TarotCafeSeries_bundle

by Lynn LaFleur

  “Kari has visions. And before you start snickering, her visions are real. That’s how we met. She saw Brenda when she went missing two years ago. My little sis would have died without Kari’s help.” He squeezed Kari’s hand. “What did you see, babe? Is Brett in trouble?”

  In trouble? Brett didn’t like the sound of that.

  “Quite the opposite. But what I saw doesn’t make any sense.” She looked at Brett. “At first, I thought it might be bad because I saw a storm, and some kind of gym. Maybe a high school gym.” She rubbed her forehead again. “Suddenly a large body of water appeared, and a castle. And…” She glanced back at Brett. “Don’t laugh, Cinderella’s carriage.”

  A chill galloped down Brett’s spine and goose flesh rose on his arms. He knew exactly what Kari described. He didn’t believe in psychics or any of that New Age bullshit. But how did Kari know? How did she describe something so perfectly without having seen it? Impossible. Even Slade didn’t know about the storm or Whispers by the Sea.

  Brett tensed when Kari laid her hand on his arm. “I don’t sense anything ominous. In fact, it’s all good. Warmth rushes through me when a vision is good. I’m feeling a great deal of that right now.”

  “Can you tell me more?”

  “I can only tell you what I saw. But I know the castle and the body of water, even Cinderella’s carriage—they’re all going to make you very, very happy.”

  Brett stared at Kari a long moment, then at Slade and back to her. He didn’t know what to say. He jumped when Slade pounded his fist against the table.

  “Son of a bitch, Kincade, I never thought I’d see you speechless.” He turned to Kari. ”This is the original silver-tongued devil. He can spread it like nobody else. And you’ve stopped him in his tracks.”

  “Then maybe Brett needs a reading,” she said.

  The hairs rose on the back of his neck. “A what?”

  “A Tarot reading.” She waved her hand in a circular motion. “I guess Slade didn’t tell you about this place.”

  “What about it?”

  ”Our friends Leandra Knight and Synda Day own it. Synda’s the best chef on the eastern slope, and Leandra does superb Tarot readings.” She picked up a menu and showed him the tag line written at the bottom. The Tarot Café—where your taste buds are tempted and your future revealed.

  Brett hadn’t paid much attention to the name of the restaurant and only glanced at the New Age art on the walls when he and Slade walked in. “I’m not much for the woowoo stuff.”

  Kari arched one eyebrow. “Are you saying my vision is woowoo stuff?”

  Oh, shit. “No. I mean, I’m sure your visions are… I’m not…” He stopped, unsure how to get himself out of the hole he’d dug.

  Slade snorted. “Keep trying, Brett. You’ll get your tongue to work eventually.”

  Brett tried again. “Kari’s proven her visions are real, but Tarot readings… I don’t put much faith in them.”

  “Theirs are as accurate as Kari’s,” Slade said. “Synda and Leandra are good, Brett.”

  Kari looked over her shoulder. “There she is.” She waved to Leandra. “She does a great reading.”

  Brett didn’t want to say no to his friend’s wife, though he’d rather sit through a Sunday sermon after an all-night party than listen to any more magical mumbo-jumbo.

  “Hi, Kari,” Leandra said when she drifted over. “Red or white this afternoon? We’re featuring a great little Pinot today.”

  “Not right now, thanks. Have you met Brett?”

  She nodded. “Slade introduced us when they came in.”

  “I had a vision about him just now. Will you do a reading for him?”

  “Of course.”

  Brett smiled weakly. He knew better than to argue with a determined woman. He was about to have his cards read whether he wanted them read or not.

  Leandra took the fourth chair at the table and removed a velvet pouch from the pocket in her long skirt. “What kind?” She shuffled the cards. “Four card spread? Celtic cross?”

  The more she shuffled the deck, the more uncomfortable Brett became. “Look, I’m not really into this.”

  Leandra smiled. “Not a problem. We’ll keep it simple.” She fanned out the deck face down on the table. “Think a moment about what Kari’s vision revealed, then choose one card and turn it over.”

  “What’s one card going to tell me?”

  “A lot.”

  Brett looked at Kari and Slade. They stared back at him, true believers. With a soft sigh, he chose a card and flipped it over.

  The Ace of Cups.

