“Mystic Hollow moves a little slower than the rest of the world,” Beth mused beside me. She was putting on a bright shade of pink lipstick in the rearview mirror and fluffing her mass of wavy blonde hair. She was wearing a pink low-cut top and jeans.
“I forgot.” And I had. So much had changed, but certainly the slow pace of the place hadn’t.
“But that should be fun with your next relationship.”
I stiffened. Huh?
She winked. “You know, the men around here like to take their time.”
I felt my cheeks turn beat red. “I am in no way thinking about relationships, men, dating, or anything of that sort!”
She laughed, crinkles forming at the corners of her blue eyes. “Really? Because I saw the way you two were dancing. And it looked more than a little friendly.”
Was I so obvious? My heart raced. “Not even a little.”
“Really?” She arched a brow.
“Really.”
“Because he has the most stunning blue eyes I’ve ever seen.”
“He has green eyes.” I stopped myself too late.
Her grin widened.
“Shut up,” I mumbled and looked away from her.
Daniel was cute, but I wasn’t twenty and running after a hot guy with my mouth hanging open. I had my brother to find, my life to get in order, and my powers to figure out. Plus, I swore this was already the longest darn day of my life. There was definitely no energy left for thinking about the handsome shifter.
A shifter I had learned a lot about the last few days. Apparently, shifters weren’t like werewolves. They could control when they changed, and most of them changed into wolves rather than anything crazy mythical. Daniel was unique, they’d explained, because he was a bear shifter. A bear?
I still hadn’t quite wrapped my mind around it all.
My gaze moved back to the house, and I tried not to tap my thigh. I was exhausted, but couldn’t help but stare at the little house with the porch swing and colorful, wild-looking flowers planted around the yard. The place screamed Carol, from the dozens of windchimes hanging on the porch to the suncatchers reflecting in the windows. But Deva had been living with her for over a year, and there were little touches of her too. A couple of potted plants, all in a row. A stone walking path that looked new and carefully tended. I had heard she’d even started a garden in the back.
It was strange, them living together. Carol was wild and fun, but definitely liked her space. For some reason, the fact that she’d never married, or even seemed mildly interested in dating, had seemed normal for her.
But organized Deva living with Carol? I never thought it would happen. Unlike my marriage, Deva and her husband started out so perfect. High school sweethearts. A sweet proposal. Everything that people say should lead to living happily-ever-after. She’d settled into being married and having kids like it was what she was always meant for. And now, picturing her single and living in the chaos that was Carol’s home? It was hard to imagine. But maybe good for both of them.
“How are they as roommates?”
Beth grinned next to me, flashing those dimples of hers. “Surprisingly, they’re doing great. Deva likes feeling like she has someone to take care of still, with her girls scattered around the world and her ex gone. She was getting lonely in her big house. And Carol has always seemed so happy to live alone, but I swear she’s been giddy since Deva moved in. You know she thrives with an audience.”
“She says that about you,” I said, giving a tired smile.
Beth rolled her eyes and tugged at her long blonde hair, something she’d been doing since we were kids. “I’m glad for them. But I honestly give it another year before Deva starts dating Marquis.”
“Really?” I lifted my head from the headrest, suddenly intrigued. I’d thought she was more likely to get back with her ex than some new guy. “Tell me all about the mysterious Marquis.”
“You know him. Remember? He was short, big glasses, and braces. Sweet, but really quiet.”
“That Marquis?” I was shocked. I tried to match him up with the confident Deva and couldn’t.
“Well, he got taller in high school. In college, he lost his braces and filled out a bit. Now, he’s a handsome guy, and the town doctor. He’s still kind of a shy guy, but there’s no question he’s got a thing for her. I think he’s just waiting for any sign she might be ready.”
I leaned back and closed my eyes. “I’d love to see her with someone like that. He sounds like the opposite of Harry.”
“He is.” She sighed. “But Deva doesn’t even seem to be willing to acknowledge him.”
