Free Web NovelChapter 142: Chapter 141: What is It like?
The other two pack members straightened when they saw Eve, their expressions respectful. Elena turned at their reaction and went still when she saw who had entered.
"Luna," she said, and the word came out slightly breathless. Her hands stilled over the herb bundles, and Eve could feel the nervousness spike in her energy. "I...good afternoon. Can I get you something? Are you hungry? We have..."
"I’m not hungry, thank you," Eve said, keeping her voice easy and non-threatening. She could see Elena’s anxiety clearly....the slight tension in her shoulders, the way her eyes cut briefly to the other women in the kitchen like she was calculating whether to make this a witnessed conversation or a private one.
Eve made the decision for her. She looked at the other two pack members with a smile. "Would you mind giving us a few minutes?"
They didn’t mind. They left with a speed that suggested they were either very obedient or very aware of what Elena’s recent duties had been and wanted no part of the conversation that was coming.
Probably both.
The kitchen door swung shut behind them, and Eve moved to the central island, pulling out a stool and sitting down in a way that she hoped communicated this is informal and you are not in trouble as clearly as possible.
Elena hadn’t moved from her counter. She was gripping a bundle of thyme with the focused intensity of someone who needed something to hold onto.
"Sit down," Eve said gently. "Please. I’m not here to...." She paused, trying to find the right framing. "I just wanted to meet you. Properly."
Elena came to the island slowly, perching on the edge of the stool across from Eve with the careful posture of someone who hadn’t yet decided whether to stay or run. freēwēbηovel.c૦m
Up close, the quality of her energy was even more evident. She genuinely was glowing....not literally, not in the way Eve’s own power sometimes manifested visibly, but in that particular way of someone whose body had been extremely well cared for. Her skin had a warmth to it, her eyes were bright, and there was a looseness in her posture beneath the nerves that spoke of deep physical satisfaction.
Eve felt her succubus nature stir with curiosity....not attraction, nothing like that, but the instinctive interest in someone whose energy signature was this interesting. Raphael had left his mark on her in the most literal supernatural sense. His power had wound through her system during feeding and left traces that Eve could perceive clearly.
"I know this is awkward," Eve started.
"A little," Elena admitted, then immediately looked like she regretted the honesty.
"It’s okay," Eve said. "It’s allowed to be awkward. The whole situation is objectively strange. The brothers arranged...." She stopped. Started again. "They assigned you to my uncle’s....." Another stop. "This is difficult to discuss without it sounding like something it isn’t." freewebnøvel.coɱ
Elena’s mouth quirked slightly. The first hint of a genuine expression breaking through the nerves. "The Alphas arranged for me to be Lord Raphael’s dedicated feeding partner," she said, with a directness that suggested she had decided honesty was safer than dancing around it. "For the duration of his stay."
"Yes," Eve said, grateful for the plainspoken clarity. "That."
"And you wanted to....what? Make sure I’m okay with it?" Elena asked. "Or make sure I understand what it means?"
"Both, maybe," Eve said. "Are you? Okay with it?"
Elena looked at her for a long moment, assessing. Then something in her expression shifted....the nervousness receding to make space for something more honest. "Luna, I’m going to answer that question truthfully because I think you’d know if I was lying."
"Probably," Eve agreed.
"I volunteered," Elena said simply. "Originally. I was not one of the twenty who offered when the Alphas first arranged it. Lord Raphael turned them all down." A pause. "When Catherine came to ask if I’d be willing to....to accept his specific request, I said yes immediately. Without hesitation."
She glanced down at the thyme bundle in her hands. "I know how that sounds. I know it might seem like I had some kind of agenda, or that I was angling for...."
"It doesn’t sound like that," Eve said. "What does it sound like?"
Elena looked up. "It sounds like someone who made a choice. A fully informed, completely voluntary choice. And I stand by it."
Eve nodded slowly. "And after? How are you now?"
The question hung between them, and Eve watched Elena process it.....the genuine inquiry behind it, the lack of judgment in Eve’s expression.
"I’m....." Elena stopped. A small smile appeared, private and involuntary, the kind that came from genuine memory rather than performance. "I’m very well, Luna. Thank you for asking."
The smile that had appeared on Elena’s face was doing something interesting....growing slightly, taking on a quality that was part contentment and part wonder. Like someone revisiting a memory that continued to surprise them even on reflection.
Eve recognized that expression. She’d worn it herself, in the early weeks with her mates, when the reality of what she’d experienced hadn’t quite finished settling into her understanding.
"Can I ask you something Elena?" Eve said. "You don’t have to answer."
"You can ask," Elena said carefully.
Eve considered how to phrase this without making it strange. Without making it about the fact that Raphael was her uncle and therefore this was technically her uncle’s sex life she was asking about.
She was asking as a succubus. She was asking with genuine curiosity about feeding dynamics, about what the experience of being fed on by an ancient incubus was actually like for the person providing the energy. That was a legitimate interest entirely separate from family relations.
She was mostly convincing herself.
"What is it like?" Eve asked. "Being fed on. By someone like him. Someone that old, that powerful."
Elena was quiet for a moment, clearly considering how much to share. Then she seemed to make a decision.
