Padding down the hallway, I headed toward the kitchen, ready for a warm cup of tea. My mind flipped through potential places I could meet the type of guy I wanted. For a moment, I found myself wondering how most succubi went about their feedings. In the time I had knowingly been a part of this team, I’d created a specific process for myself.
The moment I felt the first trickles of sickness making their way through my body, I instantly went on the hunt. It was something I’d learned early on the hard way.
Finding someone proved to be a difficult and lengthy process at times, considering there were only certain guys I chose to feed from. Being picky was the single best advice my mother had given me at the time of my awakening. Of course when she mentioned it she’d meant I should pay attention to the aura colors, not the guy in particular, because some could cause adverse reactions. I followed her advice each time, but also took it a step further and became selective with the type of guy I fed from as well.
I enjoyed going after the guys who were on the nerdy side and had yellow as their base aura color. It tasted of lemons and always seemed to leave me feeling alive, healthy, and happy. Orange was a second favorite of mine, as long as it was truly orange and not red-orange. There was a huge difference between the two, as with any color variation, when it came to their meanings. I spun the ring on my left hand around. It was something I tended to do when I thought about her because the ring had been what led her to me on the night of my awakening. There was some sort of connection between it and her, one that a part of me hoped was still intact. It was the main reason I still wore the thing.
After I made myself tea, I migrated to my couch, grabbing my laptop off my end table along the way. Feeding could wait, at least for a little while. I checked my email on my cell while my laptop booted up. Fifteen unread emails glared back at me. I scanned the subject lines: Price Quote, Any Pre-mades, Cover Question. I clicked on the first email. It was a request to purchase a pre-made I’d created months ago. A smile twisted at my lips. Designs by Kenna might actually become a thing by the end of the year. Excitement slipped through me at the thought.
After reading through each email, I created a list of which ones were for pre-mades I had already completed and which were for brand new works. Leaning back, I stared at the notepad balancing on the armrest of my couch. There were nine customs and six pre-mades waiting to be sold! After taking a small sip from my tea, I set it down on the end table and decided to get down to business emailing those who wanted pre-mades first.
Around eleven fifteen my eyes were crossing from staring at my computer screen for so long, and my legs had fallen asleep from the awkward way I’d been sitting. It was time to shut down my computer and move around. I had responded to everyone, sold three of the pre-mades instantly, and received an idea for a paranormal cover that I’d ran with and had already almost completed a mockup for. If I could complete all fifteen orders this month, that would be fifteen hundred dollars in my pocket. My mind ran wild with thoughts of what it would mean to have that many orders every month. Tingles slipped through me as I daydreamed about not bartending at Spark anymore and living my dream as a graphic designer.
That was all the motivation I needed.
After rinsing my mug in the sink, I headed down the narrow hallway to my bedroom. I was starved, and there was only one place I wanted to eat at—Lucky Duck. Who knew, maybe I could kill two birds with one stone and curb my succubus side while there as well?
The bells attached to the double front door of Lucky Duck jingled as I pulled one open. A delectable aroma of spices and vegetables tickled my senses as I stepped inside. That had always been one of my favorite things about Lucky Duck, the incredible smell of the food. My best friend, Bree, and I had stumbled upon the place the first time we skipped school and headed to the city alone. Even back then the atmosphere and amazing smells had called to me.
“Hello, welcome to Lucky Duck,” the woman behind the register called to me. In all the times I had eaten here, I’d never seen her move from that spot. She hadn’t seemed to age either. If it hadn’t been for the fact that I couldn’t see an aura around her, I would have thought she was something supernatural. “How many?”
“One,” I answered.
“Take a seat wherever you like.” The woman smiled and waved her hand toward the dining area.
I returned her smile and started toward the nearest table. Once I sat a waiter stepped to my table, ready to take my drink order. It was always the same—sweet tea with no lemon.
“Hello.” He greeted me with a toothy smile.
I attempted to look him in the eyes, but his vibrant aura was distracting. “Hi.”
The bright yellow shimmering around him called to each of my senses more than the delicious scent of food clinging to the air.
“Can I get you something to drink?”
“Sure. I’ll take a sweet tea. No lemon, please.”
He nodded. “No problem.”
I watched him as he walked away, taking his insanely bright aura with him. While I loved the vibrant yellow auras, he wouldn’t be my guy. I didn’t like feeding off guys I saw on a regular basis. Not that it would matter because they wouldn’t remember what I had done to them anyway, but because I would. It would be destructive to my conscience because the guilt from knowing what I had taken from them would eat away at me each time I saw them.
While I wasn’t a philosophical person, I sometimes wondered if what I did—fed off the life energy of men—robbed them of a few days, weeks, months, or even years of their life. This would be another question for my mother, should I ever get a chance to see her again. Unconsciously, I toyed with my ring again.
