Fated Souls (The Fated Saga Book 1)

by Sariah Skye

  Feeling a pang of desperation, I darted for my phone that I had tossed on the remains of my charred nightstand and started flipping through my very small list of contacts. Kit was the first person I could think of so I called her first, hoping she’d be home now and would answer. It went straight to voicemail. I tried again…no luck.

  I sighed in exasperation. My brother would be of no help. Maxxus? I considered this for a moment before deciding that wasn’t wise. I landed on Madison’s entry and started to text her, but second guessed myself.

  Madison was young, and a bit bossy. Judging from the fact that she was 17 and claimed to of been in love a handful of times already this year, I kind of had to doubt that she was the best person for the job of guiding me onto what I should do on a first date. Besides, she’d already seen us together at the grocery store, confiding in her that I hadn’t been on an actual date yet might get me to appear a little—wantonly.

  Emily Burton’s name was right above hers, my other co-worker. Emily was beautiful, her hair and makeup always appropriate and not overdone yet always immaculate. As far as I knew, Emily had had a steady boyfriend for a time, and been out with a couple of guys. She was a bit more reserved, and patient. I decided to try her.

  Emily, it’s Leo. I need to borrow your beauty expertise.

  Instead of texting, she actually called me. It barely rang for a second when I answered.

  "Emily?"

  "Yeah. Surprised to hear from you! What’s going on?" she asked, sounding a bit timid. "Not often my boss calls me when I’m not late for work!" she said, with a nervous chuckle.

  I had to laugh back. "Don’t worry hun, this is strictly girl stuff, not work stuff."

  "Oh. Well then, happy to help, but I don’t know what I can do. You already look so pretty all the time," Emily said.

  I softened. Sweet girl, that Emily. "Aw, that’s nice of you to say. But I’m going out and I want to look extra special."

  "Out? Like on a date date?" Emily squealed excitably.

  "Mmm…yeah. A date." My ear erupted with cheers and girly giggles.

  "Oh! That’s so cool! Who with? Oh, I bet it’s that hottie with the glasses that keeps drooling over you at the shop, huh?"

  I had to grin at that one. "Yeah, that’s the one," I replied.

  She shrieked again. "Oh, yay! He was so cute! You guys would be so cute together!"

  "Well, not if I don’t make a decent impression which is why I called you. Madison is good at makeup but not good with secrets…I feel kind of silly that I even have to ask, but I’m not good with hair or makeup, and I don’t have a lot of time either. Normally I’d call Kit but she’s not answering her phone." I tried to hide the concern from my tone, not wanting to alarm Emily as to Kit’s unknown whereabouts when I didn’t know anything myself.

  "Oh! Of course! Well…hmm…you have internet, right? Duh, who doesn't? Let me get out my laptop here…let’s see what I can find. I don’t have a ton of time since the dance is tonight but we’ll figure something out."

  "Thanks, Emily." Over the course of the next twenty minutes, Emily had me sit down and peruse this Pinterest site I’d never heard of but she swore it’d change my life. She had me look up "date hairstyles" and said she did the same, so hopefully we’d both come up with the same entries.

  "I know most guys like the natural look and some of these are pretty high maintenance anyway so let’s keep it simple." She instructed me to a photo with the girl in the picture, the front pieces of hair were twisted back and joined together in the back of the head, fastened with a neat design of bobby pins (which I could never do, but, she insisted that I didn’t have to). The back of the hair was teased up and slightly poufy, and she claimed it was really easy to attain this but as she described and I read what was going on, I was quite confused.

  Emily exhaled, trying to gather patience. At work, I normally just wore my hair long and straight or in a big, chunky braid down my back. I wore minimal makeup, just concealer, some eyeliner and mascara and lip gloss. In the dragon realm, makeup was non-existent. Obviously. So this was all fairly new territory.

  She found a tutorial online and made me watch it, it appeared like something I could do except when I asked her about the stick in the woman’s hand, I swear, sweet patient Emily actually sounded like a dragon when she growled. But she guided me through how to use it—it was a curling iron—I had one I just hadn’t really ever used it much.

