Drained: The Lucid (6 page)

“Don’t you feel like our lives are on repeat every few years?” Riley continued. “We do everything, have everything, travel the world … and yet, don’t you feel like we’re missing something?”

“If you mean wrinkles and death,” said Heather with a serious nod, “then yes.”

“Ha ha, funny girl.” Riley shook her head before resting against Heather’s side. “I don’t know how to explain it.” She exhaled into the room. “But maybe I’m being silly.”

Heather sighed before she moved to wrap an arm around her friend. “I think I know what you mean. But it’s hard to complain about our lives.”

“I know.”

It was true for every single member of the group. Working for Trusics provided them with a means to enjoy daily life in ways that most humans could only dream of. None of them worried about their health, their physique—unless they had a habit for perfection—or finances.

“Am I being too greedy?” Riley wondered aloud. “Am I searching for something that doesn’t exist?”

“The Holy Grail?” Heather guessed.

“It might as well be. I want what you and James have,” Riley confessed. “But I tried dating an incubus and that blew up in my face. And now I’m with a human, but that has an expiration date. Is it asking too much to find someone to share my journey with? It’s cheesy and mushy, but I … I think all these rom-coms are getting to me.” She laughed at herself.

“With Amber …” Heather played with the ends of her friend’s hair. “Do you think she’s that someone you want to share your journey with?”

“I don’t know,” Riley grumbled with her face mashed against Heather side. “I’m open to finding love though. Whatever way it may come.”

But for the time being, Riley would have to be content with what she had: her friends, a new girlfriend, and the constancy of work.

Riley stood on the front lawn of a small house. The green grass was well manicured and perennial flowers dotted the concrete walkway that led to a yellow front door. The surrounding neighborhood looked like it was plucked straight from the old films she loved to watch. She approached the house with confident steps. She reached the front door, grasped the doorknob, and turned. Locked. She twisted the handle again. Definitely locked. Riley took a step back and looked up at the house. The streetlamps that lined the residential street glowed brightly, but no lights illuminated the inside of the house to indicate that anyone was home.

Having walked her way into numerous dreams, the roleplay wasn’t new to her. Plenty of marks fantasized about having someone come home to them. But in the majority of those scenarios, the door was unlocked. Most fantasies flashed her straight into bed or out to an open beach. The only scenario that Riley could think of was a person that wanted someone to break in. It wasn’t a popular fantasy, but it did exist. Usually those profiles were flagged, however, and she hadn’t noticed any special notes about this particular mark. She rattled the door once more to confirm her initial assessment. Still locked.

She didn’t want to break into the home, not with the heels she had on, so she opted for looking for a spare key. After checking beneath a few rocks and potted plants, she found a key hiding under a welcome mat. She smiled to herself. Despite centuries of evolution, humans were still predictable. The key fit in its designated slot and the door swung open without protest. She entered quietly and shut the door behind her.  

Before moving farther into the house, Riley stood in front of a hallway mirror and used the reflection to adjust her outfit and makeup. It was dark inside; a dim blue hue filtered into the hallway from the moon through the house’s windows.

“So, you’re a simple romantic,” she stated quietly to herself. She had a knack for memorizing Trusics profiles but also her patrons’ unstated desires. “The love, the care, the tender touches.” She grinned at her reflection. “Game on.”

Riley had no problem meeting her monthly energy quota with her four current clients, but Trusics was particular about company policies and regulations. Each active agent was mandated to have a portfolio of at least five marks. None of the company-suggested members had struck her as particularly interesting, but of the user profiles that Josh had acquired, one had stood out. The woman had not provided a photograph, but Riley had been intrigued and found it endearing how she had answered each recommended profile question.

Riley gingerly crept toward the end of the hallway to a lit opening. “Hello?” she called out. “Is anyone ho—”

Her words were cut short when a messenger bag swung around the hallway corner and struck her in the face.  She stumbled backward in her stilettos.

“Holy fuck!” Her hands immediately flew to her stinging nose. “I think you broke me.”

