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At her lapse into Spanish and the thickening of her accent, Ana clenched her teeth, then deliberately modulated her voice so it was once again white-bread Americana. “Why are you following me?”

He smiled again, as if her speaking Spanish had amused him.

Embarrassment washed over her and she wavered, accidentally lowering the gun. “Answer me,
bastardo—
”

In a blur of movement, he grabbed her wrist, wrenched the gun from her hand, flipped her to the ground, and covered her body with his much larger one.

Reflexively, she struck out, striking him in the face before he pinned her arms and his body simply weighed her down. Damn it, she’d known it had been too easy. He’d set her up. And the way he’d moved … Faster than anything she’d ever seen before.

But oddly enough, he had his body braced so his full weight wasn’t on her. As if he wanted her pinned but not hurt.

As if he was taking care of her.

Breathing hard, she stared into his mesmerizing face. His scent would be all over her, she thought absently. When he shifted, rubbing his lower body against her, she blinked at the unexpected warmth that flooded her. He was cold, yet he made her feel so good. So hot. Literally. For another crazy second, she wanted to grab either side of his face, pull him closer, and kiss him.

Ah Dios
. She was losing it.

He tsked. “It was your f-bomb that finally got to me, you know. Normally, you hold back. You don’t have to. Your cursing. Your use of Spanish. I like it. I
more
than like it. I just had to see if you felt as good as you look. As you sound.”

Again, that dazzling smile. The British perfection in the way he modulated his words. Those cold eyes. Danger
emanated from him like a flashing red light, while charm oozed from him like honey.

He leaned closer and whispered. “Lucky me. You feel even better than I’d anticipated.” When she failed to respond, he raised a brow. “What? I’ve rendered you speechless? Or are you just holding back again? I told you I’m here to help. That starts with offering you a job.”

Now
that
she hadn’t been expecting. She snorted and shifted underneath him, working to twist her way out from under his weight. The intoxicating feel of her limbs rubbing against his made her want to move slower. To relish the contact.

Instantly, she ceased her attempts to get away from him.

“I’m not stupid or gullible—” she began.

“No. In fact, Téa believes you’re extremely smart. One of the smartest she’s ever worked with.”

Ana went rigid with hurt. Téa—a woman she’d thought was the closest thing she had to a friend—had sent him here with no warning? “Please get off me,” she whispered when what she really wanted to do was scream. Cuss. In Spanish
and
English.

He kept his gaze locked on hers for several seconds, then said, “As you wish.” Pushing himself to standing, he held out a hand to help her up.

She ignored him and scrambled to her feet, immediately backing several steps away. “How do you know Téa? Why did she—”

“Ana!”

Ana jerked when she heard Paul, one of her employees at the coffee shop, call her name, but she didn’t take her eyes off the man. “I’ll be right there,” she shouted back.

The man in front of her didn’t bat an eye.

She shook her head. “Téa misled you. I don’t want anything from you.”

“Not even information about your sister?”

Her heart stopped beating and for a moment the world around her blurred. She fought against the wooziness, focusing on the man’s face. Excitement tickled the back of her throat and sent a buzzing up her spine.

Ana hadn’t seen her sister, Gloria, for seven years, not since Ana had tried to jump them both out of Primos Sangre. Gloria had only joined the gang after returning from living with her grandparents. Ana had barely recognized her. Gloria had been angry. Distant. Wanting her sister’s company one minute and hating it the next. After the shooting, she’d written Ana in prison, making it abundantly clear she blamed Ana for her injury and never wanted to see her again.

Had Gloria changed her mind? Had she sent this man to tell her that? A wash of excitement shot through her. Buoyed her. Maybe the stranger that had returned from living with her grandparents had finally turned back into the loving sister Ana remembered. Without even realizing what she was doing, she stepped closer. “You know Gloria?”

“I know about her.”

“But did Gloria send you to find me?” she asked, hope reducing her voice to a whisper.

“No.”

Disappointment. Suspicion. Dismissal. All cut through the excitement and hope, scattering them to the wind.

Nothing had changed. As such, this man had nothing she needed.