  Another five minutes of hunting for tutorials on how to apply cat-eye makeup, flawless foundation and lip gloss, I had to swear to her that I would send her a "selfie" of my face before I stepped out in public. Then we discussed attire.

  This was a bit more difficult, seeing as how I didn’t have much. I had to describe to her everything in my closet in detail. Her audible dismay was very obvious. At one point she even insisted on coming over and loaning me some items of hers (although she was smaller than me, she swore she would have things that would fit me…I was doubtful) but I stretched the truth and told her my apartment was a huge mess and I was embarrassed to let her see it. Truth was yeah, it was a mess but I couldn’t care less if she saw it or not. I didn’t want her to see Gabriel camping out in my living room, comfortably lounging on the couch with his feet up, laptop in his lap, chewing tentatively on the earpiece of his glasses as he worked (yeah, I was spying on him through the crack in my door. Yeah, he looked pretty damn adorable while concentrating on…whatever the Hell he was concentrating on….)

  I pulled the item she mentioned out from the back of the closet: I had never worn it, I almost forgot about it. Kit ordered it online, claiming the orange would just look so stunning with my hair and skin, while Madison claimed no one looked good in orange (it was more of a reddish, rusty orange, Kit had insisted). I never had any reason to wear any sort of dress.

  "I could try it," I said, the phone cradled between my ear and shoulder as I held the hangered dress up to myself.

  "Now…shoes. Do you have anything besides damn Converse or Doc Martens?"

  "Umm…" I tossed the dress down on my bed and peered into the back of the closet, behind a handful of boxes to the sole pair of dress shoes I owned: a black pair of sparkly gladiator sandals with a slight platform heel. "I have one pair," I said, and I described them to her.

  "Good. Perfect. You’re gonna look so hot, he isn’t going to be able to stand it." I had to swear again to send her a picture with my phone about five times before I could get her to hang up.

  But before I could get started…I still needed that pop!

  "Get a good nap in?" Gabriel chimed, as I tried to discreetly head into my kitchen.

  "Pretty good," I said, reaching in the fridge for my drink. "Working hard, or hardly working?"

  He snorted. "Well, a little of both, actually," he said, closing his laptop and setting it aside. "Still feeling up to going out?" he asked, a mischievous raise to his brow.

  I popped the top of the can and took a sip, stifling the urge to belch afterward, causing my face to twist up in a grimace. "Feel great," I said, my tone strangled as I resisted the urge to burp. Belching as a dragon was...quite scary and usually required actual fire.

  "Really?" he said with a chuckle.

  "So what are we doing, then?" I questioned, leaning against the fridge and casually crossing my feet—one over the other—trying not to appear too eager.

  Gabriel smiled impishly. "You’ll find out."

  "Uh-huh…you have no idea, do you?" I retorted.

  He pretended to be wounded. "Come on now! Have you that little faith in me? After all we’ve been through?"

  I snorted. "Right…well before we do whatever it is you have planned…need to grab a shower or anything before I hole myself in there for a while?"

  "I can wait until you’re done," he offered.

  "No really…this will take a while. A long while. Trust me."

  He scoffed and took the hint. It was interesting to see how male humans lived as opposed to female ones. Well, I onl
y had myself to compare to but as depicted on TV, women tended to spend hours primping, plucking, curling—whatever.

  Gabriel was in and out in about ten minutes flat, and came out looking fabulous.

  It wasn’t fair. Not fair at all.

  "There," he said. "Sorry it took so long; your shower is pretty nice."

  "Long?" I shook my head.

  He chuckled. "Let me finish up some stuff here." He dove back into his laptop as I took my leave to the shower.

  It was a nice shower, I had one of those rainfall showerheads with just the right amount of pressure. After undressing I paused a moment in the steam, inhaling the scent of his shampoo and soap and musing at how outrageous it was that there were men’s shower supplies adorning the shelves of my shower: a bar of fragrant, musky soap next to my fruity-scented conditioner; a black bottle of shampoo next to my own. I smiled a little to myself.

  If nothing else, at least I was getting to experience this point of humanity for myself, something I didn’t think I’d ever experience: male companionship.

