Succubus in the City by Nina Harper Read Free Book Online Page B

all over the Cowgirl Hall of Fame (though I think it’s the roasted garlic there that she can’t resist). Desi likes burritos just fine but thinks that if she’s going to the East Village she really would prefer Indian food on Curry Row, which is what everyone calls that one block of East Sixth Street between First and Avenue A. A number of guidebooks have called it the best-smelling street in New York, and if you’re in the mood for Indian food that’s probably true.
    So Benny’s is a solitary delight for me. Since tonight is a delivery night, I could have hit Benny’s on the way out for service and sit-down, but I don’t like to eat alone in public. Maybe because when I know I’ll have my mojo on, I won’t be left in peace. The prey will swarm around and I won’t be able to just relax with my burrito and chips before hitting the clubs. Besides, I’d been busy at work and I wanted to catch up on MagicMirror before going out.
    It was one of those nights. At particular times, which are predicted by a complicated formula that includes the aspects of the Moon, the Earth, Venus, and Mars, along with specific hours not only of astrological conjunction but “witching hours,” I am irresistible. I am lust incarnate, and any man who sees me desires me. On those nights I am demon succubus, the deliverer into Hell of whomever enters my bed. That’s in the contract.
    The hours are specific and limited. Ten to three a.m. on the nights when the particular astrological alignments are in the correct degrees. Once upon a time it took a fair bit of work for me to calculate the time; these days I’ve just got it running on my computer, all neatly entered into my calendar in red. Hunting nights.
    What makes me irresistible during these particular and limited times are my pheromones. During the correct astrological windows, whatever changes about me specifically affects the subtle underlying scent that is more instinct than actual attraction.
    But not for a couple of hours yet. So I nuked my burrito and booted up the laptop in the living room. I ate while I read the blog and caught up on the doings of Hell.
    Okay, so I got a little distracted. It happens online. I’m reading and there’s some really exciting food porn that just makes me salivate. This time I ran across a flamewar in Marduk’s topic about the Orders of Precedence, and whether Mephistopheles ranks Marduk. Well, easy enough to imagine what Marduk thinks about the situation, but there is good reason for Meph to get top billing even if Marduk is another Babylonian, so I spent some time composing a conciliatory post pointing out that really the incident did take place in Meph’s territory and that Marduk shouldn’t take it personally. Marduk is the head of the Treasury of Hell, after all, and if he’s no longer a god he’s got one of the top gigs in the Underworld. Along with Beelzebub, Beliel, Moloch, and Meph, he’s in the next layer of organization directly under Satan Herself. Though Moloch’s specialty isn’t really directly in line politically, he’s mostly included out of courtesy because Satan has been so pleased with his performance.
    I like Meph, truth be told. He’s smart and interesting and a lot of fun, to say nothing of being Satan’s second in command. Marduk can be a stuffed-shirt prig, and I don’t dare drop him from my friends list because he’d whine all over Hell about it. But he expects my support because he was a Babylonian deity and I did at one time pay him homage. That was back before I knew the Orders of Precedence of Hell and got to hang with him one on one. Face-to-face, Marduk is a has-been who can’t change with the times. It’s surprising that he’s on MagicMirror at all—I always thought he’d be one of the Luddites who refused to master the tech. And hey, maybe he hasn’t. Maybe he’s impressed one of the newly delivered (and I certainly could supply enough of them myself) to do his setup. Maybe someone’s made him