Beyond Magic (Magical Love Book 1)

by Lizzie T. Leaf

  “Maybe you should talk to your wife once in a while. Sorry I can’t stay and chat. On my way out of town.”

  The expression on his face was priceless. She almost felt sorry for the embittered female she now called cousin. It appeared Faith’s husband wasn’t just a skirt chaser, but a careless one too. Things would be fun at their house if word got out about his baby mama.

  Her credit card company was going to love her. It had cost plenty to switch her ticket, but she’d deal with the balance when her statement came. Maybe it was foolish, but her only clue to locate Emily was the address on Emma’s birth certificate. The odds were probably slim—more like none,—she still lived in the same place, but Emma had to start somewhere.

  She sat in her rental car and studied the neat little house. Fall had not zapped all the green from the not-a-blade-untrimmed lawn and a few hardy chrysanthemums held their heads high in the twilight.

  She rubbed her churning stomach.

  Talk about butterflies. Will they call the cops to arrest the loon who wants to know the history of the previous owners? I probably would.

  Emma had spent a lot of money and time to get here so she’d better get her ass in gear or turn on the car and drive away instead of watching twilight fade into dark. A mixture of excitement and heavy reluctance pushed her up the flagstone path to the front door. Her first tentative rap got no response, but with her next overkill pound against the wood, the porch light flicked on.

  An older woman in a flowered dress cracked the door and peeked out. “Yes. What do you want?”

  She sounded as happy to have a stranger standing at her door as Emma thought she might.

  I want you to have the answers I need.

  “I hope you can help me with information about someone who once lived at this address.”

  “Ain’t nobody lived at this address but me. This has been my home since it was built.”

  “Oh.” Talk about the wind taken out of one’s sails. What would Emma do next? If this old woman was the only occupant, Emily had given a false address. Hopes of finding her mother, or at least information about her, faded into the night.

  “Why you asking about who else lived here?” The woman opened the door a little wider. “Step under the light so I can get a better look at you.”

  Deflated, Emma did as instructed by the no-nonsense command. It might help the lady feel a little safer that she wasn’t about to break in and burglarize the house. The elderly woman squinted against the brightness of the light bulb that now glared directly into her eyes. She gasped and rubbed her eyes.

  “Lands a mercy.” Her eyes grew huge as she stared at Emma and the woman’s voice trembled.

  Okay. I know I look a little worse for wear given all I’ve been through today.

  “You look just like her.”

  Startled at the remark, Emma moved toward the door. “Who? Who do I look like?”

  The grey-haired woman smiled and unhooked the screen. Smoothing down her dress with one hand and holding the door open with the other, she stepped back. “You’re Emma, ain’t you? Best you come on in, child.”

  Emma squeezed past the woman and walked into a too-warm living room. Most of the furniture had seen better days, but colorful afghans covered some of the worn upholstery on the couch and chairs.

  She glanced around and turned to face her hostess, whose mouth still hung open.

  “How do you know who I am?”

  “It’s easy, child. You look just like your mother. Emily was a beautiful little thing.”

  “You know my mother? I thought you said you were the only one who has lived in this house.”

  “That’s right.” She padded toward the kitchen. “Come on in here and let’s get a glass of sweet tea before we start chewing the fat. I’m LaVinniea, by the way. My friends call me Vinnie.”

  They sat at the table with a frosty glass in front of each of them.

  Vinnie propped her varicose-veined right leg on an empty chair and grinned. “Lordy, I never thought I’d see the day you’d come walking through my doorway. Did that nasty old granddaddy of yours finally let the truth be told?”

  “Uh…no. Grandpa’s dead.” Emma took a deep breath to steady her nerves. She couldn’t believe luck had smiled on her and given her the opportunity to find her mother.

  “Humpf. Thought he was too mean to die. Well, Lucifer has some good company in Hell then.”

  “Vinnie, I came here hoping to find someone who would remember when my mother lived in this house or direct me to a neighbor who does. You’ll have to forgive me if I’m a little overwhelmed.”

