Claire Hill, an ordinary human, and Chloe Danes, a werewolf, become unlikely partners when they become trapped together in Chloe’s body. When they both meet their mates, they must travel to the magical land of Logia to find a solution or risk losing their loves forever.
Age Rating: 18+
Ghosted Soul by Sapir Englard is now available to read on the Galatea app! Read the first two chapters below, or download Galatea for the full experience.
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1
Claire Hill, an ordinary human, and Chloe Danes, a werewolf, become unlikely partners when they become trapped together in Chloe’s body. When they both meet their mates, they must travel to the magical land of Logia to find a solution or risk losing their loves forever.
Age Rating: 18+
Original Author: Sapir Englard
I stared at the clock on the office wall. The hands didn’t seem to be moving in the slightest.
It must be broken.
I checked the time on my phone.
10:34 am.
Nope. Not broken. Maybe time has stopped entirely?
Or perhaps this was just the longest Friday morning ever recorded.
I folded my arms across the smooth surface of my desk and rested my head on them. For a brief, beautiful moment, I closed my eyes.
“Miss Hill!” a sharp voice with a Texas drawl made me jump in my chair.
I turned to see Ruby Hendricks, the office manager at Lopez & Martin, glaring down at me from the other side of the desk.
Ruby’s unnaturally blonde hair was curled and sprayed to within an inch of its life.
Her lime-green talons clicked on the metal of my desk.
“Claire, this is one of the top accounting firms in Amarillo. If you would like to remain an employee of this company, I suggest you show a little more enthusiasm for your work, hmmm?”
My cheeks flamed scarlet. “Yes, Mrs. Hendricks. Sorry,” I mumbled, keeping my eyes on the striped tweed of my skirt.
This was not the first time she had reprimanded me, but it was hard to be excited to come to work as a secretary every day.
I mean, I was happy for the job, and it paid the bills, but it was hardly what anyone would call thrilling.
“Oh Clay-yah, do stop hunching,” Mrs. Hendricks tsked, stretching my name into two syllables. “How are you ever gonna catch a man when you’re slumped over like a—”
I never did find out exactly what I slumped like, because Mrs. Hendricks stopped mid-sentence as if someone had finally pressed the “pause” button on her.
Color rushed into her face until it was almost as pink as mine.
Her pupils dilated, and her lips parted as she inhaled a breathy gasp.
For a moment, I thought she was having a seizure.
“Mrs. Hendricks, are you okay?”
I stood quickly from my chair and went around to my boss. She was still standing in front of my cubicle, her chest rapidly falling and rising.
I touched her lightly on the arm. “Mrs. Hendricks?”
It was like an electric jolt had rushed through her; my boss’ head snapped around to look at me. Her brown eyes were glazed and unfocused.
From where I stood, I could see that Mrs. Hendricks wasn’t the only one behaving strangely.
Two members of the sales team were walking in tandem down the corridor.
As I watched, they entered a maintenance closet together and closed the door behind them.
Mrs. Hendricks raised a hand to her throat, and I could see the pulse beating beneath her spray-tanned skin.
“Yes, Miss Hill umm…that will be all. Thank you,” she said, barely moving her lips.
She left my cubicle and trotted on her high heels down the hallway to the door marked Mr. Lopez. He was one of the senior partners of the firm, and a very powerful man.
He was also a werewolf.
As was Ruby Hendricks.
Oh God. Please not today. I groaned heavily, realizing what was happening in my office.
It was the haze.
Damn it. Damn it. Why today!?
I looked over at the glass picture window of Mr. Lopez’s office, just in time to see my boss kneel down in front of him and begin unbuckling his pants.
Nope. No way.
I was one of only five humans working for Lopez and Martin.
With the haze going on, the entire office would be overrun with horny werewolves looking for release.
I’m out of here.
I grabbed my coat and purse and headed toward the elevator.
It finally opened to reveal one of the IT guys with his fingers buried deep within the skirts of our marketing manager.
“Ugh, grow some self-control.” I muttered as the pair giggled and ran off, probably to find a more private space.
If I was going to survive this day, I was going to need a coffee.
A big one.
***
The coffee shop was packed with both humans and werewolves. Even my less acute senses could smell the sex in the air.
It was like an invisible energy running through all of the wolves, making them quiver with pent-up frustration.
As I stood in line for my coffee, I wondered what it would feel like to have no control over my own sexual urges.
To give into my passion whenever the need hit me.
To surrender completely to my impulses…
I was no doe-eyed virgin, but as I shifted through the short list of my sexual encounters, none of them sparked the insistent craving that I saw in the eyes of the wolves around me.
