Before I Wake (2 page)

I pulled a hair clip out of my pocket and secured my hair in a messy twist on top of my head. “Do you have Noah’s file?”

“You bet.” She lifted a thick folder from the pile on her desk and offered it to me.

I eyed her with suspicion—and a good dose of amusement. “How many times have you looked at the pictures?”

Not possessing an ounce of shame, Bonnie merely smiled. “A few.”

I laughed at the blatant understatement. “You’re twisted, you know that?”

Her smile broadened—her lipstick matched her nails. “And proud of it. Now, your patient is waiting, Doctor.”

She got a kick out of calling me that. It wasn’t like I was the only female on staff, but I had started working at the clinic before finishing my degree. Bonnie had been one of the first people to hug me the day I officially became a doctor—right after my brother, who had flown down from Toronto especially for the occasion. My sisters and father hadn’t been able to make it, and my mother…

Well, my mother hadn’t been able to come. She was the reason the rest of my family didn’t come. None of them had been able to bring themselves to leave Mom’s side “just in case.” Just in case she woke up.

Of course she hadn’t. Had I been able to have a discussion on the topic without being filled with an immeasurable rage, I would have told them not to worry about Mom. But then I would have to explain how I knew there wasn’t going to be any miracle, and they would think I was crazy.

“By the way,” Bonnie said, just before I walked away. “Canning and Revello are all buzzed about something. I don’t know what, but I’d avoid them unless you want to hear about it.”

Bonnie didn’t think much of Dr. Canning. I wasn’t sure why, but I knew firsthand how difficult he was actually to like. He was a great doctor, and he did fabulous work here, but I think somewhere along the line he started putting professional image ahead of patients. He had been on Oprah once, and had a framed photo of the two of them together hanging on his office wall behind his desk—right where you were forced to take notice.

I flashed Bonnie a grin. “I’ll be careful.”

I was still smiling when I left Bonnie, the thick file in hand. I flipped it open as I walked down the brightly lit, cream-carpeted hall with its sage-colored walls. I couldn’t blame Bonnie for looking at the pictures taken of Noah for the sleep study he was part of. I wasn’t part of that team, but had access to the file because of my own work with him. Tall, dark, and sexy when awake, he was just as appealing asleep. He wasn’t one of those slack and openmouthed sleepers; he wasn’t a drooler. In fact, he slept mostly on his back, arms at his side as perfect and poised as an actor on TV. A device which—I reminded myself—I watch entirely too much.

Noah was one of the few people I had ever met who faced the unpleasantness in his dreams. He was one of my special patients—a lucid dreamer. The most consistent I’ve ever witnessed. No matter the dream, Noah could fix it from inside his own head without waking up.

I hadn’t been working with Noah long, but he was one patient who I truly got excited about seeing, and I don’t mean in a personal way either—well, not totally. We met when he signed up for the sleep study. When I asked him to help me with a study of my own, he agreed without so much as a blink. I had other patients with varying degrees of lucidity in their dreams, but no one quite like Noah.

I loved discussing his dreams. He would tell me how he had changed things, how he had bent the dream to his own will, and I would write it all down as we dissected his dream and talked about what it might mean. His dreams were so vivid, I could almost imagine myself in them as he recounted them to me. I envied him. I worried for him.

Sometimes I worried for myself because Noah was the only patient who made me want to let down the walls in my head. I wanted to see his dreams for myself, watch him bend that world to his will, and cheer him on.

Through him I hoped to be able to help other people learn to free themselves from the nightmares that cripple them. To take control of their dreams within the Realm of The Dreaming, rather than allowing dreams to control them. That was my not-so-secret passion—to compile the most common abilities belonging to lucid dreamers and (hopefully) teach them to people suffering from chronic nightmares.

Because I knew that sometimes a bad dream was more than just a bad dream. And it was my way of sticking it to my father.

Dr. Canning and Dr. Revello were standing just outside the sleep rooms, talking in hushed voices. They looked excited—and guilty. There would be no avoiding them.

They looked up as I approached. “Something up?” I asked.

Dr. Canning cleaned his glasses with the end of his tie.

“Have you seen the paper this morning?”

