He lay on the table, trying not to wince. Or call out for pain meds. And, of course, it didn’t help that Keely’s words kept playing through his head. He had to find her before she left town. The sense of it ground into him, his bones. Yeah, she’d given him a stiff arm, clearly angry about Vic—and maybe she had a right to be.
“Why don’t you call a press conference,tell therest of my secrets.”
Ouch. But if he looked past that, he could see her fears behind the persona. Maybe he had been blind to what he might be getting into with her.
But maybe that blindness—the blizzard, the circumstances—had been the only way to really know her.
And for her to know him, past the dark funk, as Flynn called it.
An hour later, ice wrapped around his knee, plenty of prodding from the intern, he had an MRI scheduled down in Anchorage, had traded out the wheelchair for a pair of crutches, and might be a little less edgy with the flow of painkillers in his system.
Such a hero. But at least he wasn’t curled into a ball.
“You have someone picking you up?” This from the intern, who’d taken off his gloves and was petting Caspian, whose tail swished on the floor.
Hopefully. “Actually, I’m looking for a woman who stopped by here. About five foot four, blond hair, really pretty.”
The intern grinned. “Yeah, she was here. A couple hours ago, maybe. She wasn’t admitted.”
He sighed. “She left?”
“I saw her go upstairs. But didn’t see her leave.”
Upstairs? He frowned, then nodded and headed for the elevator.
It opened onto the second-floor lobby. A woman with copper hair, long and flowing, who wore a pair of leggings and an oversizedhand-knit sweater, sat in a wheelchair, holding a couple of parkas in her lap.
Kennedy Bowie, Flynn’s sister.
Sully stood behind her, leaning on the push handles, his mouth pinched. He wore a wool cap, his hair falling out of it in the back, and a good week’s growth of beard.
The image of the bloody cabin flashed through Dawson’s brain as he maneuvered out of the elevator. “Hey.”
“Hey,” Sully said. He stepped up to catch the door, but it closed on him, so he shrugged and held out his hand to Dawson. “You okay?”
“Yeah. I, uh...” He glanced at Kennedy. She seemed pale and wan, and his heart bled out for her. “I’m sorry about your loss.”
Caspian came up to her and put his head on her lap. Kennedy jerked, then ran her hand over his head. She looked up, offered a smile that didn’t touch her eyes. “Thanks.”
His chest hurt. He turned to Sully. “We were at the outpost. Keely, uh, cleaned everything up.”
A beat.
Then Sully nodded, followed by a frown. “Are those my jeans?”
Oh, right. “Yeah. And socks. And I really like this flannel shirt—”
“I got it at Bowie Mountain Gear. It’s a Pendleton.”
Another beat. “Right. I’ll get it back to you.”
Sully laughed, not quite clear of pain, but he put a hand on Dawson’s shoulder. “Just messin’ with you, bro. It looks good on you.”
Kennedy took Sully’s other hand. “Thank you for ... for...” She cleared her throat. “Thank you for cleaning up.” Her eyes filled.
“It was Keely, really. She also fixed your ham radio.”
“Wow. Skills,” Sully said. “She seems ... different than when we found her.”
