Karma's Spell (Magical Midlife in Mystic Hollow Book 1), Lacey Andersen [best book club books .txt] 📗

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 have 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.

It may have irritated the marching band, but it made me love her even more. She was brave and fierce in ways I always wanted to be. And I was glad to see that, at least on the surface, that wild soul of hers was still there.

The long skirt she was wearing hit mid-calf and was covered in cocks. No, not that kind. Roosters, in black and white with pops of red, in all different positions covered it. This was paired with black and white houndstooth sky-high shoes and a black and white plaid top. The kicker was the green army or utility jacket, though. It looked more than a little out of place with the flowing skirt, heels, and blousy top. The glasses that perched on her nose had bright red frames which matched the bright red lipstick she wore.

Carol was never one to shy away from loud patterns or bright colors. It was comforting to see that was still true too.

“Hello,” Beth crooned into the phone behind me. “Yes, one sec.” She covered the mouthpiece. “I have to take this. Carol, watch her. She just found out about the supernatural world. Be gentle.”

Carol’s eyes widened, nearly filling the space inside the red frames. “Ohhh, that’s juicy.” She plopped down in the chair across from me. I watched as she pulled out her knitting and picked up her needles, hooking the glittery purple yarn over her finger just so. “Tell me about it?” But when her gaze fell on me, her eyes widened. “Emma? Emma, is it really you?”

I forced a smile. “In the flesh.”

“And you finally know about the supernatural world?” She seemed even more excited.

“I thought—I thought Beth might have texted you about it?”

She sighed and waved her hand. “I hate phones. I was just heading here anyway. So, you said you know about the supernatural world now? How?”

I didn’t know where to begin. “Yeah. The cat talked to me,” I whispered. Dread filled my stomach at the idea of this being some kind of elaborate prank, or some inside joke between the two of them. Clearly Carol was comfortable with Beth if she just came in and knit.

“Oh, yeah, of course. That’s Beth’s specialty. It’s such