Runaway Vampire (Argeneau, #23)

“Hurry Dante,” she urged. “Give me a baby.”

Dante clasped her hips and she waited, bracing herself for his thrust, but it never came. He just held her. Mary glanced over her shoulder, scowling when she saw the frown on his face. He was thinking when he should be doing.

“Dante,” she said impatiently. “We can’t make a baby that way.”

His gaze shifted to her and then something like determination crossed his face, and he shifted his hands to grab her by the waist.

Relieved, Mary started to turn forward again, and then gasped in surprise when instead of entering her, he simply picked her up and set her to stand on the chair again, still with her back to him. She frowned and glanced around then. Dante was a lot taller than her and she supposed it would have been awkward for him with them both standing on the floor. Still, surely this put her up too high?

Mary had barely had the thought when he urged her feet further apart until they were on the very edges of the chair. She thought he was trying to arrange her so that she was at the right height for penetration, but he startled her by then squeezing his wide chest under and between her legs to sit in the chair facing her.

“What—?” she began with confusion, than gasped when he caught her butt cheeks in each hand and pulled her forward. Mary cried out with surprise and grabbed at the wall, then cried out again as his mouth was suddenly between her spread legs, his tongue thrusting where she’d wanted his erection.

“No!” Mary cried with a dismay that quickly turned to need. “Oh God, yes . . . no . . . yes . . . Oh Dante,” she cried, bracing one hand on the wall behind the chair and tangling the other in his hair as he began to lick and suck at the nub of her excitement.

Apparently, the shared pleasure made it easy for him to know just exactly what to do to push them over that edge they’d been approaching before she’d stopped too. Dante didn’t stop, though, he just pushed until they both rode over the falls and dropped into the dark waters waiting below.


Mary was slumped in Dante’s lap on the chair, her legs on either side of his and her head on his shoulder, when she woke from their post-noncoital encounter. He was already awake, something she deduced from the fact that he was rubbing her back soothingly. Mary lay still for a moment, both enjoying the caress and avoiding having to face him. But it seemed she didn’t fool him. Dante knew she was awake, which she deduced when his hands stilled and he spoke.

“Do you want to explain what just happened?”

Mary reluctantly sat up, but feigned ignorance. “It’s usually referred to as oral sex. Although one of my patients said it’s called having a box lunch now, or alternately a Bikini Burger or a Cherry Flip.” She paused and grimaced before admitting, “He has a thing for looking up such words online and was always coming into his appointments with risqué lists of slang terms.”

“Was his name Bricker?” Dante asked, his eyes narrowing.

“No,” she answered, and frowned. “I can’t tell you the name of my patients, Dante, even if they aren’t my patients anymore. That would be unethic—”

“Never mind,” Dante interrupted. “Of course it was not him. You are from Winnipeg and he has not even been there that I know of.”

She tilted her head curiously at that, wondering who this Bricker was that he was talking about.

“Anyway,” he said, “that’s not what I meant when I asked you to explain. I do know it was oral sex, Mary,” he added dryly. “I meant why the sudden desire for a baby when less than an hour ago you were determined we should not have one and made me go out and find condoms?”

Mary’s mouth twitched with amusement at the complaint in his voice, and then she sighed and sat up a little straighter.

“I’ve changed my mind is all,” she responded. “I want a baby now.”

“Why?” he asked at once.

Mary shrugged and glanced unhappily away.

“They will not replace the children you already have,” he said solemnly.

Her lower lip trembled and she bit it, and then lowered her head. “I know, but—”

“Tesoro,” Dante interrupted. Catching her chin, he turned her to face him before saying, “I would be happy to give you a baby if you want.”

“You will?” she asked uncertainly.

He nodded solemnly. “You are my life now. My future. My love. I will give you anything you want if it is within my power.”

Mary stared at him, his words circling in her mind. The “my love” part really got her attention, but even it was not enough to distract her from her desire for a baby, and she asked plaintively, “Then why didn’t you—?”

“Because I will not do so until I am sure it is what you truly want and—”

“It is,” she interrupted impatiently.