“Can I help you?”
Riley swept her arm to the side. “After you.” She smiled at Ophelia.
The woman’s eyes narrowed momentarily before she stalked off to a nearby corner that looked like a waiting area in a doctor’s office.
“Guess not,” the woman from HR mumbled under her breath. “And how about you?” She turned to Riley. “What can I help you with today?”
A tight smile came to Riley’s lips. “I’m looking for the appropriate forms to report a dream-realm incident.” She rocked back on her heels, and hoped she wouldn’t have to explain the details out loud with Ophelia in earshot.
The woman pointed to the nearby corner where Ophelia sat. “You should find all the paperwork on that wall,” she noted. “If the form you’re looking for isn’t there, let me know and I can find you a copy.”
Riley bobbed her head gratefully. “Thanks so much.”
Across the room, a few vacant chairs lined the wall along with a literature rack filled with blank forms for employees. Riley scanned the array of papers for the form needed to report the unusual mark. She found the appropriate sheets and sat down in a chair on the opposite side of the sitting area as Ophelia. As advanced as Trusics was, it was as if half the building never got the memo to move away from pen and paper.
She propped her feet up on a small coffee table littered with outdated periodicals. There was a laminated table-tent printed with bulleted safety tips about the dream realm: Never stay longer than an hour without sexual energy. If a mark doesn’t feel right, your safety comes first. Ere on the side of caution.
Riley scanned the papers she had accumulated and began to work her way through them. She had to recount the incident to both Security and Human Resources. They wanted details—a lot of details. Riley pushed out a long breath, causing Ophelia to stir across the way.
“Who knew being a succubus would be so glamorous?” Ophelia joked. “I guess I should have read the fine print.”
“You said it,” Riley muttered.
By the end, there was so much paperwork that her pen ran out of ink. Riley looked in her bag for another one, but came up empty. She gathered up her papers and tapped them into a tidy pile. “See you later,” she said in parting to Ophelia, still scribbling on her own paperwork.
Riley approached the front desk area, which again was deserted. All she needed was another pen, but calling out for help seemed foolish. The clock ticked in the quiet room as she waited for the receptionist to reappear. She looked back at Ophelia whose head was still bent as she completed her own paperwork. Riley couldn’t help but roll her eyes. She was a succubus, and a damn good one at that. All of the paperwork was ridiculous, and she decided it could wait a day. A surge of defiant independence tickled down her spine. When no one came back to the front desk, Riley shoved the forms into her purse and exited the department.
CHAPTER FIVE
For the first time in weeks, Riley was on time for brunch. She had an inkless pen to thank for that. If she had stayed in Human Resources to finish filling out the appropriate paperwork, she would have been late again. She saw the usual suspects seated at their table on the front patio of the café. Among the regulars she recognized the form of a rarely seen friend.
She tapped the man on the shoulder, garnering his attention. “Hey, nice to see you. You’ve been MIA all week.”
Aaron twisted in his seat to greet Riley. “I know. Sorry. I was going to call, but I’ve been …” He hesitated on the word. “Tired.”
Riley took the vacant seat beside him. “How’s the wife?”
Aaron took a drink from his orange juice and set it back on the table. “Good.” He bobbed his head. “She’s been busy with work and all.”
“And how are you?” She lightly nudged his ribs. “Aside from tired.”
A weak smile crossed his rigid features. “Happy. And I’ll be even happier once I’m done with the social meet of anguish. I have to do one tonight.” Riley laughed at his honesty.
The ‘social meet’ he was referencing was a mandatory group affair held by their employer to allow a random mix of cubare and non-cubare employees to interact. It was a team-building exercise to promote bonding that had turned into an AA confessional over the years. Each employee was required to attend at least one social meet annually. During that hour, each person stood and said whatever was on their mind. Because of the free format, ‘social meets’ could run much longer than the intended hour. It wasn’t a secret that the meetings were simply a large therapy session poorly disguised as a company mixer.
