Crazy Seduction(erotica)

“Okay, we have our project for the week. If everyone is available, I’d like us to get together this coming weekend,” Camila suggested, and once more, everyone nodded in agreement.

“Henry’s going to have to work from the mansion until he fixes the rift inside him,” Roy stated.

“He did,” Siobhan said with a smile. “It’s only leaking a little more than normal background levels currently.”

“When did he get a chance to do that?” Roy asked.

Siobhan shook her head. “He told us this morning, and I saw it working.”

Camila smirked. “As I said earlier, Henry had a busy day.”

Roy fixed an eye on Camila. “Like you said, he has to take it slower for a bit.” He thought about that. “It’s a short work week. Only three days. Let’s ask Henry to hold all magic-related issues until the weekend.”

Sigrid smiled and nodded. “I’m sure he’d be delighted to concentrate on his computer-related tasks instead.”

Roy nodded, and Camila brought their meeting to an end.

“Have a great week, everyone!”

Hugs were exchanged as people made their way down to the doors back to their homes.

Camila sat on a footstool next to the chaise lounge where her daughter and granddaughter were still relaxing. Soon they were the only ones in the room.

Marisa looked at her mother with a curious expression.

“What?” Camila asked when she noticed.

“There’s something different about you,” the gorgeous blonde said pensively as she tried to determine what it was.

Camila gave her daughter an innocent smile. “Really? I don’t know what it could be.”

“There’s a calmness about you. You seem… content? Happy? A mix of the two and something else,” Marisa puzzled.

“Is it wrong to feel happy? Content?” Camila asked.

“You were obviously with Henry. Last night?”

The brunette beauty nodded but maintained her innocent expression.

Marisa gave her mother a confused and exasperated look. “What is it?”

Camila shrugged with a euphoric smile. “It’s love.”

Marisa’s jaw dropped. “Love?” she whispered. “That’s… not supposed to be possible for us. Are you sure?”

Camila nodded. “I spent a lot of time trying to understand these unfamiliar feelings and sensations. I’ve never felt this way about any of the mates I’ve taken in the past. There’s always been a distinct boundary between them and me, with very little shared over a wall I’m always conscious of. My sense of self is defined by this individuality. With Henry, that separation is gone and in its place is a duality. I’m me, but I’m also us.”

Marisa’s eyes widened as she was very familiar with her own emotional boundaries. Nate’s death made her very aware that she’d kept him on the other side of the line, regardless of how often he professed his love like his Human parents had done for each other. She’d never lied to him. He knew that Succubi emotions didn’t work like Human emotions, but he always held onto his hope.

Now her mother was telling her it was possible. This shook her foundations.

Camila continued, oblivious to her daughter’s shock. “The strength of this emotional bond takes my breath away, and the feeling of connection and vulnerability is both thrilling and frightening.”

She finally noticed the stricken expression on Marisa’s face. “What’s wrong?”

“Nate said he loved me. He believed in love, and I didn’t think it could happen. Now you tell me it not only can, but it happened for you! Does that mean I could have loved him in return if I tried harder?”

Camila took Marisa’s hands in hers and looked into her eyes. “I don’t believe it works that way. These feelings I have for Henry weren’t something I tried to create. They just grew over time. You didn’t have that much time with Nate. His behavior was based on his desire to emulate his Human parents. We can’t even be sure if his emotions were love or just a longing to be in love. You shouldn’t feel bad about something that didn’t have time to grow, and you couldn’t have known if it even would.”

Marisa nodded shakily as that made sense to her. She knew she was a little sensitive about the seemingly one-sided love affair Nate had with her. She knew her feelings for Henry were stronger than how she’d felt about Nate. From what her mother said, that might have been due to how long they’d known each other. Maybe it would lead to her experiencing what Camila had. Time would tell. Her skin tingled at the idea that she might one day experience love.

Another thought occurred to her. She recalled the stories her mother told her about past mates she’d lost, and Marisa had always dreaded this experience for herself. She’d always held back a little bit of herself because of that fear. What if… what if all she needed was to not hold back?

