Page 98 of Bleed

Clarify expectations.

Easier said than done.

When the elevator doors slide open to the penthouse, I half expect to find him waiting for me, annoyed that I disappeared before he woke up and am just now getting back. Instead, I’m met with silence.

There’s no clink of glass in the kitchen as he mixes his nightly blood cocktail. No rhythmic clang of weights from the home gym down the hall. No faint hum of equipment drifting from the lab upstairs.

It’s just… quiet.

Too quiet.

It wouldn’t be unusual if the sun were still up, but it isn’t. The sky beyond the wall of windows is dark, the city lights glittering like hundreds of stars.

Which means Elliott’s awake… or at least he should be.

A chill slithers down my spine as my gaze drifts toward the staircase. Since I moved in, I’ve never actually had the penthouse all to myself. Even during the day, there was always the underlying certainty that I wasn’t truly alone, thanks to the six-foot-six vampire asleep upstairs.

At first, the thought creeped me out a little.

Then, somewhere along the way, that certainty became oddly comforting.

I kick off my shoes and tiptoe across the hardwood, that lingering edginess creeping back beneath my skin. The place has been cleaned up since I left. The breakfast spread on the kitchen island is long gone, the marble countertops sparkling beneath the recessed lights. I do a slow lap around it, listening for any sign of life, but all I hear is my own pulse thudding in my ears.

I consider calling out Elliott’s name just to prove he’s still here somewhere, lurking behind one of the many closed doors. Instead, I lean against the countertop and pull out my phone, staring at the void in my notifications while the silence presses in around me.

The elevator dings, and I nearly jump out of my skin. My heart does a kamikaze dive into my stomach as I whip around, eyes wide, breath caught somewhere between my lungs and my throat.

Elliott strides into the penthouse, his dark hair slightly mussed and a small black duffel bag dangling from one hand. He’s dressed in dark jeans and a black hoodie, his glasses perched low on the bridge of his nose. The instant his gaze meets mine, I’m pinned like a butterfly to a corkboard.

“Where the hell have you been?” I blurt.

He stops just short of the counter, one brow lifting. “Had an errand to run.”

My eyes drop to the bag in his hand, clocking the logo for the city’s premier blood bank stenciled across the canvas.

“Well, that’s rude,” I huff, folding my arms with a scowl. “I’m right here, ready and willing to donate.”

He steps past me, rounding the kitchen island and setting the bag on the counter beside the fridge. “Your blood type is AB positive,” he murmurs as he unzips it.

“So?” I scoff. “Is that a bad type or something?”

He glances up as he reaches into the duffel. “Not at all. It’s the universal plasma donor. But I prefer a mixture of positive and negative to dilute the Rh protein, and I was out of negative.”

His science word salad goes straight over my head, but I don’t ask him to translate. Instead, I watch him unpack the bag with the same precise efficiency he applies to everything, one blood pouch after another emerging. He arranges them neatly on the refrigerator shelf, my attention snagging on one already inside that’s different from the others.

Plain white cap, no blood bank label. My blood inside, drawn by Albert.

His fingers brush lightly over the pouch before drifting past it to select one with a red cap, then another with a blue one. The refrigerator door swings shut with a soft thud, and he proceeds to go about his usual routine– retrieving a glass from the cabinet, twisting the caps off both pouches, and pouring them in.

“Is that why you drink it from a glass?” I ask, watching the dark red blood splash against the sides. “So you can mix the types?”

He stills for a moment, then looks up, his gaze catching briefly on my throat before lifting to meet my eyes. “Yes,” he says simply, swirling the blood once before lifting the glass to his lips.

I drift a little closer, leaning my elbows against the cool marble as I watch him. “Since when do you run your own errands?”

“Since my assistant proved he can’t be trusted with blood that belongs to me,” he murmurs, flicking me a glance over the rim of his glass.

My pulse skips at the reminder, any clever retort dying in my throat.