Page 47 of Demon of Dreams

It was hard to say what I saw, exactly. Surprise, first—the tiniest widening of his eyes. But that was gone so fast I thought maybe I’d imagined it. It was followed by the hint of a lip curl, and his body stiffening, like he wanted to take a step back, but self-control was stopping him.Disgust, whispered the voice in the back of my head.

But in the blink of an eye, that was gone too, replaced by a nostril flare, and his brows knitting together. Anger. There was no mistaking that.

And then, nothing. It was like a portcullis smashed down in front of his face, sending his features back to stillness.

It was all over before anyone else had a chance to notice.

“Would you care to share your skills with the class?” the lumberjack said. You would never have known from his tone that he recognized me at all. “Perhaps come up here and teach the lesson that you’re so convinced you don’t need to attend?”

His face was so blank, his posture so rigid, that I wondered if maybe that was just his default setting. He didn’t look like the kind of guy who relaxed easily. It was hard to even picture him sitting down.

He was waiting for a response, I realized with a jolt. And now everyone was watching me, and I was going to make a fool of myself before class had even officially begun. Fan-fucking-tastic.

“Uh, no. Sir.” I added the honorific, uncertain if it was necessary but figuring it couldn’t hurt. “I wasn’t—I don’t—I’m not an expert. At all. I just wasn’t, uh, feeling…”

I trailed off, not quite able to mention my by-now-very-real stomach ache. I had a feeling the lumberjack wouldn’t care. I jogged forward, joining Ash and Felix in line.

“Sorry,” I said when I realized he was still staring at me. What more did he expect me to say?Sorry I watched you dominate some guy in a public restroom and fantasized about you doing the same thing to me last night?“Sorry, I didn’t—I mean, it won’t happen again.”

After a long moment, he nodded, as if he expected nothing less. “See that it doesn’t.”

With that, he scanned the rest of the line and began to explain a confusing set of instructions regarding the moves we’d be practicing that day. At least he didn’t make me introduce myself again. With my luck, I’d forget my own name and make an even bigger ass of myself.

Hi, I’m an idiot, and horrified by how much I’d like to suck your cock.

“What’s up?” Ash whispered as the lumberjack continued to talk. “You okay?”

“Yeah,” I said faintly, trying to keep up with the instructions. Most of them made no sense to me, but I didn’t need to get yelled at a second time for not listening. “Just, uh, wondered if I could find a bathroom here.”

“Far end of the room, through the door on the right, then down the hall on the left,” Felix said with an encouraging smile. “But I wouldn’t try to go until the second half of class. Professor Braverman hates it when people miss the beginning of lessons.”

“Professor Braverman,” I said under my breath. So that was his name. Still hard to match that to the guy who’d told me to get on my knees in a public restroom.

“You can just call him Noah,” Ash said. “Everyone else does.”

“Not to his face,” Felix said.

Noah.

I rolled the name around on my tongue, tasting the edges of it.Noah. It fit him, I decided. Not that I’d ever tell him that. I was still hoping that magic would turn out to involve time machines, and I’d be able to go back and undo this whole day.

That wish only got stronger after we were broken into pairs and arranged around the mats to practice the day’s moves. Ash and Felix began arguing about who should partner with me, but before they could decide, the lumberjack’s voice cut through the din around us.

“Sean. Come on up. You can partner with our expert over here. It sounds like he could use a challenge, and you’re always talking about how this class is too easy.”

My stomach plummeted to roughly the center of the earth. I looked over at the lumberjack—Noah, his name is Noah—and Sean, who had joined him. Sean was smiling that predatory smile again, while Noah remained expressionless.

With a final glance back at my friends—Ash mouthed a silentsorryat me, and Felix winced in sympathy—I walked over to meet Noah and Sean, my body leaden. At least no one else was looking at me now, busy as they were with their own exercises.

No one else except Noah.

“I’m sorry,” I said when I reached him. “I wasn’t trying to say I knew the lesson and didn’t need to be here. I swear, I don’t knowanything. I just—”

“I’m sure if there’s something you don’t know, Sean will be happy to help you.”

It was the kind of thing you were supposed to say with a smile, but there was no trace of one on Noah’s face.

The smile on Sean’s face only grew. “More than happy, Professor Braverman.”

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