churning waters below threatened to drown him and then carelessly wash his body away, casting it wantonly where no one would ever find him.
Then suddenly, unlike all the other times he’d had this unnerving dream, there was someone touching his arm.
Someone grabbing it and shaking him.
Someone was saving him, keeping him from being swept out to sea. He was saved!
More frustration assaulted him because he couldn’t make out the face of the person who had rescued him at the very last, possible moment.
And then he heard the voice—a woman who had hold of his arm, calling his name even as she shook him.
Somehow, he finally managed to open his eyes.
And then he saw her bending over him, her blond hair falling into her face, her hand on his arm. Holding him and keeping him from falling.
Startled, he bolted upright.
The ravine, the churning waters, they were gone. He was back in his office again. The same office where he’d lain down a few minutes ago to catch a short nap before driving himself home.
No, wait, it wasn’t a few minutes ago. It was last night.
Except that, unlike last night, he wasn’t alone. Ramona Tate was looking down at him, concern evident in her sky-blue eyes.
“Are you all right?” she asked, and he realized that this wasn’t the first time he’d heard the question. She’d voiced it before, only then it had been part of his dream—or maybe he should start calling it his nightmare. Nightmare seemed like a far more fitting label for it.
Sitting up, he swung his legs off the sofa, trying to gather his dignity to him.
“What are you doing here?” he asked gruffly, dragging his hand through his hair.
“It’s eight o’clock,” she told him politely. When he continued staring at her, she added, “You told me to come in early for a tour. Introduce me to some of the other people, things like that. I knocked on your door first,” she added. “You didn’t answer, but I heard you moaning.”
Scrubbing his hand over his face, Paul tried to focus. “I was having a nightmare.”
Ramona nodded. “That’s what it sounded like,” she agreed. Her eyes washed over him, taking in every last detail, or so it felt to him. What was she thinking? he couldn’t help wondering. “You never went home last night, did you?”
“One of my patients called in, or rather, her husband did. She was spotting and really afraid. I met them at the hospital. I seem to have a calming effect on her and her husband,” he added with a shrug. A pain zigzagged up and down his spine. He’d forgotten how uncomfortable his sofa really was.
“And?” Ramona prodded.
The woman actually looked interested, Paul mused. “She delivered just before midnight.”
Her eyes held his. “Everything went all right?” she wanted to know.
He laughed shortly. “Other than the fact that the babies arrived six weeks prematurely and that Marc McGee fainted at the first sign of blood, everything went just fine.”
“Babies?” she echoed. One of the allegations making the rounds against the Armstrong Fertility Institute was that there were entirely too many embryos being implanted at one time, resulting in multiple births. “How many babies?”
Was that interest, or suspicion, he heard in her voice? He wasn’t sure. “She had twins. Two boys. I think she was hoping for one of each, but the last few hours, she was just hoping they’d be alive and well—and out of her.”
Her mouth curved warmly. “So you delivered them and then came in here to catnap?”
Paul shrugged dismissively. “Something like that.”
He still looked tired, Ramona thought. She wasn’t going to ingratiate herself to him if he felt that he had to drag her around when he was half-asleep.
“Look, if you’d like to postpone my orientation and go home to catch up on your sleep, I understand completely. We can do this tomorrow,” she told him cheerfully.
Paul rotated his shoulders, trying to get the kink out. The sofa had definitely not been constructed with napping in mind. Still, though she’d given him an out, he didn’t want to postpone the tour. He’d already postponed it once when he shifted it from yesterday to today.
“Tomorrow,” he told her, “has a habit of never coming.”
Tongue in cheek, she pretended to take this as a revelation. “You know something that the newscasters don’t?”
He wasn’t sure if she was kidding or not. “I just meant that life has a habit of interfering with things. If we postpone this now, who knows what might come up tomorrow? For all I know, there might be a bigger fire to deal with.” He stretched, feeling several muscles line up in protest as he did so. “Just give me a couple of minutes to pull myself together.”
She was more than willing to be cooperative. “No problem. I can wait in my office if you like. And, better still,” she volunteered, “I can get you a cup of coffee.”
The offer out of left field surprised him. “I thought that women didn’t do that anymore, get coffee for their boss.”
Were her eyes smiling or laughing when she looked at him? He couldn’t tell. “Women don’t like being told to get coffee. Volunteering to do it is a whole different story.” She leaned in closer to him for a moment. Close enough for him to get a heady whiff of her perfume. Something remote stirred for a second, then faded. “And in case you didn’t notice, I was volunteering. You take it black, don’t you?”
“Is that a guess,” he wanted to know, “or are you clairvoyant, too?”
“Just a guess,” she assured him cheerfully. “The percentages were in my favor,” she confided. “You don’t strike me as the latte type, or even the cream-and-sugar type.”
“I strike you as the black-coffee type,” he said and she couldn’t tell if she’d affronted him, or if he was just trying to figure out what that actually meant. He seemed to be the kind of person who needed to have everything in black and white. He was, she silently promised him, in for a surprise. But for the time being, she’d play things his way.
Ramona nodded. “Basic. Good, rich, no frills.”
He realized that for a second, his breath had backed up into his lungs. That did it, no more sleeping on the office sofa.
“Are you describing the coffee or me?” He didn’t realize until he heard the words that he had said them out loud.
She smiled in response and for a second, he didn’t think she was going to answer. But then she grinned impishly and said, “Both,” just before she left the office.
Paul sat there for a long moment, staring at the closed door. He needed to get his day going, he reminded himself, not try to figure out the puzzles that hid behind Ramona’s sparkling eyes and long, shapely legs.
Crossing to the door, he locked it and then went to change into the spare suit he kept on hand.
A shower would have been nice, as well, but that was a luxury he couldn’t afford right now. He had a full schedule today, which was why he’d suggested doing the orientation so early. These days, he thought as he swiftly changed clothes, he always felt as if he was half a league behind in his life.
Someday, he promised himself, he was going to catch up.
Ramona was just looking at her watch for a second time, wondering if Paul Armstrong had decided to postpone her orientation tour after all when she heard the light rap on her door.
Rather than bidding him to come in, she opened the door, thinking that was the friendlier path to