"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."
"Thanks for coming by, Gwenna. I appreciate it." Brittany gave her a look, a shared understanding.
Brittany knew how Gwenna had worried about her daughter, could sympathize with the fear, because now she was living it, too. They both had given birth to daughters with more vampire blood than mortal running through their veins, and a mother's fear was a powerful thing. Gwenna only hoped Ava would come to a better end than Isabel had.
Feeling tears unexpectedly pricking her eyes, the baby's crying and the ringing of her mobile in her handbag shrill and harsh on her raw nerves, Gwenna just squeezed Brittany's hand and followed Alexis out of the room.
Her brother was frowning at her the minute she stepped out. "What's the matter? Who's calling you?"
"I don't know," she snapped at him. "I can read minds, but I'm not bloody omniscient."
Ethan held up his hand. "No need to get your knickers in a knot. I was just asking."
"Is it any of your business?" she asked, knowing she sounded defensive. But hell, she felt on the verge of tears, and she despised that feeling. It meant she hadn't made any progress at all, that she was still vulnerable and emotional. And it seemed she was going to pay for her standoff with her ex. Roberto was going to harass her mercilessly, another charming tactic of his.
It was the worst thing she could say, though, because Ethan had been about let it go until she spoke. But he was a naturally suspicious person and her words made his eyes narrow. "What does that mean? Give me your cell phone." He held out his hand.
"No." Gwenna clutched her purse tighter to her chest.
"Who would call you, Gwenna?"
Her sister-in-law made a sound of impatience. "Leave it alone, Ethan. Gwenna's right, it's none of your business."
When Gwenna had traveled to Vegas for Ethan's wedding, she had been surprised at her brother's choice of a wife, because Alexis was very twenty-first century with her attitude. But the more Gwenna got to know her, the more she liked Alexis, and the more she realized that Alexis was actually strong in the way women of their eleventh-century mortal youth had been. Alexis did what she needed to do and got the job done without needing or expecting help from a man, and Gwenna suspected that was what appealed to Ethan about her.
"It is most certainly my business." Those blue eyes pierced her, studying her, calculating, accusing. "You're talking to Donatelli again, aren't you?"
Her brother knew just how to get to her, how to make her feel small and naughty, childish.
But she wasn't going to let him intimidate her. "So what if I am?" She wasn't, not technically in the way he meant, but even if she was, it wasn't Ethan's right to criticize.
Ethan didn't like her nonanswer. He took it as confirmation and exploded. "Christ, Gwenna! You haven't learned one goddamn thing in the last three hundred years, have you?"
That hurt. But it infuriated her more. She had learned more than Ethan would ever know. She had learned her lesson the hard way, over and over again, and had continued to have to swallow the lecture long after she had memorized it. "Go to hell, Ethan."
She spun on her heel, and started down the hall.
He grabbed her arm and jerked her to a stop. "Gwenna… wait. You know I'm just worried about you."
"Give me a little credit for having
some
sense. I'm not some unruly teenager who's letting the town cad up her skirts."
"But that's exactly what you did! Twice. Why do you think I worry about you?"
For the first time in her life, Gwenna wanted to knock her brother unconscious.
Alexis made a sound of shock. "Uh, Ethan… not a cool thing to say, babe."
Gwenna vowed to be mature. "My relationship with Roberto is none of your business. It never has been. And I would appreciate it if you would respect my decisions." Gwenna straightened her back, and took a deep breath, controlling her anger. "I know what I'm doing."
Ethan snorted. "Obviously not if you're sheet diving with Donatelli."
So much for maturity. She clenched her fists and gave a sound of exasperation. "Bugger off."
Her brother's jaw dropped. "Gwenna!" He turned to his wife. "Did you hear what my sister just said to me?"
"Yeah, and you really deserved it," Alexis said. "I would have said it to you years ago, but Gwenna's much nicer than me."
Gwenna was actually not feeling nice at all. It had been rather easy to blurt out that rude command to her brother. Ignoring Ethan's protests, she yanked her arm out of his grip and headed toward the elevator.
