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Which was not how I expected to spend my day, seeing nude gods.

Of course, it wasn’t that bad a thing, all things considered. He was built and pretty damn good looking.

No, focus!

I needed to wake him up, right? How did one wake up a god?

Surprising them was probablynota great idea.

“Excuse me?” I asked.

No response.

I crept closer. “Um, Mr. Were God? Rise and shine.” I tried to sing a stupid song my mother used to sing to me as a teenager, when I really didn’t want to wake up. No doubt I sang it off key and horrible, but maybe that would get him up faster.

I set a hand on the side of the slab and leaned forward, giving me the chance to peer into his face. It was younger than I figured, making him look like he was in his twenties or so. “Time to get up,” I whispered.

His eyes snapped open, and I immediately regretted everything in my entire life. He had no iris, no pupil, nothing but the amber color, brighter than a flame, nothing human or soft or kind there. It was like seeing a feral Were, seeing something driven by instincts and desires I couldn’t understand.

Yeah, maybe waking a grumpy sleeping god wasn’t the best of ideas…

Chapter Twenty-Three

The man sat up slowly, his gaze locked on me. He sure woke up well, not a bit of grogginess in his features.

I backed away, wanting more distance between him and me. He didnotlook like the sort of person I wanted to spend much time around.

“You smell of chaos,” the man said.

“I get that a lot,” I answered, trying to inch back toward the doorway.

He was awake, right? That’s all I needed. According to our best guesses, all he needed was to be aware and the energy would correct itself. It would flow correctly now, which meant I didn’t need to get all chummy with this guy.

And everything about him drove me backward, step by step. It felt like a deeply buried instinct that said I shouldnotbe here, that I should get away from him.

My crow told me that, even older instincts than that told me it.

I reached the doorway, but it was just as solid as it had looked. I turned my gaze back on the man, to find him standing now.

“You shouldn’t be here.”

With the open wall, I didn’t have a lot of places to go. I didn’t have much room to maneuver, to get clear of him. Still, I tried to keep space between us. “You’re just confused. Sleeping a long time will do that. Maybe some coffee? I know a great place.”

“I missed the scent of fear. You reek of it.” He sounded as though it turned him on, like he had some weird kink for it. That let me know everything I didn’t already know, made me suspect Knot had been totally on point.

This was not the sort of person we really wanted to deal with much.

“Well, we don’t kink shame here,” I said with a rough laugh, my hand patting along the wall behind me, searching forsomeway out.

I couldn’t hear the men from beyond the doorway, giving me a feel for just how thick the walls must be, the doorway still solid and uncrossable.

Still, even if I was starting to wonder if this had been a good idea, I was locked in. So why exactly hadn’t I found a way out? Maybe because the wall was open?

The man came forward so fast, I couldn’t track his movements. He went from across the room to just before me, his hand on my throat, pinning me to the wall.

He didn’t close off my airway, didn’t stop my breathing, but his hand was like a band around me, unwavering. He didn’t even shake as he held me, as though it took no effort at all from him at all. “I canfeelhow long I’ve been asleep. Centuries.”

“We all need our beauty sleep.”