  It took me about thirty minutes to shower and moisturize afterward (being a dragon, in human form we didn't have a ton of body hair because we were scaly…the downside is I suffered from dry skin most days that required lots of lotion to fix), another twenty or so to blow dry my hair with the adequate volumizing technique as was shown in the YouTube video I watched, another fifteen to curl some soft waves in my hair (I could only do the front and ends, it was just taking too much time and I had a difficult time operating the iron behind my head—I hoped Emily wouldn’t scold me for it). All I had was a bottle of cheap hairspray to set it—product wasn’t something I used in my hair, often. But, Kit swore it was good for taking out t-shirt stains like coffee which was mostly why I kept it around.

  The makeup went a little easier. Using mineral makeup on my face that thankfully had little smell to bother my sensitive dragon nose, a little blush and simple eyeliner (I couldn’t do the cat-eye wing thing that Emily suggested, even from watching the video I couldn’t figure it out so I just settled with a simple line) put on some pale peach shadow and some mauve lipstick and finished off with mascara.

  All the while I could hear Gabriel in the kitchen, banging around. He was talking to someone on the phone, I assumed it was Daniel from the way he was speaking. After about a half an hour of swearing, banging and clanging around did a wonderful aroma of garlic and herbs start to waft from the kitchen.

  I was beginning to feel kind of high-maintenance. This was going to be around the third time he’d cooked for me, and I hadn’t done so once for him. Of course, I had been serving him coffee for weeks but I was paid for that.

  It smelled divine though—whatever it was and I didn’t have any idea what we were going to be doing, although I was already impressed.

  I glanced at my computer clock; I had about fifteen minutes before I was meeting him for our date (which just seemed so cheesy, making a grand entrance into my living room), which was just enough time for me to get that dress on and then spend the next ten minutes after that trying to work the straps on those damn shoes.

  I paused as I was pulling the dress over my head, and looked down at my underwear: plain white bra, high-cut gray underwear with faded pink flowers on them…I wrinkled my nose. They didn’t feel very…date like.

  Not that I thought anything was going to happen, but I’d watched enough movies, seen enough TV to know that you did not want to be caught with your granny panties on. So I rummaged through my "delicates" drawer for something a little more acceptable.

  "Really?" I asked myself, cursing because the sexiest pair of underwear I had was a pair of pink boy shorts and a pink cotton bra with white lace around the edges—again a gift from Kit; something she bought for herself but the bra was too big, claiming it was marked wrong. "Thank you Kit!" I said to myself, changing out of my grungier underthings and replacing them with the cuter ones.

  Once I was fully dressed, I eyed myself in the mirror and was shocked at what I saw. I hardly recognized myself. One might describe me as pretty but humans’ views on that were so varied, I wasn’t sure if I’d fit that bill. But I definitely looked different.

  I remembered to snap a shot of myself for Emily, begrudgingly. Dragon's hate selfies. I grabbed my phone and took a quick shot of myself in the mirror and sent it to Emily, who promptly responded with a simple: "Hot!"

  "Here goes nothing," I said to myself, suddenly feeling my heart flutter. Not sure what was making me nervous: the impending date or my state of dress. Maybe Gabriel wouldn’t like it? Perhaps he didn’t like orange? I fingered my hair. Maybe I did my hair wrong?

  I shook my head. "Shut up, Leo. It’s just a dress." Okay so the dress made me feel weird—exposed. A bit like wearing traditional dragon robes. I inhaled, forcing the sudden feeling of bile rising in my throat down. I exhaled and forced myself to step out of the hallway.

  Gabriel had his back towards me in the kitchen, frantically stirring something over the stove, with his phone perched between his shoulder and ear.

  "No, Dan, I don’t know if I used free-range beef. I see cows alongside the road all over here, they all look pretty free to me! So sorry I don’t have your culinary skills or— "

  "Am I interrupting?" I inquired meekly.

  Gabriel chuckled. "Oh, just my brother, he—" he swiveled around from his spot in the kitchen, his mouth fell open in surprise.

  "Leorah?" His tone was a mixture of surprise, and uncertainty. He allowed the phone to fall from his ear to the floor with a metallic thud that either killed the phone or hung it up; I heard no further noise from it.

