Authors: Tracy Madison
A series of small beeps sounded, followed by, “Hey, babe.
It’s me. Change of plans. I need to stick in Cinci through Friday. Not making it home until Saturday. I’ll call when I get in.”
Nope, I hadn’t heard wrong. Damn! I hit the
end
button and dropped the phone on my desk. This was so not the way I’d envisioned the forthcoming evening. All day long, I’d gone over and over what I would say to Kyle. What words to use to end our relationship. How to explain my change of heart. Even though I’d made my choice, even though I’d taken Miranda’s message to heart, that didn’t mean all of my doubts were gone. They weren’t. My love for Kyle hadn’t vanished. My belief that we could have a good life together still existed. But I’d found a truth inside of myself that refused to be ignored, so…now what? Everything hinged on meeting Ben again with a clear conscience. How could I do that as an engaged woman?
“Fuck,” I murmured. “Why can’t any of this be easy?”
I started to give my available options some serious consideration when the telltale clomping of Paige’s blast-from-the-past, 1970s-era platform shoes broke into my consciousness. A few seconds later, she pushed into the back room at the Mystic Corner like a woman on a mission, matching my barely-stuck-on artificial grin with one of her own.
“We’re all locked up,” she announced. Folding her arms across her chest, she leaned against the wall, her posture stiff.
“Awesome. Thanks, Paige.”
“No reason to thank me. Locking up is part of my job. Right?” Fiddling with an invisible thread on her sunflower-laden dress, she kept her eyes planted somewhere to the side of mine. Suddenly concerned, I set my own worries on the back burner and gave her all of my attention.
“Is everything okay with you?”
A painful silence drifted between us. Grabbing my cup of cold coffee, I swallowed the last gulp, playing for time, giving
her a chance to respond. But when the quiet seemed as if it would never end, I gave it another go. “Is there something you want to talk about?”
“I don’t know. Is there something
you
want to talk about?”
“Um…no?” Had I upset her somehow? “Help me out here. What’s bothering you?”
“Fine.” She slapped her ring-adorned hands on her hips. “Is the store in financial trouble? Should I be hunting for a new job?”
“Whoa!” Talk about coming out of left field. “Where are you getting that from?”
“You’re either in the middle of some hushed phone call, or you’re staring off into space, or you’re disappearing back here whenever you can. I wasn’t going to bring it up, but your snapping at Jen today made me rethink that.” The words tumbled from Paige’s mouth in a mess of syllables. “As long as I’ve worked here, I’ve never seen you behave so…” Breaking off, she twisted the mood ring on her right index finger.
She had a point. “You’re right, I have been a little crazy lately. But the store is solidly in the black, and your job is one hundred percent safe. I promise.”
“Really?”
“Really,” I affirmed, happy to be able to solve at least one problem. Yay for me.
She puffed out a breath. “Okay. Good. But what’s up with the weirdness, then? Jen is really upset. She thinks you’re about to fire her.”
“God, I’m sorry.” And I was. Poor Jen. She was one of my two part-timers, and had made a minor error on a return. Rather than calmly explaining the mistake, I’d lost my patience. Not in a bitch-boss-from-hell way, but still. “I apologized already, but I’ll talk to her again tomorrow.”
“And the weirdness?” Paige prodded. “Are
you
okay?”
I meant to say I was fine, I really did. But what came out
was “No. Not really. I’ll figure it out, though, and I’ll work harder at keeping my personal garbage away from the store.”
“Understood.” Crossing the room, she retrieved her backpack from a cupboard. “Can I say something else?”
“Go for it.”
“This store is a reflection of you and your beliefs, Chloe. This might sound really stupid, but the last few weeks I’ve felt this weird energy at the shop. Nothing bad, just…unsettling, I guess. Kind of freaky. And I think some of our customers are feeling it too. My guess is that whatever’s bothering you is…um…somehow disrupting the good vibes here.”
