Chapter Two
Allie
Trying to get out of my apartment without talking to my roommate, Delilah, was my goal for tonight—an impossible task since Delilah had ears like a bat. As soon as I stepped out of the bathroom, Delilah bounced out of her bedroom dressed like a biker Catholic school girl. I didn’t think that look was possible until I’d met Delilah, who favored knee-length plaid skirts paired with leather corsets and boots. Most days, she also wore her long brown hair in pigtails. I’d met Delilah through a friend of my mom’s when we were both looking for roommates. While we didn’t have much in common, it was nice having another succubus close by.
“Off to work?” Delilah asked with a sweet smile. She was barely nineteen and had only come into her succubus powers a year ago, so she was constantly on the prowl for sex. While it was technically illegal for her to set foot in SpellBinders, the sex club I worked at, my sleazebag boss looked the other way when it came to sex demons breaking the rules, probably because it was good for business to have more sex demons in his club.
All I had to do was say no. One little lie, and I’d be on my way to SpellBinders without arguing with Delilah about the many reasons she shouldn’t go there unless she was looking for a way to feed off sexual energy without actually having sex. It’s not that I had anything against sex clubs, either. As a succubus, I’d been in more than my share of them over the years. Working at SpellBinders had just made me somewhat bitter—probably because some of the things I’d seen there were enough to give most people nightmares.
“Yes, I’m going to work,” I admitted with a sigh because I was a terrible liar, and my clothes were a dead giveaway, anyway. I was a jeans and t-shirt kind of girl and only wore this leather corset dress to work.
Delilah jumped up and down, clapping her hands. Moments like these made me want to protect her from the ugliness of the world. While most of our kind became pretty jaded within a month of getting their succubus powers, Delilah still had a youthful innocence about her.
“It might be a good idea for you to wear your cuffs,” I suggested, tapping the spelled leather wrist cuffs I wore. The cuffs were designed to suppress succubus abilities, and I had several pairs in different colors and fabrics. I even had waterproof ones for the shower. I’d also given Delilah several pairs since she attended a human college.
“Nah, I’m planning to use all my sex demon wiles tonight,” she said with a giggle. “Let me grab my purse and fake ID. It’s been a week since I had a man, and I’m starting to snap at people at school.”
I sighed because I knew she was right about her need for sex, but I still wished she’d find somewhere else to get it.
My phone buzzed, and I looked down to see that my mom was calling. Inwardly groaning, I debated letting it go to voicemail. Then I realized how futile that would be. If my mom got my voicemail, she’d just call Delilah to check on me. Either way, I was going to end up talking to her, so I might as well get it over with.
It’s not that I don’t love my mom, she’s great, but she’s also a succubus and is always worried that I’m not getting enough sex. My last sexual encounter with a partner was more than six months ago, so she probably had good reason to worry. Oh, I get plenty of battery-powered love, but it’s not the same. Still, I hadn’t been inclined to deal with any man since my last boyfriend decided I wasn’t the type of girl a man brought home to meet his mother. Since then, I just hadn’t felt the urge to sleep with random guys—much to my mother’s dismay. My lack of interest in casual hookups was the only reason I worked at SpellBinders. There was enough sexual energy on slow nights to satisfy my succubus needs.
“Hi, Mom,” I said, trying to sound as happy and energetic as Delilah did.
“You sound tired,” were the first words out of her mouth, which meant I’d failed at sounding energetic. “Are you getting enough sex?”
“I’m fine, Mom,” I assured her, nearly groaning. Why couldn’t I have been born a witch, or anything else that didn’t involve my mother pushing me to have sex every time she called?
“You don’t sound fine,” she insisted. “When was the last time you had sex? I’m not talking about a quickie. That kind of fast food won’t hold you over very long. A long slow fuck gives you much more energy, and those kinky ones are the best for recharging,” my mother added. “The kinky ones will really fill you up. Sometimes you can feed from them without even having sex, not that I understand why anyone would choose to skip sex.” If I wasn’t mistaken, that last comment was directed at me. “There was this one demon with a thing for spanking. He liked to spank and be spanked with all sorts of crazy things. Sometimes, neither of us could sit afterward, but I could go days without sex after a night with him if I needed to. Don’t they have spanking rooms at the club you work at? A good spanking might be just what you need to get some energy.”
“Mom!” I said quickly. Geez! Was it really too much to hope I could avoid talking about sex with my mom just this once? At the very least, I’d like to avoid having her paint images of her spanking a demon. Yes, I’m different from any other succubus I know. I blame it on my parents for sending me to school with witches who didn’t talk about sex with their parents the way sex demons do. If I’d gone to school with other sex demons, I might not have turned out the way I did. Or, maybe it was the fact that I was only half-succubus that caused my instincts to be all out of whack.