“Give her time,” I said.
Time. That was what I needed too. I might have been thrown into a new life, but in so many ways I was still the same me. Deva and I were similar in that way. We wanted to move on, but we weren’t there quite yet.
“Shit,” Beth whispered. “Why does he have to be here, now?”
My eyes flashed open and I glanced at my friend. She looked like she'd seen a ghost. Her face was white as a sheet. When I looked past her, I could see a man and woman walking toward us on the sidewalk. “Who is it?” I said in a low voice. Both of our windows were down. I didn’t want him to hear me.
“My ex,” she hissed without ever moving her eyes from where they were fixed ahead of her, not looking at her ex and his new woman or at me, just focused on trying to ignore the whole situation. “He left me for her.”
It hit me. That was Roger? I’d seen pictures, yeah, but the guy had aged more than I imagined. I tried to picture him from their vacation photos over the years, and guessed I could see the resemblance.
“Beth?” The man, admittedly handsome if one liked a dad-bod, bent over and peered into the car. His blue eyes twinkled as though he found something altogether too funny, and he flashed a car salesman smile at her. “Is that you?”
“Yeah.” Beth’s hands fluttered in her lap. “It’s me.” Her voice was high but quiet, as though she was struggling to get the words out as she stared down at her hands without ever making eye contact with him.
I leaned over, making sure to give him my best unimpressed look, and peered up at the woman. The other woman.
Holy shit. She looked like a younger version of Beth, which was insulting in more ways than I could count.
“Of all the bullshit!” I hissed.
No. Absolutely not.
Throwing open my car door, I lurched out of the car and slammed it shut. Fury burned through my veins like lava. “You’ve got a lot of nerve, asshole!”
Her ex, Roger, straightened from where he'd still been leaning over Beth and looked at me all startled and hoity-toity. “Excuse me. Who the hell are you?”
A pang of guilt swept through me that we'd never really met. Sure, I'd seen photos, but they’d gotten together shortly after Deva’s wedding twenty years ago, so I hadn’t met him when I’d come into town for the event. And Rick hadn’t wanted to go back after that, so we hadn’t. Something I regretted with every fiber of my being. He'd controlled so much of my life without me even realizing it. I wasn't going to let this jerkwad make Beth feel bad about herself the way Rick did to me.
I stalked around the hood of the car until I was less than a couple feet from the two of them. “You heard me. You don’t get to speak to her! You cheated, with this…” I waved my hands at the other woman. “Creepy version of Beth. Baby version of Beth. Is that the problem? You wanted Beth but you like ‘em young?”
His face turned dark red and a fury that made me think he may be hiding an even darker side passed through his eyes. “Now hold on—”
“No, you hold on! Karma is going to get you. And you!” I pointed first at her ex then at the woman, girl, whatever. "I'd bet money you knew he was in a long-term, committed relationship, with a woman he’d been promising to marry for almost twenty years, when you started fooling around, didn't you? Didn't you? But you didn't give a crap about his partner and how she felt. You just wanted to get y
ours. Well, I've got news for you little girl: he's going to dump you faster than a hot potato when he gets bored. Look forward to that."
“No, he’s not, because I’m the woman he always needed. And I don’t look like her,” the woman suddenly sneered, as if the dummy had just now realized we were talking about her.
But she really did. “Yeah, you do. The same hair, the same eyes. Holy crap. Tiffany?”
Hell. Beth’s parents had accidentally gotten pregnant again when Beth was seventeen. Tiffany had been a toddler when I’d left. But there was no way. No way her sister could actually…
She tilted her head up, and I realized that she had a pig-shaped nose that she’d tried to sculpt with a pound of makeup to look more like Beth’s. “Yeah? So what?”
It felt like the floor dropped out from under me. I knew he’d been cheating on her with someone younger, but why hadn’t Beth told me? I knew the answer immediately. Because it would’ve killed her to even say the words aloud. Husbands cheating happened all too often, but leaving their wife for her younger sister? Disgusting.