“That doesn’t sound stupid at all.” Geez, and here I was thinking I’d done a great job of covering up all my personal stuff. Apparently, not so much. “It should get better soon.”
She gave me another long, searching look. “Just let me know if I can help in any way.”
“Will do.” And really, that should have ended the conversation. For some unknown reason, I found myself asking, “Do you believe in fate?”
She slipped her arms into her backpack straps. “Sort of. I guess I don’t believe that our fates are predetermined, but that we have several possible destinies we can claim. That’s where free will comes into play, you know? One choice leads to one future, and a different choice to something new.”
Similar to Alice’s take on the situation, but…“That’s not really fate then, is it?”
Paige bit her lower lip in thought. “Let me say it like this: even if three choices out of four will eventually lead to some variation of the same endgame, we have the ability to choose door number four. And who the hell knows what lies on the other side? Free will.” She shrugged. “I prefer to believe that my decisions matter, and that my life isn’t all laid out from the second I’m born. Why such a heavy question?”
I forced another smile. “Just wondering. Have a good night, okay?”
“Um…yeah. Sure. You too.” She tossed me another curious glance. “Hey, Chloe? Don’t worry too much about the future. It’s the present that matters, you know? Be happy today. Tomorrow will take care of itself.”
The door slammed shut behind her. Her words swirled in my brain as my gaze landed on the cell phone. Kyle was a good man, but could I say I’d truly been happy this past year? Content, maybe, but not really
happy
. The truth of that settled inside, adding weight to the decision I’d already made. I had to move forward. I had to see if I really could reach the sky.
But I wasn’t free to begin anything with Ben. So…what to do? Have Paige make the delivery to Ben’s office and then find a reason to contact him after my conversation with Kyle? Or should I just bite the bullet and call Kyle and do the breakup thing via the phone, with approximately three hundred miles between us?
Yuck. Double yuck. No way would I break up with Kyle during a freaking phone call, and no way was I going to skip out on going to Ben’s office. Okay then, my choice fell somewhere in the middle. Wait for the face-to-face to end the most important relationship I’d had the past year, because it mattered—
he
mattered—and both of us deserved nothing less.
But I’d also go ahead and make the delivery to Ben as planned. Business only, though. No hanky-panky. No funny stuff. No kiss. And definitely no magic. Not that I’d purposely tested my powers yet, because I hadn’t, but the rule needed to be set for my own sanity.
My resolve strengthened as I completed the day’s deposit. I could do this. It was just a delivery, after all. I’d behave, follow my rules and hopefully set the stage for another meeting after Kyle and I worked everything out. I mean, really, how hard could it be?
“Do-or-die time,” I mused late Friday morning. The package for Ben’s assistant firmly in hand, I strode into the Malone & Associates lobby with a confident gait. Inside, I was a pile of mush, a messy concoction of anticipation and anxiety with a generous side helping of guilt. Luckily, no one but me knew that.
Do not flirt. Do not say anything stupid.
The not-flirting thing I could handle; it was the “stupid” angle that worried me.
I continued on toward the bank of elevators, my thoughts wholly centered on the image I intended to present. Basically, that of a woman whom Ben would want to get to know better. That seemed simple enough, but based on our last meeting, chances of failing were high.
Alone in the elevator, I pressed the appropriate button and drew in a breath. He was a businessman who focused on the absolute fact of numbers to earn his living, whereas I—at least in his mind—dealt in the weird and unexplained. So yeah, on the outside, we were a totally mismatched pair.
But I knew better. Or rather, I
hoped
I knew better. God help me if I was wrong.
My cell phone buzzed the second the elevator doors swished open. I stepped out before answering, taking a place along the wall. Across from me were two glass doors into the floor’s offices.
The phone buzzed again and Alice’s number lit up on the display. “What’s up, Alice? I thought the plan was for me to call you when I left?”
