by Lina Jubilee
Succubus Lips
Succubus Sirens Book One
Lina Jubilee
Succubus Lips by Lina Jubilee
© 2018 by Lina Jubilee. All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form, including written, electronic, recording, or photocopying, without written permission of the author. The exception would be in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.
The characters and events appearing in this work are fictitious. Existing brands and businesses are used in a fictitious manner, and the author claims no ownership of or affiliation with trademarked properties. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.
Created with Vellum
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Epilogue
Look for Book Two in the Succubus Sirens Series Soon!
About the Author
Chapter One
“Come on. Please.” Nash put his hands together as if worshipping at an altar erected in my honor.
“No,” I said, swiping my fingers across my tablet to watch another video of an adorable ninja cat stalking its prey. In the background, I still had the Nelian tracking app running. I was keeping tabs on it. So far this evening, two false alarms—one Typical confusing a Natch for an otherworldly elven invader, the other a couple of kids messing around with smoke bombs in an alley. Like smoke had anything to do with a Nelian attack. “Aurora, angel,” Nash said, drumming his fingers atop the back of a chair. “You’re killing me.”
Roulette snorted from where she sat in front of the triple sixty-inch monitors covering one wall of the room. She was ostensibly monitoring Renegade activity on top of current news reports, but I saw the DM tab in the corner where she kept sending cute and racy messages to her boyfriend, Darien, who was out on assignment along with Wade and Chastity.
“I doubt that,” I said, swiping the screen again. “Sweet cheeks.”
Nash cleared his throat, which drew my attention to the flush spreading across his neck. What? It was an accurate enough nickname. More accurate than the one he used for me. He ran his fingertips through his close-cropped blond hair and growled. Damn, he had a sexy growl. “If we need to go out there, we won’t necessarily have time to have sex first—”
“La la la,” said Roulette, covering both ears with her hands. “I’m not hearing my best friends talk about bumping uglies.” Like she was being much more discrete in her little chat that kept popping up on one of those huge screens, the vixen.
Nash crossed his arms and walked over to Roulette, nudging her shoulder with his elbow. The grin on his face could have melted glaciers. I shook my head to clear it of all dirty thoughts and put the tablet on the table, closing out the browser.
Roulette spun around in her swivel chair and laced her fingers together, smiling devilishly up at Nash and then me. “But when are you two getting together already?”
“Rou,” I said, rubbing my temples with my fingers. “Don’t—”
Nash jutted his chin out. “Aurora thinks I wouldn’t be okay with her using her powers on anyone else if we were an item.”
“You wouldn’t,” I said, pulling my overly long sleeves over my palms and slipping my thumbs through the corresponding holes. “Who would? But that’s beside the point.” My voice got quieter. “I can’t be with anyone, not long term.”
In the library, my bare ass against some dusty volume of Descartes, his thick hands cupping me from below. Him nibbling on my ear, my hands threaded through his wavy, dark brown locks.
Why, oh why, do my thoughts inevitably drift to that night…? I had to stop myself from dwelling on him too long.
“I often find myself having such thoughts about that night, too. Though I certainly make no point of dismissing them.”
That was why. That was Zander’s voice in my head—leader of the Renegades, traitor of the Veras team, all-around hunk but a little too aware of that. Having a bond with a selective telepath who wasn’t exactly the most welcome face around Veras HQ—he hadn’t set foot in it in over a year—made for some potentially awkward situations to say the least. He had to be thinking about me at the same time I was thinking about him for me to hear his voice in my head, but… Damn, if that man wasn’t almost always thinking about me whenever he popped into my head. I scratched my scalp and focused on my breath. In and out. In and out. Clear your mind. Don’t think about the leader of the Renegades, don’t think about the leader of the Renegades…
“Come on,” he told me through our telepathic bond. “You can’t resist me. I’m far too good-looking. Right? What was the title you gave me just now? ‘All-around hunk’?”
You forgot the “little too aware” bit, I sent back through the bond.
I pounded my fists against the table, causing Roulette to jump in place and Nash to stare at me questioningly. Like he knew I had just been communicating with Zander in my mind. Like he wasn’t happy with it.
I wasn’t exactly ecstatic with myself about it, either.
“Sheesh,” said Roulette, “you don’t have to take it that hard. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have teased you.”
Chewing on a hangnail on my thumb, I shook my head. “It’s fine.” It was the least of my concerns.
Nash took the seat next to me and looked at me a moment more before speaking. He was probably deciding whether or not to say something about Zander, to ask if I’d found out anything important when we’d had our little telepathic conversation.
Just that he wanted to jump my bones.
“I do.” I could hear Zander mentally laughing. “Always, darlin’.”
I slapped my face with both hands multiple times.
Nash ignored it. “You don’t think that’s a good idea, though?”
Wait, what? Time to focus on what was in front of me. What had Nash wanted again? Right. To have sex. Right now. As usual.