  “Not a problem, honey.” Vinnie patted Emma’s hand and played with her upper bridge, her tongue dropping it and popping the teeth back into place. “Why don’t I start off with telling you how your mama and me came to be friends?”

  “That sounds good. I’ll hold my questions until you finish.”

  “As I recall it, my husband Morris had been gone a few months, and I was doing right poorly over his loss.” Vinnie brushed a stand of grey hair from her face and tried to work it back into the tight bun at the nape of her neck. “One of my neighbors suggested I rent one of my extra rooms to earn a little extra money and have a little company around in the evenings.”

  Vinnie paused for a minute, a sad smile on her face. Emma sat quietly and waited.

  “I put an ad in the paper, and the next thing I know, this young gal is knocking on my door. We hit it off real well. Course, I weren’t this old back then.” She patted the bun and grinned.

  “Her name was Emily, and she worked at the Five & Dime. Brought me home a little nick-knack every time she got her paycheck.” Vinnie’s gaze drifted to a shelf laden with porcelain dolls and animals. “Evenings when she wasn’t out with her feller, we set around drinking sweet tea and talking. She told me she was from a pretty highfalutin Charleston family, but her father and sister were ashamed of her. She set out on her own, so she didn’t have to listen to their yammering about the things she did.”

  Vinnie lowered her bad leg and stood. She shuffled to the refrigerator and pulled out the tea pitcher.

  Emma saw the effort it took for her to move around. “Why didn’t you let me get that?”

  “No, honey. You just sit. I have to keep moving or my leg starts to hurt so bad I can’t stand it.” She refilled her glass and topped off Emma’s. “Anyway, one night Emily comes home in tears. Her daddy had somehow found out where she worked and showed up there.” Vinnie shook her head. “The old bastard—excuse my French—also found out about that nice feller she was seeing and had a little talk with him. Seems he didn’t know Emily was only sixteen, and your granddaddy threatened to have him arrested if he didn’t get out of town and leave his daughter alone.”

  A long sigh shuddered Vinnie’s plump body. “Well, he did leave, all right. From what I heard, after they beat him, he was put on a freight train and told if he ever showed his face around these parts again he’d become a permanent addition on the chain gang. Poor little Emily got drug off back to Charleston.” The old woman gave Emma a sad smile and shrugged.

  Was that it? Her hostess seemed to have come to the end of her story, and Emma’s hopes crashed.

  Vinnie took a sip of tea and gave another weary sigh. “Then, a few weeks later, Emily showed up at my door again, and her daddy was with her. She was going to have a baby, and the old goat didn’t want the family embarrassed. He offered to pay me to take her in.”

  The old woman’s jaw clenched and her soft brown eyes darkened. “I’d a done it for nothing, but Emily said no. ‘Take what you can get from him, Vinnie,’ she said. ‘’Cause money is all he’ll ever give. He’s not capable of love, no matter how much my stupid sister thinks he dotes on her.’”

  Vinnie shook her head, and her voice aged. “After you were born, her daddy showed up again. This time he brought his other daughter, and they took you away. The old bastard—oops, pardon my French, again—he said if Emily ever tried to contact the f
amily, he’d have her feller arrested. He had people keeping track of him, and that would be that.”

  Tears flowed down Emma’s cheeks. Her mother had lost the man she loved and her baby. All because of a selfish old man who thought more of his reputation than his family.

  “Anyways, your mama and grandma found a way to write to each other in secret. Emily would sneak down to Charleston, and your grandma, bless her soul, would take her out to places where she could get a glimpse of you.” Vinnie’s eyes filled with tears. “She was proud of you, and no matter what lies you may have been told, your mama loved you.”

  Emma’s own tears turned to sobs. At least she’d had a mother who loved her. No wonder Nola hated her. Forced to raise the bastard child of the sister she hated as her own would create a lot of resentment. Especially when her father was a carousing control freak who didn’t want shame brought on the family name. What a joke. Did the idiot actually think the whole town didn’t know about his women?

  Vinnie rubbed her arm and waited for the storm to subside. “Your mama stayed here with me until she took sick.”

