Bled Dry (10 page)

“You care about your brother-in-law, yes?”

“Ethan? Of course. Alexis loves him and he’s a good guy.” Brittany snuggled up against Corbin, not really sure what place her brother-in-law had in the room when she was naked and postorgasmic. “Why?”

“I was just thinking that your pregnancy could have very negative repercussions on Carrick’s reelection.”

Brittany stopped playing with Corbin’s chest hairs and looked up at him. What a mood kill. “What do you mean?”

“I mean that Carrick has campaigned on the side of population control. I am conducting very controversial research, not to mention that I have not completely served out my sentence. For you to be having my child, again a breach in vampire rules, will reflect very badly on Carrick. After the incident with Seamus Fox turning Cara, it could well prevent him from being reelected president.”

“I thought his opponent stepped down. And I don’t understand why the election was pushed back. It seems like he should have just won automatically.”

“It is meant to give the others time to replace Donatelli as an opposing candidate. And Carrick must still receive at least fifty percent of the popular vote within his own party to even remain on the ballot. It’s democracy, doing its job.”

Brittany was trying to get a grasp on vampire politics, but she had to admit she hadn’t made a study out of it. She wasn’t the vampire here. She was just a dentist, a normal day dweller. Until she had gotten knocked up by Corbin. Now she wasn’t sure what she was, but it had honestly never occurred to her that her pregnancy could affect Ethan’s career. “I don’t want to mess things up for Ethan. But we can’t change the facts. I am pregnant.”

Corbin smiled at her, his hair still rumpled. “And delightfully so.” He ran his fingertips over her arm, kissed her forehead. “But no one knows that I am the father of your child. No one even knows we are acquainted. Perhaps it would be best to keep our relationship a secret for a few weeks until the primary election is over. If any vampire discovered you were pregnant, they would assume the father to be a mortal. That would not be any cause for alarm.”

“But this... ” Brittany stroked Corbin’s penis, loving the way his body immediately hardened at her touch. “Is cause for alarm? We’re not supposed to be together? Does anyone really give a shit, Corbin? I think maybe you’re overreacting.”

He closed his eyes, his breathing heavier as she stroked him. Then to her disappointment, he reached down and held her hand still. “Zis es the reality, Brittany. I am a criminal. I am responsible for the death of a woman, however unintentional. I am on the verge of being able to offer a combination of medications, a vaccine essentially, that will inhibit the vampire virus, causing vampires to revert to a mortal physiology. There are vampires who hate me, who would like to see me dead. There are those who would like to steal my research, either to destroy it or to mutate it to their own purposes. Your brother-in-law is fighting with everything in his political power to ensure radical vampire politics don’t overthrow the current government. Our one moment of weakness should not jeopardize the entire future of my race.”

Well, he certainly had a way of sucking the romance out of the moment.

“Okay, God, when you put it that way. I can keep my mouth shut for a few weeks. But honestly, I had no idea things were as dire as you make them sound.” Brittany felt a small bit freaked out. “We’re having a baby, Corbin. Are you telling me rogue vampires are going to be after you all the time? I don’t think bloodsuckers randomly dropping over to kill you is the best environment to be raising a child in.” She was thinking bonnets and bottles, not draining blood and decapitation.

“Of course not. Once the election is over, and I present my findings to the UMA, then I intend to retire. We’ll get married, move to a house, and we will be soccer mom and dad, yes?”

With his hand on her butt, and her breasts pressed against his chest, she could almost believe him that it would all work out, even if she had a hell of a time picturing Corbin sitting on the sidelines cheering from the bleachers. At night games. “So you’re still going to court me? Try to convince me I should marry you?” she asked flirtatiously. She couldn’t wait to see what his wooing entailed. It sounded fun and full of gifts. With any luck, it would also involve lots of sex and nights out on the town.

“Absolutely. But we will be discreet until the election is over.”

“A secret courtship? Wow, we’ll be like Romeo and Juliet. How sexy is that?” Brittany closed her eyes and yawned into his chest. A sharp stinging from the top of her head made her jerk back. “Ouch! Did you just pull one of my hairs out?”

“Sorry, it got caught on my watch.” Corbin massaged her scalp and encouraged her to lie back down.

Not wanting to remind him of what his watch represented—his punishment—Brittany kissed his chest and teased, “But I haven’t agreed to marry you, sweetie.”

“You will marry me,” he said. “That is what the courting is for... to show you how it will be between us, how we belong together.”

Brittany shivered in delight. There was something really flattering and pleasing about his determination to be with her. “Court me hard, baby.”

Apparently a certain nineteenth-century French vampire’s idea of how to court a woman was different from Brittany’s, and as far as she was concerned, his way sucked.

Eight weeks. Eight freaking weeks, and she had not seen Corbin. Not once.

Every week she got a bouquet of fresh flowers sent to her with a computer-generated note that said, “Thinking of you. Corbin.”

Thinking of her? Big whoop. That was the equivalent of telling someone you thought about getting her a gift for her birthday, but didn’t. The thought did not count in Brittany’s book.

So Corbin had said they needed to be discreet until the election. She had heard him, known he meant it, but she didn’t think that meant he was going to disappear into the frickin’ night, never to return. She had thought he meant stealth sex, sneaking into her apartment at odd hours and whisking her away for romantic walks in the desert. Or something fun like that. Geez. Instead, she just felt like an abandoned pregnant woman stupidly waiting for a scrap of attention. Waiting for Corbin to get a clue.