  Leandra’s smile widened. “The stirrings of the heart. Excellent. A new beginning in your emotional life. You’ll be blessed with love and happiness.”

  A new beginning in my emotional life? Shit, he’d seen better fortunes fall out of cookies.

  Brett glanced around the table. The gorgeous Kari wore a blissful expression with an I-told-you-so smile. Slade’s smile said, “I done good.” Now there’s a dude who’ll get lucky tonight.

  Only the Tarot chick looked pensive. She obviously believed in this stuff, and obviously had more to say.

  He studied the card and the picture of a large goblet with what looked like sunrays shooting out the top of it. “So this card tells me I’m going to find love?”

  Leandra nodded. “It could be a new love, or the revival of an old one.”

  Despite his lack of belief, Brett couldn’t stop his mind from rushing back to a time so many years ago, when he’d been trapped in the dark during a storm with a girl he’d known only by her first name. For three hours they’d clung to each other, sharing their most intimate secrets. In the time they were together, he’d learned the meaning of soul mate.

  But the timing had been all wrong. He left two weeks later for Notre Dame and devoted himself to football while she went on with her life.

  “Brett?” Slade said. “You okay?”

  “Yeah, sure.” He straightened in his chair. “So when do I meet this love of my life?”

  “I can’t tell you that,” Leandra answered.

  “But I can,” Kari said. “Soon. Very soon.”

  Chapter Two

  Two months later

  Seaside

  Whispers by the Sea, The Ultimate in Sensual Adult Dining!

  Abby Horton re-read the headline then flipped to the magazine’s cover. She’d picked up an open book and wasn’t sure what she was reading. The Underground Guide to Seaside, an in-town guide to after-hours jazz clubs and specialty shops not normally explored in magazines found at Hiltons and Holiday Inns.

  She turned back to the review, grateful for a quiet moment. She sat in the showroom of Love In Bloom. Her aunt Rose owned the flower shop, and for reasons Rose refused to explain, insisted she had to get away for a week or so. Abby, and only Abby, could take her place.

  ”You know I don’t know a thing about floral design,” she’d pleaded with her aunt. Valentine’s Day was less than a week away.

  Rose refused to budge, and when Abby stepped off the plane in Seaside, her aunt boarded a flight to Rio.

  Abby picked up the Guide again. At thirty-two and celebrating the second anniversary of her divorce, she certainly understood terms like “adult” and “sensual” but adult sensual dining? That was a new twist.

  Let me issue a warning before you read any further. Whispers is not a place where girlfriends lunch before a Saturday matinee, nor the place to take the grandkids when they’re bored with pizza. And it’s definitely not for a first date unless your lady is adventurous and uninhibited.

  “Hmm.” Abby slid onto the metal stool behind the counter and turned her back to the door.

  Whispers is an incredible dining experience. Exquisite cuisine, only the best French and California wines, and not a bottle of scotch aged less than thirty years.

  Our evening began with a limo ride through the hills to a place with a magnificent view of the ocean, cliffs and seashore. I’ve lived here twenty
years and never found this place before.

  Abby leaned back against the counter. She’d lived in Seaside for nine weeks as a young teenager while her parents were getting settled at her father’s new tour in Germany. Even then she’d had trouble finding her way through the tangle of one-way streets leading to the beach.

  Our senses were bombarded from the moment we stepped into Whispers’ pavilion, an elegant throwback to the twenties and thirties in the best tradition of the finest clubs of the Art Deco era.

  Abby loved that era. Men with shiny, slicked-back hair leading reed-thin women in diaphanous gowns around elaborate dance floors. She sighed again and continued reading.

  Our maitre‘d escorted us to a small ballroom for an apéritif. A fifteen-piece orchestra provided dance music, but like the other couples in the room, we were too cowardly to rise to the tango.

  “Get outta here!” Abby had studied the tango for years. To tango again, with someone who really knew the dance—well, that would be better than eating her way through a Snickers factory.

  Whispers features private dining spas, hidden from prying eyes by magnificent tiered gardens. Our spa was an ornate tent, twice the size of my condo, and definitely worthy of the Sheik of Araby. At that point, I accepted that we’d somehow stumbled into a parallel universe and would find Rudolph Valentino making love to Agnes Ayers among the finest Arabian silk pillows.

