Hope

by Emma South

A little hope is a dangerous thing


Mary was born into poverty over a thousand years ago. When the rich, powerful, and sinister Sylvester gave her a chance to alter her fate, a chance to escape the shackles of the peasant class she was born into, she takes it. The naive girl didn’t know exactly what was going to happen to her, but the reality wasn’t like anything she had imagined.

Now she has been cursed to roam the world as an immortal Succubus, a smoulderingly sexy temptress irresistible to all mankind, an unwilling agent of inhuman evil, until she conceives a child by a man who loves her rather than lusts after her. Centuries of evidence has convinced her that such a man cannot exist.

That is, until she meets Clinton in a small town called Riverfield. Both of them have known the extremes of emotional pain in their lives, but that could be what makes each one the other’s saviour. Can they fall in love before her curse brings the entire town down on top of them?

"...Once again I found myself on Clinton’s couch but this time he sat with me, our legs nearly touching as we made more small talk and the warmth from the enhanced coffee spread through our bodies. By the time Clinton finished his mug he was apparently fortified by enough Dutch courage

“Mary, you’re amazing… would it be ok if I kissed you yet?”

“Let’s find out.”

I leaned in close to him, but not all the way, letting him close the distance himself. I peered out through my almost-closed eyelids as he approached, anxiously awaiting the first contact of our lips outside of fantasy. Our mouths met and an electric current of excitement surged through me. His kiss was so different to all I could remember, strong but gentle, not frantic and crazed like those whose minds were lost to my curse. His tongue reached out to lightly brush the tip of my own, as if they too were sharing a brief kiss.

I mimicked his movement with my tongue but lingered longer, maintaining contact under the intimate seal of our lips as I pushed him sideways on the couch and followed until I was laying on top of him. I spread my legs, causing my skirt to ride up, and planted my knees on the cushions to either side of his hips while we slowly kissed and enjoyed the feel of each other’s lips gently playing together.

Breaking off the kiss I sat up straight, feeling a growing hardness inside his pants pressing between my legs as I pulled a hairband out of my ponytail and shook my hair out before leaning forward again, pushing my soft chest against him. Our lips met once more and my hair fell all around us like a silky red privacy curtain, shielding our intimate moment from the outside world. Clinton’s hands settled on my hips as his body unconsciously pushed his crotch towards mine..."

Warning, this 17500 word novella contains occasional coarse language.

46 pages, Kindle Edition

First published September 16, 2013

About the author

I’m in my thirties and living in New Zealand. A little over a year ago I lost somebody very close to me. I was lucky in a way, I was given enough time to make a promise. My promise was that I would never forget our young and innocent love, and it’s a promise I intend to keep.

My writing is a way to help me keep that promise. I’ve always enjoyed writing but was forced into being ‘prudent’ and giving myself over to soul-crushing office work for the sake of a steady salary. Recent events forced me to re-evaluate my priorities and I decided to take a chance. I like to put little pieces of ‘us’ into my writing, from funny conversations we had, to apocalyptic arguments, to that special feeling you get when you hop into bed fully aware that your feet are freezing but your partner doesn’t kick you away.

Even though these things are set in fictional worlds and attached to fictional characters, in a way it feels like I’m doing something that will make our love live forever. If somebody reads one of my stories and likes a joke or sheds a tear, then our love has lived on, and I thank any readers I might have for that.