Or maybe I was just romanticizing the first man I’d felt anything for in years. That was probably it.
I grabbed some snacks off the shelf and willed myself not to think of Daniel again. Right now my job was to pull myself and my life together again, not lust after guys I didn’t even know. My twenties and thirties were long gone. Forty-year-old me would not make the same mistakes as before.
Still, I smiled when I thought of Daniel.
4
Emma
An employee pushed the cart out to my car and loaded the bags. If only I could’ve taken him home with me to do the same, but Mystic Hollow was way too small to have grocery delivery. We were lucky to have two grocery stores.
As I pulled out of the parking lot, my car beeped at me. I looked down and the needle for the gas gauge was perilously close to the edge of the red line. Dang it. Of course I needed gas, but for some reason, it was the last thing I wanted to do in life. Getting out of the car. Pumping. Making awkward conversation with the person who inevitably pulled up on the other side of the pump. Smelling like gas for hours afterward. I wanted nothing to do with it. At least not right now.
Adulting was irritating sometimes. Scratch that. All the time.
I pulled into the gas station in town near my old high school, which was also on the way home. It hadn’t changed a bit since I was last here. There were even teenagers still hanging out on the wall to one side of the building with big sodas and skateboards. But now, instead of there being open lots on both sides, there was a little shopping center to the right that I instantly liked. It consisted of a collection of little stores with dark faux-thatched roofs, with robin’s egg blue painted walls, which only looked even brighter when combined with the white shutters and white doors. It had the same cozy feel as most of the places here. The only difference was that these stores had been built in the last ten years. I was glad whoever designed them had kept the small town feel to them. None of them were even over a single story in height. Nothing to obscure the skyline.
One of the stores was a coffee shop with a big sign that said Cafe Mama. Just the sight of the place had my mouth watering. If I needed anything in this world, it was coffee. I jittered up and down on my toes so much as I pumped the gas that I probably looked like some kind of weirdo, then I quickly moved the car and parked in front of the coffee shop.
As soon as I walked in the door, the scent of roasted coffee and sweet treats hit me, along with the fact that I saw someone I knew. Not too surprising for a town this small, but what was surprising was that she was one of the only people I was unbelievably happy to be running into, even if it meant delaying my coffee addiction.
I froze, not wanting to interrupt as she helped a woman with a walker get her coffee and situate it in a special carrying case that hooked onto the front bar of her walker before helping her sit in one of the plush, overstuffed armchairs. I stood there like I’d been cemented to the spot and let my gaze run over her. Beth was as easily recognizable now as she had been then. She was just under five feet tall, which meant pretty much everyone in town towered over her. Her blonde hair had been left long, and it was just as thick and luxurious as it had been in high school, something I had always envied and did all over again the moment I saw her. She had the same curvy body, and the same style. She wore light wash jeans and a white flowy top with embroidered flowers on it. The only thing that was really different about her were the lines on her face and the bold shade of pink lipstick.
Staring at her was like stepping back into time. Did she have the same sweet personality she used to, or had time warped that as well?
“Beth?”
She had just straightened from helping the older woman sit when her gaze fell on me and her eyes widened. I could tell she was looking at me the same way I’d looked at her as she stared from my feet slowly up to my face. It was hard not to squirm. Not to wonder if she was thinking how much thinner I had been back then, or how I hadn’t needed a special bra to keep my boobs looking decently perky. And could she tell my hair was dyed instead of natural now.
When her face lit up, some of the tension eased inside of me. “Emma! I didn’t know you were visiting.”
I was ashamed of how long it had been since I came home to visit. My brother had driven out to see me a few times, but it had been too many years since I came home. Still, it was no excuse for not keeping in touch with the people who had mattered to me the most.
I forced a smile. How do you tell people that you have nowhere else to go? That you’ve moved back into your parents place because your husband was a cheating asshole and might now be a toad? “Yeah, I decided spur of the moment to come for an extended stay.”
She walked away from the door and pulled me in for a hug. “Well, come have a cup of coffee.”
Even in high school, I’d loved my coffee. So, we walked through the cafe together, even though she already had a cup. I ordered their biggest size and tried not to to tap my fingers while I watched her pour the sweet liquid of life. Then I paid the cashier, gave her a tip, and we headed outside.
“Do you still own the detective agency?” I asked, hoping I was remembering correctly.
She nodded. “Just two shops down. Have time for a sit down?”
I only had a few cold things in my groceries and it was a fairly cool day. They could wait. The worst I’d get was some melted ice cream, and even that was iffy. “Sure. Let’s catch up.”
We passed a shop full of what looked like a tea store, lots of jars of leaves on the shelves and some fancy-schmancy tea pots in the window, then came to stop in front of a building with the words, “Private Psych,” on the front door. There were big picture windows that looked out on the parking lot, the sidewalk lined by trees, and the main city road. She unlocked the door and we stepped into the strangest building I’d ever been in. The front had a sitting area with comfortable, worn-looking couches that were a cream color, a coffee table that was all dark wood and glass, matching end tables, and lamps with stained glass enclosures that were made up of different animals. After the neat sitting area, there were shelves covering the walls. Most were filled with books, especially toward the top and bottom, but there was also a mouse cage on one of the middle shelves, and a lamp sitting over a cage with a lizard or gecko or something that reminded me of those car insurance commercials. The back wall had more books, but also cat climbing trees that went from floor to ceiling with cat-sized walkways between them, where several cats snoozed. There was a big desk covered in papers, and near it an open bird platform with something that looked like a crow sleeping.
