“Go away. I’m not in lo… lo… love with anyone, least of all Sylvie Fontaine. That’s ridiculous.” Lord, I’m pathetic. I can barely think the L-word, let alone say it out loud.
René shook his head in disagreement. “No one is bullet-proof, big brother. Geez, maybe love potions really do work. Oh, man, Tante Lulu must be in seventh heaven.”
“I am not amused, René.”
“Yep, it mus’ be love,” his brother continued. “I think I’ll write a song about it. ‘The Cajun Love Bug.’ Dieu, I jus’ can’t believe it. My big brother in love!”
Luc sighed deeply. In his opinion, his brother and his aunt were both wrong. Oh, he’d already suspected earlier that he was developing feelings for Sylvie, but he’d marked them down to the effects of her souped-up jelly beans. No way am I falling in lo… lo…
But he was beginning to fear that his heart had a mind of its own. And that scared the hell out of him.
So, he handled the situation the way most men do. He decided not to think about it. Shoving René out the door with a promise to come over later to the tavern where his band, The Cajun Swamp Rats, would be playing, Luc turned the key, locking himself in, and proceeded to the other side of the room. He stood over the cot and said softly, “Sylvie. Time to wake up.”
Nothing.
“Come on, darlin’. I’ve been slavin’ over the stove all day. Come eat.”
Nothing.
Okay, now what? he asked himself. I could shout. Or I could take other measures.
He thought about opting for “other measures.” Those might include easing himself into that small cot with Sylvie and checking out the possibilities of just how far a love potion could go.
Sanity ruled, though. “Hey, babe,” he hollered, “move your butt or you’re gonna have company in that bed.”
Sylvie jackknifed into a sitting position and glared at him through sleepy eyes, blinking with confusion. “You don’t have to yell.”
“Yes, I do, chère. Yes, I do.”
“Do you have an erection?”
Luc’s mouth dropped open, then snapped shut so quickly he almost bit his tongue. His hand went reflexively to his crotch to make sure he was decent.
He wasn’t, but Sylvie couldn’t see that, hidden as his lower body was by the table. They were sitting at the small galley booth, having just finished their meal, when Sylvie made her out-of-the-blue inquiry.
With a flaming face, she put aside the rats, which she’d been feeding leftover gumbo. Then she pulled out a small black-and-white-speckled notebook and a ballpoint pen she’d found on the counter. Unbelievably, she was preparing to take notes.
I have landed in a god-awful Saturday Night Live skit. Pulling himself together, he replied as calmly as he could, “Now? Or ever?”
“Now, of course.” She was looking everywhere but at him as she spoke.
“Sylvie, I’ve had half a hard-on for you ever since I swallowed your damn jelly beans. A five on a scale of ten.”
“Oh.”
“Wanna see it?” he teased.
“No!”
Luc hadn’t realized that a face could get so red just from embarrassment. He kind of liked this shy side of Sylvie, though her question was far from shy.
“Are your nipples sensitive?” she asked.
“They are now.”
“Do you have sexual fantasies?”
“Do I ever!”
“More than usual?”
He grinned. “Ab-so-lute-ly.”
“Is your heart rate accelerated at certain times?”
He nodded. “At certain times.”
“Do you ever-—”
“Hey, Sylv, do you have any particular reason for asking about the state of my body parts?”
She’d been scribbling like crazy in her notebook, but now she put her pen down. “Well, yes,” she said enthusiastically. “I was thinking that, since we’re going to be together the next few days anyhow, and since you already swallowed the love potion, and since we don’t have any human trial data on the formula yet… well, it’s a perfect setup for studying your reactions.” She stared at him hopefully, waiting for a response.
“A guinea pig? You want me to be your human guinea pig?”
“Yes! I could check hourly on your pulse and temperature and… and arousals, not to mention a dozen other variables. I can already envision the separate time/data graphs I could plot. Really, this will be even better than a lab setting for the human trials.”