I was so lost in my imagination that I didn’t see the line move forward.
The person behind me cleared their throat loudly, and I startled, my purse swinging on my shoulder as I turned.
It collided with a tall, well-dressed man carrying a paper cup of hot coffee.
The drink tumbled from his hands, splashing onto the green tile floor and covering his suit and shoes.
“What the hell!” the man snapped angrily.
My jaw dropped in mortification. “Oh my God! Are you okay!”
I bent down to try to clean up the mess, but a woman in a red apron was already approaching with a mop and bucket.
“I wasn’t looking—I’m so sorry—” I stammered, my cheeks burning as I turned to look at the man I had just scalded.
He was tall, with dark brown skin and the most unusual eyes I’d ever seen.
They were a clear gray green that seemed to shift in shade with every twinkle and facet of light.
His head was closely shaven, but the recently shaven shadow of a beard outlined his chiseled jaw.
My apologies died in my throat. I stared in rapt wonder at the handsome stranger, who looked back at me with an annoyed expression.
“You should really try to be more careful,” he said. His voice was a deep baritone that sent a little shiver up my spine.
Say something, Claire. Something clever and funny.
But it was like I had lockjaw. I couldn’t make my mouth form words.
The man raised an eyebrow at me, as if trying to decide whether or not I was screwing with him.
“Whatever. Just don’t worry about it, okay?” he said in a gentler tone.
He turned to go, his shoes leaving wet coffee-prints on the floor.
SAY SOMETHING CLAIRE YOU LOOK LIKE AN IDIOT.
“Err,” I managed to grunt. But it was too late. The gorgeous dark-skinned stranger was gone.
I groaned inwardly. This was not shaping up to be my day.
***
If life were a Reese Witherspoon movie, that would have been a “Meet Cute.”
Instead, it was a “Meet Weirdo.”
I sat at the red plastic counter, stirring my double shot vanilla latte with a cardboard straw.
I took a sip of the coffee, watching the people strolling outside in the cool autumn weather.
The chirpy indie music in the cafe was starting to set my teeth on edge.
I fished my phone out of my pocket and plugged in my headphones before picking a soothing, acoustic song from my Spotify playlist.
I moved my lips softly to the music, closing my eyes and letting the gentle strumming take me away.
For weeks, I’d been practicing this song on my guitar at home in my childhood bedroom.
I had been living with my parents since I graduated from college last year.
This job with the accounting firm was only a few months old, and I was eager for the day when I would have enough money saved up to move into my own apartment.
Which will take a lot longer if I keep spending $7 on a single cup of coffee…
I groaned again. It wasn’t so much that my life was terrible, it was just turning out to be so damned predictable.
An underpaid job I didn’t enjoy. A mountain of student loans. Friends who were starting to get married and lose touch.
Plus, now that I was out of college, my mother was dropping hints about my lack of a boyfriend almost daily.
I’d been on dates, even had a few boyfriends during college, but nothing had ever lasted more than a few months.
I just wasn’t the party-girl or extrovert that the guys on campus had looked for in a girlfriend.
My thoughts drifted back to the man I had accidentally hit with my purse.
He had the most handsome face—with a chiseled jaw and a soft-looking mouth.
Sigh.
I gazed blankly at the busy street outside, lost in a dream of all the things I should have said to the handsome stranger.
“Can I buy you a drink to make up for it?”
“If you give me your number, I’ll pay for the dry-cleaning.”
Even “My name is Claire Hill” would have been better than incoherent mumblings.
A man with orange eyes was staring at me from across the street.
He smiled malevolently when he caught my gaze.
That’s impossible.
Great, now I’m seeing things.
I blinked. The man was gone.
What the hell, Claire. Get a grip.
That’s when the cafe erupted into chaos around me.
It all happened fast—so fast that I only got flashes and images of what was happening.
BAM! BAM! BAM!
The sound of gunfire.
The panicked screams of humans and wolves as they realized the cafe was under attack.
The bitter smell of spilled coffee.
My muscles felt locked in place.
A thousand high-school safety drills told me to get on the floor and cover my head, but I remained frozen, staring at the violence of the scene.
There was a loud blast.
And I knew nothing.
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2
Darkness.
Not the everyday darkness of a moonless night, but a thick, inky blackness that seemed to stretch into oblivion.
I saw nothing. Heard nothing. Smelled, tasted, touched absolutely nothing except the darkness.
Panic seized me then, wrapping icy fingers around my—
Body? Did I even have a body?
I tried reaching out, but I couldn’t tell if my hand was near anything.
I wasn’t even entirely sure I had hands.
I tried rubbing them together and felt nothing.
