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expression.

Chapter 3

    S he was so disconcerted by this unexpected apparition that it took her several seconds to make any sense out of his words. Despite her best efforts, her eyes kept falling to his chest. There was something about that expanse of masculine skin that put a catch in her breathing and made her feel flushed.
    She blinked, forcing her mind to function again. He was saying something. She dragged her eyes from his chest and looked at his face. Something was wrong. What was he saying?
    " .. .in the shower and she fell. There's blood all over. I don't think a Band-Aid is going to do it. Maybe she needs stitches. You've got to come and take a look at her."
    The doctor in her took over at the mention of blood. "I'll be right there. Keep her quiet and apply firm pressure to the wound. I'll get my bag."
    Flynn disappeared in a flurry of blue towel and Ann hurried back into the living room. She grabbed up her bag, her mind working a mile a minute. The doctor in her was speculating on what the medical situation might be, wondering if it would be necessary to call for an ambulance. The woman, shoved well to the back, was speculating on other things, like whether or not her neighbor lifted weights. That would explain those sleek muscles that had rolled so easily under his skin.
    In the shower and she fell. Flynn's half-heard explanation popped into her head, and her lips tightened in disapproval. Obviously, he had been cavorting in the shower with a woman, and she'd fallen. Probably hit her head, which would explain all the blood. There was a small, nasty part of Ann that muttered that she probably deserved it.
    None of these frantic thoughts slowed her pace as she hurried out of her apartment and across the carpeted hall. She entered his apartment through the open door. She didn't have to look far for her patient. Flynn was kneeling on the floor next taone of the sofas, his naked back blocking Ann's view.
    "She's a doctor and she'll know just what to do," His voice was soothing and full of confidence. A good bedside manner, she noted absently.
    "But you said that a dragon lived next door." The voice was definitely feminine and just as definitely under ten years of age.
    Ann tripped on the steps that had almost been Flynn's downfall the night before. Her recovery was not as graceful as his had been, but she didn't have the advantage of eight hours of steady drinking under her belt.
    Flynn glanced over his shoulder, his face expressing his relief at her presence in the moment before he turned back to his companion. "I was kidding about that. She's really very nice." He didn't sound in the least embarrassed at having it revealed that he'd called her a dragon. Ann filed the words away to examine at some other time. Right now, what mattered was her patient.
    Stepping around Flynn, she knelt by the sofa. Other than being female, the child bore no resemblance to her hasty image of a woman who'd been cavorting in Flynn's shower. She was small-boned and fragile with a mop of badly cut sandy hair that was matted with blood on one side. Her gray eyes were swimming with tears and an occasional sob shook her thin frame. She examined Ann solemnly without releasing her hold on Flynn's left hand. His right hand held a kitchen towel to the side of her head.
    The scenario was not quite what Ann had been expecting, but the injury was exactly what she'd expected. Head wounds were always frightening, but they had a tendency to bleed out of all proportion to their seriousness.
    "Becky, this is Ann. She's going to take care of your head for you."
    Ann smiled at the little girl, unaware of the way her face lit and softened with the smile. "Hi, Becky. It looks like you smacked your head pretty good." She eased the towel away and was relieved to see that the actual wound itself was not too bad. A small cut at the end of Becky's eyebrow still oozed blood sullenly, but it wasn't enough to warrant stitches.
    "Are you going to stick a needle in me?"