Craved: A Chosen Ones Novel by Nia Davenport

that lay beside it.  
    Two hours into making then reviewing flashcards over the functional groups in organic compounds and the reactions they can undergo, I found myself dozing off on my bed.  
    “Alex, there’s Chinese in the living room if you’re hungry.”
    I woke up to Whitney’s voice along with the delicious smell of fried rice and pepper steak floating into the room. Yum.  
    I sat up on my bed, stretching my arms above my head as I did so. “What time is it?” I yawned.
    “Almost three.”
    Good I didn’t sleep for too long. I had enough time until my grandmother’s charity ball to eat, study a bit more, then shower and get dressed.  

    ******
    A knock sounded at my apartment door and I still wasn’t ready.  
    “ Shit,” I cursed under my breath.   My makeup was done but I couldn’t figure out what to do with my hair. It hung freshly washed, blow dried, flat-ironed, and limp around my shoulders. I hated my hair. It refused to hold a curl or even a kink. Trying to curl it with an iron would be pointless, the curls would fall in two seconds flat.  
    “It’s not Chase!” Whitney yelled from the living room. “But it’s six forty-five so he should be here any minute. Hurry up and get your butt out here. What’s taking you so long to get dressed? Usually I’m the one lagging behind primping in the mirror and you’re waiting on me.”
    “I’m coming!” I yelled back through the partially closed door. “It’s my hair. I don’t know what to do with it.”
      “Since when do you care about your hair? Just throw it into a pony tail or pull it up into a bun like you usually do for these things. Your grandmother is used to it by now.”
    She was right. Why did I care indeed? I never do. My appearance at my grandmother’s social events was normally the least of my concerns. I didn’t even want to be at them. Why would I bother getting all dolled up?
    I grabbed a brown hair tie off of my sink and gathered my hair into a somewhat messy ponytail, using the hair tie to hold it in place.  
    My door bedroom door creaked open and Whitney walked to stand beside me. “Here, let me,” she said as she tugged the hair tie off.  
    She picked up the still warm flatiron lying on the sink’s countertop. She’d put a couple of spiral curls into the top layer of my hair when another knock sounded at the door again. For some reason, the second knock made my heart speed up even faster than the first.  
    “Kellen, grab the door for us!” Whitney called into the living room.  
    She put a few more spirals into my hair then stepped back to admire her work. “Perfect.”
    I looked at myself in the mirror and had to agree. She’d managed to make my lifeless hair spring to life with a handful of well placed curls. The top layer was in spirals while the bottom layer remained bone-straight beneath them. It gave my hair a pretty voluminous effect. “It’s…nice,” I said still looking at my reflection.”But it won’t last.”
    “Oh it will last. I got skills.” Whitney grinned at me in the mirror. “What would you do without me? You’re welcome by the way. No need to thank me though. You’ll more than repay me for my services when you wash my dirty clothes for a month.”   Her grin grew wicked. “I’ll go entertain our dates while you put on your dress. Hurry up. The faster Chase sees it on you the faster he can take it off.”
    A couple of minutes later I stuck my head out of my bedroom door. “Whitney,” I said before even looking around to see that she was not there. “Oh…hi,” I greeted Chase. My words came out about ten types of awkward.  
    Sapphire eyes met mine. “Hey.” Dimples flashed at me as he spoke. “The car arrived a minute ago so they went downstairs ahead of us.”
    Of course it did, I muttered to myself in my head. My damn roommate was setting me up again. Only, I really did need her. The zipper on my dress was stuck and I couldn’t reach around my back to get it all