Bled Dry (Vegas Vampires #3)(4)
Author: Erin McCarthy

“Absolutely.” He nodded up and down once.

Brittany couldn’t tell how he was taking the news. He didn’t look angry. He looked surprised, but nothing more. Damn, he was cute. She’d almost forgotten how adorable he was in person with his caramel-colored hair and rich, chocolate eyes.

Corbin rubbed his jaw. “And as such, I owe you an apology. This is my fault and I accept complete responsibility. I will marry you.”

Brittany forgot how cute he was. “What!” Of all possible reactions, she hadn’t even considered that one. He was smoking something if he thought she was going to just marry him because he’d gotten her pregnant. And what kind of a proposal was that anyway? A sucky one, that’s what kind.

“It is for the best.” He nodded, like everything was decided. “We will marry and hire a nurse to care for the babe.”

Someone had fallen back into the nineteenth century. “Why is getting married for the best? We barely know each other.” Brittany sucked in quick, short breaths. Her stomach was churning again. “I don’t want to marry you.”

“You would have my child be born a bastard?” He looked outraged.

“This is Vegas! No one cares.” Brittany took a step back. He was so close to her she was getting dizzy trying to talk to him. “My mother was a stripper, for God’s sake!”

Corbin winced.

Brittany was offended. He didn’t like that? Too bad. “I don’t even know who my father was. My mother cheated on her husband with Mr. Anonymous. Alexis and I don’t even have the same father.”

She was blathering on in total panic, because while she was intrigued by the idea of maybe dating Corbin, or at the very least having an amicable relationship with the father of her child, she could not marry him. Jesus. What the hell did they have in common?

Just a bundle of cells that were dividing in her uterus as they were speaking.

“Brittany… ” Corbin clapped his hand on his forehead. “You and I, we have forgotten something. Your father was a vampire.”

“So?”

“So, you are half-vampire. I am a vampire. This baby you’re carrying, it is a three-quarter vampire child.”

“So?” she asked again nervously. Why did Corbin look like he was going to drop to the ground? His eyes were actually narrowing, darkening, turning almost black, and she could tell he was thinking hard.

“So, there has never been a three-quarter vampire child to my knowledge. Ever.”

That didn’t sound promising. “Why not?”

“Because vampires are not supposed to procreate. Some, of course, do anyway, when they inadvertently mate with a mortal who has the recessive gene for vampirism, which allows for conception, though fortunately their numbers are few. The resulting child is a mortal Impure. But never has a vampire mated with an Impure such as yourself, or if they have, there was no child, possibly because their mother did not inherit the gene from her mother. You clearly do have the gene, as do I, meaning the gene will most definitely be in our child. It is the most basic of biology, but there has never been such a child that I know of, one with a complete vampire gene.”

He’d already said that, and he was starting to scare the crap out of her. “And?”

“And if there has never been one, there is no scientific precedent. What is it? Mortal or vampire? Day or night dweller?”

Breast milk or blood drinker. Corbin didn’t say it, but Brittany knew he was thinking it.

“Oh, my God! You’re telling me our child is going to be some kind of… mutant, or something? Is he going to have fangs?”

“Of course not!” But he didn’t look convinced. Then he stood up straighter and his jaw locked. “Our child is not a mutant. He will be strong and intelligent, lacking mortal weakness. Yet he will not need the blood. I am almost sure of it, because it is the draining which activates the urge to feed, not the gene. Besides, I am Corbin Jean Michel Atelier, the most premier vampire research scientist, and I will correct my mistake, that I promise you.”

Wow. How reassuring. Brittany burst into tears. Her baby was a bloodsucking demon. Instead of a Gerber baby, she was going to have an infant with fangs, pale skin, night vision, and the ability to read minds. Brittany pictured a fridge full of little bottles, prancing lambs on the outside, all filled with human blood. She would have to lock down her thoughts all the time so her baby didn’t see her sexual fantasies about George Clooney or her mean unkind thoughts about her dental hygienist’s butt and the way it looked in white pants.

This was panic time.

“Corbin, you can’t experiment on our child! God, this is horrible, I’m going to be sick.” She clutched her stomach. “We were both so stupid! I’m never having sex with you again.”

“But it is not as if you can get pregnant a second time,” he pointed out, looking a little mystified. “There would be no reason we’d need birth control if we lay together now.”

“Arrgh!” How did you say idiot in French? Idi-ote? She turned to the window, tears blinding her. “I want to talk to my sister.” Fumbling in her pocket, she pulled her cell phone out of her jeans and pressed number one to call Alexis.

“Alex?” she sniffled when her sister answered.

Alexis swore. “What did the bastard say to you? Where are you?”

“I’m still in the suite you told me to come to. Alexis, Corbin says our baby is going to… going to… ” She choked on the words and dissolved into a fresh round of tears.

“I’ll be right there.”

When Alex hung up, Brittany let the tears take her over. She sobbed, overwhelmed, frightened, scared for her child. Totally flipping freaked out.

Suddenly Corbin was behind her, arms wrapping around her. “Shh. It is all right now, ma chйrie . I did not mean to frighten you. Everything will be just fine, and we will have the most beautiful child. After all, look at his mother.”

Corbin’s voice was soothing in her ear, his embrace confident and strong. She shouldn’t lean on him, should try to be strong, but she couldn’t. And she had no right to place all the blame on Corbin. She had been there that night. She had encouraged him, enjoyed their time together, and she had never hesitated or considered that there could be ramifications of their actions.

She tried to stop crying. “I did always want to be a mother.”

“Now you will be, and you will be fantastique . It will all work out.”