Unfortunate Miss Fortunes, The

by Crusie, Jennifer; Dreyer, Eileen; Stuart, Anne

  “No,” Mare said, surprised. “I missed that part. What happened to William?”

  “We feel William will be happier in another line of work.”

  “No.” Mare took a deep breath, surer every time she said it. “No, no, no.” She took a step back and bumped her butt into the counter, knocking off a pencil and letting it roll to the floor. “We need William here. He’s the voice of reason. He does math. We need William as manager. I refuse to be manager. Go back in that office and tell William he still has a job.”

  Jude picked up the pencil and handed it to her. “Miss O’Brien … may I call you Mare?”

  Mare repressed an exasperated sigh. “Sure, Jude.”

  “Mare, I realize that some women have a fear of success—”

  “I’m not afraid of success. I embrace success. Success and I are practically twin souls. I just don’t want to manage a video store. Where’s the fun in that?” As soon as she said it, she knew it was true.

  “Well, this.” Jude gestured to the promotional displays.

  “Yes, but if I’m manager I have to have somebody else do that while I do the ordering and the books and all the dull gray dead stuff. No. No, no, no. Go tell William he’s manager again. I’ll wait here.” Mare folded her arms and stared at him. “Go on.”

  “Well …” Jude leaned against the counter, closer to her, smelling faintly of good, expensive cologne. He had a really large Adam’s apple, but on the other hand, his suit was very good. You couldn’t have everything. “There is another possibility.”

  “William is still the manager.”

  “Yes, fine, William’s the manager,” Jude said. “But I’m really intrigued by your displays. I think other stores in the chain could benefit from your imagination. Would you be open to working in the promotions department at the head office in New York City?”

  “You’re kidding.” Mare frowned. “The promotions are designed in New York? You’d think they’d be more creative there. Greatest city in the world and their idea of a hot promotion is Two for One Tuesdays? Jeez.”

  “That’s why they need you,” Jude said. “I can arrange for you to work outside the department, be your own boss. I get the feeling you don’t respond well to authority.”

  “Authority has never responded well to me.” Mare stared off into space for a moment, considering this new possibility. “New York. Huh. That could be good. The Statue of Liberty. I’ve always considered her a kindred spirit. Maybe …” The dusty Tuscan sun tried to swirl in again, but she kicked its ass out of her frontal lobe. She had a real life to live here. And pay for.

  “Uh, well, that’s good,” Jude said, clearly lost. He polished his tie tack with his finger for a moment and then he cleared his throat. “It’s Friday, so it’s going to take me a while to pursue this, I’ll have to make some calls, but can I say that you would be interested in relocating to New York?”

  Mare almost said yes, and then remembered Dee and Lizzie. Would they like New York? Art museums for Dee, the New York Library for Lizzie, lots of anonymity, a good place to hide from Xan. It could work. “I’ll have to ask my sisters.”

  “For permission? Surely you’re old enough to make this decision on your own.”

  “To see if they want to move,” Mare said. “We stick together.” We have to. We have strange and unusual powers, Jude. Lizzie could change you into a toad before you could polish your Rolex. “But I’m interested, yes. Go ahead and make your calls. And tell William he’s still the manager.”

  “Yes, Mare,” Jude said and went back to the office.

  Mare turned and crooked her finger at Dreama.

  “What?” Dreama said as she got closer.

  “So you told Jude about William and the rope,” Mare said.

  Dreama flushed again. She put her hands behind her back and stuck her chin out, trying for innocence and missing by a mile. “He was asking me things and I just told him. It slipped out. He’s so gorgeous, Mare, don’t you just want to tell him everything?”

  “No,” Mare said. “And neither do you. You almost got William fired.”

  “Yes, but then you could be manager,” Dreama said.

  “So you had a long talk with Jude,” Mare said severely.

  Dreama leaned closer. “You’d be a much better manager, Mare. You really would. William hates being manager.”

  “So would I. Listen to me.” Mare fixed her with a steely gaze. “Do not tell Jude anything else. Ever. We are us and they are them. Got it?”