  I let out a small giggle. "Hopefully this will work."

  "Leo—I—you," he stammered. "Holy shit, Leo, you look amazing!"

  I smiled, feeling the heat in my cheeks, and had to look away from his stare of admiration.

  "And I’m still not dressed yet," he said, setting something down on the stove with a clink. "I hope you don’t mind, I figured since I don’t know the restaurants here I’d just make something, then we can go somewhere." He motioned to a place set at the bar, with two place settings across from each other with my mismatched plates and silverware. There was a small daisy in a small glass between the two, with two tealights in two small dishes on each side.

  I felt my heart swoon a little: a candlelight dinner! How totally Hollywood rom-com and cliché …

  …and utterly adorable.

  "Sit down!" he prompted, pulling out one of the chairs and motioned for me to sit. "I’ll be right back!" He took one last glance at me and smiled nervously, before grabbing his backpack and darting off for the bathroom.

  While I waited for him to return I glanced around the apartment. He didn’t just have candles on the table, but a handful of them strategically placed in mismatched, clear glass glasses (that I forgot I had) around the kitchen and living room. Strategic in that they were perched in spots that would be difficult for my cat to reach.

  Not only that but he had picked up a bit…not intrusively but organized my little piles of clutter, and wiped stuff down. I grinned to myself.

  "Sorry," Gabriel said, re-entering the room a little hurriedly.

  My breath caught momentarily upon seeing him and my heart jumped into my throat. He was dressed in boot-cut dark blue jeans, and an athletic fitting black t shirt with no slogans on it; which was unusual for him. The sleeves were short enough for his bicep tattoos to be fully visible; the tribal design on his right arm that extended to his forearm, and the flames on the other, surrounding what I assumed was Celtic writing. I wanted to ask him what it meant, but I was too busy trying to force myself to not drool. It was simple dress, but a far cry from the baggy jeans and sweatshirts he normally wore.

  He bit his lip uncertainly, looking down at himself. "What? I know, I could do better but my dressy stuff— "

  I cut him off, "You look…hot." I had to look away so he couldn’t see my face set on fire with that confession.

 
; The corners of his mouth turned up and his face flushed. He also wasn’t wearing his glasses and you could see the glint in his playful, hazel brown eyes. "Let me get you—well," he awkwardly tried to reach for my plate, getting rather close to me, his forearm brushed my bare shoulder, sending electrical tingles down my arm. I could smell the aroma of his spicy soap in my shower on him.

  I handed him the plate and he took it and his own five feet over into the kitchen. "I’m sorry, I know I bragged about my brother’s pizza recipe but after arguing for about thirty minutes about not having the right ingredients, I decided spaghetti was the better option. I hope that’s okay," he said, putting a plate together of noodles and sauce, garnishing it with parsley and a piece of garlic toast and setting it in front of me. "My brother insisted it was a bad idea, because the sauce is messy and if you spilled it—"

  "It’s great, one of my favorites actually," I interrupted his insecurity. "If I spill the washing machine is just right over there—" I said, pointing down the hallway.

  Gabriel relaxed and smiled, setting down his own plate and sitting down to it. "Good. It occurred to me that even though we’re shacking up together, I don’t know that much about you. Like, your favorite food, your favorite color— "

  "—anything but pink!" I exclaimed with a chuckle.

  "No, I suppose not," he replied with a grin.

  "Well," I said, twirling my fork into the noodles and winding up a good bite, "ask me anything you want to know. Just prepare to answer the same question."

  "Fair enough," he said, as he started to take a bite himself before abruptly standing. "Almost forgot!" He went to the fridge and produced a bottle of red wine and a corkscrew. "I ran out quickly while you were showering—I hope you don’t mind. Just the store around the corner."

  I smiled. "Why would I mind?" I asked as he removed the cork and set two plastic goblets on the table.

  "Sorry for the cheap plastic, but you didn’t have any wine glasses, I noticed," he said, pouring me a glass first and himself second, before setting the bottle down in the middle. "Daniel assured me it was better 'slightly chilled', though I don’t know if I believe him."