Craved

Renee:

Sure, Damon was sexy and brimming with confidence, but an incubus? No way. Those creatures were myth, legends. The woman was insane. Across the desk, Cynthia said, "Show her."

When Damon didn't budge or say anything, she cocked the gun and pointed it at Renee. Terror froze in her veins. "Don't make me ask again." Cynthia's words were dipped in syrup and poison.

Damon frowned, but nodded and righted Renee's chair. Then he held out his hand toward her. "Trust me, it'll be okay." "What...?" Before she finished her thought, a glimmer illuminated his skin.

Her cheeks heated. Both of them watched her, Cynthia with a leer and Damon with an apologetic look on his face. Nausea rolled through her stomach. God. What was that? Shit! This was real? "So, what are," she waved a hand out, "you?" "An incubus."

Right. "Meaning what, exactly?" She remembered the myths about incubus and succubus-sex demons who hunted their prey at night, in their dreams. She shivered. Impossible. Damon didn't appear to be like those images. "Are you supposed to be a vampire or something? Not that I believe in those either."

"No, vampires crave blood. My kind lives off sexual energy." He sighed. "I'm immortal or somewhat. We're not sex fiends as legends portray us. True, sexual energy sustains us, but we must find a crystal before our fifth millennia birthday or we become a true demon. One without remorse or caring or even the ability to love."

He had gotten chummier with her lately. Did he like her? She'd been right to keep him at arm's length. He was crazy. In the past, there was always an issue with a boyfriend: she was too demanding in and out of bed, too insistent on equal treatment, too rigid in not allowing multiple partners. Figures Damon would have something wrong with him.

"So, you've done some type of post-hypnotic suggestion and triggered it? I don't believe you or her." Renee stood, though her legs shook from the earlier demonstration. Then her mind drifted to her dreams with Damon. Or her seeing bizarre things like him as a demi-god. No, that had to be a coincidence, right?

"She has a point, Damon." Cynthia kept the gun on her. "Do something more dramatic. Something to erase her doubts."

"If you're going to shoot me, then do it. I'm leaving." Renee stomped to the door, but suddenly an image, no, more like a see-through Damon was between her and the door. Yet, his body was still slumped over in the chair. What the hell is going on? Some type of trick or something.

The ghost-like figure of Damon held out his hand to her. Not giving in, she pulled away, but he grabbed her wrist. When she raised her free hand to push him off her, her fingers went right through him like trying to catch fog. Then he held up a finger and traced her jaw. His skin was warm, and she locked her legs to keep from swooning.

"I-I don't understand. How is this possible?" Renee stumbled backward when he reached out to steady her.

"I'm an incubus. This is my dream-form." Sorrow darkened his eyes. "My power is stronger this way, so I reined it in."

"Why did my hand pass through you? And not vice versa."

"In this form, I can touch you, but you can't physically touch me." As if seeing her confusion, he sighed again. "Usually in this form, we visit humans while they are asleep. Wouldn't you wake from a dream if a body weighed upon yours?" "Those women are lucky; they don't know what they're missing when they fret over it." Cynthia gestured them back to the empty chairs with her gun.

Renee flopped into a seat. "Wait, are you telling me incubi are responsible for wet dreams?"

"Yes." Cynthia bit her lip, her eyes half closing. "And many more dreams you don't remember."

Part of Renee still refused to believe in nonhumans. She'd been attracted to him. Wait. Him or his talent? It wasn't a tumor making her see crazy things? Damon was an incubus! She shook her head. Julia was a cyclops and Travis...she didn't know what he was except an old-looking man. And she saw this all because of this stupid necklace! Oh, geez, if she wasn't sitting, she might faint.

Yes, first the weird visions when she found the crystal. She'd gotten so sick. At first, she blamed it on the flu or something, but her symptoms disappeared when the jeweler took it. And he had looked like a dwarf when she put on the necklace. Like a real Tolkien character.

She eyed Damon. "So, with your magic, you can seduce anyone? Like a vampire's mind control in the movies?"

"Not exactly. I haven't been able to seduce you." He gave her a sideways smile.

"I don't think that helps your cause any."

"And we can't beguile vampires or animals."

"You say that like vampires are real."

He nodded. "They are."

"Your finding of both the crystal and urn is remarkable." Cynthia fingered the urn with her free hand, ignoring Renee's scowl. "These lines coming out from the scepter are the energy from those around her. The crystal enhances an incubus's gift and allows them to feed fully on a tiny portion of sexual energy."

Dread and disbelief collided through every nerve inside her. This was a dream or some mad, practical joke. But Damon's eyes drooped at the corners, telling her it was the fact. "Is what she says, true?"

"There's more to it." His husky words laced with regret. Probably from this forced confession.

"You flirted with me because of this?" She fingered the cold crystal. "For this? You can have it! I want nothing to do with it or you."

But when she strained to rip it off, the crystal wouldn't budge. It was fixed to her skin. More so, a blackness crept into her vision as if she were going to faint. A cold sweat broke out over her skin, and a caffeine-jitteriness filled her. What's happening?

Cynthia tapped her chin. "Interesting, Clive didn't tell me a crystal would bond with anyone, especially a human."

"Clive?" Damon jerked. "How could you be involved with him? He's a monster and betrayed his kind. He feeds off violence and war; he's a demon."

"He feeds off sex, but it has to be more," Cynthia grinned, "intense."

"If you think Clive cares about you, you're mistaken. My cousin is dead. The only thing left of him is a shell." He slammed his hand on the chair's arm. "That's why you were so interested in the urn. You took it to Clive. Now he knows about the crystal and Renee."

His gaze shifted to Renee, and she swallowed from the mixture of emotions chasing each other across his face: terror, regret, and perhaps remorse?

