The sunlight streamed into the bedroom through the open balcony door. Fortunately, it streamed in through the quietly dancing curtains, making it remain soft, full of vitality but calming. The world was waking up, as the silence of the half asleep city was pushed away by the relentless march forced by life.
On the carpeted floor at the foot of the large bed, the dark form of the woman who had remained unmoving for hours stirred. First a twitch of the hand beside which the wooden box, small, but the cause of everything, had fallen on its side. Then, the closed black eyes opened slowly and took in the unfamiliarity of the environment as the sensation of the ground instead of the usual bed came to settle in her perception.
There was a moment of confusion under the light draping of the light of the nascent day, before a splashing sound came from behind to startle her, and make her eyes open wide. She stood up in panic and looked to the left, only to find the chair that had been occupied earlier empty, with ropes on the floor around it.
Her heart skipped a beat, then started to pound in her chest. She did not even have the leisure to wonder how Alex Lenner had managed to free himself, as she immediately snapped her head toward the source of the sound behind her.
Seeing the half-open sliding door of what must be the bathroom, she paused, her lips moving behind her mask as if to voice a sudden fear though no sound came out in the end. She looked back at the chair that had been vacated, at the ropes on the floor, then at the bathroom again, before she looked down at herself, panic starting to settle in.
She… Nothing happened to her. Even though Alex Lenner had freed himself, he left her on the floor and went to take a shower?
By the end of her contemplation, her surprise gave way to the incomprehension that had budded inside her.
As befuddlement slowed down her thoughts, her eyes were pulled by the piece of white paper that had fallen on the ground beside the wooden box she had opened. More precisely, she was attracted to the beautiful writing in black that felt obvious on the white background.
'Kid, fate is a marvelous thing, but it has never been kind to you. However, what one can not do, two will be able to. Even against the world, together, you will be able to stand.
With the red string tied, your fates are now entangled, like two sides of the same coin, sharing pain and joy, fortune and misfortune.
Of course, there is nothing that can't be undone. You will just need to find out the 'how' by yourself, then get the true treasure.
Till then, beware of the full moon.
Hehe…'
It felt like a message, not the key to the heirship of an empire as she had been told. And looking inside the box, there seemed to be nothing else apart from the end of the red string connecting the white paper to the ceiling of the box, a red string with a knot tied in the middle.
For a moment, the masked woman's curiosity grew to overshadow the fear she had woken up with, as she thought about the circumstances before she fainted. She recalled the resistance she encountered when opening the wooden box, and now that she thought about it, that seemed to have been the red string holding her back, before getting pulled tight, and a white flash followed, with a sharp buzzing. After that, she only remembered the darkness from her loss of consciousness.
So, did she tie the red string with her actions? Therefore, was her fate entangled with… Alex Lenner? Because the message seemed destined to him.
Her thoughts couldn't help but get tangled. The words felt like the riddle of a fantasy-themed story, feeling too unreal, too illogical to unravel, and for a moment during which stillness reigned, it buried any growing apprehension and dread she had about her situation. That was until a wave of warm dampness hit her, and a pair of bare feet walked into her field of vision. She looked up slowly, her gaze going from the masculine feet to the shins they were connected to, then to the white towel covering the knees above up to the waist she could only describe as strong, or better yet, as handsome, with the belt of well-defined muscles circling it just below abs just as defined, and beautiful.
Her gaze froze on the scar running over the right side of the healthy-toned abdomen, then jumped at another imperfection just as jarring, but this time, on the chest muscle that was moving with the movement of the arm on that side. Right, movement.
Suddenly, she could not remain engrossed in her appreciation of the attractive body before her anymore, because everything she had ignored while being tunnel-visioned came back to her, and she recalled the situation she was in.
She had broken into someone's home, tied him to a chair, and made to deprive him of something that was his, not hers. And now, that person, a man she was certainly not stronger than, was free, and was now standing right in front of her, his chest muscles dancing as he wiped his hair. Gulping a mouthful of saliva, she raised her eyes further, and met the brown eyes looking down on her, the calm inside them making her unable to perceive anything at all.
Swallowing again in another attempt to drown the overflowing apprehension, she was thinking about what to say, or do, when Alex Lenner crouched to her level, and asked with a smile:
"Liking what you are seeing?"
The saliva went down her throat, but not with the apprehension it had started the journey with. Instead, it passed through her chest with the heat that had arisen from the close proximity with the naked chest she had been appreciating.
Alex's smile grew, as if he got the answer he wanted even though she did not speak, and turned playful:
"Hungry? How about breakfast before you go?"
That did it for the woman in black. She finally remembered that she had spent the night where she should not have. Her face heated up, her body tensed up in embarrassment, and her fingers curled against the carpeted ground as if to dig a hole to hide her defenses that had almost already crumbled with everything that had happened.
Too ashamed to even glare at Alex, she sprang up from the floor, away from the heat of the hot body fresh out of the shower. She grabbed her bag from the bed, and hurried out of the room, then apartment, as if she was being chased by fire.