Page 71 of The Very Virile Viking

"Are you hungry, sweetling?"

Through a cloud of sleep, Angela heard Magnus's whispered question against her ear.

"Oh, no! Not again! I mean, really, Magnus, you are a magnificent lover, but let's not try to set an Olympic record here. Can't we save something for another day?"

A deep male voice chuckled as the mattress dipped and he sat on the edge of the bed. "Not that kind of hunger, you suspicious wench, you!" He tweaked the side of her breast. "And do not try to paint me as the only insatiable one in this bed, oh you of the pop-sigh-call trick. You told me we could try it later. I can hardly wait."

Angela's eyes flew wide open at that reminder of the outrageous suggestion she had made mere hours ago, and Magnus's more than willing agreement to follow through. That was when she noticed the box of pizza sitting on the mattress between her and the insufferable, grinning rogue. Oh , that kind of hunger .

"You called Domino's?" She sat up in bed and pulled the sheet around herself. A bit of belated modesty on her part. Very belated, if Magnus's arched eyebrows were any indication.

"I did," he said, placing a paper napkin on her lap and handing her a glass of iced soft drink. "I already ate one."

She smiled at him. She was hungry, and she had soon devoured three slices and the entire glass of Pepsi.

"Now, about that pop-sigh-call trick?" Magnus asked silkily as he removed the box and glass from the bed and slid under the sheet with her.

Who knew Angela Abruzzi could set Olympic records?

Would wonders never cease?

Well, apparently not… because soon thereafter— with Magnus sitting up in bed propped against a pillow and the headboard, and she lying facedown on the bed, her face buried in her own pillow—Angela was hit smack-dab with the biggest wonder of them all.

"By the by, there is something important I must tell you," Magnus said in a voice that was surprisingly serious… and oddly nervous.

"Oh?" Her response was muffled by her pillow.

"I am a thousand years old."

"Yeah? And I'm sweet sixteen and virgin to the… uh, bone." Her voice was still muffled by the pillow.

"I am serious, Angela. I was born in the year 963. I reached my thirty-seventh year two months ago, in the year one thousand."

"Puhleeze!" She raised her head to look at Magnus. Even though he was sitting, his height was still immense.

He stared back at her, looking concerned. He kept flexing his hands in an agitated manner.

She roiled over on her back so she could see him better. "You're mighty virile for such an old man."

"Do not make mock of me, Angela."

"How can I not make fun of you? You're trying to say I just made love with a man old enough to be my

grandfather more than fifty times removed."

"Precisely."

"This is a joke, right? Next, you will be proposing another one of your sex games, though I can't for the life of me think what the appeal would be in senior-citizen sex games."

"Huh?" Magnus scratched his head and appeared to ponder her words. "Exactly what would senior-citizen sex entail?"

"I haven't a clue." She had to laugh at his interest in what would surely be a perversion. But then she sat up and wrapped the sheet around herself, sarong-style. It was obvious Magnus had something he wanted to discuss, and it wasn't sex, despite his momentary curiosity about yet another fantasy game.

"I do not know how to tell you this, Angela, except to blurt it out. Alas, I am a time traveler."

"Ha, ha, ha! You and Jules Verne. Quit joking."

"I wish I were joking."