“I just did mine last month,” Riley said with a proud smile. “That’s another eleven months I don’t have to worry about it.”
“Lucky girl.” Aaron hummed into his glass cup. “Do you think people would believe you if you said you were me at the meeting?” The playful tease earned him a slap to the arm. “I’m sure my wife would prefer it if I spent that time with her.”
Despite being older than all of them, Aaron had recently married a human. Riley couldn’t fathom how he was able to keep his true self a secret from the one person to whom he was supposed to be closest, but Aaron seemed to have it under control. She didn’t press her friend what he planned to do as the years went on and he continued to look untouched by time. She was happy for Aaron and didn’t need to remind him of how imperfect this romance might be.
Seven eyeballed Riley suspiciously. “You do something with your hair, Riles? There’s something different about you today.”
Riley could feel the eyes of her well-meaning friends hone in on her. Heather’s stare in particular seemed to penetrate through the sunglasses that she hid behind.
Heather reached across the table and removed Riley’s oversized aviators. “Oh my God. Your nose!” There was a dark, ugly bruise across the bridge of Riley’s nose. The swelling had further dwindled, but the purple coloring had set in, and a hint of sickly yellow spiderwebbed across her features. “What the hell did you do?”
Riley slid her sunglasses back into place to hide the swollen bruise. “I was hoping you wouldn’t notice.”
Aaron held up his hands. “I wasn’t gonna say anything.”
Heather swatted Riley with the magazine in her hands. “Sweetheart, it’s staring me in the face.” She gave the rest of the group a disbelieving look. “Is everyone honestly telling me that they were going to ignore the elephant on Riley’s face?”
“Don’t worry about it. I was just in a rush,” Riley tried to reassure her friend. “It should heal soon. In the meantime, I’ll cover it so you won’t have to stare at my elephant.” She waved a hand in front of her face.
Heather frowned, unconvinced by her friend’s words.
“I promise I’ll try to be more careful.” Riley patted at Heather’s hand before cracking a jovial smile. “Now, let’s get some breakfast. I’m feeling like pancakes today.”
Moments later their waitress arrived tableside to take their order. While they waited for their breakfast to appear, Riley dug around for the makeup compact she was sure she’d seen floating around at the bottom of her purse. Her hand knocked into her phone, which seemed to buzz nonstop ever since Josh had set it up to access both her work and personal e-mails. He had reasoned it was necessary so she wouldn’t miss any more company messages, and with hesitance, Riley had agreed. She wasn’t opposed to technology, but she hated all of the interconnectivity.
She removed a folder that contained the paperwork that needed to be returned to the office and set it on the table to gain purchase of the elusive makeup.
“Has Amber seen what you did to your face?” Heather pressed. At the mention of her girlfriend’s name, Riley shook her head.
Seven balked. “Wait. Amber didn’t do that to you, did she?”
“What? Of course not.” Riley’s face was incredulous.
Madison laid a comforting hand over Riley’s. “Oh, honey.” She lightly squeezed Riley’s fingers. “Don’t make excuses for her.” She looked wistfully in the d
irection of the café’s front entrance. “I guess this will be our last breakfast here. I’m really going to miss their iced coffee.”
Riley slipped her hand out from under Madison’s. “Seriously, guys. I did this to myself.”
Even James frowned. “I don’t know, Riles. You do have a track record of covering for your partners,” he pointed out.
“Oh shit,” Seven cursed. “The bloody thought slipped my mind, but the rotten bastard’s back.”
“Who’s back?” Heather prodded, taking a full sip from her mug.
Seven flicked his eyes purposefully in Riley’s direction. “Sean.”
“No!” Madison squealed and Heather coughed down her coffee.
James squared his jaw. “Where did you hear that?”
“You know I can’t reveal my sources.” A weak smile fell to Seven’s lips. “It’s just a rumor that he’s in town. It’s not like I’ve personally seen the wanker.”