And yet, as crazy as the room was, it kind of fit Beth’s personality perfectly.
Trailing my hands over the dark velvet-like fur of a tabby cat snoozing in a ray of sunshine, I settled into one of Beth’s oversized chairs in front of her desk and sipped my coffee.
We didn’t have a chance to really start talking when the soft chime over her door started tinkling. A woman barged in carrying a bright pink smoothie, and slammed the door behind her. The cat that had just been sleeping so peacefully jumped up and hissed before streaking out of the room to somewhere past beaded curtains in the back.
“You were supposed to prove he’s a cheating bastard!” she yelled.
Beth took a deep breath and stood before walking toward the woman. “April, what is this? I did. I got the information you requested.”
“I talked to my husband and he denied everything. You made it all up.”
Beth looked at the woman like she was totally nuts. “April, I gave you pictures. There was no doubt that your husband was a cheater.”
“You’re a fraud, Beth Ari! A fraud and a shyster!”
Beth shrugged. “It’s not my fault if you don’t want to believe the truth.”
The woman froze and her chin rose. “You’re just angry because Roger left you. Trying to ruin everyone else’s relationships because yours didn’t work. Oh, he had so many promises. Didn’t he? But we all knew he was with he
r the whole time. It seems you can figure out any secret, except the secrets in your own house, huh?”
Beth’s normally warm toned skin went absolutely pale as all the blood seemed to drain from her face. The worst part was that she didn’t say a word, which was completely unlike her.
The woman grinned in a way that said she knew her words had hit their mark before she spun on her heel and headed for the door.
Rage filled me. Even if none of what the woman said was true, which I seriously doubted, it was a cruel thing to say. Beth was one of the kindest people I’d ever met. She didn’t deserve to be hurt like that.
I eyed the woman’s back, and said loudly enough for just Beth and I to hear, “Sounds like she deserves a big dose of Karma.”
As soon as the words left my mouth, the woman tripped on thin air. The top of her smoothie popped open and the pink sludge crashed against her chest and poured all over her front.
A snort erupted from my mouth before I could control myself. She turned, like she was covered in blood instead of smoothie, her mouth hanging open like a fish. She made a little sound like a dog’s squeaky toy.
“Well! Aren’t you two going to do anything?” Her face turned pinker than her spilled smoothie.
Unable to help myself, I shrugged. “Must have been those invisible ninjas.”
I couldn’t have stopped the grin that covered my face even if I wanted to, so I embraced it and rose, then snagged one single tissue out of the box on Beth’s desk. I walked toward her, but instead of stopping and offering her the tissue, insult though it would be, I pulled the door open and held it for her.
Her mouth finally snapped closed. “I hope you both go to hell!” She stormed toward the door I was holding open, chunks of smoothie dripping off her chest and landing on her legs as she went, as though it was some weird, perfectly choreographed disaster.
I gave her a little wave with the tissue. “And make sure you watch out for those invisible ninjas!”
Her eyes flashed with rage, and she rushed out the door. Once she was outside, I watched her finally grimace at the state of her clothes as she moved along, and couldn’t help but laugh. That pink color was never going to come out of her white running top and matching yoga pants.
Beth walked over and peered down at the floor. “I don’t know how this is possible, but she didn’t spill a single drop of that smoothie.”
My breathing suddenly froze. Oh no, not again.
Beth looked at me in wonder, and I tried not to look too guilty. I had an idea of how it was possible, but I hoped it wasn’t written all over my face. I mean, I didn’t even want to believe it myself, but I was beginning to think I had something to do with these karmic things happening.
Beth looked at me, then back at the spot on the floor where smoothie should’ve been splattered. “Did you do that?”
“M-me?” I stuttered. “I wasn’t even near her.”
Beth made a humming sound as she turned and walked back to her desk, shooing another cat out of the way as she sat back down, and I returned to the big chair in front of her, feeling nervous. “I know damn well you were human when you left Mystic Hollow, so you can’t be a shifter or a vampire. Are you some sort of witch that can hide your powers?”
What in the world was she talking about?
“No, I didn’t do that. I mean, I’ve had some freaky things happen over the past few days, but are you really talking about vampires and shifters?”
Beth leaned in closer and stared directly into my eyes as though she could find the truth within them, which made me want to look away, but I couldn’t. Then she held her hands in front of me, her palms facing me like she wanted me to give her a high five, before moving them up and down and around in circles, bracelets jangling as she went. I looked at them with my eyebrows furrowed and my back pressed into the back of the chair.
“What are you doing?” I squinted at her. Beth had always been quirky, but this was new.
“I’m reading your aura,” she said. “But it’s not easy.”