  Now there’s a true romantic, Abby thought.

  Although the meal, the wine and the service are stellar, we quickly learned the true allure of Whispers came from the spa and its amenities. Privacy prohibits me from describing the details of our evening except to say the spa provided everything we needed to live our wildest fantasies.

  “No way.” Abby’s tummy quivered. She switched on the little fan next to the cash register.

  Now that I have you salivating, here’s the bad news. The food and beverage service is mostly the same at all spa levels. Your choice of spa determines the price. The lowest starts at four digits. Yes, you read that right—a two followed by a comma and three zeros. Prices go up from there. But as my lady pointed out, one night at Whispers could wipe out the need for shrinks, marriage counselors and divorce attorneys. A bargain at twice the price.

  “Well, hallelujah to that!” Abby had spent a fortune trying to save Pierce from his demons. By the time she realized her ex loved only one lady—cocaine—she’d spent what little money she had left on attorney’s fees and court costs.

  Until you’ve experienced Whispers, until you’ve left your inhibitions on the doorstep and steeped yourself in fantasy, you’ll never know what you’ve been missing. Like the mythical Ambrosia, not a day goes by that I don’t crave it.

  Abby stopped reading for a moment and waved the magazine in front of her face. She’d need more than a tiny fan to cool her jets.

  Lord Tennyson wrote, “’Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.” For this reviewer, ‘twas better to have spent my retirement fund at Whispersby the Sea than never to retire at all. Bon appetit!

  “I should be so lucky.” Her imagination in high gear, Abby tossed the magazine aside and closed her eyes. She and Pierce hadn’t made love for months before they split, and she hadn’t been with another man since. She couldn’t read any more.

  “You must be reading Charlie’s review of Whispers.”

  The voice came from behind her. A deep, masculine voice with a trace of a Southern drawl as smooth and rich as her Aunt Rose’s sweet potato pie.

  Abby whirled around, an apology tumbling from her lips. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t hear you come…” She stopped mid-sentence. Oh…my…god! Her mouth fell open and her mind went blank. She could do nothing except stare at the man who filled the doorway, with a look of shock on his face that must have mirrored hers.

  No way this was really happening, the left side of her brain told her, but it was as if a bolt of lightning had slashed through the showroom. Neither seemed able to speak or move.

  Brett “The Bullet” Kincade stood in the doorway, the wind off the ocean battering his back and tousling his rather longish blond hair. The same Brett Kincade who rewrote the record books and led the Buffalo Bills to four consecutive championships. A six-foot-five, two-hundred-thirty-five-pound southpaw who could launch a rocket of a Hail Mary, or scramble for the down on fourth and three. Brett Kincade, who left the NFL at the top of his game to join the family business. Brett Kincade, Venture Capitalist. That Brett Kincade!

  Willing herself to breathe, Abby found her voice and thrust out her hand. “Abby Horton. Welcome to Love In Bloom, Mr. Kincade. I’m a huge fan.”

  “You’re very kind, Ms. Horton.” She saw a flush rise from his neck all the way to his eyes. Charming and rare in a man, particularly one who likely hadn’t known the blush of humility since he’d completed his first pass. “I’m afraid I’m more at home behind a desk these days than tossing a ball. And please, call me Brett. My daddy’s Mister Kincade.”

  “Then I’m Abby.”

  He held her hand now in both of his. Strong hands, with long slender fingers. Soft hands, sure in what they touched and held. Heat radiated through her. Hands capable of giving a woman enormous pleasure.

  “I know this sounds cliché as the devil, Abby, but haven’t we met before?”

  She grinned. “I think I would have remembered, considering I drove in snow up to my bumpers to watch you play at home.” She held up her hand with four fingers splayed. “Four times at home, and twice at the Meadowlands when you played the Jets.”

  Brett’s eyes sparkled. “You came to see me play six times and we never met? Impossible.”

  “I doubt my mother would have recognized me under a pile of blankets and a ski mask. But I did cheer you on from the third deck.”

  “Well, I can assure you, Abby Horton, had I known you were there, I would have brought you down to the sidelines and kept you warm myself.”

  Would lightning sizzle as much? Get a grip, Abby! Don’t be taken in by all that boyish charm and Rhett Butler manners. You won’t see any more of him now than you did freezing your patootie on game days.

