Deadly Part Three: Lust (Revelations)

Parts one and two: Deadly Part One: Envy and Deadly Part Two: Gluttony

Lance rolled over on the bed, withdrawing all contact both physical and emotional from the woman beside him. The passion had been genuine, but now it was over. He was already bored with her, and brushed her hand away impatiently when she tried to touch him.

“That was great, Nancy.”

“Julie.”

“But you should probably go,” he said, as if she hadn’t corrected him. “I have things to do.” The only things he had to do were taking a shower, wolfing down a sandwich, and lying down for a nap. He didn’t need company for any of that.

The next night, he was cruising his favorite gay bar, looking for an easy pickup. He was good-looking and he knew it; he got propositioned a lot here, by some damn fine men. He usually accepted.

Tonight’s prey was a younger man in a muscle shirt and tight jeans. Cute ass, nicely-sized bulge on the other side. He was currently on the dance floor with some other guy who didn’t deserve him. Moving smoothly, Lance cut in and basically froze the dance partner out. The dejected man headed back to the bar, and Lance now had his quarry’s full attention.

They danced for a while, making bedroom eyes at each other, and then made their way to a table.

“I’m Lance, and I have to admit, you’re hot as Hell.” He used the same line every time. It worked often enough that he had never changed it.

“Brad. And right back at you.”

“Want to go to my place, where we can be alone? I have a king-sized bed,” Lance said in his most seductive voice.

“Have you been tested?” the other man inquired. “I have been. Clean as a whistle.”

“Yeah, I’ve been tested,” he lied. The last time he had an STI test was two years ago, and he had engaged in plenty of unprotected sex since then.

He had a ravenous appetite for sex of all kinds, with anyone. He was pansexual and tried to sleep with everyone he met. He had a list of phone numbers in his cell phone that were named Booty Call 1 through 5. He had a hard time keeping their names straight.

Brad followed him out through the bar’s double doors and they got into Lance’s fixed-up classic Mustang. He always drove a little too fast when bringing home a new conquest, just to show off.

Once they got into his apartment, Lance wasted no time in peeling Brad’s clothes off. They were both naked within minutes, pawing at each other. Lance led Brad into the bedroom, and they romped around the mattress for a while. When they were both satiated, Lance got up and went directly into the bathroom without a word and started running a shower. By the time he was finished, Brad had gone.

That Thursday night found him in line at the hottest strip club in town. There were men and even a few women standing in the cool air, waiting to get inside.

Behind him, he heard the most sultry voice he had ever heard purr, “Exuse me, but I work here. Can I sneak past you?”

He turned, and couldn’t help but stare. The woman behind him was almost freakishly erotic. Exaggerated hourglas figure accentuated by a black leather Merry Widow that squeezed her breasts up and out at the top. He could see just a glimpse of her areolae. Below the corset was a black skirt that was basically a belt with a pleated ruffle on it. He noticed that the “skirt” didn’t completely cover her ass. Her boots came up to just above her knee, glossy patent leather with six-inch heels. Fishnet stockings were held up by a garter belt. Her heart-shaped face was graced with arched, professionally-waxed eyebrows, Cupid’s bow lips, and icy blue eyes. Her hair was jet black and gleamed in the streetlight above.

Remembering what she had just asked him, he stepped aside. As she passed she reached up and brushed his chest with one hand.

When her fingers made contact with his shirt, suddenly all he could see was her and the strip club door, alone in an inky sea.

Then, right before his eyes, she changed. Although her body and clothes stayed the same, a tail grew from just above that luscious backside. Wings sprouted from her back and ram’s horns from her temples. Her skin had turned the color of arterial blood.

“We need to talk, Lance. You are consumed by Lust, but we are giving you a choice: you can either change your ways, or be punished both in this life and in what comes after.”

They went into the strip club, which was somehow deserted and crumbling apart. The woman, Lust, climbed onto the deteriorating stage and rubbed her hand down the rusted pole in a suggestive manner. On the far side of the wall there materialized a set of double doors. Once again, she took his hand in an iron grip and walked him through them.

They were in a hospital. Everything gleamed white and stainless steel. They were walking past open doorways, and in each of them he saw a doctor pulling a sheet over a face he almost recognized. Then they closed the privacy curtain to block his view.

They walked past many rooms like this, but the hallway ended at one last door. Without stopping, they walked through it. On the other side was Lance, in a hospital bed with his good looks melted off. There was an IV in his arm and a breathing tube in his nose. He gasped for every breath as if it hurt.

“You are dying of complications from AIDS. All the other people in the rooms we passed were those you have infected. Some of them are already dead, and the rest are dying. All because of you. Even worse will be your punishment after this life. You will be trapped in a whirlpool made of all the illnesses there are in the world, surrounded by an endless orgy that you may never join, even if you could swim to shore, because you will have no genitals.”

“What happens if I accept your offer?”

“Let me show you.” Lust turned back to the door and they walked through again, ending up in his apartment looking at him sitting close to an attractive woman.

“Are you sure?” the woman was saying. “We haven’t been intimate yet, because I was afraid that my being trans would turn you off.”

“I don’t care what you are outside. I love what is inside. You fill a need I didn’t even know I had. Being with you has changed my life.”

“This is Emily, who turns out to be the love of your life,” Lust explained. “You will marry her and never sleep with anyone else again. But you will never get bored.

“What do you say, Lance Allen Carlyle? Your choice.” She reached up and brushed a forefinger gently across his brow.

“You know, I think I will take my chances. Maybe I’ll just start wearing condoms or something. But I know I couldn’t just sleep with one person for the rest of my life, no matter how great they are.”

“I have to admit that I am not surprised, but I am disappointed in you, Lance,” the somehow still sexy succubus said. Then she snapped her fingers, and he was back in his apartment, dressed for bed, which for him meant buck naked. He looked around, confused, and then decided it had all been a lucid dream. Then he succumbed to the siren song of the comfortable mattress and piles of pillows and went back to sleep.

Two years later, Lance finally went to get tested and was not shocked to learn that he was HIV positive. The clinician asked if he had engaged in any unprotected penetrative sex with anyone, and he had to say yes, but no, he didn’t have most of their phone numbers. Or even all their names. It occurred to him at this point that he was not on a first-name basis with anyone. In spite of his string of casual hookups, nobody ever stuck around. Suddenly he felt lonely in the uncomfortable seat facing this chilly woman with a clipboard in her hand.

He wondered if he could somehow find Emily. And buy some condoms.