Roulette snickered. “Anything to get into Aurora’s pants, right?” She grabbed her can of ginger ale from where it rested precariously on the computer console and tossed her head back to take a sip.
Nash’s lips went thin. “I’m serious.” He looked back and forth at Roulette and me. “And you two should have sex, too.”
Roulette spit her drink out, spraying several feet in front of her.
I couldn’t help it. I laughed.
“I’m not kidding,” said Nash, not a trace of a smile on his face. “Every day. Like clockwork. Have sex with us all.”
Roulette and I locked gazes. She broke it first, shaking her head and putting her can back beside the computer keyboard. “You sure you just don’t want to watch, big boy? Me and Rora. Toss in Chastity, too?”
Nash was turning red again. “I wouldn’t need to watch, no.”
“How magnanimous of you,” I said.
Shaking his head, Nash scoffed. “You’re laughing at me. You’re both laughing.”
Roulette was indeed giggling, and I found myself stifling a snicker.
“Okay, look,” said Nash in an excellent imitation of Wade, the man whose Natch powers meant his intelligence outstripped the rest of ours combined by miles, “hear me out. Aurora, what do your Natch powers do?”
I rolled my eyes and hugged my arms to my chest. “You know w
hat my powers do.”
“Humor me.”
I looked to Roulette for help, pleading, but she just smiled and shook that voluminous dyed bright red hair that popped so vividly against her imperfection-free dark brown skin. She turned back to the screen and the DM window popped up again, and I could see her sending Darien kissy emojis.
I sighed. “Yes, professor. I boost Natch power.”
“For how long?”
I chewed on the inside of my lip for a bit. “Anywhere from a few minutes to a whole day.”
“And how do you boost Natch powers?”
“Roulette?” I asked.
She flung a hand up in the hair, her attention still riveted on the screen. “You’re on your own with this one.”
I met Nash’s eyes. He just nodded at me, as if to convey he wasn’t dropping this until we finished our charade.
“I kiss them,” I admitted, my voice growing quiet.
Nash tsked. “That’s good for a few minutes, Succubus Lips.” That was my “official” code name in our files, though I would clobber anyone who dared call me that in person. I didn’t have a cute code name like Roulette, birth name Sasha. I side-eyed Nash, and he gently threw both hands up in surrender. “My bad. Miss Haddix. Please continue. How does a Natch boost their power via your Natch ability for one full day?”
“They have…” I didn’t know why this was embarrassing me so much. Everyone in Veras knew it. Everyone in Renegade knew it for that matter.
Oh, fuck, don’t think about Zander.
Huh. Quiet for once on the other end of the bond.
I exhaled deeply. “They have to have sex with me. Penetrate me.”
Roulette whistled and started fanning herself. “Okay, I think I might visit the little girls’ room.” She pushed back from the console and mouthed a silent “sorry” my way. I shook my head and waved her away. Once she turned the corner, I said, “Which would be kind of hard for Roulette and Chastity, okay? Don’t tease her.”
“I wasn’t teasing.” Nash pivoted his chair toward me, his knee bouncing. “I’m serious. Wade thinks maybe the women could stick their hands—”
I cradled my face in my hand, shielding my eyes from the inanity of my supposed best friend. My temptingly gorgeous best friend. Who was it who had decided we should stay friends-with-benefits again? Right. Me. Foolish me. “Can we not do this?”
“We tested that theory,” he said quietly. “You and me.”
“And?” I said, my own knee now bouncing.
“It might not have worked that well,” he admitted. “Probably boosted a few hours. But that’s better than nothing, Aurora. The women could get a boost for a few hours and maybe boost again when it wears off and then the men can boost once a day—”
“Nash, are you hearing yourself?”
There must have been more than a hint of anger in my voice because when I removed my hands from my face, he actually shrunk back.
“You all have your own powers,” I said, rage beginning to boil in my blood, “and they’re actually useful. They worked just fine before you ever met me and they’ll continue to work just fine without me.”
“But with your powers, we’re so much stronger, Aurora, you have to admit—”
I raised a finger to warn him to let me finish. It might have been a middle one. “My Natch powers are so useless.”
“No, they aren’t!”
“Useless in the field. They’re… They can be degrading. You don’t know how it feels to have to—to feel like you have to…” I stopped.
Nash’s face went serious. “Did it ever feel like you had to with me?”
I didn’t answer.
“Aurora, angel, I never want you to feel that way with me.”
I ignored the fact that he thought of me as an “angel” again and bit down on my lips. “That’s not what I meant. I don’t… I have fun with you, Nash, I do. But I’m literally performing under pressure. It just…” I sighed. “And now you’re telling me to just drop trou and bend over and let the whole team go at me? On a ‘preventative’ basis in case we’re called out on a mission?”
