by Nana Malone
She set the dry erase marker down and slapped her hands together as if her fingers were coated in chalk dust. A commotion in the back of the room caught Ryan’s attention even as the professor began to turn. Instinctive curiosity made him twist in his seat to watch three people exiting the back doors. Two of them wore pajamas.
“Very well. Now that we’re all on the same page, let me introduce myself. I am Professor Fielding, but you all may call me Liz.”
Ryan swiveled forward again to find himself pinned to his seat by an intense blue gaze. Wow. Hot from the back, stunning from the front. He became aware that while she’d said all, the invitation in her voice and those eyes seemed to be solely for him.
It was a crazy notion, considering she had to be at least twenty years his senior, and yet, a vision flashed in his mind. Dark hair spread out on white linen sheets, red lips swollen and glistening from his kiss, full breasts straining against the low-cut lace neckline of an ice-blue, satin gown.
The scent of roses teased his nostrils, until lush curves began to writhe beneath his weight, awakening other senses. His blood warmed. His pulse accelerated.
Dazed and feeling slightly drugged, Ryan blinked just as the girl in front of him looked back over her shoulder. As if the arousing scene playing in vivid color wasn’t strange enough, the instant the redhead’s face came into focus and the professor’s blurred, his dream from earlier that morning impacted his consciousness with the force of an arrow piercing a bull’s-eye on his chest.
* * * * *
Chapter 2
Ali Whitman said goodbye to her friend Debbie as they went their separate ways, and continued to the coffee shop. She glanced over at her jeep in the parking lot from when she and Debbie had met earlier, then readjusted her backpack on one shoulder. Butterflies swarmed in her stomach as she debated her next move.
Go in, or go home?
Her reason for entering had much more to do with the good-looking guy sitting in the back corner than a need for caffeine. All her life, she’d been aware of strong connections to things, places, people. She didn’t usually question, just accepted. Having been born in the Colorado Rockies, the feeling of soul-deep belonging didn’t seem so strange. Her parents and Aunt Liz were family, so those connections made sense, too.
But this, feeling as if her life could change by meeting one person…yeah, this made her nervous.
You are not chickening out for a third day in a row. Get your ass in there!
After a deep breath, she pushed inside and further procrastinated by getting in line and placing an order. While waiting for her latte, she cast covert glances in her classmate’s direction, piecing together the complete picture of the guy instead of just a couple sneak peeks over her shoulder in class during the past week.
His hair was long enough on top to reveal a bit of a wave, but cut shorter on the sides and back. The rich brown color matched his eyes. His strong jaw sported a sexy five o’clock shadow despite it being nine forty-five in the morning, and even though he was sitting, she could tell he was tall.
The more she saw, the more she liked. Except, ever since that first day, after he’d looked her in the eye and set her heart racing, he’d taken to sitting in the very back and slipped from the room the moment Aunt Liz announced they were dismissed. Ali had followed him to the coffee shop three days ago, and her plan today was to ask him if he would be her critique partner.
She’d never been so forward in her life. Handsome as he was, he’d probably already paired up with someone, but at least it gave her an opening so she could discover why she was so drawn to him.
“Excuse me, Miss? Your order is ready.”
Ali thanked the barista as she picked up her cup and turned toward the back of the shop. Her heart skipped when she caught the object of her fascination staring at her. The moment their eyes met, electricity zapped her pulse, but he quickly looked away, color rising in his cheeks.
She forced her feet to move and approached his table. “Hi.”
Oh, yeah, real witty.
Without lifting his attention from his laptop, he mumbled, “Hey.”
“Ryan, right?”
“Yeah.”
“I don’t know if you remember me—”
“You’re Ali.” He still hadn’t raised his head. “Professor Fielding’s niece.”
Color infused his face once more, as if he hadn’t intended to reveal so much. Encouraged that he’d paid attention to her name, she slid into the chair opposite him and slipped her pack off her shoulder to rest on the floor.
“She’s not really my aunt, you know. More of a family friend. She and my mom were in the same sorority when they were in college.”
A single nod acknowledged her explanation.
She spun her cup with her thumb and forefinger, wondering if her head had suddenly sprouted hissing reptiles. Was he afraid another glance would turn him to stone? Resisting the ridiculous impulse to run her fingers through her hair, she shifted her latte to the side and dipped her head until he had no choice but to look her in the eye.
He froze for a split second before straightening in his chair. His gaze shifted up, swept the space all around her, then returned to her face. She sensed relief as if he’d blown out a tension-filled breath, and yet he hadn’t moved.
“No snakes?”
Confusion furrowed his brow. “Excuse me?”
She shrugged with a smile, running her fingernail along a line on her cup as she glanced up through her lashes. “I was beginning to think I’d turned into Medusa, the way you were avoiding looking at me.”
“Oh, sorry, no. It’s just…I had this strange dream—”
He abruptly stopped talking. She tensed at the mention of a dream, but then, he seemed so surprised by his own admission, she couldn’t help but tease. “About me?”
“No. Yes. No, not like that.”
