Page 118 of A Sanctuary from Shadow
His hardening eyes were all the response I needed.
“That’s what I thought. You were a slave, Pete, which meant your will to make your own choices had been taken from you. Which meant any sexual attention Gentian sent your way was foisted. It was imposed. You were forced.”
I watched Pete’s eyes darken like oil for a moment, but then he rebounded, brushed off his disquiet with a gruff, “My, my, my.” He handed Sedge the community wine bottle. “Views on that account have certainly changed in America since I was last there.”
I sniffed. “Most views have changed since then, you old geezer.”
The insult lightened the pall I’d dropped upon the group. Everyone chuckled.
“Well, tell us about it, Shorty,” Tansy took me off guard once their amusement faded.
“Tell you about what?”
“The sex.” Her supper finished, she set her bowl at her feet. One of the beagles panted over to lick it clean. “What was your best time like?”
I pursed my lips, astounded again.
“Go on, Shorty.” Pete swatted my arm. “Tell us all about it—if you’ve had it.”
Be a romance heroine, I ordered myself.Don’t be ashamed of your sexuality.
“Fine.” I turned from Pete. “I don’t have much to tell you, though. I’ve only had sex twice.”
“See, I told you,” Pete said.
Olea pointed a finger at him. “Pipe down, you.”
“Anyway,” I continued. “I—uh—well—his name was Briar. He was very attractive—cute face, muscles, height—the whole package. We did it the night of Beltane.”
“Beltane of this year?” Tansy asked. “That was only weeks ago.”
“Yeah. We’d been dating—er, courting—for a short while, and he and I spent the entire Beltane festival together.”
“I didn’t think Beltane was still celebrated in America,” Pete puzzled.
I gritted my teeth, knowing to divulge too much of my actual life might blow the cover off my identity. “The festival was really just a barbeque between our two families. Not a very big event at all.”
Liar, liar, pants on fire.
“Anyway, we were having fun, drinking, eating moonberries—”
“Moonberries?”
That exclamation had issued from everyone.
“Yeah.” I peered around, put off by their amazement. “So?”
Pete snickered into a hand, shaking his head before meeting my clueless gaze. “Shorty, moonberries are a potent aphrodisiac.”
I gulped. “Huh?”
“They make the animal urge to copulate almost uncontrollable. Jaysus, and you thinkIwas raped. He drugged you.”
I shook my head, unsettled once more. “No. No, he didn’t.”
“Sounds like he did,” Sedge noted, passing the bottle to Ox.
“Then he drugged himself too,” I said. “Because he was eating them.”
