I Accidentally Summoned A Succubus

No one spoke on the ride back.

Marcus sat in the backseat like a passenger in his own body. Pale. Quiet. Still breathing, but his eyes didn't focus right. The rest of us weren't much better. Jen kept looking at him like he might keel over again. Raph hadn't said a word since we left the hospital. And me? I drove in silence. Trying not to think too hard about the fact that Marcus shouldn't be alive.

When we pulled up to his house, we didn't get out right away. We just sat there.

His front door was still broken. Or rather, gone. What was left of it lay scattered across the steps like a miniature wreckage site. 

I looked at the others. No one said it. But I knew they were all thinking the same thing I was:

None of this made sense.

We helped Marcus inside. Or Raph did. Jen hovered. I stayed back, watching them disappear into the house.

I turned to go, already heading for my car when I heard her.

"James."

Linda. Standing halfway between me and the curb, arms crossed over her chest like she was cold. But it wasn't the weather making her shake.

She came closer. Whatever fire she had back at the apartment had burned out somewhere between the ambulance and the hospital.

"I don't want to go home," she said.

I said nothing.

"Raph and Jen are going together," she went on, "so that just leaves us."

"No." My answer was clear.

She flinched. Didn't expect me to shoot it down that fast, but she kept talking.

"I'm still drunk and terrified and confused out of my mind. Marcus is alive, but he's acting like a ghost. You saw what happened. That door. His wound. It's all wrong, James. Everything's wrong."

She paused, then stepped closer.

"I'm not asking you to hold me. I'm not asking you to talk to me or cuddle me. I'm not asking you to make me your girlfriend or start being nice to me.'' 

She stuttered for a moment, while I looked at her all bored.

Then she started to cry. 

"I don't have time for this.'' I said, with a tone that can equate an eyeroll. She gasped at my words, but I didn't care. I moved to open my car door, but she touched my hand to stop me. 

"Fuck me.'' She blurted out.

Linda wasn't subtle, she never had been. But desperation stripped off whatever layers of pretense were left. 

"Please just fuck me, James.'' She muttered, " I beg you.'' 

She looked at me with that lost look in her eyes, like a puppy does when you don't feed it. "I'm tired of dropping hints and burning out my vibrator thinking of you.'' 

I fought the urge to smirk, she dangled on the edge of perfect wording, but she wants there yet. The words I needed, the kind of begging I wanted, were not yet given.

"I mean it," she said. "Do you know how you sit?"

I didn't answer, I just et her go on.

"You sit like your lap is a fucking throne. Like the way you spread out in that stupid office chair of yours is a goddamn invitation. I used to stare at you, James. Just stare and imagine climbing right on top of you, right there. Just me: plapping down and bouncing till I forgot my name. Just you, all dominant and strict, watching me like you're waiting to take over if my legs give out or I get overwhelmed with pleasure."

She laughed a little, but it broke in the middle.

"I've thought about it. God, so many times. Watching your hands move when you talk. How your fingers tap the desk. How you never slouch, like your spine doesn't even know how to bend."

Still, I said nothing.

"You don't have to show me your cock for me to know you could fuck me into a brain aneurysm," she said. "You're that kind of man. That kind of mind. The ones who don't just fuck—they rewire you."

She stepped closer and I didn't back away.

"You're different. You try to pretend you're like the others, but you're not. You dull yourself to blend in, but it's bullshit. There's something off about you. Something sharp. And I fucking crave it."

She whined and a tear fell from her eyes, she stared at me: breathing heavy and yearning. 

"I don't want comfort. I don't want gentle. I don't want to talk about it or process the trauma. I just want to forget. I want to feel something else. Something hard. Something real."

She looked at me, eyes wide. Raw.

"I want to get on my knees and give up control for a few hours. Just be your toy. I want you to fuck me so hard my thoughts stop and my head gets scrambled."

That last line… That's the one that stuck.

"Just be your toy." Said with no irony. No joke. Just a plea.

I felt it then.

That precise, undeniable flick of something low in my spine.

Desire, yes. But not just that. Alignment. Like puzzle pieces snapping into place.

She'd said exactly what I would've written. In a scene. In a theory. In one of my notebooks tucked between journals and case studies.

And now it was standing in front of me. Begging.

Her eyes flicked down.

A small, wicked smile curved her lips.

"I knew it," she whispered. "You're hard."

She leaned in, lips brushing my cheek.

"You're incredibly adorable when you try to hide it," she murmured. "And I was right—you're big."

I didn't react. Not on the surface.

But I opened the car door.

"Get in," I said quietly. "Just one night. Meaningless sex. Expect nothing after."

She slipped inside without hesitation.

"Perfect," she whispered.