“I know, I know, but this can’t wait. Something strange happened this morning. You haven’t seen Ben yet, have you?”
“Not yet.” Her uneven tone registered, and a swift bolt of apprehension tightened my hold on the phone. “What is this all about?”
“Well…you see…Miranda was here, and she—”
“She what?”
“Indicated that I should draw another picture of your future. So I did.”
Uh-oh, this didn’t bode well. At all. My grip tightened even more. “And?”
“It might be better if you pop over here and take a look yourself. I’m not sure what to make of it.” I heard Alice exhale. My foreboding increased tenfold. “Them. I’m not sure what to make of
them
.”
It took a minute, but when I understood what she was getting at, I gasped. “Them? As in more than one picture?”
“Chloe,” she said softly. “I have three new pictures of you spread out on my kitchen table. None of them depicts the same future! So…uh…I have no idea what this means.”
Her confession hit me about as hard as a dozen semitrucks gunning along at top speed. I pushed myself against the wall for support. “How is that possible?”
“Oh, honey. I just don’t know. My magic has never worked this way before. I’m at a loss.”
All my confidence bled away. “I can’t deal with this right now,” I choked out. “I’m here. I’m going to do what I came here to do.”
“Don’t you want to know what the new drawings are of?
Before
you see Ben?”
“No. I really don’t.” As much as this new knowledge sat inside, mucking everything up, I’d made a decision. Come hell or high water, I was seeing it through. “Later is fine.
After work. Can you bring them to the Mystic Corner tonight? And can you see if Elizabeth and Verda will come too?”
“Absolutely. Just…well, go slowly for now.”
“I will.” I made the promise and disconnected the call. Nothing had changed, really. Regardless of what Alice had now drawn, her magic had shown her the wedding-scene picture first. And my reaction to Ben had been immediate and strong. Both of these things pushed me forward.
Straightening my spine, I tucked my phone into my purse and marched toward the glass doors.
Ben.
He was in there somewhere. Quivers of anticipation, of longing, licked through me. Being here felt right. Whatever the rest meant…Well, I’d deal with that later.
On the other side of the door stood a large, circular desk where two women—one blonde and one brunette—clicked away at their keyboards. Both young, both attractive. Were one of these Ben’s assistant? The one he might be involved with?
The brunette glanced up first, smiling widely with perfectly even, if a little large, white teeth. I stopped in front of her. “Do you have an appointment?” she asked in a nasal twang.
“Um…sort of. I’m supposed to drop something off for Ben Malone. Personally, that is. I can’t just leave it here. With you. In case you were wondering,” I blurted.
“And your name?”
“Chloe Nichols. He’s expecting me.”
She clicked on her keyboard. “Take the hall all the way to the end. You’ll see his office.”
My knees nearly buckled as I walked past the desk and down the hallway, but I pulled myself together. When my eyes landed on the office that had to be his, I stopped. This was it. Once I walked in there, once I saw him again, I somehow
knew there would be no turning back. Taking a deep breath, I stepped to the edge of his doorway and peered in.
Instead of seeing him, as I expected, I saw another desk with another woman—I guessed her to be in her late forties, possibly early fifties—also typing. “Um…excuse me? Am I in the wrong office? I’m looking for Ben Malone.”
“He’s expecting you.” Her fingers kept clacking away without missing a beat. Impressive. She tipped her head to the left, toward a door I hadn’t noticed. “Go right in.”
Even as I crossed the room, relief sluiced into me. Obviously, neither of the women out front was Ben’s assistant, and this woman—well, I doubted he had any type of romantic entanglement with her, based on her wedding ring. Not that the possibility was completely out, but it certainly seemed unlikely.
God. What was I doing? I knew what: I was totally getting ahead of myself.
Reminding myself yet again to stay on course, to not act like a loon, I evened my breathing and finally stepped into the lair of the man who, unbeknownst to him, had completely taken over nearly every waking moment of my life. Crazy. Just crazy.
