“Are you feeling better?”

The voice came out of the darkness. He groaned and squinted, his head throbbing. He was in a soft bed, a beautiful blonde woman looking down at him with concern in her eyes.

“Ow,” he muttered. “My head. My legs.”

She put a cool cloth on his head and patted his shoulder gently.

“I know,” she said. “It’ll hurt for a time, but I’ve put a splint on your leg and I think, with time, it’ll get better.”

“Ugh,” he said. “I hope so. You should see me dancing.”

He managed a thin smile, and she smiled back. “Well, you can save your first dance for me,” she said. “Why would they do this to you, anyway?”

He sighed. “I wouldn’t tell them anything,” he said, half closing his eyes and sinking back into the soft pillows. “They wanted to know where the attack was going to fall but I didn’t tell them.”

She stroked his hair gently.

“I didn’t tell them. They don’t know about Jericho Beach.”

She smiled. “Jericho Beach? Lovely. That’ll do.”

He fell back into unconsciousness as she left the room, smiling like the cat who got the cream.

© Kari Fay

(Author’s Note: Bit of a sequel to last Wednesday’s story.)