“Eat it, you demonic asshole!” came a feminine snarl.

Riley ducked and dodged as the messenger bag continued to attack. She retreated through the hallway until she reached the front door. She grabbed an umbrella from its stand in hopes to ward off her attacker.

“What the hell is your problem?” Riley demanded, umbrella raised to shield her from further attack.

The woman in front of Riley lowered the messenger bag and cocked a hip to one side. Her positioning was more an offensive stance than a feminine pose. “Intruders are my problem. And since you seem to be one,
you
’
re
my problem.”

Riley blinked a few times and shook her head. “Something’s wrong here. This isn’t a fantasy.”

“No, really?” The woman narrowed her eyes. “I’m guessing that not too many people would fantasize about beating someone with a messenger bag and then sleeping with them. However, I could be wrong.” Her eyes flashed. “Care to try me, Demon?”

Riley stepped backwards, umbrella still raised, and fumbled for the door handle of the front door. “This is crazy.”

Riley threw herself outside and stumbled down the concrete front stoop. She’d never had problems in high heels before, but her new mark had left her completely disoriented. Although she should have flashed out of the dream realm, Riley instead followed a row of glowing streetlamps until she reached a small, abandoned park at the end of the street. She paced back and forth on the concrete, her heels clicking on the sidewalk as she stole glances at the darkened home.

“Think,” Riley said to herself, mindlessly tossing the umbrella away. “What just happened?” Minutes passed as she thought back to her training and employee manual. “You were assaulted by a client and, to add insult to injury, turned down,” she admitted to no one in particular. “This can’t be a fantasy. No one in their right mind would think a bag to the face is foreplay. Right?”

She stopped pacing and ran her hands through her loose brunette hair. “No. You go back in there and show her the time of her life,” she ordered herself. Realizing that her body had a slight tremble, Riley took a few calming breaths before turning on her heel and storming back to the home. “In your decades of work, this will be your
best
mark. Yes,” she said with a nod of finality.

The front door was as far as she got before she came to a stop. Her hand never quite reached the door knob. “If you go back in there, she might have upgraded her weapon.” She tested the bridge of her nose, still tender from the mark’s assault. In all her decades of being a succubus, she’d never been attacked. A little light BDSM wasn’t unusual, but it had never taken the form of a bag to the face.

Her hand hovered over the doorknob. The hesitation came again. “Screw it.” She relented and pressed a combination into her wristwatch. Within a few seconds she flashed out of the dream realm.

Back in her apartment, Riley found herself in her bed, back where she was supposed to be.  She groaned and rubbed her face, flinching at the soreness of her nose. Glancing at the blue digital numbers of her alarm clock, she could at least be grateful the damage hadn’t been worse.

• • •

New York City, 1990

Rillea squinted her eyes and picked at a patch of rough skin on her right knee. She raked her short nails over the dry bits of torn-up skin and frowned. Sleeping through her alarm had made the morning a rushed one. In her scurrying around to get ready, she’d scraped her knee against the corner of a drawer in her apartment.

She chewed on her bottom lip as she brushed at the flakes of skin.

“Rillea Schroder,” came a stern voice.  She snapped her eyes away from her bruising knee and in the direction of the male tone. One of Trusics’s instructors stood at the front of the classroom, glaring in her direction.

He was a tall man with wavy, sandy-colored hair. His profile was strong and he had one of those butt chins that people paid plastic surgeons thousands of dollars to acquire. Rillea wasn’t sure if this man’s was his birthright or manmade, however. During her meeting with Human Resources, the HR contact had repeatedly noted the availability of cosmetic procedures for long-time employees. Rillea wasn’t sure if the HR woman was being thorough or if she was hinting that she would benefit from a little nip-and-tuck.

“Rillea,” the man barked again.

“I’m sorry?”

“I asked you a question.” He growled impatiently and tapped his foot. “What is the protocol for reporting an abusive mark? We’re all waiting.”

