached the virtues of logic, she certainly hadn’t used very much when she’d set out from home. She couldn’t very well turn up at an inn without even a maid accompanying her. She would just have to press on until she reached whichever place the earl was in for the night and count on his indulgence. She feared there was not much logic in that plan, either. He was more likely to turn her over his knee than he was to welcome her with open arms.
Well, there was nothing to be done about that at this late date.
