Turned by Virna Depaul Page A

something and rolled to the other side of the bed, Ty winced. The speakers transmitted her low moans as her dream got worse. The images that plagued her in her sleep might be different from his, but seemed no less painful.
    Cursing, he rubbed his eyes and got up to get a bottle of animal blood from the fridge. He chugged it down, almost gagging. Compared to the human blood he’d swallowed earlier, it tasted flat. Barely palatable.
    But he hoped he never drank anything else for the rest of his vampire life. He didn’t want to remember the blood lust that had overcome him before any more than he wanted to remember his lust for Ana. Deep down inside, he knew he’d feel both again. The question was whether he’d act on either one.
    After putting the bottle of blood back in the fridge, Ty sat at his dining table and dropped his face in his hands. Even so, he could still envision the amber specks in Ana’s brown eyes and the way the scar contrasted with the softer, silkier skin of her face.
    With a muffled curse, Ty rose and returned to the surveillance station. Ana was still moaning. It didn’t surprise him that he had to fight the urge to go to her. It did surprise him that rather than wanting to fuck her or drink from her, what he really wanted to do was comfort her. Hold her.
    And be held and comforted in return.

CHAPTER
EIGHT
    In the cold, hazy mist of her dream, Ana was transported from the bedroom in her Seattle home to the shadowy streets of the Bronx. For a moment, she simply looked around, trying to push back the memories that threatened to overwhelm her.
    It was odd the way she dreamed. As if there was always two of her: Ana, the objective observer, and Eliana, the girl who was swept away by the events of the dream. Somehow, it was possible for her to be in the heads of both of them—both of her selves—at the same time. Even more odd was the fact that being in Ana’s head was the most frightening, because while Eliana was often carried away by the violence around her, it was Ana who knew the eventual outcome and the depths to which she’d sunk.
    On this particular night, Eliana slammed the door as she escaped her mother’s house, her disgust palatable. Ana cringed in sympathy.
    Theresa Maria Sanchez Garcia, Eliana’s mama, was a whore of the worst kind—the kind who didn’t bother collecting her money before she let men fuck her; the kind who passed out drunk, leaving her daughters—half sisters Eliana and Gloria—alone with strange men who considered them part of the deal their mama had struck. Thankfully, now that Gloria was living with her father’s family, Eliana had only herself to worry about, but thatstill meant carrying the knife that her friend Miguel had given her, and using it if she had to. So far, she hadn’t had to use it, but Ana knew that was about to change.
    “I’m not gonna use that,” she’d scowled at Miguel when he’d first held it out. “What? Son usted loco? You wan’ me to kill someone? I’d go to jail!”
    “Jail would be better than being raped by some pervert!” Miguel had shouted.
    “I’ve always escaped before. Me and Gloria—”
    “Gloria’s gone now. You’re alone. It’s just you and me, and when I can’t be there to protect you, you need to protect yourself. Please. I care about you.”
    And that was that. That was why eleven-year-old Eliana Garcia, who had a nasty mouth but secretly wished she could be like the Disney princesses she sometimes saw on TV, had reached out and taken the knife. That’s why she’d started to carry it with her. Because now someone besides her absent sister and her drunken, whoring mother cared about her.
    She’d been such a fool, Ana thought, wishing she could reach out and tell Eliana that, but of course, she couldn’t. All she could do was watch as the dream fast-forwarded through more days, Miguel playing a major role in all of them.
    The fifteen-year-old boy had been an anomaly to eleven-year-old Eliana. Protective