As if he could read her mind he said, “I told you, I’m here to offer you a job.”

“I’m not interested in anything you’re offering.” Slowly, her eyes never leaving him, she retrieved her gun, tucked it into her waistband right next to his, covered them with her sweater, and started walking backward toward the cafe entrance.

“I’m quite fond of my gun, you know,” he called out.

“It’s mine now.”

“It’s also a violation of your parole for you to carry a firearm.”

That made her freeze, but only for a second. She turned and walked to the coffeehouse door, her steps slow and lethargic. Over her shoulder, she muttered, “So tell my parole officer. Téa always knows where to find me.”

Ty sighed as Ana walked back into her coffeehouse. She moved fast and loose, as if tackling a guy in an alley and pointing a gun at him was par for the course. He supposed given her background, it was like riding a bike—you never forgot how, not when your very survival was at stake. But that didn’t mean she hadn’t been shaken up by their encounter.

She seemed to fit in well with the college crowd she served. In fact, in her uniform of short tees and tight jeans, she could have been a student herself. She worked. She went home. She kept to herself.

But she wasn’t happy with her life. Far from it. She’d simply convinced herself she couldn’t have more. Sometimes, however, her true nature came through despite her best attempts to hide it.

Soon after he’d arrived in Seattle, Ana had ceased to be a fuck fantasy. The hot ex–gang member with the checkered past turned out to be a woman to admire. She kept her distance, but she was hardworking and good to her employees. He’d also been right about her smile. She didn’t use it often, but when she did, her hotness ratcheted into heart-stopping beauty.

His surveillance had also alleviated any lingering concerns he’d had about her refusing to do what they wanted. Because as hard as she tried to keep herself
apart from others, she clearly longed for the type of connections she didn’t allow herself.

He’d seen how she’d stared longingly at the couple playing footsie in the corner of her coffee shop. How she’d stared at two women at the grocery store, arm in arm, obviously loving sisters. And how she’d helped a frail young man with MS across the street; she had watched him walk down the block until he turned the corner and disappeared from view.

Over the past few weeks, his protective instincts had kicked in. So many times, he’d wanted to go to her. Wrap his arms around her. Comfort her. But of course he hadn’t. Because she would have fought him, yes, but also because his hunger had grown almost unbearable.

When she’d confronted and challenged him, he’d managed to hang on to his control, but just barely. He’d known she was waiting for him in the alley and he’d been prepared for her to touch him, even if it was simply to disarm him. Although he’d allowed himself to touch her back, he’d done so with ruthless restraint. He’d led Ana to believe he was just a strong human rather than a hungry vampire lusting after her blood and her body. His sheathed fangs ached the way his dick did, longing to penetrate and take everything from her: her sweet blood and her complete surrender.

Once again he reminded himself it wasn’t going to happen. No matter how he admired her, and no matter how she made him feel, she was a job and that was all she could ever be.

He took out his cell and punched in Carly’s number.

“You found her?” Carly’s voice was husky. Feminine. It was flat-out sexy—deliberately so—and he couldn’t help compare it to the gravelly, clipped speech that Ana had used, her occasional melodic slip into Spanish aside. Despite the sentiment behind her words, the flow of them combined with the touch of her body had made
him hard, harder than the brick wall he’d been pressed against. The intensity of his desire as well as his decision not to push her too far—yet—had been the only reasons he’d remained against that wall. Despite carrying an illegal gun, Ana had turned her life around. He didn’t want to take that away from her. And she had no reason to hurt him unless he gave her one. Besides, it wasn’t as if one of her bullets could kill him anyway.

As far as he knew, nothing could.

“She’s not going to be as easy as the others,” he said in response to Carly’s question.

“I wouldn’t say the others have been easy.”

“She’s good. Even managed to get my gun.”

“Right,” Carly answered, her tone laced with the knowledge that if Ana had gotten Ty’s gun, it was because he’d let her do it. Just like he’d let her spot him watching her in the first place. “Did she shoot you?”

“No, she did not shoot me. She cursed me, though. In Spanish. Something that seemed to bother her.” It had certainly bothered him, but only because he’d liked it. Too much.