I tried to run, kick, and flail, but with nothing but endless darkness extending as far as I could see, I had no idea if I was actually moving.
I tried heaving in great gobs of air, only to find out that there was no air to breathe.
And I had no lungs.
That’s when my panic turned into full-blown terror.
I screamed, but there was no sound. The silence pressed in on me.
What was going on? Where was I? Who was I?
There were no answers. There was only blackness. The abyss.
The void.
WHO AM I?
I could feel my soul shrinking, everything that was left of me being bent and twisted and crushed by the darkness.
Soon, I would be nothing.
Claire. A tiny voice, a whisper in my mind.
A scene flashed before my eyes. A little girl with tangled hair being pushed on a swing by her father.
An older girl, smiling and holding a university diploma.
Standing in line at a crowded coffee shop.
A stranger with brilliant green eyes. A flash of orange. A burst of pain.
Claire. That’s my name.
Like a star exploding in my mind, I remembered.
I was Claire Hill. I was twenty-two years old. I was drinking coffee when—
When what?
I tried to put a hand to the spot on my head where I had felt that immense shock of pain, but of course I had no hand to move.
A tremor of revulsion crawled through my mind, but I clamped it down and forced myself to think.
Come on, Claire. You were in the coffee shop.
And now you’re here. In the void.
The void. Even the word sounded empty and dead.
Dead.
My heart—if I had one—shuddered to a halt.
A pain in my head. Then darkness.
I think—I think I…
Died.
***
I had no idea how long I drifted after realizing where I was and what it meant.
Dead. I was dead.
I was never hungry, never tired. There were no days or nights to keep track of, nowhere to go and nothing to see.
This was death?
Where were the pearly gates and the golden trumpets?
Even dancing devils with red-hot pitchforks would be better than an eternity of this—
Nothingness.
If I focused hard, I could picture myself as I might look right now. Floating on a lazy river of night-black emptiness.
Forever alone in a bottomless chasm of death…
I can’t be the only one here. An insistent little voice jolted into my grim thoughts.
An image came to my mind of myself as I had looked when I was alive.
My arms were crossed over my chest, and my hazel eyes were narrowed with anger.
No one gets their own personal void. Try to reach out!
How? I didn’t have any hands.
Stop making excuses. Get your act together and come up with a plan!
Okay. A plan.
Once more, I tried feeling the blackness around me, trying to sense any change that could indicate the presence of another soul.
I pushed out, imagining slim threads slipping through the darkness.
Spreading without direction.
When these mental lines finally did brush up against something, I wanted to scream—but I had no mouth.
“Hello?” I called out to the glimmer of—something—that I felt.
Nothing.
But I could still feel a presence, wavering in the stillness of the void.
“Hello?” I called again.
Hello…
A distant voice sounded, and I didn’t know if I had heard the word with my ears or my mind.
Either way, excitement coursed through me.
At least I wasn’t alone.
“My name is Claire,” I said to the voice.
Chloe…
I heard it again, like a gentle breath against my thoughts.
Where are we?
The voice was clearer now.
I wondered how long she’d been here—if she did not yet realize she was dead.
“I’m sorry to be the one to tell you this, but I think this is the afterlife.”
I’m dead?
“I…I think so. You’re the first person I’ve met here so far.”
Oh God. I could hear the panic and fear in her voice.
No—I didn’t—I can’t be—I never meant to—
Her thoughts became a frenzied jumble.
“I’m so sorry, Chloe. Is there anything I can do?”
Even as I said it, I knew it was a stupid question.
Her voice in my head turned cold and scathing. Just leave me alone.
I hesitated, rebuffed by her harsh tone but understanding that she had just been dealt a heavy blow.
“Okay,” I said in my mind. “I’m still here if you need to talk though.”
Silence.
We sat quietly in the darkness. I wondered if talking had been a terrible idea.
Claire? The voice brushed against my thoughts. Is this it? Is this forever?
“I don’t know,” I said honestly. “Maybe you and I can work together, try to find some others?”
Why bother? We’re completely fucked.
Before I could come up with a response to her pessimistic words, a strange buzzing sensation filled my mind.
Not the buzzing of a beehive, but a low, pulsing thrum, like standing too close to electrical towers.
If I had skin, it would be prickled with goosebumps.
Claire, do you feel that? Chloe’s voice sounded frightened.
“Yes. What is it?” I asked.
Why the hell would I know?
“I don’t know!”
The buzzing grew louder.
A narrow beam of light appeared out of the void. It stretched down in a jagged line, like a tear in the fabric of reality itself.
I shook with terror. What was this thing? Was it dangerous?
What was it searching for?
