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“Classy, Dakota.” Noah turned back to Leah. “You sure you want to continue hanging out with him. I’m far nicer than he is.” He offered her a grin then shook his head. “No, that’s not true. I’m not half as nice as he is.” Sighing, he angled his head at her. “You look as if you’d be good at finding spots for all these sunflowers around the room.”
“Sure.” She rolled up her sleeves and prepared to dive in.
A clatter, followed by shouts, ripped her attention off the flowers. When her gaze landed on the overturned ladder and Dakota’s sprawled form on the floor of the hall, she stopped breathing.
****
Dakota never realized how fucking hard the wood flooring at Brenton Lake Hall was until his body slammed onto it. All the breath whooshed out of his lungs on impact and he literally saw stars. He’d never actually thoughtseeing starswas a real thing. He’d been proven wrong a mere few seconds ago when two hall workers moving a table rammed into the bottom of the ladder he’d been perched atop. He’d gone from contemplating the best way to fasten the streamers to the center light to shouting at the workers to watch out to plummeting at a scary velocity to hammering into the unforgiving ground.
“Oh, my God… oh, my God…” Leah’s face came into view as she kneeled and bent over him. Her skin was freaky pale and her eyes were super wide. “Oh, my God.”
Is she shaking?Or was he dizzy from the fall?
He made a move to sit up, but a strong hand on his shoulder pinned him down.
“Hold on a minute, man,” Noah said. “Someone call 911.”
“I don’t need 911,” Dakota said. “I’m fine.”
“Dude, you got tossed like a rag doll from fifteen feet. You’re getting checked, and I’m tearing those hall workers a new one as soon as possible.”
Dakota rubbed his hand over his torso. “Am I bleeding or something? Nothing feels busted.”
“No blood, but let’s be sure before you spring back into action, okay?” Noah wagged a finger at him. “You’d make me do the same thing. Admit it.”
Dakota swatted his buddy’s hand away. “You’re more fragile than I am.”
“Oh, my God…”
He turned his head to look at Leah. “I’m okay, Leah. Really. The EMTs are going to have a good laugh over this one.”
But Leah wasn’t laughing. In fact, she hadn’t blinked in the moments he’d been looking at her. She hugged her arms around her and just stared at him.
“Are you all right, Miss Greenstead?” Luke had sidled up next to his teacher.
“Note how the boy figures I’m just fine,” Dakota said.
“Rule number three,” Luke said. “Adventure guys don’t break.”
Dakota managed a smile for his young apprentice, but when he went to reach out to take Leah’s hand, a sharp pain shot through his right arm. “Shit.”
“Your arm is broken, isn’t it?” Dena came into view.
“Of course his arm is broken,” Jacy said from somewhere nearby. “Did you see the way he bounced off it before rolling to his back?”
Come to think of it, he did remember putting his arm out at the last moment. Something had told him to stop this from being a bad accident. A really bad accident. Not so much for him—though he had wanted to avoid that as well—but for Leah. She wouldn’t have a good reaction to this.
“Oh, my God…”
He’d been right.
Krista squeezed in next to Noah and looked down at him. “How many times have I told you that you can’t fly, Dakota?”
“At least a million,” he said with a pained grin.
“Oh, my God…”
“Someone please take care of Leah,” Dakota said, lifting his head slightly to see her. Witnessing the scene must have made it look as if he were falling to his death. That would no doubt spur painful memories. Memories in which she lost people she cared about. “I think she’s in shock.” He didn’t want to unload her story because it was private and not his story to tell. He just wanted someone to reassure her that he was going to be fine.