I scoped out the room before announcing my presence. “Spare and Clean” seemed to be Ben’s design motto. A long, lean, so-dark-it-gleamed-nearly-black walnut desk took center stage. Behind the desk, a tall credenza, also walnut, housed a plethora of books along with his computer. Not one framed photo could be seen on any of the surfaces, nor were there any other types of personal mementos. Obviously he was a man who kept his business and private lives in separate compartments.
As for the man, his dark-blond head was bent forward, immersed in whatever data existed on the printed-out page in front of him. My heart pounded faster and harder, as if I’d
just run uphill several miles. I fought the nearly irresistible urge to throw myself at him, to run my fingers through his hair, to give him that kiss I so badly yearned to experience. I felt as if I already knew him, as if our being together wasn’t a question mark but a definite. And that made it so very hard to not give in to temptation. But you know, I couldn’t. Mostly because leaping into his lap and draping my arms around him was sure to give the wrong impression.
So I resisted. But it wasn’t easy.
“Chloe?” His deep voice broke into my daydream. “Come on in! You have the package?”
Blinking several times, trying to catch up, I shut the door behind me. Damn those urges, anyway. “Oh! Yes. Of course. It’s right here.” I waved the wrapped gift in the air like a loon. “All ready to go!”
His unbelievably blue eyes met mine, igniting a tingle of warmth that began at my toes and, inch by tantalizing inch, crawled all the way up my body. “It’s a pleasure to meet someone who loves her job as much as you do,” he said. “I don’t see enough of that.”
Wide, full lips turned upward at the corners as he spoke. My eyes fastened onto them. All I could think of was kissing him. “Happy to pleasure you,” I murmured. “It’s my job.”
“Really?” he drawled. “And I haven’t even tipped you yet.”
“No tip necessary. Just—uh—here.” I snapped my mouth shut and walked forward, placing the package on his desk. “I hope she likes it.”
“She will. But I’m curious. Is that a benefit exclusive to your specific niche in the business world, or have I been missing out with all of my other deliveries?” he teased.
“What benefit?” I felt clueless.
Tapping his long fingers on his desk, he didn’t answer. But his mouth softened into a broader grin, and a glint of humor whisked over his expression.
I replayed the conversation thus far, and when I realized exactly what I’d said, heat gathered on my cheeks. “I didn’t actually mean…” Well, that was a lie. The thought of giving him pleasure and getting some back reddened my cheeks even more. “I’m a little out of my element here.”
His smile vanished. Standing, he rounded the space between his desk and where I stood. He stopped in front of me, so close I could smell the shampoo he’d used that morning. And that made me think of him wet, naked and soapy. I cleared my throat, trying to remove the unbidden image from my mind. It didn’t work.
“I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable. Thank you for the delivery.” He held his hand out. “It’s been nice seeing you again.”
I grasped his hand, the feel of it warm and electrifying all at once. I wanted him to pull me to him so badly that I nearly couldn’t stand it. “You’re welcome, Ben.”
Dropping his clasp from mine, he nodded toward the door. “I think that’s everything…?”
This was it? It couldn’t be. I had to say something. Preferably something intelligent and witty. Something that would drag that smile back to his lips and light his eyes up with interest. But nothing came to me, so I stood there like an idiot while my brain rapidly flip-flopped through possible points of conversation, searching for anything that would lead us to where I wanted to go. I grabbed on to the first semirational possibility that came to me. Okay, the second. Because sadly, asking him to kiss me seemed rather forward.
“No, not everything! I still need to congratulate you!”
His eyebrows bunched together. “For?”
“For…winning a free class at the Mystic Corner. We…uh…conduct a monthly drawing on each month’s customers.” The lie slipped out easily. “You’re our winner this month!”
He rubbed his jaw with one hand. Which brought my attention back to his mouth, and how much I still wanted to kiss him. To taste him. So. Very. Much.
