Page 57 of Succubus

“Yes!” I agree. I don’t even know myself by now.

And his hands drop onto me.

His fingers spread across my shoulder blades, his palms magnets pinning me against him, securing me in place.

My heart hitches.

Something pours into me.

My death.

I gasp.

“My turn,” he growls.

I feel it unspool through my blood, out to every microscopic capillary. Something flares in me in response. Inside my cells, a battle begins, metastasizes in a frenzy. I feel my darkness balloon, out of control; I feel my muscles soften, my lungs—tissue paper—heaving to fill.

I think of Benny.

His lungs stopped working.

The thing I did to him taking over his body.

Oh, I understand it. I understand it.

This is how they died, my half siblings. Their own power turned against them.

I can tell.

It feels as though my body is trying to eject the curse. But the curse is too powerful, it is fighting back, it is going to kill me rather than surrender my body.

He is healing the curse.

Except it can’t be healed.

He is killing us by healing us.

I seize his face again between my hands, force my gaze into his.

“You are mine,” I say, not really on purpose.

He closes his eyes, grimacing, resisting, his chest rising in rough swells.

“Mine,” I insist.

His hands slide to my waist, my hips, he grips me hard, holding me against him, or maybe trying to hold me off.

“Give in.” I drag my hands down his chest, over his stomach, plunge them lower.

He groans, turning his head, agonized.

I’ve never had this effect on anyone.

I’ve never needed anything this much.

I am vibrating, a string pulled to its extreme.

“You want to,” I whisper. “You want to.” It is completely obvious how much he wants to.