“Beth practically raised you,” I said in disbelief.
It was one of the reasons Beth had decided to go to the local community college for her business degree instead of away with me. But then she’d had to drop out after her associate’s degree, because her parents started having serious health issues and needed her to help. Sometimes when we talked late at night, she’d sound so wistful when I talked about college. I’d try to change the topic, but she said she loved to live through me, since we’d both been business majors.
“I didn’t need her to raise me,” the woman said, tossing her blonde hair.
“Yeah, you did.” A cold feeling rushed through me. “And it’s heartbreaking that you could do this to her. But I want you to know something: Beth doesn’t need you, because we’re her family now.”
I was shaking, and that cold feeling inside of me kept growing. A person needed to have a frozen heart to steal a man from her own sister. Not that he was some prize to steal. But if Tiffany wasn’t a trash human being, she would’ve helped Beth realize that Roger was a bad guy, rather than take him for herself.
“You--” I struggled for the words to express just how angry I was at them.
“Emma,” Beth interrupted in an amused voice as she got out of the car. Her door slammed shut behind her as she came up to me and quietly said, “You’re glowing.”
I looked down at myself to find I was, indeed, glowing. Like a lightning bug. My skin was luminous and not in the way all those night eye creams talked about either.
When I glanced back up, Beth’s ex and his child-girlfriend were hurrying down the street, him with his arm around her protectively. “She needs your protection because she’s done one of the worst things a woman can do to another woman!” I screamed after them.
Beth blew out a laugh, bending over at the waist and hee-hawing a deep gut laugh. At one point, I swear she squeaked like a bike horn. “Emma,” she wheezed. “That was amazing! What did you do to them?”
With the strangest certainty, I said, “I’m not sure exactly. Sometimes Karma takes a bit of time, but it'll be good, no matter what it is. Or bad if you're them, I guess.”
“Good,” Beth said, and there was a sad note to her voice.
“I’m so sorry,” I said, fighting the urge to pull her into a hug.
“Surprisingly, it’s getting easier.”
“But you raised her, you--”
“I never did any of that thinking that she’d owe me, or even that she’d appreciate me. I took care of her because it was the right thing to do.”
That was the first time I felt my powers race over my skin, sending every hair standing on end. It seemed that every time I used my abilities, it felt different. “Well, you did something good, and the universe knows that.”
She smirked at me. “I guess I’ll trust that karma knows what it’s doing, or should I say she.”
I nodded, feeling strange. A breeze rolled over me, and I swore my powers scattered away from me like leaves in the wind. I even stared into the sky, expecting to see something. But the dark sky was the same.
Karma, I realized, wasn’t just popping tires. It took time. It worked in mysterious ways. But I had no doubt Tiffany and the ex would feel the bite of my powers, and that Beth would be rewarded for being a good person.
Having powers was definitely starting to have its perks.
“I’m going to go give those two a little present.”
I jerked at the high-pitched voice, searching for the source of the sound. What I found was a crow on a branch staring at us.
Beth said, “We shouldn’t..”
“You shouldn’t. Humans pooping on humans is strange.”
The bird lifted off the branch and about a dozen more left the tree, heading for her ex and her sister. At first I just stared in confusion, but around the corner, I heard a chorus of screaming and swearing, and then it hit me.
I looked at Beth. Beth looked at me. And then we both started laughing like idiots. Being a witch, or whatever, definitely had its perks.
A minute later, I heard the sound of a door being thrown open. Carol came out of the house first, lugging a big duffel bag behind her. Deva wasn’t far behind her with her arms full of bags as well. It looked like we were vacationing for a week. But this was my first supernatural adventure, so I wasn’t about to second-guess the things they thought we needed.
We all piled into the car, and Carol started handing out small burlap bags. “Hex bags,” she explained.
