Page 56 of One Last Chance

“Please. That is not true.”

“You don’t know that.” Axel stepped past Moose. “And then he struck again. And now Flynn is here, hurt and . . .” He lifted his hands. “Just sayin’.”

“That’s a pretty big blame leap there, bro.”

“I’m a pretty athletic guy. Not hard to make.” He turned and headed down the hallway, then followed the nurse into the room.

Flynn was awake, her head wound stitched and bandaged, her arm in a real sling, and her knee on ice and elevated. An IV ran into her vein, probably painkiller along with fluids, and she gave him a wan smile. “Hey. You’re here.”

The nurse rounded on him. “No, he’s not.”

He didn’t recognize her. “Aw, c’mon. I’m the one who rescued her.”

“It’s past visiting hours?—”

“Please.” He gave her his best local-hero smile.

It worked. The woman—he put her in her early forties, short brown hair—shook her head. “Celebrities,” she said, but smiled. “Five minutes.”

“She can’t sleep anyway, right?”

The nurse sighed, stuck her hands into her pockets. “Fine. But no trouble from you.” She pointed at him.

“Me?”

She rolled her eyes and left the room.

“Really, she means me?” He looked back at Flynn.

Oh, shoot, she was lovely, even with all the wounds. And sure, maybe she’d left an imprint on his heart over the radio, and only in his wildest dreams would it belong to someone who wasn’t fifty and in bearskins. But nope, she had pretty copper hair, burnished by the fading sunlight, and now that he could see them clearly, beautiful green eyes, a petite nose, pert lips, and a crooked smile that now creeped up one side.

“I don’t think she means me,” she said.

“What—I’m not the one sitting in a hospital bed, having taken a flying leap off a tall mountain.” He came over and sat in the bedside chair. “What, did you think you could fly?”

She leaned her head back in her pillow. “I wish I could. I just . . . ran. Down the mountain, at break-my-neck speed.” She sighed, her gaze on him.

Silence.

“So, I need to tell you something,” she said quietly.

“Shoot.” He leaned back, propping his ankle on his knee, folding his arms.

“Now you’re being weird.”

“Go on.”

“Fine—I was going to tell you before you almost drowned the second—or wait, was that the third—time.”

“Only the one time there, skipper. What were you going to tell me?”

And he didn’t know why, but he held his breath, hoping?—

“My name is Flynn.”

And there it went, his last reason for not really liking her full out. He sighed and leaned forward. “So, Flynn . . . Sparrow is, what, your call sign?”

“My sister’s nickname.”

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