  Wiping her face with her sleeve, Emma looked at the old woman. “Sick?”

  “She came down with a case of the tuberculosis. The doctor said she needed to go to the sanitarium for a stay until her lungs got stronger.” Vinnie bowed her head and looked at her varicose-veined leg. “She never came back. Poor thing died in there, and I buried her next to my husband. I can show you the grave tomorrow, if you want.”

  “I’d like that a lot, Vinnie. Thank you.” There was still one question she needed answered, but the way her luck ran, she didn’t know if Vinnie would have the answer. “Do you know my father’s name?”

  Emma stood in the dark entryway, reluctant to turn on the lights. Raising a hand for something as simple as hitting the switch took more energy than she could muster. What a time for Cori to be gone. But her friend was at a travel convention and wouldn’t be home for several days.

  Tired of the dark, Emma flipped on the light and dragged her carryon bag to her room, dumped it at the foot of her bed, and headed for the kitchen. While the coffee brewed, visions of tombstones danced in front of her eyes and memories flooded in.

  Vinnie had gone with her to the cemetery where Emma laid flowers on Emily’s grave. The mother’s love she’d hoped to find was still a dream. That hadn’t changed, since she’d never known a mother’s love.

  There was still the possibility of a father out there somewhere, and she’d taken steps to see if finding him ended another dream. On her way home from the airport, she stopped by a private detective’s office and paid him a retainer to start the search for Lane Williams.

  Fortunately, Vinnie still had an envelope from a letter he’d written to Emily. With the aid of a magnifying glass, Emma had been able to read the faint postmark from a small town in Pennsylvania.

  “Your mama named you after him. Lane’s your middle name, right?”

  Vinnie had peered over her glasses, and Emma nodded.

  “She wanted you to have something that belonged to him. When your grandpa took you away, Emily insisted the new birth certificate that was concocted keep the names she gave you.”

  Emma had always wondered where Lane came from. When she’d asked as a child, Nola said it came from a silly book she’d been reading at the time. She never saw Nola read, so the answer had surprised her.

  The private investigator didn’t hold out a lot of hope on the little information she’d supplied, but that hadn’t stopped him from taking her check. He thought there would be a lot of Williamses in the area, and a long time had lapsed. Unless it was a well-known family, without more to go on, he’d probably hit a dead end.

  What else was new? Her life was pretty much at a dead end right now. She wasn’t the person she’d been raised to believe she was, and to make things really interesting, she loved a man who was certifiably insane.

  Exhaustion that caffeine couldn’t fend off forced her to bed. Sleep, and lots of it, would put a different perspective on things. After all, her life couldn’t get much weirder, could it?

  Chapter Twenty Five

  Snap. Snap.

  Emma pried her eyes open to a pink glow enveloping her room. “Fire.” A frustrated effort to unwind her body from the twisted sheet had her heart racing. To die in a house fire would be the crowning touch on the way things had gone for her recently.

  Cori. I have to warn Cori. She’s such a sound sleeper the house will burn down around her. Another tug and she’d be free.

  “What’s the matter, toots?”

  “Huh?” How had she missed the woman sitting on the hope chest at the end of her bed? “Who the hell are you, and why are you so relaxed when the house is on fire?”

  “Not to worry. There’s no fire.”

  She sat up, which was not a good choice. Emma grabbed her head with both hands to stop the pink spin of the frigging fun house.

  The spin stopped, but the pink glow remained. Emma rubbed her eyes to clear the strange haze, but nothing changed. Things were usually blurry when she woke up, but this was the first time she’d experienced color. It did help soften the heavy antique furniture she’d acquired over the years. Maybe she should change the light bulbs and keep the look.

  The blonde Barbie popped her gum again and grinned. That explained the snapping sound. It still didn’t explain this throwback to the sixties dressed in pink, down to her lipstick and nail polish. She wasn’t sure if the toes matched the fingernails, since they were encased in white patent-leather go-go boots.

