Succubs on Top Page 0,4

I could trust him, but I had come to respect him.

Troubled by the scrutiny, I glanced back down and discovered I finally had a respectable hand after several rounds of shit. Three of a kind. Not the greatest but passable. I raised high, wanting to get the others out before more cards came into play and made my hand less passable.

My strategy worked on the vampires. The next card fell. Seven of spades. Hugh scowled and folded when I raised again. I waited for Carter to drop out as well, but instead, he reraised further.

I hesitated only a moment before calling. As the last card was about to play, I puzzled over what the angel might have and whether I could beat it. A pair? Two pair? Ah. The last card came out. Another spade. There was now a strong possibility he had a flush. That would beat me. Still hoping I could bluff him out, I raised even more. He reraised me again, more than doubling my initial bet.

That was a lot of money to add, especially considering what I'd already put in. Centuries of investments kept me pretty comfortable, but that didn't mean I had to be stupid. What did he have? It had to be the flush. Balking, I folded.

With a pleased grin, he swept in the massive pot. When he tossed his hand over to the discard pile, the cards' edges caught, making them flip over. Two of diamonds. Eight of clubs.

"You...you bluffed!" I cried. "You had nothing!"

Carter wordlessly lit a cigarette.

I looked to the others for confirmation. "He can't do that."

"Hell, I've been doing it for half this game," said Hugh, borrowing Carter's lighter. "Not that it's done me any good."

"Yeah...but...he's, you know. An angel. They can't lie."

"He didn't lie. He bluffed."

Cody considered, twisting a piece of his blond hair around one finger. "Yeah, but bluffing is still dishonest."

"It's implied lying," said Peter.

Hugh stared at him. "'Implied lying?' What the fuck does that mean?"

I watched Carter stack his money and made a face at him. You'd think an angel who hung around with employees of evil would be a good influence, but at times, he seemed worse than we were. "Enjoy your thirty pieces of silver, Judas."

He gave me a mock hat tip while the others argued on.

Suddenly, like a row of dominoes, conversation steadily dropped. Carter felt it first, of course, but he merely arched an eyebrow, as indifferent as ever. Then came the vampires with their heightened reflexes and sensitivity. They exchanged glances and looked toward the door. Finally, seconds later, Hugh and I sensed it as well.

"What is that?" Cody frowned, staring across the room. "It's sort of like Georgina but not."

Hugh followed the young vampire's gaze, face mildly speculative. "Incubus."

I had already known that, of course. The signatures we all carried differed by creature. Vampires felt different from imps, just as imps felt different from succubi. If one knew an immortal well enough, one could also pick up on an individual's unique attributes. I was the only succubus who inspired sensations of silk and tuberose perfume. In a room full of vampires, I would have been able to quickly determine if Cody or Peter were present.

Likewise, I immediately knew there was an incubus approaching Peter's door, and I knew exactly which incubus it was. I would have known his signature anywhere, even after all this time. The fleeting feel of velvet on the skin. A whispered scent of rum, almond, and cinnamon.

Not even realizing I'd gotten up, I flung the door open, staring with delight at the same fox-faced features and mischievous eyes I'd last seen over a century ago.

"Hello, ma Fleur ," he said.

CHAPTER 2

"Bastien," I breathed, still disbelieving. "Bastien!"

I threw my arms around him, and he lifted me up like I weighed nothing, twirling me around. When he gently set me back on my feet, he looked down at me fondly, his handsome face cracking into a grin. Until I saw it, I hadn't realized how much I'd missed that smile.

"You look exactly the same," I noted, taking in the curling black hair that touched his shoulders, the eyes so dark a chocolate brown they almost looked black as well. Unlike me, he liked to wear the shape he'd been born with, the body from his mortal days. His skin was the color of the mochas I consumed regularly, smooth and lovely. His nose had been broken when he was human, but he never bothered to shape-shift