  Dreama looked annoyed. “Then how are you ever going to get a promotion? You said you were gonna be queen of Value Video!! Well, you’re gonna need a promotion for—”

  “I changed my mind,” Mare said, equally annoyed because she didn’t know that the hell she was doing, either. “Queens of the Universe do not get into ruts, Dreama. They stay fluid and unpredictable—”

  The door chime rang and Mare turned to smile and then sucked in her breath, like a punch to the stomach. He stood there, tall and dark and blue-eyed as ever, the dusty Tuscan sunlight behind him, and Mare thought he was a hallucination and almost had words with her frontal lobe until Dreama said, “Oh, my,” and then she put up her hand to ward him off and knocked over the stack of DVDs, scattering them all over her nice, tidy desktop.

  “Hello, Mare,” he said and shoved his hands in his pockets, looking pretty much exactly the way he’d looked five years before when she’d been so in love with him that the world had tilted sideways every time she’d looked at him. “Uh, I’m back.” He waited a minute while she stood breathless, speechless, and then he said, “You gonna say anything?”

  “Hello, Crash,” Mare said, hating it that her voice cracked, and then she went toward him and all that sunlight, which wasn’t easy because the world was tilting again.

  Xan put the shallow silver bowl in front of the see glass, now a mirror on her silver-paneled wall. As she reached to take down a gilded box from the shelf beside it, the angle of light changed and she caught her own reflection. The light of day wasn’t kind to a woman at midlife, she thought.

  She looked closer. Even with magic and plastic surgery, the skin lost elasticity. Last night Vincent had leaned close to her, his tux immaculate in the low light of the restaurant, his white hair perfectly styled, and said, “We should always dine by candlelight,” and she’d been fairly sure there’d been a snicker in his voice.

  But then, Vincent was such a bastard. A gorgeous one if you liked graying distinguished men who could have headed the cast of an eighties television show, and adequately talented in bed if you liked choreography and a man who kept looking in the mirror admiring his own technique, but his charm was wearing thin. Thank God she was almost done with him. She was going to take a great deal of pleasure in casting Vincent aside, especially in front of everyone in their social circle, all those smirkers who’d watched last night while he’d flirted with a very young brown-haired witch named Jennifer, whose weight seemed to be entirely concentrated in her bust and her behind, which was evidently where she kept her brains if she thought Vincent was a catch. Xan had smiled, outwardly amused but inwardly seething that the moron would humiliate her in her own circle. It shouldn’t matter what any of them thought, she was the most powerful of all of them, they were just her court …

  She had been the most powerful of all of them.

  Age, she thought. Age brings wisdom. Who the hell wants wisdom?

  Youth and power. That was—

  Somebody sneezed behind her and she jerked back. “Sweet hell, Maxine, how did you get in here again?”

  “The portal—”

  “I closed the portal.”

  “Well, there was a little crack of light and I kind of—”

  I’m going to have you killed and stuffed. “What do you want, Maxine?”

  “Oh. Right. Well, it’s coming up on Friday night. Martinis would really sell—”

  “Maxine, you will do nothing to call attention to yourself or the diner until Monday.” Xan p
ut down the gilt box and began to wave her hand.

  “No!” Maxine said, waving both of hers. “Wait! I have news! There’s a new video store guy named Jude. He’s your guy for Mare, right?”

  “Yes?” Xan said, stopping in mid-wave.

  “Well, he’s really cute,” Maxine said. “Looks just like Jude Law. But the one everybody is talking about is the writer guy on the motorcycle. Ohmigod. Dee won the hottie lottery with that one.”

  “Thank you,” Xan said icily.

  “Haven’t seen the third one. Lizzie’s.”

  Elric. He made Vincent look like a roadie for a boy band. “He’s there.”

  “Oh. Okay.” Maxine hesitated.

  Xan sighed. “What is it, Maxine?”

  “Well, I really don’t know what’s good stuff to tell you and what isn’t. It would help if I knew what these guys were doing in town.”

  Xan thought about turning Maxine into a rabbit now, but she needed her. “All right.”

  Maxine came closer, glancing at the silver bowl and the liquid simmering there, probably avid to ask what it was but wisely keeping her mouth shut. Even Maxine has a learning curve.