“Is the prize transferable?”
“No. Yes. I…gee, no one’s ever asked that before.” That wasn’t a lie. “Why?”
“No time for classes,” he said easily. “And no offense intended, but I’m about as far away from your target market as you can get. But if the prize is transferable, I’m happy to pass it along to my assistant. Otherwise, you should offer it to another customer.”
“Oh…well. Sure. That’s fine. You can give it to someone else.” Damn! How in the hell was I going to set up another meeting now? And why didn’t he appear interested? “I’ll mail the gift certificate out at the end of the month,” I said, completing my lie. “To your assistant.”
He nodded. “Good marketing strategy, giving a monthly prize out to a brand-new customer. Great way to get them to return.”
Ha. It
was
a good idea. Maybe I’d actually start using it. Knowing I couldn’t extend this visit much longer, I threw caution to the wind and went with my gut. “So…um, I was wondering. Any chance we could get together again. Socially?”
I’d startled him. It was obvious by the way his eyes widened. His mouth started to form what I was sure would be a negative reply. I couldn’t have that, so rules or not, I decided it was time to let my magic out to play.
Focusing all of my energy, emotion, wants and desires about Ben—about us together—I visualized my power wrapping around him, washing into him, changing the words he planned to say. I latched on as hard as I could, and this time I felt the magic—the power—as it whooshed from me to him. My nervousness trickled away. My breathing quickened. Energy whipped through the air. It buzzed in my ears,
tickled my skin and stung my eyes until they watered. My entire body quaked as the magic surged from the very core of my being, from who I was, feeding off of all I felt, all I wished for, all I yearned to be.
Say yes, I thought. Accept me. Want me. Desire me.
His eyes narrowed, and if I hadn’t known better, I would have sworn he knew precisely what I was doing. With a slight shake of his head, as if waking up from a trance, he said, “A date? But I don’t—” He stepped backward, nearly knocking into one of the chairs in front of his desk.
I stared at him, not speaking, staying as still as possible.
Just. Say. Yes.
He rubbed his hands over his face and then combed his fingers through his hair. Retreating another few steps, he braced himself against his desk. Then, when I’d about decided his will was stronger than my magic, he nodded. “Why not? What do you have in mind?”
Not exactly the enthusiasm I’d hoped for, but hey, we had to start somewhere.
Several hours later, I found myself in a strangely positive mood. Sure, there were plenty of issues still requiring my attention: Kyle, the three new drawings and the undeniable reality that without my magic, Ben’s answer that morning would have been an indisputable “Thanks but no thanks”—which pretty much sucked. Even so, for whatever reason, on this day and at this moment, I felt pretty damn good.
Though I was incredibly, out-of-my-skull, antsy-as-all-get-out bored. The shop had been quiet all day, unusual for a Friday, and I’d sent Paige home early. Jen had called in sick, and my other part-timer had requested the night off. So I was alone with nothing to do but think. And frankly, I was tired of thinking.
I checked the clock for what had to be the one hundredth time in the last fifteen minutes and groaned. There were
still hours to go before the Gypsy brigade’s planned arrival, and until then, I needed to keep my mind occupied. Racing to the back room, I grabbed Jen’s teen magazine, which she’d left at the end of her last shift, and took that with me to the front counter.
Hot pink letters on the cover promised to “uncover your dating style,” a splash of turquoise offered “amazing hair, skin, and nails,” and along the bottom, a ribbon of red detailed this year’s “hottest beach fashions.” Geesh.
I’d barely flipped to the first page when I caught a glimpse of someone hovering near the counter, followed quickly by the sound of that same someone clearing her throat. My heart thumped an extra beat in surprise as I glanced up to see a customer. She looked vaguely familiar, so I smiled, trying to place her. And then, all at once, I got it. She was the blonde girl who’d been in the store the previous Monday. The girl Paige hadn’t seen.