The muscles in James’s jaw visibly twitched. “If I so much as smell that incubus, he’ll wish he’d stayed off the grid.”
“I don’t know how he’s evaded Trusics or the Custodes for so long.” Madison looked more flustered than usual. She hugged herself. “I hope we’re not in any danger.”
Heather was the only one to notice Riley’s silence while the rest of the group chatted about Seven’s latest intel. “Riley?” she softly called her friend’s name.
Riley’s eyelashes fluttered in rapid blinks before her gaze came to focus on Heather’s face. “Huh?”
“Are you okay?”
“Of course.” Riley forced a smile to her lips. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
• • •
It wasn’t until she was halfway home that Riley remembered that she had left her portfolio on the table under Heather’s stack of magazines. She would lose her head if she lost that confidential information, not that there was anything within her pile of paperwork that would have exposed the company if an unsuspecting person were to have found it. Between the forms and her personal printouts on her marks, she looked like an actively-seeking single that experienced a horrible first date, not a succubus.
“Tell me you have it,” said Riley. Her words spilled out the moment she heard the call pick up.
“I have it right here in my hands.” She could envision a sardonic smile crossing Heather’s lips. “You left rather abruptly. Are you okay?”
“Yeah, I forgot I had some errands to get around to.” It was a lie. She hadn’t wanted to be around once the topic of her ex-boyfriend had come up. “Can you tell me when you get home, and I’ll come pick it up?”
“How about I do you one better and personally deliver it?” Heather offered.
“Add one of those sexy brown delivery uniforms and you’d be perfect,” Riley drawled. “Thank you.”
Within a half an hour the doorbell rang. The echoing sound was promptly followed by three consecutive knocks. Heather had arrived.
When Riley pulled the front door open, Heather stood with her hips canted to the side, one hand perched firmly on the angular bone, and the other held the portfolio. She was eerily silent. There was no greeting, no smartass remark, just a cold anger emanating from the woman. Even her breath seemed angry. Her brow had deep ridges and her oversized sunglasses made her tightened jaw stand out even more.
“No sexy outfit?” Riley half-heartedly joked as she prepared herself for Heather’s wrath.
“You lied,” Heather said. Her voice was harsh. She shoved the portfolio into Riley’s chest. “You fucking lied. And to me.”
For a few seconds, Riley’s brain couldn’t process the accusation. She tossed the leather folder onto her entryway table.
“You’re lucky I’m not going to flick your damn broken nose.” Heather huffed and pulled her sunglasses up to rest on her head. She pushed past her friend and began to make her way into the home. Heather only made it a few steps in before Riley caught her by the wrist. The grip was firm enough to still her movement.
Testing her luck, Riley situated herself in front of her friend. She placed her hands on both of Heather’s shoulders and squeezed the tense muscle in reassurance. “I didn’t want you to freak out in public.”
The action made Heather glare, but she didn’t recoil from the touch. “Of course I’m going to freak out. You could have died or something.”
“A small bruise is far from death,” Riley said in an attempt to calm her friend. She inched her way closer and stretched her arms out. “I’m still in one piece.”
“You have to report this and get a new mark.”
“I’m a big girl,” Riley reasoned. “I can handle it.” She slid her hands down both of Heather’s arms and gave another squeeze. When Heather didn’t respond, Riley offered her a soft smile and pleading eyes. She knew exactly which expressions got under her friend’s skin, and it was only a matter of time before she would cave.
A few silent moments passed until Heather visibly relaxed her once rigid stance. Riley took another step closer and pulled her into a hug. Heather’s head naturally fell into the crook of her neck even though she didn’t return the embrace.
Kissing the side of her friend’s head, Riley pulled back from their hug. “If you want me to live long, you shouldn’t shove stuff at me with the force of a freight train. I thought I’d been impaled for a second.”
Heather laughed and the worry lines on her face dissipated. “I don’t want you hurt.” She blinked her eyes at the first signs of excess moisture.