  Xan smiled at her. “I am concerned about my nieces, so I have cast a spell to bring them their True Loves.”

  Maxine’s mouth dropped open. “You can do that?” Xan looked at her, and Maxine nodded like a bobble-head doll. “Of course you can do that, you can do anything, but I mean, geez, do you know what kind of money you could make doing that for real? I mean, people would pay hundreds of dollars for that kind of stuff.”

  “Right, Maxine,” Xan said. “Hundreds of dollars. May I go on?”

  “Oh, yeah,” Maxine said. “This is good stuff.”

  “I’m afraid that just bringing the men into Salem’s Fork won’t be enough. The girls are very stubborn. So I have to keep an eye on the way their romances are going.” I have to make sure that Dee knows Danny hates magic so that she’ll give her power up to me. I have to make sure that Elric takes Lizzie’s power from her because she’s too dangerous and gives it to me. And I have to make sure that Mare discards her magic for earthly power so that I can take it for myself. “You know how easily young girls can throw away good men through inexperience.”

  “I know.” Maxine’s face crumpled. “My Boyd. If I could do it all over again—”

  “I’m sure,” Xan said. “So we’re keeping an eye on Dee and Danny, Lizzie and Elric, and Mare and Jude.”

  “Lizzie and who?”

  “Elric,” Xan said. “He’s probably not going to be outside much. Tall, blond, beautiful, you’ll know him if you see him.”

  “Wow,” Maxine said. “You sure are good to your nieces.”

  “Yes,” Xan said. “I sure am.”

  She turned back to the see glass where Danny was heading for the bank; inside Dee was bent over her desk. Lizzie was at the kitchen sink, doing dishes; Xan sighed for a woman so lacking in passion that she’d do dishes alone in a house with Elric. And Mare was heading for the diner, probably meeting Jude there for lunch; who could resist a movie-star-handsome boss who’d just offered her the promotion of her dreams?

  She opened the gilt box and sprinkled the contents into her right hand until the red spicy powder made a mound there. Then she waved her left hand over the bowl, drawing up a spiral of vapor, then another, then another, until she had the three coiling together, a silver arabesque above the bowl in front of the see glass.

  “Wow,” Maxine said.

  “Quiet,” Xan said. A little refresher course in “Xan Is Magic, Don’t Disobey Her” wouldn’t hurt Maxine. “This is an impulse spell, Maxine. It’s very delicate. Don’t move.”

  “Right,” Maxine said, leaning closer to see.

  Xan thought about explaining “don’t move” in detail, but since an impulse spell was one of the sturdiest spells in existence, she decided to let Maxine go.

  Xan held her right hand in the middle of the vapor arabesque and waited. In the see glass, Danny walked into the bank and began to talk to Dee. Xan looked closer at the house and saw Elric standing behind Lizzie in the kitchen window. And much harder to see, Mare was sitting in the diner with someone, leaning forward—

  Xan gently blew the red powder through the arabesque and into the see glass, and the peppery vapor spiraled into the see glass, down into Salem’s Fork, into a bank, a kitchen, a diner—

  “Wow,” Maxine said, her eyes wide.

  “It’s lunchtime, Maxine,” Xan said. “Go sling hash.”

  “But,” Maxine said, and Xan waved her hand and then there was silence.

  In the see glass, Maxine reappeared in the Dumpster, staggering among the green plastic bags.

  Xan closed the portal and stuck a psychic brick behind it.

  Find a crack in that, Maxine, she thought and then poured herself a glass of wine.

  As she sat back with her wine, the see glass gave her back her reflection. “Only by candlelight,” Vincent had said. And the bastard was older than she was.

  But if she had the girls’ powers, she’d also have the girls’ psychic energy, all that juice flowing through her veins. She closed her eyes and imagined the swell of youth again. The loss of power probably wouldn’t hurt the girls if she took it carefully; they’d probably age like normal humans, they’d fit right in and have the ordinary lives they craved, but she …

  She’d be young again.

  And then she could put that bastard Vincent in the Dumpster with Maxine.