  “That would have been lovely, Brett, but…” Footsteps striking on the flagstone hallway separating the design studio from the showroom interrupted them.

  “Are you just going to stand there, Abby?” Judy Crawford, the head designer and a twenty-year veteran of Love In Bloom, sidled up beside her. “Or are you going to ask Brett what we can do for him?” She leaned against the counter and rolled her eyes. “Honestly, you can’t get decent help these days.”

  “Well…actually, I…”

  Brett turned back to Abby. “You’re new to Seaside, or to Love In Bloom?”

  “New to both, and she claims temporary,” Judy answered. “Brett, meet Rose’s niece and the new, albeit reluctant, manager of Love In Bloom, Abigail Granger Horton. She’s the Lily Rose always talks about.” She turned to Abby. “Presumably, Brett Kincade needs no introduction.”

  Brett reclaimed Abby’s hand. His eyes took a long leisurely stroll from the tip of her head to her booted toes. Goosebumps rose on Abby’s arms and followed along the path he traveled. “Would that be Mrs. Horton? I don’t see a ring.”

  Abby stiffened. She liked to flirt, but she didn’t like people prying into the private and painful parts of her life. She pulled her hand away. “If you’re here to look at the Gala flowers,” she said, “I’m afraid the shipment won’t arrive until first thing Friday morning.”

  Judy took a chocolate from the candy dish at the end of the counter. “I’m guessing Brett’s here to pick up Lauren’s flowers.” She peeled the chocolate and popped it in her mouth. “Good thing I made up the arrangement before I left for lunch. I had a feeling I’d be seeing you today.”

  Abby saw Brett’s gaze stayed trained on her. “You’re good, Judy. Always one step ahead of me.”

  “That’s because you’re so easy to read. Miracle you ever completed a pass.” Judy raised an eyeb
row. “At least on the football field.”

  “Come on, Jude, you’re going to give Abby the wrong impression.”

  “Yeah right, like that could happen.” She stepped back from the counter. “What about the roses for Jordan and the other gals?”

  “Deliver those to the office on Friday.” He finally dragged his gaze from Abby. “I’m taking Mom’s as a preemptive strike. She’s home sipping Mimosas and expanding her list of Sonny-Do’s for the Gala. Dad was smart. He called a bunch of the guys and took off for Hilton Head this morning. Figured if I brought Mom her Valentine flowers today, I’d distract her.”

  “Distract the chairwoman of only the biggest fundraising event ever?” Judy tapped the counter with her finger to make a point. “Abby, you don’t know this, but Love In Bloom’s been doing the Cardiac Unit’s fundraiser for the last fifteen years. We have never had an order for flowers and table decorations even half the size of this year’s. Your mom’s done a fantastic job, Brett. Whatever Lauren wants, do it or you’ll be answering to me, Mr. Quarterback!”

  “Yes ma’am!”

  Judy put her arm around Abby’s shoulder. “I’ll get the flowers. You ask Brett how he wants to handle them.”

  “Handle them?”

  Judy rolled her eyes again. “Pay for them. We have a purchase order from the Foundation for the Gala flowers, but these are personal expenses.” Judy turned and headed back to the workroom. “We can put them on his account unless he’d rather pay for them now.”

  Abby ran a business office in Manhattan, but with Brett Kincade standing over her, she couldn’t string two nouns and a verb together. “Right. I…I guess I wasn’t thinking.”

  “Hey, no big deal.” Brett reached into the back pocket of his jeans for his wallet. “Put all of them on this.” He handed her a credit card, then picked up the magazine with the page Abby had left open.

  “Lily’s such a pretty name.”

  Abby’s head shot up.

  “Would you prefer I call you that?”

  “No, I would prefer you do not.” She knew she’d answered too quickly, in a tone too sharp. Love In Bloom had been owned and operated for five generations by Granger women with names like Iris and Daisy, Dahlia and Amaryllis. Despite the silly names they’d chosen for themselves, they’d had both the brains and the stones to succeed in business at a time they were expected to stay at home and birth babies. She admired them, but she didn’t want to be one of them. She was Abby, The Playwright, not Lily, The Florist. She wanted to make her mark in the theatre, not in a flower shop or managing someone else’s business.