“You wouldn’t be performing under pressure then,” said Nash quietly. “It might make it less stressful—”
I let out an exasperated sigh. “Nash, Roulette and Darien have each other and they’re faithful to one another—and Roulette is my best girlfriend and it would be super awkward to do more than give her a kissing boost.” I paused to glare at Nash then, and sure enough, his eyes had popped at the thought. Like he hadn’t seen me swap spit with her on the field half a dozen times already. “Chastity may be bi, but that doesn’t mean she wants to do every woman she can, for Chrissakes, and I’d feel awkward too. Wade has a Typical boyfriend and needs a boost to his intelligence and cloaking abilities about as much as the ocean needs a drink of water. How much smarter and stealthier can the smartest and stealthiest man we know get?” Wade had never even bothered to get a kiss from me, which I totally respected. It was bad enough feeling like the Veras team’s resident whore as it was.
Nash opened his mouth, but I kept speaking. I hadn’t finished the team roster. “And then there’s Jayden…” My throat went dry when I said his name.
Our team leader. My first real, can’t-stop-thinking-about-fucking-him crush. His gorgeous, tortured self had made my toes curl the second I’d met him six years ago. True, I’d only been eighteen, and at seven years my senior, he’d already been edging his way to thirty at the time, but even now, though I was twenty-four, he thought of me as a “kid.” Thirty-one wasn’t ancient by any means.
Zander had never had a problem with the age gap.
There was still nothing on his end of the bond. Hmm.
“And then there’s Jayden,” repeated Nash, crossing his arms and pouting. I’d never much talked about that crush of mine, but everyone had known. I might have been a little trip-over-my-own-feet, eagerly-help-him-with-bringing-in-the-groceries kind of obvious about it. For years.
“Jayden would never so much as touch me,” I said. “Not even if the world would burn without my boost.”
Someone cleared his throat from behind me and I spun in my chair to find the man himself in the doorway. He caught my eyes and immediately looked away, removing his circular glasses and grabbing a microfiber cloth from his front pocket in order to wipe the lenses. I wondered if he’d really found a spot or if he just welcomed the distraction.
My face felt hot at the idea of having been overheard.
I had tried not to bring up those days, tried to act much more professional around him. My puppy dog days had been ages ago. I’d thought I was over it.
Damn, though, did he have the “hot geek” look down to a tee. His sandy-blond hair looked windswept as he put his glasses back over his eyes. “Any activity?”
Of course. Just ignore the whole me-embarrassing-myself thing. That’s what you always do.
Clearing my throat, I turned back to my tablet and tapped the screen back to life. “Nope. False alarms.”
“And the Renegades?” asked Jayden, looking at the gigantic screens. Nash noticed Roulette’s message box was still open, so like a child about to be caught by the teacher, he jumped up and took her place in front of the keyboard, quickly closing the screen with a wave of his hand over the sensor that controlled the cursor. “Noth—wait a minute.”
The diminished message box had revealed a flurry of activity on the #Renegades hashtag. “They’re downtown.” Nash’s Adam’s apple bobbed as Jayden stomped across the room to get a closer look at the messages popping up at a faster and faster rate.
He spun around to face me. “Why was no one monitoring this?” He looked more than disappointed—he was angry.
Zander provoked that in him.
“Hello, darlin’,” said Zander over the bond. “I could have really used your boost today.”
I swallowed as Roulette appeared in the doorway. “I was on Renegade duty, sir.” Her voice lacked its usual boisterousness. “Au
rora had Nelian.”
Jayden narrowed his eyes on Roulette, but not before sending a pained look to me. I was always on Renegade duty, at least as a backup. Considering Zander and I shared that bond. But, to be fair, so did Jayden. Jayden and I were the only ones I knew of who shared telepathic bonds with Zander.
“Is he giving you a hard time, darlin’?” asked Zander through the bond. “Don’t let him blame you. I had to force myself not to think about you so you wouldn’t be able to tell I was up to something.”
I sighed. But just the fact that Zander had been so distant for a matter of several minutes should have been indication enough that something was up.
Jayden was already turning to Nash. “Send a message to Wade, Chastity, and Darien,” he snapped, though not unkindly. He was in full command mode now. “Abandon current surveillance mission. This takes priority.” He spun to face my friend. “Roulette, suit up. Nash, you have five minutes to get the van ready.”
“Yes, sir,” said Nash, springing to his feet. He caught my eyes and cocked his head toward the doorway, likely indicating for me to follow him, but I didn’t move. He and Roulette vanished down the hallway, their fleet-footed steps echoing across the space of the former recreation club Jayden had acquired with his inheritance to turn into the undercover operations for the team known as Veras.
Not that “undercover” really worked when the leader of one of the teams opposing you used to live here and had co-led the team alongside his dearest childhood friend.
“You remind him he and I didn’t see eye to eye on almost anything,” said Zander through the bond. “Not on when to use Natch abilities. Not on you. And not on what it’s going to take to save the world from these cross-dimensional invaders.” I could almost see the sly wink he was sure to be giving me just then. He must have been too busy for a projection. “See you in a few.”