  She shifted again to watch Maxine in the see glass, outside the Dumpster now, patting down her uniform. Hell, maybe she wouldn’t wait. The memory came back to her of Vincent and that little witch Jennifer last night, she of the big brown eyes and big brown hair and very small power, laughing in a corner while the rest of the party watched Xan avidly. If Vincent was going to chase trash, Xan could at least put him in the vicinity of it.

  The thought of impeccable, immaculate, tuxedoclad Vincent in a diner Dumpster in Salem’s Fork, Virginia, cheered Xan so much, she smiled.

  And then she looked closer at the glass …

  CHAPTER THREE

  Dee yanked her skirt into a more comfortable position and prayed for the day to pass. This was the fifth time in three hours she’d had to stand, wriggle, and then sit back down, just to get some relief. She had a headache from the sudden cellular disruption. She was still jumpy from the close call she’d had that morning. And she was dressed in heavy wool and starched cotton.

  The good news was that she’d been able to reach Pete Semple’s toolshed and change without attracting any attention except from Pete’s dachshund Eddie, who was used to seeing Dee walk naked out of green fog. The better news was that Pete hadn’t found her clothes and tossed them before she needed them.

  The bad news was that the suit she’d stashed with Pete was the heaviest one she owned, meant for winter. Since the day had grown unseasonably warm and muggy, she itched like a mange victim and smelled vaguely like damp motor oil. Worse than that, though, it seemed she’d forgotten to pack underwear. Which was why she kept readjusting her clothes. The wool skirt was bad. The stiff cotton blouse was pure torture.

  “Anything else, there, Dee?” a gravelly voice asked in her ear.

  She jotted down the information she’d just received from Salem’s Fork’s only police detective and fiddled with her Bluetooth. “No, Larry. I think a clean police record is all a girl could ask for. Thanks. I really appreciate the help.”

  “Not at all. The chief gave me a heads-up on this guy when he heard he was at your house this morning. I know we didn’t find nothin’, but you be careful.”

  “Thanks, Larry. You give my best to Eleanor.”

  She hung up, checking off another item on her list. She wasn’t going to be caught unprepared again. By the time she got off work, she was going to know everything there was to know about Danny James. Then she was going to make a preemptive strike and surprise him before he surprised her. He could use a little unse
ttling. Actually, he could use a mallet to the head. Ready or not, here I come, indeed.

  Of course it didn’t go the way she planned. God forbid she should ever once be prepared for the disasters in her life. She’d just added her notes from Larry to the ones she’d shoved in her desk drawer when a shadow fell across her desk.

  “No, Mike,” she said, expecting to see the latest junior VP standing there asking for a sexual harassment suit. “I won’t suck your toes and make you a happy man.”

  She looked up and froze.

  Danny James was standing there right in front of her desk, his hair damp enough to curl, his physique a thing to make grown women weep. Oh, she hadn’t realized it before. His eyes were blue. Not just blue. Cobalt-teal blue. Drop-your-business-suit-and-take-a-sailboat-to-paradise blue. Breathtakingly bright and shrewd as sin. Dee was mesmerized.

  “Can …” Embarrassed at the squeak that came out of her throat, she tried again, perfectly aware that her cheeks were flaming. “Can I help you?”

  She tried so hard to ignore the pure shaft of heat that ripped through her. Sharp heat, sizzling like hot oil in a frying pan. She wondered if Mr. James could possibly have felt it, too. His smile sagged, and his eyes had suddenly grown very dark.

  “If sucking toes is part of this bank’s service,” he said, “I’m surprised you don’t have a line all the way around the block.”

  Dee flushed like a hormonal teen. Lovely. Multiple humiliations in a single day. “Please excuse me. Now, can I help you?”

  His smile reappeared. “They said I should see you to open an account.” He held out his hand. “You are Deirdre O’Brien?”

  Dumbly, Dee took it. He didn’t shake, though. He just held on. Dee just stared.

  This had to stop. She’d never reacted to anyone like this in her life. And to make matters worse, he was conjuring up that damn fantasy again. Just a flash, the way it had appeared in that swirl of dust. His skin had been tanned, she would swear it, with just a sheen of sweat across his back, so that it gleamed in the light of the high sun. And his smile. Oh, his smile.