Apparently deciding she wasn't worth pursuing, Ethan still yelled after her, "You'll just be sorry all over again for getting involved with Donatelli. You know I'm right."
Rolling her eyes, Gwenna waited for the elevator and tapped her foot impatiently. Just to annoy Ethan, she pulled out her phone and checked the missed calls. It was Roberto's number. Of course. She had changed the rules on him and he didn't like it. Despite what she led Ethan to believe, she wasn't planning to take any of Roberto's calls, and she'd rather die of starvation in the burning desert sun after a failed decapitation attempt than have sex with her ex.
She knew where his penis had been in the three hundred years since their divorce. Everywhere. Around the block several dozen times. Stopping at every strip club and brothel along the way.
If she were going to have sex ever again, which was doubtful, it wouldn't be with Roberto.
The elevator opened.
Gwenna stepped on.
Her eyes landed on a ruggedly handsome man leaning against the back wall, his eyes red and his expression stricken. Smashing. Just when she'd almost forgotten for a whole two minutes that instead of meeting Slash she'd found a murder victim, the cop who had so clearly thought she was an idiot popped up to remind her. "Detective Thomas?"
The phone in her hand rang again.
Damn it. Roberto again.
"Gwenna Carrick." Detective Thomas made a sound of exasperation, his voice angry and raw.
He had been impatient with her at the crime scene, she had been aware of that, but this tone was harder, different. Gwenna saw unshed tears in his eyes, saw his face was a mask of shock and pain, his shoulders tense.
"Are you okay?" she asked. Her phone rang incessantly, loud and obnoxious in the quiet elevator.
Despite the fact that he looked like he was going to crack, he just shrugged. "I've been better. How about you? Find any more dead bodies since we last met?"
Gwenna frowned. So he didn't want her compassion. He was on the emotional edge, obviously, and maybe embarrassed by that. Instinct told her to squelch the maternal urge to touch him.
If he needed flippant, she could do that. "No, no more bodies. But it wasn't for lack of trying."
Nate Thomas let out a ragged laugh, dragging his hand over his mouth. God, like his day didn't suck enough already, now he was almost caught crying like a baby by the blonde from the train station.
But at least she'd picked up on his discomfort and had let it drop. It didn't sound like she was going to ask why he was just about blubbering on the elevator.
"Why didn't you answer your phone?" he asked, noting the way she gripped it so tightly her knuckles were white.
It calmed him down to study her, to assess her behavior, to wonder what she was doing at the hospital, and how she might be connected to the victim at the train station. Something about her was off, and he didn't understand what it was. And puzzling her out could help him to forget why he was at the hospital himself.
She glanced down at her cell phone and shook her head. "It's someone I don't want to talk to."
Someone she was angry with, if the pink spots of color on her cheeks were any indication. Her long wavy hair was also mussed, like she had tucked it back in irritation.
"Who? Your mother?" That was usually the person who pissed him off.
She gave a small shake of her head. "I wish." She hesitated for a fraction of a second, than said, "It's my ex-husband."
"Ah." That would explain her defensive posture—straight back, chin high, shoulders squared.
The door opened on the ground floor, but she didn't get off the elevator. "We're here," he told her, gesturing to the lobby, not liking the way she was looking at him.
Like she no longer saw him as intimidating, an authority figure, but instead with pity.
"I'm sorry," she said. "Whatever it is, I'm sorry for it."
He didn't pretend to misunderstand. He was too raw, too close to the edge. "Yeah, me, too."
She hesitated again, but then just stepped out of the elevator, turning her back to him. Her phone rang again in her hand. "Shit," she whispered, as her shoulders suddenly crumpled forward.
Nate moved up next to her. "What does he want?" he asked, not quite ready to leave. When he walked out that door, it would be real, and he didn't want to deal with reality just yet. And he could argue with himself that the blonde could help him solve a murder. Hell, the blonde just might be the murderer, though every gut instinct he had screamed that wasn't even close to the truth.
"He wants me back." She glanced over at him, her blue eyes sad, troubled. "He's never been good at taking no for an answer."