Nick Maltese and Barrett Miles are both ex-military, and were friends with benefits while working together a year before. They parted ways somewhat abruptly when Barrett was sent home with an honourable discharge and told Nick it was over.

Nick is now a consultant for the FBI and basically kills rogue vampires; Barrett works for the Belladonna division of the FBI, where they keep an eye on vampire criminals; although the government knows about vampires, their existence is unknown to most of the population. The FBI had experimented at turning volunteer soldiers into vampires, but it went awry and some Turneds went rogue and became criminals.

Barrett, while working a case on sex trafficking briefly sees Jane Small's face on the SexFlash website; Jane is the daughter of a high school friend of Barrett's, who died a few years prior. Barrett, a rich girl, lost her brother who was shot by gang members and died; she is dedicated to helping those in need, and when she sees Jane's face, she goes on a mission: she has to bring her back to safety. Since all the nefarious business is conducted online, she goes to the one man whom she knows will be able to help her rescue Jane: Nick Maltese. Although Nick and Barrett have unresolved issues, he agrees to help her for a specific reason: his brother Gary is dead as well: he had been Turned and things turned out very badly.

AWAKENED is the second book in the Belladonna Agency series, and if you have not read book one, don't worry you won't be lost. Virna DePaul has added some very clever twists to her vampires, although I would have wanted them to be more present in the story: they're mostly in the background.

AWAKENED is a very solid suspense, it moves swiftly along, and the dialogue is spot-on. The characters are well-rounded, complex and interesting, whether principal or secondary. I particularly liked Nick Maltese: for once here's an Alpha male who is truly a take-charge kind of guy but not a bully, as I often find those über-Alphas to be. And I hope in the future we get to read more about Kevin and especially Justine; I liked them a lot.