Camila scooped up Natalia and nuzzled her while Marisa stood. They walked together in silence back to the vestibule, where the magic doors would take them to their separate homes.

“Are you going to be okay?” Camila asked her daughter, sensing her internal conflict.

Marisa nodded as she took her daughter back into her arms. She kissed her mother’s cheek. “I’ll be fine. You just caught me by surprise with that confession.”

Camila gave her a sympathetic look. “If you need anything or want to talk, please call me.”

“I will. Goodnight!” Marisa said and stepped through her door.

The lovely brunette stood before her door and contemplated going upstairs to see Henry. She smiled and shook her head.

He needed his sleep, and tomorrow was soon enough to see him.

She’d have him in her dreams tonight.

Just not literally.

Chapter 16

Henry sighed happily as he sat at his keyboard in his office, reviewing the status reports from each of his servers. All the hardware was functioning as expected, and there were no maintenance issues to deal with this week. The patch schedule was up to date. The most recent fixes he’d added to the dashboard application were well received by the staff.

On the security side, his firewalls had reported an uptick in intrusion attempts, but there’d been no penetration, and the methods being used were all known methods, so there was nothing for him to adjust.

His tracking software managed to identify thirty percent of the hackers, tracing them back to their home addresses. These weren’t real threats, just amateurs fucking around. No need to worry about them as they never made it past the top levels of the firewall.

Two attempts had come from online accounts Henry identified as notorious hackers from the dark web. He flagged them in case they needed to have their wings clipped. Henry wasn’t above using his new magic to assist with locating these perpetrators. Dropping some of Roy’s security operatives on the hacker’s doorstep late at night might set them straight.

Reading through the tech support mailbox, he discovered a few more pleas from the NSA scientists. They were asking him to reconsider their request to set up an array of quantum tunneling servers for them to track personal data for weeding out terrorists, malcontents, and people who objected to the unrestricted use of personal data.

He’d already had Mahati deal with their last entreaty, so he once more redirected these messages to her for escalation.

His own quantum tunneling array was humming happily in the server room racks, collecting user behavior data minus all personal identification data so they could identify more helpful financial package features. Camila was looking forward to seeing the results of these computations. He told her it would take a couple more months to get truly useful statistics.

His phone chirped, and he picked it up, promptly disconnecting the call when he hit the wrong button. He frowned at the phone.

His phone chirped again, and this time he pressed the flashing button. “Yes?”

“You hit the wrong button again.” It was Marisa, and she didn’t sound happy.

Henry winced. “Sorry. I thought I had to open a line first.”

He heard her sighing. “When I’m back in the office, I’ll give you another lesson on the phone.”

“Come on. It doesn’t happen that often,” he said in his defense.

“Ms. Villamor wants you to join her in her office.” The call ended with a click, and Henry winced again.

He sighed and locked his PC before walking down the hall to Camila’s office. Felix directed him to enter, and he went inside, closing the door behind himself. He looked toward Camila and saw she had two guests sitting before her desk.Content © provided by NôvelDrama.Org.

As he approached, they stood and turned to face him. It was a Japanese man and woman, and Henry immediately noticed the disparity between the two.

The man must have been in his sixties, but he was maybe five-nine and solidly built with a vitality in his gaze that hinted at his sharp intelligence. He was dressed in a perfectly tailored three-piece suit. His cufflinks flashed with some precious stones, as did the rings on his hands which gave the impression of great wealth.

His skin was very pale, but his hands gave away his age, as did his steely grey hair.

His female companion was petite, much shorter at five foot even. She was dressed in a smart, crisp business suit with a skirt instead of slacks.

The anomalous element in her outfit was the sheer bright red stockings she wore over her slim, shapely legs.

Her heart-shaped face was partially hidden behind her long silky black hair, the ends becoming red as well, matching her lips and growing nails.

A sharp word from the older man made her dip her eyes from Henry’s, and her hair was black once more. Her lips and nails were a faint pink, and her fingers no longer had claws.