Rillea cursed under her breath. As much as she’d tried to go above and beyond to be a perfect trainee, this man did not like her. She had been a succubus since the mid-1960s, but her employment with Trusics had only just begun. She knew full well how to be a succubus; she’d survived this long on her own, hadn’t she? But now there were new rules and procedures to learn to be a part of the growing Trusics family.

She glanced down at her notebook and tapped her pen against the pages. “Uh, in case of a client who becomes violent, we’re to phase out immediately and report him—”

“Or her,” the trainer jumped in.

Rillea resisted the urge to roll her eyes. “Or
her
, to the Human Resources and Security departments.”

“And what happens next?” The trainer looked annoyed as if she should have anticipated him wanting that information.

“Then the case is reviewed and if the mark is found in violation, they’re blacklisted. And the accusing incubus
or
succubus,” she quickly added, sensing the trainer was waiting for the opportunity to interrupt her again, “is awarded a stipend of energy to offset the misuse of his or her time.”

The trainer looked displeased as if smelling a rotting scent. “Yes,” he confirmed in a tight voice. He spun on his heels and returned to the chalkboard at the front of the room. “Now, if you’ll all turn to page forty-seven of your handbook, we’ll next discuss the exception to this rule, situations where a little bit of controlled violence is actually a
good
thing—what are known as code blue clients.”

“Awesome!” a dread-headed youth chirped from his seat adjacent to Rillea. “I’ve been waiting for the twisted sex perverts.”

The trainer turned away from the board to face his students. “Yes. As I said before:
code blue
clients.”

Rillea packed up her handbook and the notes she’d taken as her Protocol class came to an end. She looked at her watch to note the exact time. The watch had been a present from her father on her sixteenth birthday, and she’d continued using it well past her second decade. If all went well, in a few short weeks she’d “graduate,” become a probationary employee, and get a new watch from Trusics.

The watch set company employees apart from other incubi and succubi. It was a symbol of belonging to an elite community, and it did so much more than tell time. Disguised as an accessory for the convenience of wearers, it was a specialized mechanism developed internally to make work efficient and safe. From what she had learned over the past month of rigorous training, the timepiece granted immediate access to the dream realm. It also stored and provided the sexual energy that was the heartbeat of the cubare.

She had half an hour before the start of her next class, Seduction Studies. It was her favorite of the long day, not because of the hands-on structure of the course, but because she had proven herself to be an apt student of the discipline. Her trainers had repeatedly praised her ability to tease out a partner’s most provocative desires.

On her way out of the classroom, she noticed a man standing near the classroom exit. She didn’t recognize him as one of her classmates or any of the trainers she knew. She smiled at the man on her way out the door.

“Don’t let him get to you,” the man noted as she passed him. “He hates everyone.”

Rillea paused her exit. “He does seem to have it out for me.”

The man pushed himself off the doorjamb. “You’ll find most of the training staff will be knowledgeable and helpful,” he noted, “but I think he’s bitter about not being an active agent.”

“They never told us; how do trainers get their positions?”

“Studs put out to pasture.” The man shrugged meekly. “Incubi and succubi who want the benefits Trusics provides, but balk at having a monthly energy quota to meet. They get paid just enough energy to keep up their standard of living.”

“They don’t age?”

“Not as long as they honor their contract,” the man confirmed. “Their age remains preserved like a typical agent, but they’re not allowed to access the dream realm without company permission.”

Rillea hazarded a glance at the trainer, who still commanded the front of the classroom. She noticed for the first time the peppering at his temples and the beginnings of crow’s feet at the corners of his eyes. Wrinkles and grey hair were virtually unheard of in the cubare community unless they had been sired or recruited later on in life.

Her grey-green eyes looked back at the informative stranger. “Are you a trainer, too?” she asked carefully, not wanting to offend the man either way.

He chuckled and shook his head. “Naw. They’ll never get rid of me. I know too many company secrets.”

Rillea found herself smiling. The man’s gentle energy had settled her nerves.  

“By the way,” he said, offering his outstretched hand, “I’m James.”