Page 1 of The Succubi's Choice

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At this sort of bar, the odds are good, but the goods are certainly odd.

Miri sips her lemonade, peering out over the paper umbrella covering it, her eyes fluttering from person to person to person. From man to man to the occasional woman, but nothing catching her eye for too long.

It’s not like she’s picky, per se, because quite the opposite. But for people like her, a little bit of discretion really makes life worth living. A little discretion and something that could be a chore, a simple obtaining of sustenance needed for survival, could turn into an utter fucking delight.

When she’s feeling talkative, she tries to equate it to listening to fine music after days upon days of silence. After that much silence, even an elevator jingle can be magical, but a fine orchestra piece makes the world feel...more real.

So she sits, tucked into the corner of the bar, and waits. Doesn’t try to stick out, doesn’t try to draw the attention that she can command with just a thought.

If she was allowed to simply do so. If she wasn’t hilariously regulated to the point where even an idle flirt needs to be reported to her handler.

She shifts deeper into the booth, the fake leather squeaking against the skin of her upper thighs, a pit of unease in her stomach. She should be happy, right now, right at this moment, but even the ability to find someone to fuck and then leave feels hollow.

You know, the basic needs of any succubi. Sex, for the sake of sex, and nothing else, as the stereotype goes.

She’ll be the first to tell you that the stereotype is narrow-minded. Because anyone who judges her solely on sex is going to seriously underestimate her. But then again, generally that’s an advantage.

For the person who doesn’t underestimate a succubi is someone who she doesn’t want to deal with at all. She thrives off of the idea that people think of her as small, as frivolous, as not worth bothering with. To the normal human eye, she’s beautiful, with a heart-shaped face and a wild tangle of red-brown hair.

To the non-natural, non-human eye...she is small. Somewhere near the bottom of the totem pole.

She’s half convinced that it’s the only way she’s lived through the past few years.

With that thought, she sips at the lemonade again, eyeing the new group of men coming through the door, cataloging them, the breadth of their shoulders and the muscles in their arms, the calluses on their hands…

“I don’t understand how you can just be hidden here.” Coming up from the bar, her friend Gabriel sets down a basket of greasy onion rings, scooting into the booth. “I mean, you stand out.” He pushes a hotel key across the table at her, complete with a cheap plastic knob with the room number on it.

She twitches a smile at him, too distracted to actually focus on him, before pocketing the key. He shrugs, pretty used to her hunting patterns at this point.

“I mean, I stand out, and I’m not all...” He gestures, vaguely, at all of her.

And it’s true. In this sparsely crowded middle of the day group at a bar that’s only a few shades above a biker bar, he sticks out in his pressed shirt and neatly combed hair. And even though he may be her closest friend and beleaguered roommate, she’s not exactly going to tell him she can hide just as easily as she can stick out like a sore thumb. Some things are obviously better left in one’s toolkit.

“The lighting does you no favors,” she says, a sort of restlessness settling under her skin.

“The lighting does no one any favors,” he points out, good-natured, before stuffing his mouth with an onion ring. “Any possibilities?”

She squints through the lighting, the lighting that’s really way too bright for a dive bar, bright enough that it slightly hurts her eyes. “I just want someone without a beer belly,” she says, shifting, as if she could move enough to release the pressure under her skin. “Or, if they have the belly, at least some shoulders to match it. Or tits.”

Gabriel blinks at her in slow amusement, as he always does whenever she references that she’s really okay with women as much as men. Not like this was a great place for women either, but still. “Should we just...I dunno...go somewhere else? Find a different crowd? Maybe a bookstore?”

He just likes bookstores.

But if she hunted at a bookstore twice a week, she’d quickly gets known as the person who does that, and there are a hell of a lot more bars than bookstores for her to diversify her…portfolio.

“I’m fine with waiting,” she says, before gesturing at the onion rings, her stomach sinking at the smell of the soggy food. “That’s...disgusting.”

He pops another into his mouth with a quirked eyebrow. “Just cause you can’t digest it, doesn’t mean it’s bad.” He smiles at her, friendly in the face of her moodiness. “What about that guy?”

That guy he gestures to has certainly been on her radar, with broad shoulders, white-blond hair, and a stubble covered jaw, but something in his square visage just...doesn’t do it for her. Not today.

“Don’t really feel like beard burn this week,” she says, flippant. “Besides, I heard him speak. His voice is squeaky.”

Gabriel turns and squints at the man. “Since when is voice a factor for you?”

“Since forever, of course,” she retorts back, before a new crowd of men file through the door, bringing with them a wave of heat from outside, acrid with the smell of hot asphalt.

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