Yes? Her interest soared. She leaned forward as if to share a secret. “Not like what?”
“Like…” That brown gaze met hers, flustered yet serious. “Forget it.”
“Oh, come on. You can’t say something like that and then tell me to forget it. That’s not fair.”
“It’s crazy is what it is.”
“Let me be the judge of that.” A vivid dreamer herself, she was very interested to hear his—especially if she’d been a participant.
He slammed his laptop shut and sat back in his seat with a resigned sigh. His attention focused out the window as he avoided her gaze once more. Ali sipped her latte, figuring he’d decided to keep his mouth shut after all.
When the silence dragged on, she tried a new tactic. “We have a whole semester together in cre-a-tive writing. If your imagination is anything like mine, what you have to say won’t be any big deal.”
He met her gaze, then rubbed his hands over his face while leaning his head back. As if coming to a hard fought decision, he finally leaned forward, arms crossed on top of his computer. “You ever dream, and when you wake up, despite some freaky twists and turns, you can directly link it to something that happened the day before?”
“Sure.” She shrugged. “Everyone does that. That’s not crazy at all.”
He cast a surreptitious glance toward the nearby tables. “How about the other way around?”
His voice had dropped and she found herself whispering back. “What do you mean?”
“I mean you dream first, and then it happens in real life. I saw the first day of class the night before it happened.”
Her turn to see if anyone was listening before leaning in while holding back a smile. “You mean like…you saw the future?”
The bob of his Adam’s apple was his only response. For the first time, his brown gaze held hers rock steady.
“You’re saying you dreamed about meeting me before we met?”
“We didn’t exactly meet. Things were…a little different in my dream.”
She cocked her head to the side, doing her damndest to figure out if he was pulling her leg,
maybe trying to scare her off, or telling the truth. The tables had turned, and now she wondered if seeking him out had been a good idea. His ominous tone stirred her subconscious, bringing buried memories of her own dream two nights ago to the surface.
Still, she asked, “What did you see?”
“You. Professor Fielding. The classroom.”
“That’s not such a big deal,” she said with unexpected relief.
“But I’d never seen you before, and yet you were in my dream. And Liz.” He frowned. “I mean, Professor Fielding. I’m sure of it.”
Ali knew the subconscious could play funny tricks on the conscious mind. She’d studied dreams in her psychology class the previous semester. “You were probably thinking about class before you went to sleep, and the next morning when you saw us, your subconscious automatically inserted our images.”
Ryan shook his head.
“Maybe you’ve seen us around campus,” she reasoned, even though she’d never seen him prior to the other morning. “I mean, to take that class you have to be either a junior or senior.”
“I’m a senior, but—”
“So am I. That’s probably what happened.”
“This is my first semester at this campus,” he stated. “I transferred in from out of state.”
Damn. He shot down every logical explanation she was determined to find. At first, she thought his claim to ‘clairvoyance’ a joke. Now, she found herself more uneasy by the minute.
“There was something else about the dream.”
She met his gaze with an intense sense of foreboding.
“There was a dark cloud surrounding you. It seemed…I don’t know…alive.”
Evil. He hadn’t said the word, but the implication resonated in his tone.
A chilling shiver zig-zagged up her spine and made the hair on the back of her neck stand on end. Averting her gaze, she rubbed at the unnerving sensation, her chest tight as she swallowed past a sudden lump of fear.
“Yeah, that is a little different. Good thing it was just a dream, right?”
He didn’t answer.
“You know, I just remembered I have to be somewhere. I’ll see you in class.”
Without waiting for his response, she grabbed her backpack and had to quell the urge to run. At the door, a glance back confirmed his brown gaze following each step she took. Apprehension tingled through her body.
Just outside the door, a pair of hands caught her. “Careful.”
She recognized the voice. A flash of silver caught her eye, and Ali absently noted an unusual winged pendant necklace as she glanced up. “Sorry, Aunt Liz, I didn’t see you.”
“Obviously. What’s the rush?”
Ryan wasn’t visible from where they stood, but it didn’t stop Ali from picturing him clear in her mind. “I’m…I’m late for my next class, that’s all. I really have to go.”
She didn’t wait for a reply as she hurried past the shop windows toward the parking lot.
Her talk with Ryan had not gone as she’d expected at all. Normally, she’d have laughed about the whole thing. No big deal, like she’d said, but two nights ago she’d had a nightmare that still haunted even her waking hours. Rolling black clouds chased her through the mountains until she tripped and fell into a river. No matter how hard she fought, ice-cold water dragged her under until she could no longer breathe. Above her, a genderless figure hovered, faceless and distorted through the water.
It mirrored a similar recollection—one she’d managed to bury deep in the recesses of her mind for eleven years. A memory that was real, not a dream.
* * * * *
Chapter 3
He’d scared her. After the dream comment slipped out, telling the truth and having her doubt his sanity had seemed like a good plan—until he glimpsed the alarm in her eyes. Then he wanted to take every word back so she’d smile at him again. Despite his efforts to avoid contact since last week, he remained drawn to her in a way he didn’t understand.