“Uh, no.” News was depressing. I avoided it at every cost.

“Another SUNDS case,” Dr. Revello informed me. She was a fiftysomething woman who reminded me a lot of Katharine Hepburn, and was just as intimidating.

Ah, so that was the reason for the excitement—and the guilt. Sudden Unexplained Nocturnal Death Syndrome was something our profession saw but rarely, and usually only in males of Southeast Asian descent, or sometimes in diabetes or epilepsy patients. Of course my colleagues were intrigued. And of course they felt bad for being excited about someone’s death.

Then it hit me. “Another one?” When I say rare, I mean rare, like one in hundreds of thousands. Healthy people usually don’t die in their sleep for no apparent reason. At least, not to my knowledge.

Dr. Revello nodded, little wisps of gingery hair escaping the loose bun on top of her head. “The fourth in two months.”

“It can’t be SUNDS,” I insisted, “not at that rate. There has to be an explanation—like sinus arrest.”

Both doctors looked annoyed, and I realized my mistake. I had doubted them out loud, and for that I got the “look.”

“There were no signs of sinus arrest,” Dr. Canning remarked frostily. “I was contacted by investigators earlier this morning. They have no idea what might have killed these poor people, and they’ve asked me to consult.”

Dr. Revello looked positively thrilled. “Can you imagine what this will mean if we actually manage to find a common trigger? The psychology world will sit up and take notice, not to mention most of the medical world as well.”

“Well,” I said, hefting my file. Noah was waiting after all. “Good luck with that.” I said it with a genuine smile. I had my doubts that this rash of unexplained deaths was the result of a parasomnia—sleep disorder—but who was I to judge? I hadn’t been asked to consult.

I continued on my way to the sleep room. These were individually decorated in different styles and colors to make them seem more like bedrooms and less hospital-like. Patients were able to choose which room seemed the most soothing to them. Noah was in #6, which was decorated in dark blue because, he said, we didn’t have a black one.

I knocked on the door, trying to ignore the fact that my heart rate had increased noticeably. This is what happens when you have no social life outside of your work—you start crushing on people you have no business crushing on.

“Go ahead,” came the muffled reply from behind the door.

I turned the knob. This was ridiculous. Noah Clarke wasn’t even my type.

He sat on the side of the mussed bed, his bare forearms resting on his cotton-clad thighs. Boots, faded jeans, and a black T-shirt sat discarded near and on the chair by the wall along with his motorcycle jacket and helmet.

He had obviously just woken up, and what composure I had drained out through my toes.

He stood up as I entered the room and closed the door behind me. The room suddenly seemed a whole lot smaller. And warmer.

“Hey, Doc.”

I smiled at the nickname and shivered just a little at the low, rough timbre of his voice. “Hey, Noah.”

My grandmother would have said that Noah Clarke had presence—and she would have said that without the benefit of seeing him in nothing but a pair of Batman pajama bottoms.

A little over six feet, he was just that much taller than me that I had to look up to meet his gaze. He was lean and broad-shouldered, like a swimmer. I knew from his file that he was an artist and into martial arts. It had been a month after our first session before he started talking about himself, and even then he didn’t offer much. I don’t think he was being standoffish; he just didn’t talk a lot.

I liked Noah. Even if he weren’t so powerful within the Dream Realm, I think I would still like him. He seemed to like me, too.

Actually, I think he liked the fact that I could make sense of the things that happened in his head and that I didn’t think he was a weirdo.

I wonder what Noah Clarke would think if he only knew what a weirdo I was. What would he think if he realized that some of the stuff he dismissed as being nothing more than his subconscious at work was real? He’d probably accept it. Creative people were a little more open to these kinds of things.

As an artist, I don’t think “weird”—or personal grooming—was high on Noah’s radar. Not that he was what I would call strange.

Really, he wasn’t. But sometimes his clothes looked like he had pulled them out of a thrift-store bag, and his thick black hair stood out from his head in a just-out-of-bed style that wasn’t salon, but truly pillow-induced. He didn’t care what opinion people formed when they looked at him. He just was what he was. I admired that.

