Ruby Shadows (Born to Darkness #3)(2)

Sorry! There I go again, letting my imagination run away with me. After all, a few bad dreams are to be expected considering what I’ve been through lately. And anyway, it’s not like they’re a warning that something really evil is stalking me…

Are they?



Chapter One





Gwendolyn





“So Victor’s excited to be a dad?” I asked, pouring myself another cup of wine and topping off Taylor’s sparkling water.

“He’s over the moon about it,” Addison said. “No pun intended,” she added dryly.

“Very funny.” Taylor elbowed her in the ribs good naturedly.

“I know—over the moon—get it?” Addison giggled.

Taylor was pregnant and it was her man, Victor—who happened to be a huge-ass cursed werewolf—we were talking about. Which explains Addison’s bad pun. Well, that and the bottle of white wine she’d had been chugging.

“Well tell me more—details, girl.” I made a “keep going” hand gesture with my wine glass, nearly spilling the contents all over my lap. “Whoops!”

“Whoops is right.” Addison giggled again. She had definitely had more than enough wine. Not that I minded, it had been entirely too long since I’d enjoyed myself this much.

I had invited my new friends Taylor and Addison over for a wine and pedicure party and somehow the time just flew. Of course, once the wine started flowing we sort of forgot about the pedicure part of it. I had managed to get at least one coat of cherry red paint on my toes but Addison’s were only half done and Taylor’s were pretty messy.

That was because Addison insisted that her pregnant best friend shouldn’t be breathing paint fumes (even if they were just fingernail polish paint) and offered to paint Taylor’s toes herself. However, this was about three glasses of wine into the evening and the effect looked like…well, like someone who’d had three full glasses of white wine had done the job. Not that Taylor seemed to mind—she was enjoying herself as much as Addison and I were, even if she was sticking strictly to non-alcoholic beverages.

For a vampire and a Vampire Auditor (I know—weird combination, right?) they were pretty fun girls. They had a few little inside jokes since they’d been friends since college but they never made me feel like an outsider. And we had plenty to gossip about, considering everything the three of us had been through in the past month. Right now, though, all anyone wanted to talk about was the baby.

“I swear Victor talks at least as much to my tummy as he talks to me,” Taylor told us, rubbing her belly and grinning.

“And why not? He’s got to get to know his daughter.” Addison patted her best friend’s tummy, which was already beginning to get a tiny bit rounder. “He’s gonna make a great dad, you know.”

“I know.” Taylor was absolutely glowing, her cheeks pink and healthy. You would never have guessed that she was a vampire to see her—not that she strictly was anymore. A combination of Victor’s blood and a well placed prophesy meant she was able to do things most vampires couldn’t, like go out in the sun, eat solid food…get pregnant. You know, that kind of thing. “He’s already building a crib,” she continued.

“What? He’s already putting together the crib? But I wanted to buy you that,” Addison exclaimed, filled with drunken indignity. “You haven’t even had your baby shower yet!”

“No, no—I don’t mean he’s putting it together from a kit,” Taylor said. “He’s actually building the crib from scratch. He went out and got the wood and sanded it down and stained it…” She shook her head, a fond light in her blue eyes. “It’s going to be gorgeous when it’s done.”

“Not half as gorgeous as the baby, I’ll bet.” I grinned at her. “If she looks like half you and half Victor, she’s going to be quite a little princess.”


Taylor laughed. “Victor says he hopes she looks just like me. But I can’t help wishing she’d get his eyes.”

“The kind that turn wolf gold during the full moon?” Addison asked.

I thought she might have gone too far but I didn’t say anything. And besides, it was something I’d been wondering too, even if I wasn’t quite drunk enough to say it. Would Taylor’s daughter take after her mother or her father? Or was the kid going to be half vampire and half werewolf—a kind of vamp-were hybrid?

Taylor looked grave. “I wouldn’t mind but Victor hopes not. He’s afraid if she comes out a were she might inherit his curse.”

“But if she comes out as a vampire, she won’t be able to go out during the day,” Addison pointed out. “That kind of puts a damper on your play-date prospects with other babies.”

“Maybe she won’t be either one,” I said thoughtfully. “I mean, really, both you and Victor have a human side—maybe she’ll just inherit that and be purely human.”

“Then she’ll just be the kid with the weird parents,” Addison said cheerfully and hiccupped.

Taylor made a face at her and took a sip of her sparkling water. “Look, just because you don’t want kids yourself…”

“And believe me, Corbin was plenty grateful I don’t,” Addison said. “He was all long-suffering and ready to be willing to adopt with me but I could tell how relieved he was when I told him I’d rather not have any.”