Free Stolen Sun (The Juliana Lucio Series) by L.C. DeCarlo Page B

to get the back of my top more thoroughly. William made a move forward.
    “I’m okay.” I told him, “I’m okay, stay with me.”
    He looked anguished as he watched me standing there bloodied in the shower as Ana cut me one last time.  His fangs began to show, but I think it was because he was fighting himself, he wanted to stop Ana with everything he had , but knew he couldn’t.
    His eyes looked as helpless and anguished as Antonio had when I went to go watch him; the realization was shocking to me. William was usually so guarded in his emotions I think this was the first time I had seen the real him, and without his realizing it. Being caught up in his gaze, I didn’t realize Ana had finished until she finally said it was done.
    I took the scrubs off and let them hang in the shower to dry. Talk about morbid . I was going to take a shower, but Ana thought it would look better if I had old dry blood in my hair. She did say she wanted to ‘dirty me up’ after all.
    This was going to be a very long night.
    I slept in the basement that night where I had woken up the first time Ana brought me here. I didn’t want to get my room all bloody and dirty, so I stayed down there and slept on some towels on the bed. Ana was waiting for me the moment I woke in the morning, and she had a bucket of dirt with her.
    “This just keeps getting better and better,” I complained. My hair was stiff from dried blood, my skin itchy , and I was irritable and hungry from the blood loss.
    “Sorry, but we need to do this as soon as possible. We want to give them as much time as we can to get you to Will before sunrise; you need to look the part. This is your last chance to back out Juliana; we can do this without your body. You won’t be able to feed before going, you need to look as pale as can be, and the blood loss will help keep you extremely bradycardic as well. Are you sure you can do this around that many humans? William will get some blood to you after they get you to the morgue, but it won’t be fresh.”
    Ana gave me a straightforward look that said the choice was mine; she was just giving me the options. It was the first time she hadn’t tried to bully me into something.
    “I want to do this. I can do this. Ana, please just don’t let my children see me.”
    She nodded her agreement and handed me the scrubs stiff with dried blood giving me an apologetic wince as I took them.
    After getting dressed, Ana smeared a little grease on my face from the trunk of my car, a little dirt on my arms and hands, and I climbed in the back curling into a ball. William was already at the morgue, waiting. Ana was going to drive me near to the police station and make an ‘anonymous call’ to report an abandoned car that had someone suspicious hanging out around it.
    As for the wound, right before she left , Ana was going to make a cut into the side of my scalp. She said that if she used a silver knife that it would slow the healing process down, it wouldn’t stop it completely, but should give me time to get to the morgue before anyone noticed it healing. Ana was going to stay nearby the scene to keep an eye on things . I f it looked like it was going downhill , she was going to come on scene and take possession of my body.
    She apparently had I.D. stating she was a big wig from the missing person’s division; she didn’t want to use it unless we had to call it quits though, afraid that someone would call in to check her credentials.
    The ride to the station took about twenty minutes. Ana was obeying every traffic law and taking all the back roads.  The last thing we needed was for her to get caught with a body in the back of a car the police were looking for in connection to a missing persons’ case. It felt like hours in the back of the car.
    I was incredibly grateful that temperature changes didn’t affect me. I was practicing ‘playing dead’ with the whole not moving, breathing thing. I tried to keep my limbs stiff which would be