Page 49 of Bitten By the Basilisk

“Oh!” Mom quickly put space between them to grasp Alice by the arms, her eyes wide with excitement. “Who were you out with all night? Was it Kenji?”

Alice shook her head. “Do you remember yesterday when my scarf almost blew away?”

Mom blinked, her expression turning bemused. “Yes…?”

Alice quickly explained the brief, wordless encounter with a golden-eyed supe, then told her mom about the hitodama and how it had led her to the sand baths, where she ran into the same shifter.

As Alice expected, her mom monitored the spa’s daily slate of appointments closely enough to infer who would’ve been in the sand bath shortly after she’d gone upstairs.

Her eyes bulged the second she caught on. “Oh my— Silas Stone?” She looked Alice up and down, concerned. “Did anything happen?”

Alice’s brow tightened. “You’ll need to be more specific.”

Mom paused to take a deep breath. “Did he hurt you?”

“What? No, not at all!” she insisted. “We had a great time. He even cooked for me. Why would you ask that?”

Her mom sighed in relief, her shoulders relaxing. “The few times I’ve met him, he’s been perfectly pleasant, which I can’t say of his father, but I hear all sorts of rumors, and I don’t have your gift for sussing out the truth.”

Mom’s casual praise of Alice’s ability made her feel even taller than usual, but she didn’t let it distract her. “What rumors?”

“Well…” Mom drew her hands back to fidget with them. “I’ve heard serpent-folk are…rather demanding in bed. Rough, I mean. Especially during their mating season, which—if their festival is coming up—means now.”

Alice and her mom strove to speak honestly about sex as a topic, mostly in regard to agency, consent, and safety, but Alice had zero interest in sharing any details of her sex life, and Mom clearly didn’t want to hear them.

“I…can’t speak to Silas’s kind as a whole, but he took good care of me. Okay?”

Mom sighed as she nodded, flattening her hands atop each other over her sternum. “Good. Otherwise, tormenting him with that girl from The Ring would be the least of the things I would do to him.”

Alice huffed a laugh. “Guess I should warn him.”

“Oh? You’re seeing him again?”

Here it comes, Alice thought, observing the growing excitement on her mom’s face. Her stomach twisted—not unpleasantly—with self-consciousness. How long had it been since she’d felt that way when talking about the person she was seeing?

“He invited me to be his personal guest at a private party tonight to kick off their mating festival.”

Mom perched her fingertips on her chest in delighted shock. “I’m told it’s always quite the event. He must really like you. Or—” With a gasp, she reached out to touch Alice’s arm. “Sweetie, is he the One?”

The wriggling shyness from a moment ago turned into unexpectedly sharp disappointment. She frowned and shook her head.

Mom twisted her lips in sympathy. “Does he know?”

“Well… I did tell him, but…he said his kind have their own instincts. That they disagreed.”

Mom straightened with surprise. “Oh. Oh.” A smile made its way back onto her face. “He really likes you.”

The wriggling shyness was back. “Mom.”

“Do you like him, too?”

Way more than I should, especially this soon. “Does it matter? Fate didn’t choose him for me.”

Mom pursed her lips. “It does matter, sweetie. Your feelings matter.”

Alice took a deep breath, fighting to retain her composure. “I’m only trying to protect them.”

Mom sighed, then smiled sadly. “I understand, sweetie. It’s just…hard for a mother when her child is unhappy. I want so much for you to feel free to follow your heart.”