Unfortunately, he couldn’t unsay the words that’d run her off any more than he could block the memory of his dream.
Ryan watched her departure through the window, conscious of the fact that a subtle wildflower scent lingered in her absence. As she climbed up into a red jeep and drove away, he admitted something he’d stubbornly avoided until now.
She frightened him.
Or more accurately, he feared what she appeared to have triggered in his life. Between her and the mentally-disturbing vision of a younger Professor Fielding in that old-fashioned gown, he had begun to doubt his sanity. More sleep would help, but he didn’t relish what came with the night when his days were discomfiting enough.
The first time Ali’s vivid jade eyes connected with his, he’d literally lost his breath. Since then, her beautiful face hovered on the edge of his consciousness. In the moments when his concentration slipped, life-like fantasies took over. The two of them talking as they walked hand in hand through a meadow full of flowers, surrounded by the majestic Rockies. Lying together beneath the stars on a warm summer night to watch the northern lights over the mountains. Laughing as they rode together along rutted roads in a horse drawn wagon. Not one of those fancy ones tourists rented in New York City, either. This had been an honest to God buckboard wagon from over a hundred years ago. Like the professor’s dress. And his and Ali’s attire.
All suggested another time in history. If he believed in reincarnation, he’d swear they were memories from a previous life. But that was crazy—wasn’t it?
“Mr. James, may I join you?”
The sultry voice jerked his attention back to the present. Ryan looked up into a pair of eyes as arresting as Ali’s, only these were blue. Surrounded by a cascading mass of dark hair.
“Professor Fielding.” Surprise wore off and he leapt to his feet. “Um, yes, of course. Please, sit.”
She sat in the chair he pulled out for her, giving him a slow smile when he returned to his seat kitty corner from her. “I told you to call me Liz. Especially when we’re not in class.”
He toyed with his phone sitting alongside his laptop. “I know, but it feels…disrespectful.”
Her crossed legs exposed an awful lot of bare thigh, bringing back the memory of long legs wrapped around his hips, a satin gown bunched between their bodies, and so much more. Oh, God, he had to look somewhere else. Unfortunately, his gaze rose right to the exposed swells of her breasts. He willed his gaze higher and managed to focus on her necklace, a small, fairy-like creature hovering just above her cleavage.
The professor leaned forward, much the same as Ali had, only she reached out to cover his hand with hers. The movement sent a heady whiff of roses wafting past his nose. He glanced at her crimson fingernails, only to have his attention inexorably drawn back to the silver necklace as a rush of warmth stole through his body. His eyelids suddenly grew heavy, and he was aware of a surge of desire.
“Ryan, I insist. Surely you don’t want to insult me by ignoring my request?”
He swallowed hard, fighting the attraction that felt wrong in more ways than one. “No, of course not…Liz.”
Finally, he was able to lift his gaze.
She removed her hand and sat back. A satisfied smile curved her ruby red lips. “See? That wasn’t so hard, was it?”
“No.” He offered a brief smile of his own, relieved for the break in contact.
“So, what were you and my niece talking about?” she asked, lifting her cup for another sip.
Her gaze bored into his over the lid of her coffee. Under her intense scrutiny, his pulse picked up speed once more. Something deep inside warned against telling her about his dream—and that whole crazy sexual vision from the first day in class would never pass his lips.
What could he say to ease the severe expression in her eyes?
“Um…we were talking about this week’s assignment and agreed to become critique partners.”
Shit. Critique partners? Seriously? He’d never been very graceful
under pressure, but talk about stupid. All she had to do was talk to Ali and she’d discover his lie.
The professor’s gaze widened. “Oh? I didn’t realize you two knew each other.”
Heat flooded his face. He clenched his right fist on his thigh to keep from reaching up to rub his neck. “We don’t, but, um, we both liked the idea of an impartial, objective viewpoint.”
That’s it, keep digging.
An eerie, blue flame flared in her eyes. Mesmerized, his gaze grew fuzzy. Her beautiful features blurred and morphed into a faceless phantom. The ghoulish figure rose up, floating toward him.
Holy shit!
Ryan shoved back in his chair. The loud screech of the legs across the floor brought the world back into sharp focus. After a few blinks, he was dumbfounded to find the professor casually reclined in her chair, watching him with a pleased smile. A soft, sensual caress slid down his leg. Conscious of nearby customers eyeing them, his quick glance confirmed her retreating bare foot, which she slipped back into her four-inch stiletto.
What the hell is happening?
This was not the attention he’d hoped to garner from his creative writing professor.
Ryan stared across the table in confusion, positive he resembled a deer caught in the headlights, yet unable to figure out his best move. Without another word, she picked up her insulated paper cup and rose to stand beside him. When she reached out with those red-tipped fingers, he couldn’t control an instinctive recoil.
His reaction made her fingers clench. Clearly, not his best move.
After a long moment, she relaxed her fist and reached over to pick something off his shoulder. A piece of lint then drifted down to the floor between them.
“Ali is a very beautiful and talented young woman, but you may want to think twice about getting too close. We wouldn’t want you to regret your choice.”