Cynthia rose. "I'll leave you two alone for the moment while I welcome Clive. The men have been given strict instructions to kill both of you if you try to escape. We won't have an issue of getting the crystal if you're both dead."

"Then why not kill us now?" Renee asked, fidgeting with the necklace, attempting to pry it off her skin. How the hell did this happen?

"Because, my dear," Cynthia kept her pistol locked on her as she drifted toward the office door, the two guards who held Damon down earlier following after her, "Clive likes to play with his captives."

She closed the door behind her, and Renee flew out of her chair. "What the hell is going on, Damon!"

"Everything she said is real, but I don't know why you can't remove the necklace."

"So, you used me to get it this whole time? Was anything you told me real?" Rage boiled up in her. She wanted to scream and punch him. Of course, she'd been so stupid. How would someone as gorgeous as Damon desire her when anorexic models clung to him everywhere he traveled? She'd seen the tabloids and newspapers.

"You've got it wrong. I've always been attracted to you."

"Yeah, right." She marched over to the desk and picked up the phone. The line was dead. Then she rummaged through the drawers.

Damon laid his hand over hers. "Look at me."

"Why, so you can weave a spell and bewitch me?" Did he seduce her in the hotel and in the cave? Was that why she'd thrown herself at him?

"No, I'm not a witch."

"But just as guilty. You did something without my permission-invaded my dreams. Incubus do it all the time, don't you?" She jerked away from him. "It's as bad as rape in my book."

His eyes filled with sadness and possibly longing. "I did nothing without your permission and believe it or not, you yanked me into your dreams."

Whatever. He lied as he had for weeks now.

"You're right, in part. At first, I got closer to you for the crystal." He grabbed her arm then lifted her chin to look at him. "I've been fascinated by you since reading your letters requesting to join my group. Then I met you." She spun out of his grasp.

"No, please listen, Renee. Then you can do what you like. When my fiancée, Belinda, died from sudden cardiac arrest, I blamed myself. My heritage. At first, I thought I could live without feeding off any energy. I grew so weak. Once I nearly devoured the repressed sexual energy of a bus full of nuns who stopped and asked me for directions."

She snorted and rubbed her arms. With Damon's looks and charm, it would be hard for even nuns to resist him. Wait, Belinda's letter in his jacket?

"Now you know why I chose the women I did. Women who didn't interest me. I fed off them for a while, with their consent." He stressed the last word. "When my power demanded more than I thought safe to take from them, I set them up with a man who loved them to replace me and broke up with them. Melanie located her replacement because I'd lost interest in her after the first night."

"What about the crystal. Why do you want it?" Did he consider her an exception to his not-caring list?

"In six days, I'll be five thousand years old."

Shaking her head, she backed away from him. How? He'd been alive and seen so many things. Must have thought her theories were childish.

"I need a specific crystal to keep from becoming a monster. The one you're wearing. Without it, I'll lose what little humanity I have, even if I'm not human. As a demon, I won't care about anyone or anything except my satisfaction, which can never be sated. This crystal magnifies the feeding, as Cynthia said. If I had it, I could touch your skin lightly," he ran a finger over her hand and she shivered, "like this and it would feed me as if I'd drained all your energy, yet you would remain unharmed. I won't hurt another."

"So, why didn't you?" She looked at her hands, which still tingled from the trace of his fingers. "Why didn't you take it from me? Plenty of opportunity in the tunnel."

"In order for the magic to work, it has to be given without duress."

"That's why you said it was radioactive. Why you asked me to give it to you."

"It's not what you think. Not entirely, I worried what it might do to you as a human. Julia told me she thought you can see our true forms-hers is a cyclops. Now it's worse as it's adhered itself somehow to your skin and your aura, which is why you seemed about to pass out when you tried to take it off." He held out his hands. "I'm afraid it won't leave you until you die."

"Are you threatening me? Will you kill me for this?" She backed up into the wall behind her.

"No, not me. I've vowed I will never harm a human again. And I would never hurt you." He glanced over at the closed door. "However, we've greater problems now."

"Oh? How can this situation possibly get any worse? I've got a magical crystal tied to my lifeline, an incubus with a conscious who runs from love, and a crazy woman with hired guns."

"Clive."

"He's a bad thing because...?" She really didn't need any more news. Her head was spinning enough already.

"He did what I tried to do. Stop feeding off energy when he couldn't find a crystal. Even though it worked for a while, he went into starvation mode when he turned five thousand years old until he found a new energy to feed on. One of the crystals would magnify his desires, allowing him to gorge on more violence and war. Because he is feeding on a source that isn't intended, he needs more and more to satisfy himself."

Her stomach knotted at his words. "What else?"

"Clive convinced many of our relatives to join him and hostility flourishes wherever they are, including a lack of compassion and logic. Any skirmishes you hear about are probably them traveling to the area."

"Wait. I thought incubus only fed on sexual energy from women and succubae from men." Was she seriously saying this? "Women don't wage war, at least not usually. Men do."

"Right. But feeding off nonsexual energy isn't natural. Doing so twists the incubus. They can only feed on men, and because of that, their hatred toward the women is manifested in their persecution of them. Don't you see? They are going against the very nature of their existence."

"And Clive?" Her heart pounded in her ears.

"He needs the quartz because feeding off this other energy doesn't sustain him. Each time, he takes more and more. And he won't stop." He reached out to her, but she shook her head. His arm dropped back to his side. "But he's a sex and mayhem demon now; he doesn't care about you. Or my feelings for you. He'll take what he wants even if it means killing you to separate the necklace from your aura. I should have told you all this sooner. But we've got to get you out of here and now."