Chapter 30

But Desirée was to have no respite from her aching conscience that night. James Devereaux answered for Robin and said that she was not well, and Rodney, still housesitting at Desirée's parents' home, answered the phone, sounding exhausted and harried, saying that Tanya was out he knew not where.

Of course, he would sound harassed, for in his quest for news of the wild dog pack he had let a great many things go, leaving himself in serious financial difficulties back home. Desirée felt sorry for him, so glad that she knew nothing that would interest him, except what Liz had told her months before.

So when Mark was suddenly summoned to a meeting with Sid Buchanan, the guilty young woman was left alone to agonise alone over her behaviour of the day. On the one hand, she was glad that she would not have to spend the evening with Mark while the memory was fresh of herself bending over the sheriff's desk with his huge cock thrusting in and out of her traitorously-wet and -responsive vagina while Mark unwittingly stared at her from just a few feet away. But it also meant that she, social person that she was, would have to suffer in solitude with the flames of her conscience.

She considered calling Pastor Hemmings, but in her shame discarded that idea. No one must know, least of all the pastor, even though that was what he was there for. So she watched television all night until exhaustion put her to sleep at four o'clock.

However, she felt lucky when she connected the next day with both her friends, Robin and Tanya, and they made plans for a little coffee klatch at the Mitchell mansion for two that afternoon. Tanya was housesitting while Desirée's parents were travelling in Europe.

At that hour, they sat comfortably in the great lounge of the house Desirée had lived in until just two months earlier, and it was Tanya, little devil that she sometimes could be, that introduced the idea of adding whiskey to the coffee, and then gin and vodka to tonic, until even Robin, the only one of them still in her teens, began to show a certain lightheadedness.

They talked, as women love to talk, and Robin mentioned the day Priscilla had ridden out into the hills and come back with Dr. Hemmings.

"She's been in there ever since," Robin said, "and I've only seen her once. Uncle Jim has been in there with her, and he's raised the reward on the dog pack."

Tanya looked up knowingly, but said nothing. She had no intention of telling them what she knew about Lobo and his offspring. "What do you suppose happened out there, Robin?" Tanya asked. "Think it was the dogs?"

Robin's blue eyes opened wide in fright. "I don't know. I hadn't thought of that? Do you suppose-"

"It's too horrible to think about," Desirée hastened to say. "Even to a girl like Priscilla."

Tanya said, "Maybe Priscilla got just what she needed."

"Tanya, that's mean," Desirée said.

"Don't I get to speak an opinion?" Tanya shot back.

"Of course," said Robin. "But I wouldn't wish that on anyone." The youngest girl's eyes seemed to cloud over with her own thoughts. Her lovely mouth turned down at the corners and her eyes misted with obvious consternation.

"What's wrong, baby?" Tanya asked, moving over to sit beside her younger friend. "What's wrong? Come on, you can tell us."

Robin looked up at Tanya, then to Desirée. "I-I'm too ashamed to say."

Desirée moved over to Robin's other side and put her arm around her friend's shoulders. "Whatever you tell us goes no farther than this room."

Robin dropped her face to her hands, stifled a sob, and dried her cheeks of the tears that suddenly began to course down them. "I'm having an affair."

Desirée was shocked. Robin, an affair?

Tanya was nowhere near upset or shocked. "Good for you, darling."

"Tanya!" Desirée exclaimed reprovingly.

"No, no, why not?" Tanya retorted. "I'm having one too."

Desirée's eyes widened. "Does Rodney know?

"'Course not," Tanya said. "He's too busy chasing the Pulitzer Pups. His dick has gone so limp he could rope a dog with it."

"Tanya!" said Desirée and Robin in unison.

"Well, that's the way it is," the older girl said. "I've always been true blue, except for a few erotic fantasies, but house sitting isn't all it's cracked up to be when you're totally alone and there's no money to even go out for a hamburger."

"Who is it?" Robin asked.

Tanya shook her head. "No, sweetie, you first."

Tanya and Desirée looked expectantly at the innocent-faced teenager. "I don't think-" She looked at her friends. "No, it's just too awful."

Desirée didn't press her, but Tanya did. "Come on, darling, let's play the game."

Desirée was surprised to hear her old friend speak this way. She sounded a bit like her other friend Liz when she spoke thus.

"Uncle-Uncle Jim," she said under her breath.

"Say again," Tanya urged. "You're going to have to talk a bit louder for us deaf girls."

Robin took a deep breath and said loudly, "Uncle Jim. It's my Uncle Jim Devereaux. We've done it three times and I feel terrible about it."

To Desirée's chagrin, Tanya laughed. Where had Tanya lost her sense of propriety? She certainly wasn't the girl she had known in high school. That Tanya would have been at least mildly shocked, but Tanya's laugh seemed callous.

"Tell me more," Tanya said. "With Rodney out chasing this phantom dog pack, I don't get much excitement at all."

Desirée shivered at the mention of the dogs. Something in the back of her mind was trying to get out, and whatever it was, it frightened her to her delicate bones.

Robin sniffed, wiped her pretty cheeks, and then the words seemed to tumble out, like a repentant Catholic girl in a confessional.

"I was riding, oh, three days ago. It was the day Priscilla had some trouble out in the hills and came back all beat up. I was trying to catch her, but I wasn't good enough at riding to control the horse. He bolted, ran away with me and I'd have gone over the ravine if Uncle Jim hadn't caught me. Pulled me right off the horse's back as if he were Superman."

Almost panting with the excitement, Desirée and Tanya looked at her expectantly.

"I-I was so upset," Robin went on. "So shaken up that I lost control-of everything. Wet myself. Uncle Jim took me into the bathroom. I was weak with fear. He took off my clothes. He-he- he licked me. With his tongue. He put his fingers in me, and licked me, underneath. I couldn't move. I wanted to move, I tried, but my arms wouldn't move. Then he-he put his thing in me."