Page 74 of Succubus

“She told me,” he mutters.

“Who?”

He shakes his head.

His doubt is a tiny opening and I lunge to pull it wider.

“Someone who taught you? Someone like you? Are there more of . . . you?”

He hesitates, and I feel the stress in it, as though he is straining against a wicked, unseen current. Which is exactly what he is doing.

“One other,” he says through his teeth. “That I know of.”

“Who is it?” I feel like I’m a detective, leaning over a metal-legged table to interrogate him. I am also the handcuffs that hold him there.

He flinches slightly, and his voice is gruff and unwilling when he says, “I’ve never met them. She said there was another.”

“Who is ‘she’?”

“Was. My grandmother.” His face closes as soon as he’s said the words; he’s angry at himself.

“This is my biggest spin!” whoops Ella.

“Wow, Els!” I call, a little shaky—I need her to stay there.

Joel looks up, startled.

“Keep watching!” she commands, looking a little queasy as the swing slows. She begins the long process of rewinding the chain, around and around.

“Your grandmother,” I say to Joel. “Did she teach you?”

He shakes his head, frustrated. “She had dementia. She was saying a lot of things. No one believed her. I didn’t, either. Until . . .”

“Until what? What happened?” I’m surprised he’s told me even this much.

He shakes his head. “A couple things. You were one of them.”

I stare at him. “You didn’t know until—until Adam was in a coma?”

“No, I knew something. But it didn’t make any sense. None of it ever makes any sense.”

“Adam told you about me?”

“He didn’t really make the connection. He mentioned you. I figured it out. We’re done talking.”

“You said you wanted to talk.”

He grits his teeth, shifts like he’s thinking about standing up. I reach out, touch his leg. He snaps my hand up in his, holding it like it has fangs, like it’s about to attack him. We look up at the same time. He goes still. Then he turns my hand over in his, and his thumb traces the line of my knuckles. I shudder, tilt toward him, making a small, involuntary sound of blatant longing.

He inhales, his gaze intensifying. Something heavy sweeps across his face, leveling the emotion, clearing it like a wrecking ball.

“It isn’t real,” he whispers.

“I’m real.” I look at his mouth. I can just kiss him.

No, I can’t, I remember, but barely. Not in front of Ella.

She won’t notice. She’s spinning. We will be a blur.