“Sending you to that witch school messed up your values,” she said with a sad sigh. Obviously, she was having the same thoughts I was. “Giving in to your father on that was a huge mistake.”
Since my father was a warlock, he’d insisted I attend the same school he had, and my mom had given in because she still felt bad about sleeping with him when he was married, not that she’d ever admit that to anyone. My mom hated admitting that she believed in monogamous relationships, but I knew the truth. I’d seen her reading mushy romance novels ever since I was little. I’d snuck them out of her stash to read myself. After my last boyfriend, I swore to get over my hopeless romantic tendencies.
“Listen, Mom, I have to get to work. You don’t need to worry about me feeding, because there’s plenty of energy at the club,” I assured her.
“Fine,” my mother relented. “Just promise me you’ll have sex soon.”
“I promise,” I said, and it wasn’t exactly a lie since I planned to spend time with my favorite waterproof vibrator, a bubble bath, and some steamy erotica on my day off tomorrow.
Delilah came out of the bedroom, ready to go, with a hand over her mouth to cover her giggles. Obviously, she’d been standing at her bedroom door listening to my conversation with my mother.
“Not one word or I’ll tell your mom you haven’t had sex in a week,” I warned Delilah.
“You wouldn’t dare!” she gasped, and then burst into another fit of giggles. “I plan to remedy that tonight, anyway. It’s crazy going to school with a bunch of humans and having to hide who I am all the time. They tell me all about how their moms call asking if they’ve eaten enough. My mom doesn’t care if I eat at all as long as I’m getting enough dick. I wish they’d let us into the witch colleges. Then I wouldn’t have to pretend I’m human.”
That was another thing that sucked about being a succubus. Demons could only attend human or demon colleges. Not all demons were nice, and you always ran the risk of being eaten if you attended a demon college. That wasn’t as much of a problem for the scarier species, but sex demons didn’t have much in the way of defenses. While a succubus, even a full-blooded succubus, could attend a witch high school, we weren’t allowed in any witch schools once our powers came in, which made sense considering how distracting a succubus could be.
“Believe me, you’d just end up with the same crazy hang-ups I have if you spent too much time around witches,” I assured her.
“I wouldn’t mind spending time around that yummy warlock of yours,” she practically purred.
“Trevor?” I asked.
“Yes, h
e is so totally hot,” she said. “Do you think he’d be interested in meeting me at SpellBinders tonight?”
I could see why she’d find Trevor attractive. With his close-cropped brown hair, soulful brown eyes, and full lips, he was definitely something to look at. He also spent enough time in the gym to keep himself fit. Still, sleeping with Trevor had never even crossed my mind. We were more like buddies than anything else, and I always felt I could really be myself around him. I already knew he wouldn’t be interested in Delilah because Trevor was a hopeless romantic, no matter how much he tried to deny it.
“Trevor’s not really into one-night stands,” I warned her, and it was true.
“Such a pity,” she said with a wistful smile. “I’m sure I’ll find an acceptable specimen at the club tonight.”
Mention of Trevor reminded me that I’d promised to stop by his party tonight. As a rule, I didn’t go to Trevor’s parties, but he’d sounded kind of down when we’d talked yesterday. Maybe I’d make my mother happy by finding a warlock to have sex with at Trevor’s. Hopefully, that would get me out of being nagged for a few weeks.
A few hours with a hot warlock suddenly sounded much better than my solo plans. My mind instantly moved to the warlock I’d had a serious crush on back in school, making me wonder if Dylan Hunt would make an appearance. As I understood it, he attended fewer of Trevor’s parties than I did, so it wasn’t likely. Oh well, I probably wouldn’t have had the nerve to approach him anyway.
“You should take your own car,” I told Delilah. “I’m going to hang out with Trevor after work.”
“Not to worry,” Delilah said with a bounce in her step. “I’m not planning on staying until you get off work, anyway. I just want to take care of business and get home to finish my paper that’s due Monday. That’s when I’ll wish I was a witch.”
“Why’s that?” I asked.
“I met this witch who uses a spell to type what she’s thinking,” Delilah explained.
“You can get a computer program to type what you say,” I told her.
“Not nearly as cool, Allie,” she insisted. “Now, let’s go get me a man to feed my succubus needs.” She grabbed her wrist cuffs from the coffee table and stuffed them into her purse. “I’ll put these on when I’m done to make you happy.”