The rip in the void became a gaping hole, still blazing with that unnatural glowing light.
The beam widened until it encompassed us both.
I threw up arms that didn’t exist as a shield against its bright beam.
The buzzing receded, and now I could hear Chloe’s hysterical screams in my thoughts.
Claire! Help! It’s taking me!
“No!” Without thinking, I reached out again with those mental tendrils and locked them around the incorporeal orb of Chloe’s essence.
Claire! Her screams were shrill.
“Hang on! I’ve got you!” But even as I mentally shouted the words to her, I felt a force begin pulling on Chloe’s soul.
A force with a grip like iron
I couldn’t be alone again. I couldn’t return to floating in that endless abyss.
Wherever this force was taking us, it had to be better than this.
I gripped my mental tendrils tighter, allowing the iron tug of the light to pull us both up and out of the void.
“Chloe? I’m still here!”
What’s happening, Claire? I’m scared!
“Me too.”
The light swallowed us both. There was a constricting sensation, like I was being pulled through a very long straw.
My vision swam and blurred, and I closed my eyes against the wave of dizziness.
***
Silence. Again.
I opened my eyes. Blackness surrounded me. My heart clenched in despair.
No. No more. I can’t stay in that place.
Then I realized that there were bright lights twinkling in the darkness above me.
Stars.
I took a deep, shuddering breath and felt my chest rise and fall.
Air. Lungs.
I heaved in huge, greedy gasps of it, savoring the feeling of oxygen flowing through my veins.
The night was quiet and chilly.
Under the silence, I could hear the chirping of crickets.
On the air came the fragrant perfume of late-blooming flowers. The autumn smells of Texas.
Of home.
I shifted my eyes from the sky above me and saw rows of smooth, gray rock stretching over the moonlit field.
A cemetery.
I was lying in a cemetery.
I jolted, but my limbs felt limp and detached. I opened my mouth to cry out, but it was gritty and dry.
Like it had been filled with dirt.
My heart pounded, and I began to feel dizzy from all the air that had suddenly rushed into my lungs.
My vision swam, and I shut my eyes, trying to block out the sudden rush of thoughts.
Claire? A voice echoed in my mind.
A familiar, female voice. But not my own.
Claire, what’s happened?
Still lying flat on my back, I raised a hand to my forehead, taking a moment to appreciate the fact that I had hands again.
Chloe? Is that you? I called out in my thoughts.
Yes! I’m here but I’m…I think I’m stuck.
What do you mean you’re stuck? I asked.
I mean, I can see and hear and everything…but you’re the one steering the ship.
The ship? You mean…
Yeah. Pretty sure we’re stuck together in one body.
Her thoughts hit me like steady drops of rain.
Stuck.
Together.
One body.
Whose body? I asked, trying to maintain my hold on this increasing insanity.
Only one way to find out, genius, Chloe said sarcastically in my mind.
That’s not helpful. I struggled to rise onto my elbows, turning to see a small wooden cross on the edge of the nearest grave.
A wreath of white lilies was draped around it, the blooms drooping in the thick summer air.
Terror rushed through my veins as I read the printed words on the temporary headstone.
Or should I say Chloe’s veins.
CHLOE DANES
She saw it too.
That complicates things a bit.
I had to agree.
A high-pitched yelp sounded in my brain. It was an utterly inhuman sound, like an echo from a nightmare.
My blood turned to ice. What else had we brought out of the void?
Oh my God. Chloe’s voice rose in panic.
What? Are you okay! I shouted back at her.
I tried to rise to my feet, but my legs were longer than I was used to, and I fell back onto the ground gracelessly.
It’s…it’s my wolf.
What do you mean it’s YOUR wolf? I demanded.
My stomach felt sick. I fought against the urge to vomit.
I…I’m a werewolf.
A thick ball of cement dropped into my stomach.
You were a werewolf?
Yes, dammit! But…something is wrong. We shouldn’t be—separated like this.
What does that even mean?
I have no idea, Claire! Do you think any of this has ever happened to me before!
Okay, okay, stop yelling.
Don’t you tell me to stop yelling! My wolf is part of my soul, Claire! How is this even possible!
I don’t know! Just…give me a minute to think.
I struggled to my—or rather, Chloe’s—feet. My head swam, and I nearly collapsed back onto the soft dirt of the cemetery.
I tried to think logically, to figure out exactly what was happening.
I was dead, but it seemed that I was now resurrected.
Except that arrow of light had been focused on Chloe, not on me.
I was in Chloe’s body, not my own.
Along with her soul.
And that of her werewolf.
I realized Chloe had been right from the beginning.
We were totally fucked.
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