Today, patches of beard covered his jaw and chin. He didn’t have a lot of body hair, so the lean musculature of his body was perfectly accentuated by his golden skin. He had black eyes, too—or almost black. His complexion gave away that his background was mostly Caucasian, but the dark hair and eyes, and the faint curve of his nose hinted at something much more exotic.

Noah was exotic, even when smiling that goofy little smile that he always gave me. It was the smile that killed me, made me wonder if maybe there wasn’t something between us other than a doctor-patient relationship. I had no business wondering, but how could I help it when the man stood before me in pj’s with the Dark Knight on them, every inch of him an invitation?

Oh yeah, did I mention that he was totally hot?

“Sorry to barge in,” I told him. “I wanted to ask if you were able to pop by my office for a chat?” This was part of our arrangement. Noah took part in a sleep study run by the clinic, and we always met afterward to discuss his dreams. Other nights, when he wasn’t part of the study, I gave him exercises to try and we discussed those as well.

Was that hesitation? He seemed to freeze, just for a second, before nodding. “Sure.”

But he didn’t sound convinced. That was weird because Noah never balked at facing his dreams, no matter what they were. “Is something wrong?” What I really wanted to ask was had something happened? Color me paranoid, but I had never seen him look like that before.

Almost like he was afraid.

“We can skip a session if you want,” I added. I didn’t want to skip anything, but I was thinking of him. Or at least trying to.

A scoff and a shake of his head. He seemed annoyed at the suggestion. “No. Let’s do it.”

I gestured to the changing room, ignoring the light dusting of goose bumps his low, smooth voice always gave me. “I’ll leave you to get changed then. Meet you in my office?”

He grinned as he scooped up his clothes. “Sure thing. Hey, Doc?”

“Yeah?”

He moved toward me, bundle of clothes in his arms, one faded leg of his jeans pointing toward the floor. “You mind if I run out and grab a coffee?”

I smiled back, my confidence returning despite his nearness. “Sure.” There was a Starbucks a couple of doors down.

A gaze as warm and personal as any set of hands ran over me. “How do you like it?”

Oh, how I wish I could misconstrue that question. There was no denying that his voice had dropped an octave, become even more deep and seductive. Lately, Noah had been getting in my space more and more, flirting. I knew better than to put any stock in it, but it was flattering all the same. He was my patient, and I respected that. “Cream and Splenda. Thanks.”

He smiled. And all my respect couldn’t keep me from wanting to lean up on my toes and taste that mouth of his.

“Doc?”

“Yeah?”

Dark eyes glittered. “I have to get dressed.”

Right. Oh God. I chuckled in embarrassment. “I should probably let you do that then.”

Amusement softened his features. “Probably.” I was pretty sure there was an invitation to stay in there. That’s why I turned on my heel and practically ran to the door.

“I’ll meet you in my office,” I tossed over my shoulder before walking out.

Fifteen minutes later, I had put myself in a professional frame of mind once more, but that didn’t stop my heart from skipping when Noah entered my office. He looked just as good in clothes as he did half-naked. He had a backpack slung over one shoulder and a cardboard cup holder with two large coffee cups in his hand. His jeans and T-shirt were baggy and comfortable, concealing the lean musculature beneath. The T-shirt wasn’t even tucked in, it just bunched along the top of his jeans, slung low on his hips. I found his lack of vanity very appealing.

I took the coffees from him as he tossed the backpack on the floor. Then, without me asking, he closed the door, shutting us into the tiny box that was my office, warming the air with the scent of flavored coffee and a hint of spicy vanilla that was entirely Noah.

I really should stop working with him, but I’d rather be uncomfortable than give him up.

He eased into the chair in front of my desk, and I took the one behind it. I took a sip of my coffee before speaking. “Mmm.

Perfect. Thank you.”

He slouched in the chair, watching me with blatant interest. “I think you must be a very sensual person, Doc.”

I raised a brow. If I’d taken a drink then, I would have choked on it. “Excuse me?”

He took a drink from his own cup, making me wait for an answer, which came in the form of little more than a shrug, then, “You like things you can taste, feel, experience.”

That would certainly explain my love affair with food. “I suppose so.”