Glancing around the room, I took in all the other patrons who had decided Saturday afternoon seemed like a good time for Chinese food as well. There was a small family of three sitting at the table adjacent to mine. The mother was talking adamantly about something while the father stared at her with a bored expression. I noticed him glancing at his cell resting on the table every few seconds. His aura was muddy red, a color I had learned early on represented annoyance and rage. My lips quirked into a thin smile as I thought of what was on his phone that seemed to garner so much attention. A game maybe? Either way, family man was ruled out because he was just that, a family man with a wife and kid sitting with him. In addition, his energy wasn’t one I enjoyed the side effects from. The last thing I needed was to go from feeling drained to being completely pissed off and irritated at the drop of a hat. I needed to find someone with a mellower mood.
I scoured the dining area for a single guy because I never liked going after the ones who were with someone. My conscience didn’t do well when it came to feeding off them.
A couple close to my age caught my attention next. I couldn’t hear what they were talking about or read their lips, but I was a firm believer in body language, and theirs was telling me they were in an argument. The girl’s aura was a mystery since I could only see male auras unless they were a supernatural, but the guy’s was bright. It was orange-red and speckled with dots of the same mud red as the family guy. Whatever they were arguing about, it was apparent from his aura and overall demeanor that he thought he was right and winning their spat. The girl seemed beaten down by the weight of his words, and unwilling to put up too much of a fight.
The waiter paused at their table to ask if everything was okay with their meals. It was typical waiter etiquette, but the way the guy cocked his head and the nasty expression on his face, you would have thought the kid had said something disrespectful.
A smile twisted my lips. Not because I enjoyed seeing such a dramatic display of assholism, but because I was in the mood to strip this guy of that specific trait completely. By the colors swirling around him, I gathered this was most likely normal behavior for him, which pushed me in the direction to do so even more.
The argumentative prick was an arrogant ass, and it just so happened that was exactly what I was craving today now that I’d s
een it.
The side effects of feeling smug and full of myself weren’t enough to detour me. Not with this guy. He deserved to be taught a lesson. To further work myself up, I thought about his girlfriend and how beaten down she seemed by whatever he’d said to her. I was positive this wasn’t the first time he had treated her like crap, especially in public.
My waiter came with my lemon-less sweet tea.
“Here you go.” He set it down in front of me. “Can I get you anything else?”
I glanced at asshole’s table and wondered if he was nearly finished eating. I needed to make a move fast if I was going to nab him.
“No, thank you. I’m having the buffet.” I reached for the straw he had set next to my tea and began unwrapping it ready to get this thing going.
“Enjoy.” The waiter gave me a slight nod and walked away taking his tempting yellow aura with him.
It would have been so easy to reel him in, feed on what would have been the best energy I’d had in a month, and drop some little compliment into his mind as payment. I couldn’t though, not tonight. The only guy I wanted was sitting two tables over already running his mouth about something else.
Every now and then, I let a good guy slip past me and went after one I thought to be vile. In my mind I was ridding the world of one asshole at a time, while boosting the confidence of the lesser, more deserving men as I went.
While I may have a curse to be slutty holding me down for the rest of my life, I could at least turn it into a mission in my mind, something to take away the dirtiness of it and bring it into the light of good. This was how I did that.
I took a slow sip of tea while fixating on the asshole sitting two tables down. He was talking obnoxiously loud, but I couldn’t focus on his words. I was formulating a game plan. Since he already had someone with him, it made things complicated. Not impossible, just complicated.
I decided making eye contact with him would be where I started. After inhaling sharply, I released my breath, allowing my facial muscles to relax. This was what I called my get-caught-looking scheme. Once he noticed me looking, I would pull out my shy smile, and hold his stare for a few seconds before glancing away.
While I was prepping, the guy did something that made me rethink the first half of my plan—he checked out the mom from family guy’s table as they walked past him to pay. It wasn’t a smooth slip of the eyes either; it was a full-fledged gawk. His head tipped to the side and he froze for a moment, as though he couldn’t have two consecutive thoughts going in his mind at once. It was sickening, considering his girlfriend was sitting in front of him.
The shy smile I had planned to use might not be the way to go with this one. If he was into blatantly checking other women out in front of his significant other, then he was looking for someone with a wild side and a sense of domination. I’d met his type before.
While I found guys like him did enjoy feeling in control of things, there were still times when all they wanted was to be controlled. They wanted a woman who would rock their world and come on as hard as they did, one who could get a little bit kinky without an issue.
Yuck. I hated guys like him. By no means was I that type of girl, but if I put my mind to it—and I was hungry enough—I damn sure could be.
Straightening my back, I took in a deep breath and decided the sex vixen smile would be more appropriate for this situation.
I was going to make this asshole think I was about to rock his world tonight, and then I would, but not the way he hoped.
Chapter 5
After taking another sip of my sweet tea, I slipped out of my seat and started toward the stack of warm plates nearest him. A small sense of doubt crept through my mind because I didn’t want to hurt his girlfriend any more than she already had been tonight. Flipping my long dark hair over my shoulders, I forced myself to think of this as helping her instead.
I wasn’t hurting her by going after her man; I was doing her a damn favor because I would make him better after. Telling myself this was the only way I could go through with it.
I never wanted to be labeled as a home-wrecker, but in situations like this the label could be placed on me without doubt. I walked a fine line as a succubus when it came to such things, one my conscience rarely let me forget.
