The CEO's Fated Mate

"Dominic Blackwood, are you listening to me?" Dominic didn't even look up from his phone. His mother's voice filled the whole living room, and his father was sitting on the other side with his arms folded, His face red like he was about to explode. "I'm listening," Dominic said coldly. "No, you're not!" his mother shouted. "This is the 200th girl, Dominic! Two hundred! Do you know how many families we have embarrassed because of you?" "I didn't ask you to arrange anything." His father stood up. "You are thirty-two years old. You run a billion-dollar company, but you can't even sit near a woman for five minutes. What kind of man are you?" Dominic's jaw tightened. He wanted to say something, but he stayed quiet. Because the truth was, they were not wrong. He had a problem. A disease, the doctors called it, but none of them could tell him the cause. Every time a woman came close to him, his skin burned, his stomach twisted, and his head pounded like someone was hitting it with a hammer. It was harsh. It was painful. One girl had touched his arm at a dinner last year, and he had thrown up in the bathroom afterwards. His parents had tried everything. Models. Doctors' daughters. Daughters of business partners. They had done more than 200 matchmaking meetings already, and all of them ended the same way, with Dominic walking out and the girl crying. "Tomorrow evening," his mother said, softer now, almost begging. "One more. Please. Her name is Cassandra, and she is a very nice girl." "No." "Dominic..." "I said no." He picked up his coat and walked out before they could say another word. The night was cold, but Dominic didn't feel it. He told his driver to take him anywhere. Somewhere loud, somewhere his parents would never think to look. The car stopped in front of a bar in the city centre, and he walked in without looking at anybody. "Whiskey," he told the bartender. "Keep it coming." One glass. Two. Five. He stopped counting somewhere after that. Women looked at him from across the room, some smiling, some whispering. He ignored all of them. If any of them came near, he would feel sick again, so he kept his face cold enough to scare them away. Two hundred matchmakers, he thought bitterly. And I still can't stand any of them. He laughed to himself, a dry, empty laugh. Maybe his parents were right. Maybe something was wrong with him. Across the city, in the same bar, a girl was sitting alone at the corner, holding a glass she could barely see. Elena Hart was twenty-five years old, and tonight, she was tired of everything. She was a cleaner. Early morning, late night, mop and bucket, other people's mess. That was her life. She didn't even have a proper day off. And that was not the worst part. Elena was adopted. She knew that since she was small. Her adoptive parents had picked her up because they couldn't have a child of their own, and for a few years, they were kind. They bought her small gifts. They called her their daughter. Then they gave birth to their own baby girl. After that, everything changed. Elena became the girl who was in the way. They stopped calling her daughter. They started calling her that one. She cooked, she cleaned, she carried things, and for it all, she got slaps and insults. When she cried, they said she was ungrateful. When she asked for food, they said she should work for it. Eventually, they abandoned her completely. At eighteen, she was told to pack her things and leave. Seven years later, the pain was still inside her, quiet and heavy. "Why does nobody want me?" she whispered to her glass. Today was worse than usual. Today was her birthday, and nobody had even said happy birthday. Not one message. Not one call. So she drank. She had never been a drinker, but tonight she didn't care. One glass turned to three. Three turned to six. Her head was spinning, and her chest felt warm and loose, and for the first time all day, she wasn't thinking about anything. Then she stood up to find the toilet. The corridor was dim, and the floor seemed to move under her feet. Elena held the wall and walked slowly, laughing at herself because the wall kept moving. "Where is this toilet..." she mumbled. She turned the corner and bumped into something hard. Not a wall. A chest. "Sorry," she said, looking up. Everything was blurry. All she could see was a tall shape, broad shoulders, and a pair of dark eyes looking down at her. She couldn't see his face properly. She was too drunk. And he couldn't see hers either. Dominic had come to this corridor to get some air. His head was heavy, his vision swimming. When the girl bumped into him, his whole body went stiff, because he knew what was coming. The burning. The sickness. The pounding in his head. He waited for it. It didn't come. His eyes widened slightly. He stood frozen, confused. Why... why am I not feeling it? She was standing so close that he could smell her. Something soft, something warm, something he had never smelled before. Something that made his chest tighten in a way that had nothing to do with pain. "Are you okay?" the girl asked, swaying a little. Instinctively, Dominic reached out and held her arm to steady her. His hand touched her skin. And still, nothing. No burning. No sickness. No pain. Only warmth. Only a strange, deep feeling, like something inside him had been asleep for years and had suddenly woken up. "Who are you?" he asked, his voice low and rough. Elena giggled. "I'm nobody." "Nobody," he repeated slowly. His grip on her arm tightened, not hard, just enough that she couldn't walk away. "Nobody," he said again, pulling her closer, "is the only one who hasn't made me sick tonight." Elena blinked. She didn't understand what that meant. But the way he was looking at her, even through the blur, made her heart race. She should have walked away. She was drunk, she was lonely, and for the first time in seven years, someone was holding her like she mattered. "Don't leave," he whispered. And she didn't.