He closed his eyes and replayed her words, enjoying the way it made him think of heat and skin and sweaty, slippery silk sheets. With her golden skin, cinnamon eyes, and dark hair, he could easily picture her spread beneath him, begging him for release as he crooned back to her in her native tongue:

Todavía no
. Not yet.

Un poco más largo
. A little longer.

Dé a mí
. Give to me.

He bit back a groan.

Give to me
.

Even now his dick twitched, ready to get busy, ready to immerse itself in Ana’s warmth.

He couldn’t have her. Not sexually. Not in ways that
might involve her heart as well as her body. And that made him angry.

It fucking made him want to kill someone.

Thankfully, Carly seemed oblivious to his internal struggle. “Excellent,” she said. “You’re right about that, she hates it when she speaks Spanish. She’s trying to deny who she is—who she was—but even after all these years she can’t. She’s still the tough little girl from the Bronx.”

“Yes. The little girl packs quite a punch, too.” Raising a hand, Ty rubbed at his mouth, grinning when he saw the blood. She might not be able to kill him, but she sure as shit could make him bleed.

“Was that before or after she got your gun? Pity. I know how fond you are of it.”

His silence just seemed to amuse her. True to form, she pounced on it.

“Oh my. Are you saying you can’t handle this one?” she purred.

God, he hated Carly sometimes. Hated her bitch-on-steroids act. Hated the necessity to partner with her at all. But she hadn’t always been like this. Years ago, as a fellow newbie agent with the FBI, she’d been good at her job but she’d had a gentle side, too. That part of her had long been quashed. And now? Sure, she’d helped Ty and Peter when they’d needed her most, but her assistance had been more about using them than saving them. Carly was doing what she needed to adjust to her new life, part of a team but very much alone. Just like him.

Ty glanced in the direction Ana had disappeared. “No,” he said, this time letting a trace of humor leak into his voice. “I can handle her. I’ll just have to be a little more direct, that’s all.”

“You don’t have authority to reveal what you are, Ty,” Carly snapped. “Not yet. We have one month until the leaders of Salvation’s Crossing attend the Hispanic
Community Alliance fund-raiser, and we need Ana fully invested before we show our hand.”

“I have no plans to tell her I’m a vampire right now. But she still has my gun, and I have no intention of letting her think she can take anything from me and just walk away.”

CHAPTER
TWO

Inside the coffee shop she’d built with blood, sweat, and
tears, Ana leaned against the closed door, keenly aware of the tension that zipped through her body like an electrical charge. The man had done a number on her, both physically and mentally. She tipped her head back against the door, forced herself to take a deep breath, and focused on the small but well-appointed space with its gleaming wood, plush sofas and chairs, and brightly colored walls, trying to get her mind off the encounter in the alleyway.

Not much luck. The man’s heady scent hung about her, as if he was still near. The sensation of his muscular body on hers—his pelvis pressed to hers—still echoed in her bones.

She forced herself to listen to the familiar strains of one of her favorite songs, playing softly in the background. Calming, but not enough to wipe clean her distress.

Handling the gun, holding it to his head, trying to come off tough—it had all shaken her up more than she wanted to admit. Her insides still quivered, both from challenging him and from the way he’d made her feel.

Alive.

And empty at the same time. He’d brought out a rush of feelings inside her, but the moment he’d mentioned Gloria, he’d blasted it all away again, leaving her numb
but longing for those few blessed moments of sensation. Longing for things that could never be hers.

She should be used to it by now, but she wasn’t. It hurt. It made her want to cry out,
Why? Why me? Why now? Why can’t people just leave me alone to live my life in peace?

Swiftly, she sent Paul home. With no customers in the coffee shop to see her do it, she took both her gun and his and stuck them into a cabinet behind the counter. Then she picked up her cell phone and dialed Téa’s number. Cursing softly when it went to voicemail, she left a message asking Téa to call her back right away. A glance at the clock on the wall confirmed she only had another half hour before closing time. She shut off the music then waited, steeling herself for what was coming.