“Well…” My fingers curled in a partial retreat. “Yeah.”
He held me a moment more, then backpedaled out of reach. “Look, kid. You’re cute. Really. And I think you’ll get on great here.”
He had more to say. It was only half a thought, and the other half started with “but.” I heard it hanging on the tip of his tongue.
When he didn’t come out with it, I muttered into the silence, “Thanks, I think.”
“It was a compliment,” he said.
My frown made it clear I didn’t believe that, and Beck’s features pinched.
“Don’t take it personally.”
“The compliment?” I failed to extinguish the flare of annoyance.
Beck held up his hands. “No, the… rejection, I suppose.”
I looked him over, and he looked at me too, and Itastedit. Faint notes of arousal wafted through the air, tantalizing us both. His gaze on me was searing, marking his interest from the hollows of my throat to the curve of my hips. Despite that, and the way his Adam’s apple bobbed through a hard swallow, he remained steadfast.
“There’s nothing wrong with you,” he said. “This is a me thing.”
“It’s not you; it’s me?” My eyes narrowed. “That’s kind of a tired line.”
Beck raised a shoulder, impervious to my scorn. “I’m a tired guy.”
I bit back further retort. Being snappy would not get me where I wanted—needed—to be. So, I made my gaze soft like I thought his had been earlier, then closed the gap between us.
“Icould be tired.” I ducked my head and looked up at him through my lashes as I added, “You could wear me out.”
Hands again, staking claims. One on his chest, testing the firm muscle of his pec. The other lower, snagging the belt I could use to lead him in the direction I wanted him to go.
He caught my wrist again but, this time, he just rested there with his skin on mine. “Is this because I scared your dinner away?” he asked. “Now I’m on the menu?”
“When you put it that way, you do kinda owe me.”
I rocked my hips forward, bumping into him, hinting at what it might feel like to really collide. His gaze dropped to the point of contact, and arousal perfumed the air. My lips parted as I took it in, another sample, the kind that had been barely sustaining me for weeks.
“More like we’re even,” Beck said and, with a swift step away, he stripped everything from me.
The contact and the chance to consume were both gone, and I was overwhelmed withwant.
He’d barely turned and was brushing past me when I caught him with clawlike fingers. He stopped short, but I had his attention. My mouth flooded with saliva at the prospect of real sustenance for the first time… ever.
“Mister Beckett.” Words spilled out while I clung to him. “I need this job. And to keep it, I need customers… I need to eat.”
It was hard to exist like this. Harder to perform. My grip on the silks felt weak, and the height made me dizzy. I lost myself in the spotlight, blinking and fearing the blacknessbehind my eyelids would consume me. I didn’t want to fall. I was low enough now, hanging on and begging this man—this demon—to fuck and fill me. Make me whole.
“It’s not like an incubus to ask for consent,” Beck said while holding my pleading gaze. “Usually, your kind just take what they want.”
Another compliment with a cutting edge, chipping away at me.
“I guess I’m not a very good incubus,” I muttered.
That was the sum of it.
If I were a better incubus, I would gorge myself in the gilded cage Maslow made for me. I would love it there. Instead, I was here, hanging off a higher demon’s coattails, asking for a pity fuck.
Soft. His eyes went soft as they met mine at last, and that sight soothed the frantic beast in me. “All right.” He nodded. “A quick bite.”
