Bloodbond

Chapter 6

"Cassia!" I woke to hear Claire practically beating down my door. I forgot I'd locked it behind her last night. The lock made me feel safe and I had needed that.

I got out of bed and went over to open the door. The second the door was unlocked, Claire burst in. She was smiling from ear to ear and had way too much energy than was strictly necessary for the morning. And no, I was most certainly not a morning person. This is probably just a stereotype, but I had sort of thought that a werewolf might be the same way.

"Good morning, Cassia!" Claire chirped. I gave her a halfhearted smile in response and went to use the bathroom. When I came back out, Claire was sitting on my bed, along with some clothes I'm assuming she took from my closet. My guess was that she meant for me to wear them. I walked over to take a look at what she'd chosen. There was a pair of dark rinse, fitted jeans and the loose, deep red top that I had admired the night before. Hmm, she had pretty good taste. I'll keep that in mind.

"I put a jacket for you to wear over by the door and I figured you could pick out your own underwear."

"Thanks," I said. I grabbed the clothes and went back into the closet to get the aforementioned underwear, then headed back to the bathroom to shower and get dressed. Claire called to me that she would be waiting in the room when I got out.

I felt like I'd passed through some sort of alternate dimension and was now surrounded by things that I just couldn't understand. It was all so surreal. A huge knot of worry and excitement sat in the pit of my stomach. I wasn't sure what to expect today and I wasn't willing to try and take a guess. Nothing that had happened so far had really turned out the way I'd thought, so hazarding a guess was fairly pointless.

When I'd finished showering and dressing, I walked back into the bedroom and saw that Claire was still on the bed, messing around on her phone. She looked up when I entered.

"Great. Let's go downstairs and get some breakfast. I'm starving." I agreed and we headed to the kitchen. As soon as we entered, I was, once again, blown away. It was like a dream kitchen, with all stainless steel applaiances, endless counter space, and a huge, industrial style refrigerator. I had a feeling that a lot of people ate here and it made me somewhat antsy to think about.

There was an older woman standing at the stove, cooking some eggs and bacon. She looked up as we entered and smiled at Claire. "Hello, dear. Come for something to eat?" she asked.

"Yes. Frances, I'd like you to meet Cassia. Cassia, this is Frances. She's an amazing cook and has been with our family for nearly forty years." Frances grinned and came over to give me a quick squeeze before returning to her cooking.

"Oh, it's so nice to finally meet you, dear. I told Gabriel that he was just being pigheaded. Men," she tutted, "they never listen to reason."

Claire giggled but told Frances to hush. I chose to keep silent because I knew that, if I asked, I would get the same response from last night; that it was Gabriel who needed to explain and it wasn't their place to delve into it. Just thinking about it irritated me. They were all just being stubborn. It can't be as private as they're making it out to be, can it?

Frances placed two plates of scrambled eggs and bacon on the counter and sat back to watch while we ate.

"You're a quiet one, aren't you," Frances stated. She definitely got straight to the point, didn't she?

"Um, well, I'm just a bit umcomfortable with everything. I didn't exactly have a choice when it came to staying here so I'm not in the best of moods. Besides, no one seems to be willing to answer my questions and it's driving me nuts. I'm sorry if I seemed rude," I finished, hoping she wouldn't take offense.