jets. The water was icy cold and he gasped when it hit him. Shivering, he quickly adjusted the temperature then looked up when Tom’s voice came from the neighbouring stall.
‘It’s unheard of for Joanna not to give a new recruit a thorough going over,’ Tom shouted above the noise of the water. ‘I can’t recall her ever letting anyone get on with the job without first checking to ensure he knows what he’s doing. You can have a list of references as long as your arm but she still has to be sure you’re equal to the task, so how come she gave you free rein today? What’s your secret?’
‘Oh, I expect she’d seen enough when I operated on that chap with the ruptured spleen,’ Dylan replied uncomfortably, because he’d heard the speculation in Tom’s voice. A wave of heat that had little to do with the temperature of the water rushed through him and he grimaced. The thought that Joanna might have treated him as a special case was both intriguing and scary. Whilst he appreciated the fact that she trusted him enough to do his job, he didn’t want to get carried away by the idea that she might have afforded him special treatment for any reason other than his professional skills…
The hell he didn’t!
Did Joanna see him as rather more than just a very new colleague? he wondered euphorically. And was that why she’d waived her rules today? His mind ran riot with the idea so that he missed what Tom said and had to apologise. ‘Sorry. What was that?’
‘I said that it still isn’t like her to be so lenient.’ The water in the neighbouring stall was suddenly switched off but Tom didn’t bother lowering his voice. It came booming over the partition.
‘Joanna is paranoid about making sure everything is done to her exacting standards. That woman lives and breathes surgery to the exclusion of everything else. I don’t know how you managed it, my friend, but you’ve achieved the impossible. You’ve made Joanna Martin behave like a human being for once, and I and the rest of the staff salute you!’
Joanna left the changing room as soon as she was dressed. It had been a busy day but she was pleased with what she had achieved. She checked her watch as she hurried towards the stairs and smiled when she realised that she’d have time to go over her speech before she needed to get ready for the dinner. She’d got through her list that day in record time thanks to the fact that Dylan Archer had taken half her patients, so she may as well make the most of the early finish. Although she was confident that she had covered all the points she wanted to make, it wouldn’t hurt to go through her notes one last time…
Joanna is paranoid about making sure everything is done to her exacting standards. That woman lives and breathes surgery to the exclusion of everything else. I don’t know how you managed it, my friend, but you’ve achieved the impossible. You’ve made Joanna Martin behave like a human being for once, and I and the rest of the staff salute you!
Joanna was passing the men’s changing room when Tom’s voice suddenly boomed out into the corridor. She came to an abrupt halt, feeling herself trembling when she realised what he’d said. Did the staff really consider her dedication as a form of paranoia? Might it even be true? She didn’t want to believe it but she couldn’t deny there was some truth in what Tom had said. She did live and breathe surgery but she’d needed to be completely focused to get where she was. She was a woman in a man’s world and it had needed total commitment to get her this far…
But surely she was entitled to a life apart from her work?
The thought slid into her mind and she frowned because it was the second time that day she’d found herself questioning the life she had chosen. It didn’t make sense because she was perfectly happy with what she had achieved, but then the rest of Tom’s statement didn’t make much sense either. To suggest that Dylan Archer possessed any kind of power over her was ludicrous!
Joanna’s lips snapped shut as she hurried to the stairs. She deliberately closed her mind to the little voice inside her head which was calmly pointing out that the suggestion had simply mirrored her earlier thoughts. Maybe she had toyed with the idea that Dylan Archer seemed to have a strange effect on her, but a stint in Theatre had soon brought her feet safely back onto the ground. Dr Archer was a colleague and that was all he would ever be. The chances of him turning her ‘into a human being’—whatever that meant—were nonexistent. She didn’t intend to get that involved with him!
Joanna was more than a little irked by the suggestion as she let herself into her office. Fortunately, it was gone five and Lisa had left so she was spared having to make small-talk with her secretary. She found her speech then sat down at her desk. There was a stack of letters in her tray for signing but she would deal with them after she had read through her speech. She wanted to be sure she was word perfect because it was important that she should put on a good show that night. She was Joanna Martin, Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons, Head of Surgery at St Leonard’s Hospital, and that was something to be proud of. Whether or not her staff considered her to be paranoid or inhuman was neither here nor there.
Joann quickly read through the speech from start to finish but the words which had sounded so fluent and interesting that morning now sounded stilted and pompous. Panic hit her as she pictured herself standing up in front of the august gathering and watching them yawning with boredom. What on earth was she going to do? She couldn’t possibly hope to rewrite the whole speech at this late stage.
‘Sorry to bother you, Joanna, but I just wanted to tell you that Ada Harper is fine…Joanna? Are you OK?’
Joanna looked up when she heard Dylan’s voice. He was standing in the doorway to her office and the concern she could see on his handsome face suddenly made her want to cry.
‘I’m fine,’ she replied thickly, struggling to control herself. She couldn’t recall the last time she’d felt this emotional and it was hard to hold back her tears now.
‘Of course you’re not fine! That’s obvious so tell me what’s wrong. Maybe I can do something to help?’
His tone was even gentler now, gentle and persuasive and so wonderfully tempting that she longed to unburden herself, but how could she? How could she show any sign of weakness when she was supposed to be in charge of this department? It could undermine her credibility to such an extent that she might find it impossible to do her job. Then she would have to hand in her notice and start afresh somewhere else although it wouldn’t be easy because news travelled fast. It would be all round London that she hadn’t been able to cope and then, of course, people would say it was her own fault for aiming so high in the first place…
‘Hey, come on! Nothing can be that bad.’
She hadn’t realised that Dylan had crossed the room and nearly shot ten feet into the air when she felt his arm go around her shoulders. He bent so that their faces were level and her heart stumbled to a halt when she saw the tenderness in his eyes.
No man should be allowed to look at a woman like that, she thought dazedly. It gave him an unfair advantage because it made it impossible for her to think rationally. When a man looked at a woman the way Dylan was looking at her she became putty in his hands.
Joanna shrugged off his arm and pushed back her chair in one rapid movement that startled her as much as it startled him. She leapt to her feet and glared at him. ‘I have no idea what you think you’re doing, Dr Archer!’
‘I’m trying to find out what’s wrong and if I can help in any way. I thought that was obvious.’
His tone was clipped although the look on his face was so comical that Joanna experienced a sudden urge to laugh. Did he have any idea how stunned he looked at that moment? Of course not! He was the type of man who was normally in control of himself and the situation and it must be a rare event for him to find himself out of his depth like this.
The thought should have been comforting but for some reason it just served to knock her even further off balance. Joanna felt her insides quiver as she tried to deal with the thought that Dylan was as unsure about what was happening between them as she was. What had Tom said about Dylan making her behave like a human being? Well, it was true because he made her feel things that she’d