I snort. “Yeah, someone who doesn’t exist.”
She nudges me, winking. “It’s Valentine’s. Have a little faith.”
* * *
Of course, our entire day is complete chaos. More orders than we could ever fulfill, last-minute requests from panicked partners who forgot all about the holiday until the very last moment. I smile, throw in extra truffles, and try my best to make each item special.
By 9 PM the rush has mostly died down, and Keisha goes home. I’m alone in the kitchen, working on another batch when I feel a prickle run down my spine and hair rising on my arms. My omega, who’s been restless all day, suddenly sits up.
Something’s coming.
I pause with my whisk in hand. The shop is quiet; outside,the street is empty. But I feel… something. Some kinda pull. Like a hook behind my navel, tugging. I shake it off and keep working. It’s probably just those dreams messing with my head, myomega being dramatic because my heat is coming… Then I look up and my entire world stops.
* * *
Rahel
I wake up hard enough to pound nails. Again.
I lie in the dark, jaw clenched, cock throbbing, trying to remember how to breathe. The dream is already slipping away, but her scent stays. Fuck, it always does… chocolate, brown sugar and the sweetest slick I’veneverfucking tasted.
I’ve been alive for five hundred years. Five hundred years of feeding on lust, drowning in bodies, taking whatever I wanted. And none of it compares to a woman who might not even exist.
I drag a hand down my face and sit up. My room at our MC compound is spartan: a bed, a dresser, weapons. I don’t need much these days. Don’t fucking want much. Just her.
The dreams started six months ago. Out of nowhere, this omega started appearing in my sleep. I can never see her face. Just shadows, curves for fucking days, and the way she sounds when she comes. But I know the fucking feel of her. Know her scent. The shape of her body under my hands… like I’ve been touching her for centuries.
And I haven’t fed since that first dream.
My brothers think I’ve lost it. Fuck, they’re probably right. An incubus who doesn’t feed is an incubus who dies. We need sexual energy like humans need food. Going without is slow starvation and death to us.
But every time I try to feed … every time I find a willing female and try to take what I need … I smell the wrong perfume. Feel the wrong curves. Hear the wrong voice.
And I can’t do it.
She ruined me. A dream. A goddamn fantasy. A woman who might just be my mind breaking after five centuries.
And I’d rather starve than settle for less… fucking pathetic.
“You look like shit. "
I grunt at my brother, Zeke, as I walk into the clubhouse kitchen. He’s leaning against the counter, arms crossed, watching me with knowing eyes.
I grumble, “I’m fine.”
“Bro, you haven’t fed in fucking months.”
“I said I’m fine,” I snarl back.
“And I said, you look like shit.” He pushes off the counter, stepping right in front of me. “We’re worried. Whatever the fuck this is…”
“Drop it,” I growl.
“An incubus who doesn’t feed is an incubus who…”
I move before he can finish, slamming him against the wall with my forearm across his throat. My eyes are glowing … I can feel the heat rising through my body, my shadows flickering at the edges of my vision.
“I said. Drop. It.”