“Aren’t those dangerous to keep in the house?” I asked.
Carol giggled as she untied the long string on one. “Here, put it under your shirt; wear the hex bag like a necklace. And they aren’t dangerous, not if you’re an experienced witch and don’t make careless mistakes.”
“Oh, I feel silly.” I laughed and tied the leather string around my neck. “What does this do?”
“If you yank it hard enough, it will tear away from the leather. Then you throw them at someone’s feet and it’ll temporarily incapacitate them.” Carol handed Beth one as she started to pull away from the curb, then stopped and pulled her phone out of her pocket instead.
I glanced over to see her son’s name on the screen.
“Oh,” Beth said with pleasure. “It’s the twins. They’re at St. Bartholomew's college.”
I knew how much of an unexpected joy it was to get a phone call from your teenager who was away at school. And also how it made that little ball of worry form in your stomach until you answered and knew they were okay.
She hit the speaker button. “Hey, cupcake!”
“Hey, Mom. What are you up to?” The deep voice of her son rang out over the speaker.
“Nothing, sweetie. Just hanging out with my girls.” Beth shrugged as Carol handed Deva a sharpened wooden stake out of her bag and then, after a moment's debate, handed Deva and me a small blade each. “How are you and your sister?”
“I’m here too,” a young woman’s bubbly voice said, which must be Ava. “Are you having book club?”
Deva and I hid our snickers behind our hands while Beth silently laughed and Carol slapped her thigh in amusement.
“Yep,” Beth said. “Book club.”
“Well, we just wanted to check in,” Noah said. “I hope you enjoy your boring Saturday night. Try not to get too crazy with all those books and wine.”
We all chuckled.
“I happen to like my books, thank you very much," Beth said in a teasing voice. "Anyway, we're about to start. Do you need anything before I go?
"Nope, just wanted to say hi!" Ava sounded just like her mom and it warmed my heart to think that somewhere out in the world there were two people who had the same goodness and strength in them that Beth did. I wondered if they had any abilities. I'd have to ask Beth the next time we had a chance to talk.
"Goodnight, sweeties. Be safe. Love you!” Beth tapped on the red end call button. For a
moment after she hung up, she just looked at her phone, and I wondered if she was thinking about what had just happened with her ex and what her kids would think of it.
I knew I had the same reaction to a lot of the encounters I'd had with Rick since we split up. Eventually she just smiled and shook her head before putting the car in drive and pulling away.
“Boring. I wish. They really think anyone older than them just curls up around a fire, don’t they?” she asked with a laugh lacing her voice, sounding more like herself than when her ex had stopped by earlier. I wasn't sure why it bothered me so much, but I was sure that one of the things I had come back to Mystic Hollow for was to help my friends, and for Beth that seemed to be helping her see her self-worth again, and give her the ability to give her ex the middle finger if she wanted to. I wished someone had done the same for me and Rick, but if wishes were fishes and all that.
“My son is the same way," I said. "Travis seems to think I'm best at laundry and cooking dinner for him when he's home from college and not much else. At least not right now. I'm sure that will change as he gets older. At least I hope so."
“Eat this.” Deva handed us each a sugar cookie, which was a good distraction before my thoughts turned melancholy. “It should make any powers you already have even stronger.”
I bit into the treat and moaned. “How do you do this? I've baked a million cookies for school bake sales and none of mine ever turned out like this. You're a goddess in the kitchen, I swear.”
Deva beamed, her smile so wide she got dimples. “Every time you eat something I cook, it’s the best compliment ever.”
“Oh, here, I almost forgot.” Carol pulled out a baggie of ear plugs from the duffel. “These are the kind that they use for the shooting range. It’ll keep us from being swayed by the sirens’ songs.”
We all put them in, and the only person that it was at all noticeable on was Deva because of her very short hair.
Karma's Spell (Magical Midlife in Mystic Hollow Book 1) Page 13
