Blood Bound

Chapter 30: Beef stew

The first thing I'm aware of when I finally rouse from my dreamless sleep is the silence. No thrum of an engine, no uncomfortable seats, no movement around me whatsoever. Instead I feel the softness of linen surrounding me, the heavy eyelids that refuse to open and a dull throbbing in my left shoulder. It takes a while to wrap my head around the past events but once they pop up one by one like annoying advertisements, it all comes back to me.

I sit up, rubbing the last dredges of sleep out of my eyes and see everything in a blur. Someone must have taken my glasses off. Probably Sophie. I see an obscure, rectangular object on the nightstand table and fuzzily reach around for it. It's hard to do so with only one hand. Once my glasses are safely behind my ears, I take a look at my shoulder, dreading to find it completely incarcerated. To my surprise, it's wrapped up very professionally in fresh, clean bandages and my arm is secured by white linen cloth. Nothing like the crude binding Sophie had scrambled together.

The room feels warm and welcoming despite the absence of windows and I'm relieved to see that there are no cameras in the corners. I'm still wearing my bloodstained clothes and I wrinkle my nose in discomfort when I catch the stench of it. Luckily, I see that someone has laid out fresh, clean clothes on the desk, probably taken from the backpack that's stacked against the wall, looking all dirty and grim. I hurry as much as I can out of the dirty clothes and into the clean ones. It's not easy; I have to take my left arm out of the binding and I wince in pain as the shoulder throbs even more in protest of having it moved suddenly. But I stubbornly power through. Otherwise I would have looked like an idiot with my arm underneath my shirt. It's enough that I look like a mess already.

Once properly dressed, I carefully open the door. It opens with a soft creak and suddenly I'm worried that I'm breaking any trespassing rules. Was I supposed to stay in my room until someone fetched me? Unlikely as I check my watch and see it's 07:30 in the morning. Both vampires are probably in the middle of their hibernation. I can't nonetheless shake off the feeling that I'm doing something wrong. Like I'm supposed to wait until I get permission to roam around as I please. Maybe I'm just worried that I'll randomly stumble upon something horrible like at that other place. I am in the living quarters of a vampire, after all. Who knows what they like to keep in their closets!

I approach the railings of the second floor hallway and am greeted by the sounds of grunts and soft swishing. I freeze on the spot, my free hand gripping the railing and a sickening swooping descends inside my stomach. Were my suspicions correct? I don't dare peek down at the first floor of the living room and yet I hear more grunts and then someone exhaling very loudly.

„There's no need to be afraid," a familiar rough yet clear voice calls from downstairs.

Slowly, I force my arm to pull myself closer to the railing and I look down. And I see something very peculiar; Kenji is standing next to the sofa, doing these weird hand and feet movements in a very slow fashion, taking deep breaths after each movement. That's not the only thing that stuns me. He's doing it, wearing nothing but his black boxers! Shameful heat creeps up my cheeks and even though I want to turn away in embarrassment, I'm drawn to his muscular figure, the way his muscles flex and twitch as he raises his arms over his head in that slow but precise action. I can't help glancing at his lower stance, but gulping I try to raise my eyes further up. His tattoos don't only cover his arms but also reach to his chest. I feel like I've seen that style before, in old Japanese movies that we watched in culture class in high school.

„You know, it's rude to stare," Kenji says and my eyes snap up at his grinning face.

The heat that had nestled comfortably in my cheeks spreads throughout my body like wildfire. Instinctively, I duck down and cover my face with my uninjured hand. I'm so embarrassed I could die!