City of Thorns (The Demon Queen Trials #1)
C.N. Crawford
Chapter 1
I tried not to stare at the frat boy I’d punched last night, but three things were making this hard. One—the bruise around Jack’s eye was a deep, shiny purple that caught the glare of the classroom’s fluorescent lights. Two—he didn’t even belong in this class. And three—he was sitting in the back making a grotesque gesture that involved waggling his tongue through V-shaped fingers.
Suffice to say, my presentation was not going well.
Jack Corwin had been harassing me since high school. I would have expected that by senior year of college, he’d have grown past finger-in-the-hole gestures and fake orgasm faces, but Jack liked to buck convention. Why give up that level of obnoxiousness when it was his defining trait?
I’d prepared so well for today, putting in hours of memorizing the names of the relevant psychological studies. I’d selected a knee-length black dress with a white collar—cute but professional, and only slightly goth. I’d copied down my notes and pulled my bright red curls into something like a neat ponytail. And yet, my preparation didn’t matter when confronted by that waggling tongue.
Focus, Rowan. Forget him.
I squared my shoulders, surveying the rest of the class. My classmate Alison twirled a blonde curl around her finger, looking at me expectantly. She gave me an encouraging smile.
I glanced at my notecards and started to read again. “As I was saying, the concept of repressed memories is fraught with controversy.” I raised my eyes. “Many psychologists dispute—”
Jack made a circular shape with his finger and thumb, then slid his other index finger in and out, opening his mouth wide in an orgasm face. The lights gleamed off the strange silver pin he always wore, which was shaped like a hammer.
“Sorry. Uh, dissociative fugue…” I started again. “Which is in the DSM—”
In the back of the classroom, where no one but me could see him, Jack was thrusting his crotch up and down in a pounding gesture.
Anger simmered. For a number of reasons, he was the last person I wanted around, and I finally pointed at him. “Is he supposed to be here?” I blurted. “He’s not in this class. Why is he here?”
Unfortunately, no one else had seen what he was doing, so I just looked like a dick.
My professor, Dr. Omer, raised his dark eyebrows and stared at me. When he glanced at the back of the room, Jack looked like the picture of innocence. He held his pen in his hands as if he’d been taking notes the whole time, eyebrows raised. Just a studious kid here, trying to learn.
Dr. Omer steepled his fingers, then frowned at me. He didn’t say anything because he was doing that psychologist thing where they looked at you in silence and waited for you to realized that you had done something inappropriate. I swallowed hard.
Here was the thing: Jack had followed me last night and cornered me outside my house. In fact, he’d been stalking me for years. There was a legitimate reason I’d given him a black eye.
But this wasn’t a therapy session, and I wasn’t trying to be professional. We were here to learn, or at least to get a passing grade on our transcript and move on.
“He’s not in this class,” I repeated more quietly. “I don’t understand why he’s here.”
I could feel the class’s eyes on me, and heat spread over my neck. Considering I was pale as milk, it was hard to hide it when I was blushing.
“He’s auditing the class for the rest of the semester,” said Dr. Omer in a calm voice. “He has permission to be here.” He pressed his fingers against his lips for a moment, frowning. The psychologist stare. Then, “Is there a problem with your presentation? You are usually prepared, Rowan.”
Normally, I adored Dr. Omer’s calm demeanor, but now it seemed off, like he was calmly ignoring the house that burned around him.
I took a deep, slow breath and tried to center myself by thinking about my feet, rooted firmly to the floor. Just focus and get through this, Rowan. Tonight, I’d have drinks with my best friend, Shai, for my twenty-second birthday. Beer, pizza, gossip about her amazing new life. All I had to do was get through this next twenty minutes.
“No problem at all.” I smiled. “I was just confused for a moment. I’m actually very prepared.” I cleared my throat. “Dissociative amnesia is theorized to be a state—”
Wait. Was he really going to be in this class for the rest of the semester? I had to take this class to graduate.
I glanced through the window at the City of Thorns—the magical city that loomed over Osborn, Massachusetts. I planned to get in there for graduate school, and I wanted to do so as soon as possible.
“Rowan?” Dr. Omer prompted, a hint of annoyance in his tone. “It might be better if you try this again on a day when you’re more prepared. I don’t think this is the best use of our class time.”
Ouch. My hands were shaking, but I wasn’t sure if that was the result of anxiety or anger.
“No, I’ve got it. Sorry. I was thrown off by the projector not working.” I swallowed, ready to regain my composure. “What I’m talking about is an inability to access memories in the unconscious…” I flipped my notecards around, trying to weave my thoughts together into something coherent. “Particularly autobiographical memories, the things from your life…”