My eyes skimmed the girlfriend as I reached for a plate. I wasn’t sure why. Maybe it was so I could see for myself that she was a fractured soul being with him, but she was in too deep to break free. A way of validation that I was doing something good for her, that she was worthy of it, because if she looked as arrogant and vile as he seemed, then I would do this without any guilt or sympathy for her. My conscience would be clean, because I would at least be making one of the two better, and that had to count for something.
As soon as my eyes landed on her, I knew I was doing the right thing for them both. She was pretty, with blond hair that fell in soft waves against her shoulders. She was petite without the frail look most women her size seemed to have. I couldn’t see the color of her eyes, but every other detail about her face was stunning—full lips, high cheekbones, a slight splattering of freckles across the bridge of her nose. What the hell was this chick doing with such a douche? She could have anyone.
My gaze traveled back to her man. I tipped my head a few degrees lower, so it would appear I was looking at him through my lashes once he glanced up. I knew from experience the move made men go wild. The second he caught me staring, I flashed him the ghost of a smile before dropping my gaze to my noodles.
One sexy smile down. Only two more to go.
The first always threw them off, the second seemed to make them wonder if I could possibly be interested in them, and the third sealed the deal.
I moved down the buffet bar toward the sweet and sour chicken and began another countdown. This time I would wait until a count of six before looking his way again. I didn’t want to seem over-interested, but I also didn’t want to leave him hanging. Adding another piece of chicken to my plate, I began my countdown.
Six.
Five.
Four.
Three.
Two.
One.
Zero.
Lifting my eyes to him, I released the tongs for the chicken. I had to stifle a smile when I realized he was still staring at me as though he had imagined my first smile. Confusion knitted his brows.
This time I didn’t glance at him from under my lashes. Instead, I held his stare for a few seconds and flashed him a seductive smile. I waited for his otherwise vibrant orange-red aura to shift into the bright red I was expecting to see before I nibbled my bottom lip and looked away.
I had his full attention now, and after smile three he would do anything I wanted…willingly.
I reached for the tongs in the crab rangoons bin, and then carefully placed two of the delicious things onto my plate before heading back to my seat. I walked past their table, unintentionally catching the eye of the asshole’s girlfriend. They were blue—big, doe-like, cobalt blue eyes. I fought to keep a sympathetic smile at bay, reminding myself that I was doing her a favor.
Adding a little more sway to my hips, I continued past their table and toward my own. His eyes were pinned to my ass; I could feel them. Either I was really on my game tonight, or else this guy was super easy to detour, which meant he had more than likely cheated on her before. My lip curled with disgust, and I had to force my expression to soften.
I twirled my noodles with my fork. Shoving down the embarrassment creeping up my neck from what I was about to do, I made sure to lock eyes with the douche before I let my tongue and lips have their way with the noodles. While I was sure I’d just pissed off every female inside the restaurant from my seductive way of eating noodles, all I had to do was glance around the room to see I’d also managed to turn on every male within sight. That wasn’t my intention though. I had only wanted to turn on one, and from the looks of it I’d succeeded.
His eyes seemed to smolder with intensity. I held his stare as
I finished chewing. One more flirty smile and a nibble along my bottom lip should do the trick. Sure enough, I was rewarded with a charming flash of his perfectly straight, white teeth.
His girlfriend said something, but I couldn’t make out what. I didn’t need to. I was positive it was about him flirting with me. The douche bag’s muscles tensed as his aura speckled with a muddy red color for a second time. He was irritated beyond comprehension with her.
I took a bite of chicken, wishing I could hear what he was saying to her, what reason he was giving for why he decided to flirt with me in front of her. Before I could finish my thought her shoulders sagged, and I knew whatever he’d said had hurt her. An ache built in my throat for her. I wished I could let her know everything was going to be all right if only she would let me have ten minutes alone with him. As I thought this, he shifted his eyes to me.
It was time to amp it up and get this over with.
Allowing my lips to twist into the most seductive smile I could manage, I flicked my eyes toward the restrooms and gave him a little nod, hoping he would get my meaning. His right brow arched, not in surprise from my rashness, but in amusement. Obviously he was thrilled about the idea. With a slight nod of his head, he wiped his mouth on his napkin and began talking to his girlfriend, probably mentioning his sudden need to use the restroom.
Without hesitation I headed in the direction of the restrooms. Running my fingers through my hair, I entered the hall. I tried to wipe every ounce of disgust from what I was about to do off my face.
I hated that this was part of who I was now.
There was no denying it though, no way to ignore it, not if I wanted to live. That was the truth about being a succubus. I could hate it all I wanted, but feeding was still a necessity.
Footsteps behind me caught my attention. I twisted my lips into a provocative smile as I spun to face my nameless conquest for the night. My eyes skimmed his features. Up close he was even more handsome than I first thought, not to mention taller. Hovering over my five-foot-two frame, I guessed he had to be close to six foot one. Sandy hair gelled and spiked to perfection was what my eyes landed on next, before moving to take in his eye color—brown. This was a letdown. Someone as handsome as he was should have an equally striking eye color. Not this guy. He was stuck with shit brown.
Succubus Kiss The Complete Series Page 4