After Xander’s blunt demand to hand over the relic, Kyanna had frozen him out with stony silence, retreating to her bookwork in simmering fury. Xander had stomped off to her study and slammed the door behind him. There he had remained. For three hours. Immersed in silence. To make matters worse, it had been a slow day at the store. Aside from Jack, only two other people had ventured inside. Of those two, only one had actually made a purchase, leaving her to stew over the confrontation with Jack, as well as the conclusions she’d drawn prior. Teacher to a demon? She snorted. How could she have been so egotistical? So narcissistic? What could I possibly teach him? Kyanna closed the store down and dragged her feet all the way to the office. A brief internal debate ensued in which her knuckles hovered at the door. With a disgusted grunt that sounded a little too much like something Xander might make—crap, he’s starting to rub off on me—Kyanna squared her shoulders and opened the door without knocking.
