Maelstrom Extra: Incubus Indifference

Ricky stood at the edge of the room, assaulted by the thumping bass of a pop tune. A blonde on stage was slithering around a pole while other girls worked the tables, thrusting their breasts into men’s faces and collecting bills for lap dances. A perky brunette in a sequined bustier hurried over to solicit a drink order, but just then Ricky saw who he was looking for.

He pushed his way through the crowd to a dark corner table on the other side of the room. Although it was against the rules of the establishment and the laws of the state, Bo had a brunette seated firmly in his lap while he kissed a redhead leaning up against him. Ricky was reluctant to interfere, but this couldn’t be allowed. “Hey, Bo.”

Bo glanced up. “Hi, Ricky, nice of you to join us.” He traced the contour of one of the redhead’s breasts. “Go see what my friend wants, babe. Make him happy. You and I can finish what we’ve got going on later.”

“Uh, I don’t think so,” Ricky said, waving the girl away. “You have a show tonight, Bo. What the hell are you doing here?”

Bo slid his hands around the brunette’s backside and ground her hips into his. “I’m hiding out,” he said.

“But—” Ricky looked around the room full of nearly-naked women. “This is the first place someone would look for an incubus, don’t you think?”

“The only thing I’m thinking is how to get my pants off.” Bo nuzzled the girl's neck, then added, “I’m hiding from Johnny Del Rio. He’s persistent as the devil, but he won’t come here.”

“Don’t you think that’s unfair to the rest of the band?” Ricky moved a little closer, shouting to be heard over the pounding rhythms of a new dancer’s song. “You seduced the music reporter and now you have to live with the consequences. Just tell Johnny the truth. Or tell him a lie, what the hell do I care? But this callous disregard for your fellow band members has got to stop.”

“What do you think, darling?” Bo asked his girl, holding her against him as she squirmed. “Do I need to stop?”

“No,” she giggled.

Bo began jerking her against him in a rhythm that made Ricky suspicious that he had found a way to undo his pants, but he couldn’t be sure because the tablecloth obscured his line of sight. Small blessings. “Fine,” Ricky said. “But Kalila said to tell you that if you’re not at the venue by eight, you’re out of the band.”

The brunette quit moaning long enough to ask, “Who’s Kalila?”

“Just a bitchy genie,” Bo told her.

“Am I a bitch?”

Ricky decided not to wait for the outcome of this conversation, or to find out when someone would notice what was going on at this dark corner table. He walked back through the club, spurning offers of drinks and lap dances. Once he was outside, he leaned against a post for a minute, glad to be out of the sex-drenched atmosphere of the strip joint. Strumpets for hire had never appealed to him, and besides, not one of them could hold a candle to Kalila.

Come to think of it, Kalila would be wondering where he was. He would just have to tell her that Bo was being a typical incubus. Demons did what they did, after all, and who was he to question it? He might spend his days and nights with fey and demons, but he was still only a man.