A Little Light Magic - Excerpt 2

Days 'till Memorial Day: 20

Days 'till A Little Light Magic: 21

Days 'till the Summer Solstice: 47

Happy Cinco de Mayo!

Note: Catch me TODAY Tues May 5th LIVE! on Rowena Cherry's Crazy Tuesday Passionate Voices Internet Radio Show "Magic, Sex and Secrets" at 10 am ET. (If you missed it - not to worry! You can find the recording in the Crazy Tuesday archives.)


Today and yesterday's Countdown features a two-part excerpt of A Little Light Magic!


When a girl with no family meets a guy with too much…

For Tori Morgan, family’s a blessing the universe hasn’t sent her way. Her parents are long gone, her chance of having a baby is slipping away, and the only thing she can call her own is a neglected old house. What she wants more than anything is a place where she belongs…and a big, noisy clan to share her life.

For Nick Santangelo, family’s more like a curse. His nonna is a closet kleptomaniac, his mom’s a menopausal time bomb and his motherless daughter is headed for serious boy trouble. The last thing Nick needs is another crazy female making demands on his time.

But summer on the Jersey shore can be an enchanted season, and love can bring together the most unlikely prospects. A hard-headed contractor and a lonely reader of Tarot cards and crystal prisms? All it takes is…A LITTLE LIGHT MAGIC.


Excerpt #2


“Divination? You mean like fortune-telling?”

“Some people call it that. I like to call it future sight.”

“You’re kidding, right?”

Tori frowned at him over her shoulder. “No. Why would I be?”

“Because you can’t seriously think to sell that woo-woo stuff around here. Summer people come to Margate to take their kids to the beach, not to get their fortunes told. You’d be better off selling wave boards. Or Italian ice.”

Her answering scowl sent Nick rocking back on his heels.

“Hey,” he protested. “Don’t go getting all mad. It’s good advice. And it’s free.”

“Really.”

“Yeah. If you want to tell fortunes, you should set up shop on the Ocean City boardwalk. That’s where the tourists go when they’re looking to throw away money.”

“Throw away— Oh!”

Ms. Morgan—Tori—abandoned her cloud, her chest rising on a quick intake of breath. Nick tried not to look down, but, Jesus, it was a lost cause. She marched right up to him and halted so close he could practically feel her breasts in his hands.

A jab of her brush near his nose brought his attention back to her face.

“I’ll have you know fortune-telling is a valuable art, not a waste of money! And I can’t go anywhere else. I have to open Destiny’s Gate here, in this house.”

“You inherited the place recently, right?”

The light in her green eyes dimmed. “Yes. From my great-aunt. It’s been a summer rental for the last seventeen years, since she moved into a nursing home.”

“Well, maybe now that it’s yours, you should think of selling. This close to the beach, you’d get a great price.”

“But the new owners would tear the house down!”

“Well, yeah, obviously. The value’s all in the land.”

She shook her head. Nick was momentarily distracted by her glossy dark curls stroking and sifting over her shoulders. His palms started to itch.

“No,” she was saying. “I can’t let that happen. Aunt Millie left so much positive psychic energy in these walls.”

Positive psychic energy?

She shot him a disgruntled look. “You know, I didn’t ask your opinion.”
“What?” Nick said. “I didn’t say anything.”
“You didn’t have to. But it doesn’t matter, because I’m not looking for your advice. I just want to hire you. And there’s really not much work here. You can probably finish it in a day or two.”

“Well, about that,” he said. “I only stopped by to—”

“Do you want to see the list?” She moved closer and he caught her scent. Something old-fashioned and flowery. Calm. It seemed an odd choice for her. From what he could see, standing still wasn’t something Tori Morgan knew how to do.

“I don’t think—”

“Wait. It’s around here somewhere.”

Huh? A conversation with this woman shifted as quickly as sand in a storm. Bemused, he watched as she sank to the floor, her gauzy skirt swirling as she rifled through a stack of papers shoved into a cardboard box. Her paintbrush, seemingly forgotten in her left hand, dripped silver onto the floor.

“Here.” He grabbed the brush before it could do any more damage. “Let me take that.”

She blinked up at him, then frowned at the brush. “Oh. Thanks. I know I put the building inspector’s list in here somewhere.”

He set the brush in one of her four and a half open cans of silver paint. “Look, don’t bother. I can’t take your job anyway.”

“What?”

She stood up so fast she nearly lost her balance. Nick caught her upper arm, then immediately wished he hadn’t. Touching her wasn’t the best idea. The urge to drag her flush against his body was entirely too urgent. What had gotten into him? He couldn’t remember the last time he’d had such a sudden, overwhelming response to a woman.

She stared up at him with eyes the exact color of the ocean before a storm. She was so close now he could see that the green of her irises was touched with subtle flecks of blue. Her cheeks were flushed. And her lips …

“ …do it,” she said breathlessly.

What? He stared down at her.

“You have to do it. You have to take my job.”

Oh, right. The job.

Nick released her and took a step back. “Look, I’m sorry, but I’m afraid I won’t be able to help you out. My company doesn’t do small projects like this. Doris should have told you when you called.”

“Oh, she did. But she also said you might be able to squeeze it in if I couldn’t find anybody else.”

“I’d really like to help, but I’m overextended as it is. I can’t possibly take this on.”

“But that’s not right! The cards said that you’d help me.”

“Cards? What cards?”

She pointed at the folding table. “The tarot. I did a reading after I talked to Doris. The outcome was favorable.”

“I see,” Nick said slowly, pacing toward the table. The cards spread out there weren’t the regular playing kind, but some sort of fortune-telling cards.

“Favorable.” He slanted her a glance. “But not, I take it, definite?”

She grimaced. “Well … no. Not exactly definite.” She tapped the closest card. “I drew the Moon. That always denotes a time of uncertainty.”

He smiled. “There you go, then. That proves I’m not your man.”

She looked up just long enough to send him a scowl. “It does nothing of the kind. See this card? The Four of Wands foretells success in new ventures. I can’t have success if I can’t open. That means you’re going to take the job.”

“Uh-huh.”

“And besides,” she pressed on, “you’re my last hope. My only hope! You can’t even imagine how many contractors I’ve called. Not one will even give me an estimate before August. But when I looked into my crystal, I saw the work completed before the solstice.”

Nick couldn’t believe his ears. “You’ve got a crystal ball that tracks construction projects? You know, I could use one of those at the office.”

“No,” she said seriously. “It’s not a ball. I can never get a good reading on a curved surface. I use a prism.”

Nick shook his head. Time to go. Because, clearly, this woman had already left the building.

“Tell you what,” he said, angling toward the door. “I’ll ask around. Maybe one of my subcontractors will be interested.”

He left before she could launch another protest, relieved to trade the whirling clouds and flashing crystals for the comforting solidity of his Dodge Ram four-by-four. Tori Morgan might turn him on like crazy, but no way was Nick going to follow his little head on this one.

Tarot cards. Positive psychic energy. Visions in crystals.

The woman was out of her freaking mind.


This week's prizes! Comment on any post from Saturday May 2 to Friday May 8th and register for a chance to win one of three autographed books: Immortals: The Reckoning Anthology, featuring three paranormal novellas, by me, Jennifer Ashley, and Robin T. Popp, Pleasuring the Pirate by Emily Bryan, or Celtic Fire by Joy Nash! Winner chosen by random drawing on May 9.


Coming Tomorrow: The Boys of Summer!


Joy Nash

www.joynash.com