“Beth.”
She ignored me.
“Beth!” I yelled.
She jerked her hands back and gave me a startled look. “Why are you yelling?”
“Because you’re talking about reading my aura, whatever that even means, and vampires and shifters. What the hell is going on?”
She laughed, her eyes crinkling at the edges as she looked around. “Hey, Marble!”
A cat, which appeared to be aptly named, as she was a calico with marbled white, brown, and orange fur, trotted over. “Yeah?”
I nearly fell off the chair. My head spun.
“Say hi to Emma,” Beth said to the cat. She said that to the cat.
“Hi, Emma.” Marble looked me over in that haughty way only cats can manage. “She might pass out.”
Then Marble picked up one of her front paws and licked it before walking back across the front of the office and settling into the beam of sunshine that the dark tabby had been in earlier.
“She just talked to me,” I whispered. “That cat.”
Beth leaned forward. “Are you telling me you really don’t know?”
“That cats can talk?”
“Well, yeah.”
I shook my head. “Can they talk to everyone? Is that cat a special talking cat?”
Beth shook her head. “Sorry, no, it’s my powers. I can talk to cats, well animals in general, and they can talk to humans when I’m in the immediate vicinity. It’s my special witch Zoolingualism.”
It was like something in my brain burnt out, leaving nothing but smoke behind.
“I turned my ex-husband and his little bitch into toads,” I whispered.
Beth’s jaw dropped. “How in the world did you do that?”
I had no idea. “I think, if I’m not totally nuts and all this stuff really happened, I did it because I saved a little old lady from being hit by a car.”
Recognition dawned over her face. “Oh. Okay. Has stuff like what just happened been happening?”
My brain was still blinking like an empty word document waiting for someone to fill it, but that didn’t stop my mouth from working without my consent. “Someone cut me off in traffic and all their tires simultaneously and suddenly popped.”
Beth nodded sagely. “Yep. Hang on.”
She jumped up and hurried through the office into a back room, but returned quickly with a book in hand. She began scanning the text, occasionally licking her finger so she could move through the book faster, until she found the page she was looking for. “Here. I thought so. Wow. This is amazing. It’s so rare.”
She turned the book toward me and there was a picture of the old woman drawn on the page. Not just any old woman. The exact old woman I’d seen. A chill rippled down my spine. “That’s her,” I whispered. “The woman I saved from the car.”
Beth looked at me, her blue eyes wide and sparking with amazement. “You’ve become karma.”
“Karma?” I repeated, frowning.
She nodded and picked up her phone and started texting. “I think we’re going to need some help.”
“I think I might be losing my mind,” I whispered.
She grinned over her phone. “Oh, just pretend you’re Alice, I’m friends with the Cheshire cat, and you can come join us at our tea party. I swear life won’t be boring again.”
I didn’t know what the heck to say. If I was Alice, I’d definitely fallen into a world that was both crazy and exciting.
Or maybe I was just crazy.
5
Emma
A few minutes passed while Beth continued to send texts, and I scanned over the book about karma. It seemed to be describing a magical woman capable of giving people exactly what they deserved, good or bad. And yet, it didn’t make sense. I’d seen the woman in the picture. She wasn’t some witch with a wand, or a fairy with wings, she was just an older woman, a woman who would’ve been killed had I not jumped in the way.
So what did this ha
ve to do with me, or the strange talking cat?
The bell over Beth's door rang, the soft sound barely registering in the back of my panicked mind as someone walked in the front door. Beth’s phone rang at the same time, and she apologized, then grabbed it off her desk. I sat back and stared at that damn cat that just talked to me. I couldn't bring myself to turn and see if smoothie-lady was back. Not after the world seemed to have come off its axis.
“Carol,” Beth called when her eyes darted from me to check on who had entered. I jerked upright and turned to see another old friend walking toward us.
Her light brown hair was threaded with grey and her blue eyes were tired with bags underneath. Not that I was one to judge. Bags under your eyes was the new thing, right? Who needed some expensive designer bag when I could have my very own racoon eyes? Okay, maybe not, but I kind of saw it as a requirement now for my friends. No bags? No friendship. Sorry, twenty-something year old. Perky breasts and a body that doesn’t ache are just not cool anymore.
Now my stylish shoulder brace? That was my own personal thing. My friends didn’t need to look like broken dolls to hang out with this cool lady.
Shut up, I told myself, taking a deep breath. I was just nervous. I’d known I’d be running into old friends in this town, but I hadn’t prepared to see so many my first day. I hadn’t even had time to try to make myself look like my world hadn’t recently come crumbling down.
Carol didn't seem to realize who I was at first, which gave me time to take in all the little ways she'd changed since I'd last seen her, and all the ways she hadn't.
Her outfit was just as quirky as her outfits had been in high school. Carol had always marched to the beat of her own drum, sometimes literally, at least when she'd tried to join the marching band. Needless to say, that hadn't lasted long when the conductor realized she had no rhythm but loved to bang her drum as loud as humanly possible.
Karma's Spell (Magical Midlife in Mystic Hollow Book 1) Page 3