“I know how to keep safe.” Riley beamed. “By the way, thanks for looking at my portfolio.”
“Like that’s anything new.” Heather rolled her eyes and walked towards the kitchen. “I’ve seen your entire closet and your barrage of sex toys. How’s that for personal?”
“You’ve seen more than that,” Riley hollered after the woman, relieved that Heather’s anger with her had dissolved so quickly. “How about I call for pizza, and we’ll have an impromptu girls’ night?”
“We just had brunch.”
“I meant later.”
“In that case, pizza sounds great,” Heather said, opening Riley’s refrigerator to inspect its limited contents, “but I can’t stay the night. I’ve got a long night of work ahead of me if I want to make my quota this month.”
As cubare, they could both survive on a quarter of the energy collected from meeting the minimum quota, but the perks Trusics provided made for an acceptable trade-off. In exchange for the lion’s share of the sexual energy harvested, agents received a generous salary, plus an inexhaustible database of potential marks. What her employer did with the rest of the energy wasn’t her business. Employees got their share, the energy reserve was kept full, and the remainder went to whatever the board of directors saw fit.
Riley nodded. “Yeah, me too.”
“And you have paperwork to complete, right?” Heather arched an eyebrow.
“Right.”
After the pizza had been eaten and Heather had said her goodbyes, Riley found herself alone in her apartment and alone with her thoughts. She retrieved her portfolio from the small table in the entranceway and opened it up. Her lips twisted into a small frown as she looked at the remaining information she needed to fill out. All she needed to list was the name of the mark and the user ID number and the files would be ready for submission.
Her eyes scanned over to a waiting pen on a narrow desk in the living room. She walked over to the small office area and sat down at the desk. Her fingers flexed as if to reach for the pen, but thinking better of it, she took the first piece of paper and slid it beneath the desk and into a small silver slot. The paper shredder roared to life the moment the edge of the document touched its blades.
She technically was turning the report in, she reasoned with herself as the shredder noisily ground the remaining paperwork into thin strips; it was just to the LA County recycling department and not to her work.
CHAPTER SIX
August
She had
n’t felt so uneasy, yet determined, about an assignment since her first one decades ago. Riley tiptoed down the hallway, carefully placing one foot in front of the other. Even with discreet steps, the wooden floorboards creaked beneath her feet. Steadying her breath, Riley tightened her hold on the large metal shield she’d conjured along for protection. It was a birthday present from Josh, a gift she never thought she’d use beyond wall decor. The shiny safeguard was a stark contrast to her babydoll and heels. It couldn’t hurt to be prepared for battle, or sex.
“Name, Morgan. Gender, female. Race, Caucasian. Age, twenty-eight. Member since 2006.” Her new mark’s account was technically still active on the Trusics’s database even though she had not personally accessed her profile in years. Trusics’s users remained accessible via the dream realm database until they cancelled their free account or stopped paying for a premium membership through any of Trusics’s network of websites.
“Likes bubble baths, books, and the scent of campfires.” Riley rattled off the details that she hoped would be enough to keep her safe. “Currently a student with a goal of becoming a psychology professor.” She bit her bottom lip and recalled what had been listed on the woman’s profile under both the “relationship status” and “looking for” columns. “It’s complicated,” she recited aloud. “You can say that again.” Why anyone filled out the questionnaires to the extent some users did had always baffled her.
Every step was tentative as she peered into each passing room. “Where are you today?” Her whispers almost seemed loud in the still house.
She should have been avoiding this unconventional mark instead of visiting for a second time. She should have reported the unusual mark to Trusics right away so they could take the appropriate precautions. Not only had this mark revealed herself to be a lucid dreamer—someone who is aware that they are dreaming—but she had been able to physically injure Riley in the realm. Both details were giant red flags. Maybe the news of Sean’s supposed return had her feeling a little reckless. Maybe it was blatant curiosity.
Drained: The Lucid Page 6