  You’re definitely dreaming. No one in her right mind dresses like that. Hell, even the hair has that tight little flip-up thing going on. Take a deep breath and calm down. Dream. Just a dream.

  “Sorry, babe. Not a dream. I’m here, and you’re awake.” More pops of the gum preceded a big bubble that reached an impressive size before it exploded. Unfazed, Blondie used her tongue to gather it back in. “I love bubblegum. One of the best things mortals ever came up with. You know I won a bubble-blowing contest last year. Beat out a bunch of snot-nosed little kids.”

  “Bet the kids were crushed.” Emma’s dreams kept getting better and better. Not only did she have nuts in her waking life, but now her subconscious brought them into the time that was supposed to refresh and rejuvenate her. There was no escape.

  “Whatever.” The blonde shrugged perfect shoulders partially covered by the perfect hair that shampoo manufacturers would kill to have in their ads.

  “Once again, who are you, and what the hell are doing in my bedroom?” Maybe she should have said dream, but frustration always caused her to respond without thinking.

  “Well, up until a few minutes ago, I sat here, watching you sleep.” Blondie curled a long lock around one of her perfect pink fingers. You have no idea how boring that is. All that up and down chest rising stuff.” She dropped the strand of hair and smiled. “By the way, you snore.”

  Emma grabbed the extra pillow and pulled it over her head. “This conversation is over until I know who you are.”

  Why am I having a dream with a woman in it that I can’t hold a candle to? The bitch is Barbie in build too—big boobs, tiny waist, long legs, and all the perfection of the doll that gives little girls complexes when they get older.

  The woman, who occupied the top of her favorite piece of furniture, pulsed, and the pink hue intensified. “My, my. You are a cranky pants when you first wake up.”

  Emma tossed aside the pillow and folded her arms across her chest. No bitch, dream or not, was going to come into her room uninvited and not give her name.

  “Oh, all right.” Miss Perfection studied her nails for a moment. “If you must know, I’m Aphrodite, goddess of love and all that stuff.” She yawned and tossed a curl behind her shoulder.

  This keeps getting weirder and weirder. Not only do I dream a woman more beautiful than any I’ve met awake, but I have to make her a frigging goddess to boot. Girl, you’re going off the deep end. Unde
r too much stress lately, that’s for sure.

  “So, Aphrodite, you’re here because?”

  “Well”—the goddess paused to get in a few more irritating snaps of her gum—“for a little mano a mano chat of course.”

  “So let me get this straight. You’re here to have a hand to hand chat with me?”

  A blank glaze clouded the intruder’s blue eyes.

  “That’s what mano a mano translates into, though most people think it’s man to man.”

  “Whatever.” Aphrodite waved a dainty hand. “Don’t be silly. Woman to woman, but I like that term, not what it means. Anyway—” She removed the wad of gum and stuck it to the edge of the hope chest.

  “Oh, gross.” I’m going to frigging kill the bitch. “Destroy your furniture if you want, but show more respect for the things I’ve spent a lot of money and time acquiring.”

  “Sorry.” The goddess raised her eyebrows and shrugged. “You don’t have to get so snippy.” She tossed her blonde curls yet again, and pointed at the item under discussion, and just like that, the gum vanished. Impressive, even for a dream.

  “I was saying, I’m here to help you, and trust me, girlfriend, if anyone needs my help, it’s you.” Aphrodite’s face screwed up and she shuddered. “I looked in your closet. Yuck, is about as kind as I can go, and your love life…well, what’s there to say?”

  Emma couldn’t decide whether to laugh or be offended. Maybe she wasn’t the sharpest dresser in Denver, and okay, she wasn’t batting a thousand in the love department. But to have some bubble-headed dream-blonde remind her… Well, that hurt.

  The scrutiny of the woman’s blue eyes generated a need to squirm. Her heart filled her throat, blocking the impulse to throw up. The only other person she’d seen with eyes that shade of blue was Ian McCabe, Nordic, or whoever the hell he called himself. The man she would forget when they closed the top to her coffin, if she was lucky. Now, yet another creature invaded her dreams, reminding her of that reality.