Bleeding Royalty Book One & Two (First Draft, unfinished)

Chapter 7: Bouncy Ball

Sorry this is so short. I figured it was time to upload a little something. I've been very busy with my other stories and it's very hard for me to write for this story because I absolutely loathe the first book. The plot is so insanely poor that it's become hard to create a decent plotline for the second book without having to change a million things in the first one. I AM EDITING THE FIRST BOOK. The second chapter will be out soon, it's called "Bleeding Prince." Thanks for being so patient, I really appreciate it!! <3 ;)

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 Dimitri lead me into what appeared to be a decently sized personal gym, with an assortment of large weights in one corner, a few treadmills, and multiple walk-in closets. Dimitri had given me a brief tour inside one of them, where there had been katana knives along the walls of the large closet, sparring gear, and even ball on chain that I had to restrain myself not to pick up and whack my kidnapper in the head with. 

"Can you teach me how to use one of these things?" I asked, brushing my finger along one of the many knives that were on display.

Dimitri gave my hand a light smack. "You're a witch, not a ninja. Your weapon is your mind. That alone is more destructive than any blade."

"This is so lame. Does Cassie get to use a blade?"

"Yes."

"Well, then her captor sucks a lot less than you."

"I'm not your captor. I'm your mentor." Sighing, Dimitri stopped in front of a large set of drawers. He then leafed through one of them until he came out with a orange rubber ball. "This is what you're going to be working with today," Dimitri said, holding it out to me.

I examined it closely. "Does it explode or something?"

"No, but it bounces." He smiled. "I got it out of a gumball machine."

I gave him a dry look. "You're going to be shifting into a wolf, with claws and fangs and all of that jazz, and I get to play with this rubber ball? What's fair about that?"

"You'll see, Anna." Dimitri gestured for me to follow him. "Come."

I followed Dimitri back into the gym room. He directed me to sit in front of him in the middle of the room on the floor and held out his left hand, palm upwards towards the ceiling.  "Feel my heartbeat,"  he said, gently grabbing my hand and placing my fingers at his wrist.  "Can you see how calm I am?"

"Yeah," I said softly.

"Now watch."

Dimitri shut his eyes and let his wrist relax on his knee.  I felt his heartbeat slow to the point that I thought it would stop. "Wow," I whispered, "that's so amazing. How do you do that? Can vampire's control their heartbeat?"

"Yes, we can. And you can do the same thing if you concentrate. By putting yourself in the same relaxed state that I was just in, you can control and isolate your powers the way I can control my shifting into a werewolf. Now, I want you to try and relax and slow your heartbeat down. It doesn't have to be as slow as mine, that will take some practice."

"I'm not sure if I can do this..."

"I know you can. Give me your hand."

"Um, ok." I shifted uncomfortable as Dimitri grasped my wrist with one hand.  Instantly, my heart started to pound like a freaking construction jackhammer. I internally cursed it's very existence.

Now Dimitri knew just how much he effected me.

There was a long stretch of silence, where Dimitri just stared at nothing in particular and felt my heartbeat. I wasn't sure exactly what he was doing. Was he having perverse thoughts about drinking my blood through a Capri-sun straw? Was he waiting for me to calm down? If so, he had to leave the room because obviously he had no idea how drop-dead gorgeous he was.