Sucker Bet (Vegas Vampires #4)(4)
Author: Erin McCarthy

Gwenna made a face, her chin set. "Fine."

The phone in his pocket buzzed. Nate glanced at it and cursed. It was the hospital.

"Excuse me, I need to take this." He started to turn away.

"Can I go home?" she asked hopefully.

"Yes, but I’ll need you at the police station tomorrow for further questions."

As Nate pressed the talk button on his phone and answered, he caught one last glimpse of Gwenna Carrick. She was making a ridiculous face, lip curled back, eyes rolling, tongue sticking out, clearly expressing her feelings about having to show up at the police station.

It was kind of funny to see such an attractive woman resorting to the childish mechanism, and normally Nate might have laughed. Except that the voice on the other end told him exactly what he didn’t want to hear. And he suspected it would be a long time before he ever laughed again.

Chapter Two

Gwenna should have skipped the hospital visit.

Finding that man’s body had been disturbing and surreal, and she felt like she still had death’s scent lingering in her nostrils. Not a good time to pop into the maternity ward.

But part of her had thought that seeing something so normal, so joyful as Brittany and her baby would ground her, settle her rattled nerves. Yet Gwenna was unprepared for the mixed feelings that hit her smack in the face when she watched Brittany and her baby. Nine hundred years had dulled her ache at the death of her daughter, but the pain would never go away entirely. That loss, that devastation, was part of Gwenna now, a permanent wound in her heart that would never close, and Brittany’s joy pricked at her own pain. But at the same time she was ate up with happiness for Brittany.

"She’s beautiful. Congratulations, Brittany, Corbin." Gwenna smiled at the couple, trying to be normal, act natural, shuffle through her conflicting feelings. She found it sweet that Brittany’s new husband, Corbin Atelier, a French vampire re-turned mortal, was sitting on the hospital bed as Brittany held the baby, a possessive hand on both his wife and daughter.

"Thank you, Gwenna. She ez the most beautiful baby ever born. I am convinced of it," Corbin said, his French modesty on display.

Brittany laughed, glowing with pride and happiness despite the dark circles of fatigue under her eyes. "All babies are beautiful."

"Not zis beautiful," Corbin insisted. "Ava is stunning."

"Do you want to hold her, Gwenna?" Brittany asked, lifting her arms and the baby out.

Gwenna felt a panic rising in her throat. It had been years— centuries—since she had held an infant. But it would be rude to say no, and surely, now that she was in Las Vegas, far away from England, she could hold a baby in her arms without having a ridiculous mental breakdown. And maybe touching Ava would wipe out that ominous foreboding she’d been feeling since she’d known instinctively on the train platform that there was a dead body stashed nearby.

"I’d love to." Wiping her palms on her jeans, she forced a smile and moved forward for the transfer. They were all nervous—Corbin holding his hands under his daughter to catch her if the pass went bad, Gwenna feeling her already cool skin grow clammy with anxiety, Brittany fussing with the baby’s blanket.

But the exchange went off without incident, and Gwenna found herself holding that tiny scrap of nothing babe in her arms. The soft, new smell of freshly washed skin and breastmilk filtered up into Gwenna’s nostrils, her vampire senses acutely aware of how tiny and human and alive Ava was.

Her weight was nothing, not compared to the strength in Gwenna’s nine-hundred-year-old immortal arms. Yet staring down at that tiny face, Ava’s eyes fluttering open and closing again, her cheeks smooth and shiny, Gwenna felt as vulnerable as she ever had. Here was responsibility. Here was the essence of true, pure love, and the source of eternal, agonizing pain.

"Your father is right," she whispered to Ava, settling her closer to her chest. "You’re quite gorgeous."

Ava was also starting to whimper, a little squall erupting from her mouth.

"What’s the matter, precious?" Gwenna rocked her and made soothing sounds, but Ava moved quickly from mild annoyance to full-fledged crying. She clearly needed to nurse, her tiny mouth rooting around Gwenna’s tight T-shirt, searching for a source of relief. She wasn’t going to get it from her.

"Why is she crying?" Alexis asked from the other side of the room, where she’d been talking to Ethan.

"She’s hungry." Gwenna felt her face go hot as she had a sudden memory sensation from the baby rubbing across her chest. She would swear she could almost feel the tingling rush of her milk letting down, the way it had when her own daughter was an infant.

Disturbed, she tried to hand Ava back to Brittany, but the new mum was busy popping open her hospital gown, clearly to Corbin’s horror.

"What are you doing?" he asked her, grabbing the gown before it could fall open and expose Brittany’s chest.

His wife raised her eyebrows. "I’m going to feed our daughter."

Gwenna rocked Ava, whose little face was turning red. Corbin’s eighteenth-century modesty annoyed her. In Gwenna’s mortal youth, survival was more important than manners.

"Not with a crowd of people in the room. I do not think so."

Brittany rolled her eyes. "No one here gives a crap if they see my breast, Corbin. Breastfeeding is a natural, nonsexual action, and this is our family in front of us." She yanked her gown out of his grip, exposing the peak of her left breast.

Apparently not everyone agreed, because Ethan blanched. "Oh, now hang on there, Brit. Good God. We’ll just leave. No need to argue, you two." He averted his eyes to the floor. "We’ll be out in the hall if you need us… not that you’ll need us to do what you’re going to do, but you know, if you need…"

He bolted out the door. Alexis turned to Gwenna and rolled her eyes. "Okay, that was pathetic. The man runs the entire Vampire Nation, yet the thought of breastfeeding freaks him out. I’ll never understand men."

"Me either. But I don’t really want to."

Alexis laughed.

Actually, that wasn’t true. Gwenna knew these men entirely too well. They were overbearing, stubborn, egotistical, unable to express their emotions, and power hungry.

On cue, her mobile phone rang. Since just about everyone she communicated with was in the room—or hiding in the hall—Gwenna had the sneaking suspicion she knew who it was. Especially since Roberto had called her at least sixteen times since she’d slammed the door in his face.

Handing Ava gently to Corbin, Gwenna smiled at Brittany. "Congratulations again. I’m going to head on out. We’ll chat soon."