“Brit, honey, just sit down. You’re making me dizzy.” Alexis squeezed her hand and tried to lead her to a patio chair, but Brittany shook her off.

“I don’t want to sit, I’m fine.” She leaned over the edge of the balcony to Alexis and Ethan’s suite and stared out into the night like there were answers in the neon lights of Vegas’s skyline. It all felt so ridiculous. She was bad poetry brought to life. She was like some forlorn chick in a vampire movie, desperate for the mysterious man of the night to return and bite her again.

She indulged in the moment, taking a good long wallow in self-pity. Where was the man who had made love to her with such feeling, such intensity, who had sworn they were going to be together? He was off doing who knew what and she was acting like a desperate loser.

Screw that. Brittany turned around and met the gazes of her sister and Cara Fox, Seamus’s wife, and pulled her shoulders up. “I really am fine. Corbin said we should be discreet, and he’s doing that. I respect and admire that.” Even though it made her want to throw herself down on the carpet and scream. “But I thought tonight, since Ethan won the primary all over again, and we’re having a party to celebrate, I just thought maybe he’d show up.” Even as she said it, she realized she was veering right smack into pitiful again. And it was completely lame that they were out on the balcony when nearly fifty people were crammed into the apartment raising their glasses to Ethan’s success.

Alexis should be in there, by her husband, but Brittany had felt hot and sick to her stomach in there, and she had wandered the room over and over, trying to catch a glimpse of Corbin. Finally she had needed to get out of the stifling crowd, away from the curious looks, and away from her own disappointment that Corbin hadn’t shown up.

Fortunately, neither Cara or Alexis commented on how pathetic she and her hopes were.

“He can’t come to this kind of stuff, Brit, you know that. He’s a pariah.”

“A pariah?” Brittany winced. Somehow she had thought Corbin was exaggerating when he always said he was banished from vampire society. And after hearing his story, she was further convinced he hadn’t done anything wrong. “That’s horrible!”

Cara uncrossed her legs and leaned forward in her chair. She was wearing a red cocktail dress, and her silky black hair was pulled up in a twist. Shooting a frown at Alexis, she said, “Maybe that’s not the right word for it. But he is still serving punishment for what happened, and for the research he does. He doesn’t get invitations to parties. It’s just the way it is.”

“Corbin isn’t a bad man.” Brittany was certain of that. She’d stake her life—okay, bad choice of words—on it. That was why she’d gone and indulged in sleeping with him a second time. “In fact, he only wants to help. He wants vampires to determine their own destiny, not have it decided for them.”

“He’s a weirdo,” Alex said.

Trust her sister to say exactly what she was thinking. Alex didn’t believe in white lies to make people happy, not even if she insulted the father of her sister’s child.

“He’s not a weirdo! He’s just a little... out of the loop.” Brittany sighed. He was actually very sweet. From the very first night she’d met him, when he had been drawing blood from a woman with a syringe, her face a mask of blissful pleasure, his lips on her neck, Brittany had been drawn to him.

His compassion, his desire to create a cure for vampirism, his obvious loneliness, all touched her heart, had made her seek him out several times, and when he had asked for her blood, she had given it to him despite her fear of needles. And even though he had run out on her both times they’d had sex, there were very legitimate reasons for that. The first time, she’d told him to go. This second time, Corbin had stayed away for Ethan’s sake, which only further proved he was a good guy. Who couldn’t be bothered to even call her, damn him.

Alexis stood up and tucked her blond hair behind her ears, fiddling with the diamond necklace she was wearing with her navy satin dress. “Look, I know he floats your boat, though I have no clue why. But Corbin Atelier is bad news. If you’re going to get involved with a vampire, at least let me set you up with someone better.”

That hurt Brittany’s feelings. Alexis never trusted her to make important decisions for herself. “I’m already involved with a vampire! I’m
pregnant
.” Though she seemed to be the only one who had a real grasp on that fact. Corbin hadn’t even mentioned the baby once in any of his cursory, lame, click this box on the website for a greeting, floral offerings. “I’m not interested in dating random vampires, thank you very much.”

Alexis gave her a sheepish look. “Okay, I’m sorry, that didn’t sound right. I know you’re pregnant, and I know you’re worried about Corbin. But I’m worried about you, and your baby. I think maybe it’s just time to concentrate on you. Maybe it’s a good thing that he’s keeping his distance and not dragging you into further complications.”

Brittany felt tears in her eyes, which embarrassed her. She was not a weepy person. But she had been fooling herself. She had convinced herself that she was in charge, that she was merely going to explore a possible relationship with Corbin, but that she was perfectly rational.

Lie. That was a total lie. She hadn’t been rational at all.

While she wasn’t a person who cried, she was an impulsive person. She saw the best in most people, and gave her love easily. Alexis didn’t understand that, but Brittany didn’t see that as a flaw in herself. She had given herself to Corbin, and maybe that hadn’t been the smartest thing to do, but she didn’t regret it.

He had given her a baby, for which she was truly grateful.

If he did decide to pop back up out of nowhere, she would be more guarded this time, not so easily coaxed into anything. Like bed. And in the meantime, she had to buy some maternity clothes, since her pants were pinching, keep swallowing those horse-sized vitamins, and register at Babies “R” Us. That ought to keep her busy.