Naughty Karma

Chapter Twelve Color Me Bad

Prometheus watched Karma escape back into her office with her three o’clock. That was the only word for it, escape. A smile curved his lips. He’d rattled the unshakeable Karma today—and enjoyed every second of it.

The kiss had been pure impulse, designed to shake her perfect self-control, and it had succeeded brilliantly. Though he would have preferred the first time he had Karma in a liplock that he not be preoccupied with making sure the finder who was going to find his heart didn’t die. That couldn’t count as their first kiss. He wanted a do-over so he could devote his entire attention to enjoying her loss of control.

It was almost comic that Karma thought of him as a knight in shining armor, riding in to selflessly save the day. He didn’t know the definition of selfless. But he was good at self-interest and keeping Karma’s finders all alive and working, as well as keeping Karma from having a complete breakdown and descending into grief, were both firmly in his self-interest. It was all about the long view. He couldn’t have dead finders if he wanted everyone at the top of their game.

But if Karma thought he was a saint, so much the better. A little delusion could take him a long way.

“Is ten o’clock okay?” Sprinkles the Wonder Secretary chirped at him.

“Perfect.” He flashed her a smile. “Just schedule me under the White Knight.”

“White?” Brittany’s head cocked to the side and she blinked vacantly.

“It’s a joke, sweetheart.”

“Oh, no, I get it,” she assured him. “I just never saw you as the white type. But I guess you can’t be the black knight because that makes you sound African-American and the Dark Knight is already taken, unless you’re secretly Bruce Wayne, which is really more how I think of Wyatt—you’ve met Wyatt Haines, haven’t you? He’s dating Jo. Lucy’s cousin? Lucy, whose wedding you tried to sabotage? And Green Knight makes you sound like you’re either really eco-conscious or only care about money. Blue Knight would be depressing, because you’d be blue, right? And no one likes a brown knight. Maybe yellow? Do you like yellow? Or gray! Definitely gray. But not 50 Shades of Grey or anything, just like, gray gray. Shall I put you down as the Gray Knight?”

“Has anyone ever told you that you are a very unusual person, Bubbl—um, Brittany?”

She beamed. “All the time. So ten o’clock?”

“Perfect. And Brittany? I’ve been meaning to tell you how sorry I am that the demon I summoned harassed you.” Amends, check.

“Oh, that’s okay. It was kind of fun. I’d never been kidnapped by a demon before.”

Prometheus blinked, momentarily thrown. “Right.”

“And besides, if you hadn’t sicced that demon on me, I never would’ve spent time with Luis and gone salsa dancing and learned how to do laundry. So in the end, it was a good thing. I should be thanking you.”

“I don’t think Rodriguez thinks I’m quite so worthy of thanks.”

Brittany shrugged. “He worries about me. But he’ll come around. He’s a big ol’ romantic and once he realizes that it’s all part of your master plan to woo Karma, he’ll melt like a popsicle.”

Prometheus tried to picture the tattooed tough guy melting and couldn’t quite make it stick. “I’m not wooing Karma.”

“Well, of course you don’t call it that, but I’ve got eyes, don’t I?” She cocked her head toward the office and Prometheus was reminded that he’d had an armful of Karma when Brittany had burst in on them. “You may have some pretty unorthodox methods, but the way I see it, Karma could use some unorthodox in her love life. For someone who deals in the weird for a living, she sticks way too tight to the straight and narrow, if you ask me.”

“Are you giving me your blessing to date your boss?”

“Sure! But if you break her heart, there are a couple dozen consultants with some really nasty tricks up their sleeves who won’t hesitate to kick your kiester into next week. Just so you know.” Even her threats were delivered with a glowing smile. They’d broken the mold with Brittany.

“Thanks.”

She beamed. “Any time.”

The next vision caught her as soon as she relaxed her vigilance. It was after eight, the office quiet and empty. She glanced up from the back-up computer she’d just finished bringing up to date since the one on her desk had been fried by activities she would not think about and allowed herself the weakness of rubbing at her dry, exhausted eyes. That’s when the image slammed into the back of them, pulling her under with startling force.

She was Ciara again, but this time there was no water—only gunfire. The visuals were a jumble—people moving and not moving, shooting and not shooting—three possible futures in an Atlantic City hotel room overlaid over one another in a flickering mess. But whichever future won, it happened soon. Ten, maybe fifteen minutes.

Karma cursed and lunged for her phone. She called the Feds, the Atlantic City PD, and would have called the National Guard if she’d had their number, and then she could do nothing but wait, pace and try to throw her brain open to another vision, one that would hopefully tell her what the hell was happening in that hotel room two hundred miles away.

She’d been blocking the visions all day. After the drag-you-under-and-pummel-you drowning visions that had plagued her the last few days and stalked her consciousness all morning, all she’d wanted was a few hours of clear, calm thinking with no interruptions. She’d felt a few little nuisance nudges, but nothing to indicate mortal peril. Not that she always had warning. The trouble with free will was that it spawned a thousand possible futures and some of them never let her know they were coming.

But this one had. This one had been raising its hand and waiting to be called on all afternoon. She’d selfishly ignored it—she’d just needed a break—and it might have hurt Ciara, might have cost her finder her life after all. Four years of never getting a single worrisome twinge about Ciara and now every vision was of the petite finder in peril. Karma did not approve of this new handler’s influence.

When the phone call came, Karma’s double awareness shivered through her and she knew. Knew the police and feds had been too late, but that Ciara and her handler—Nate, need to know his name, they’re in love now—had saved the day themselves. And recovered the priceless necklace they’d been sent to find. With no help from Karma or anyone else.

Karma thanked the officer on the line and set the phone carefully back in the cradle, as if gentleness there could keep her own fragile parts from shattering.

Selfish. There was no other word for it. She’d been blocking her abilities, hiding from them, because she was scared of them, scared they would take her over, but in doing so, how many of her people had she hurt? Could she have unblocked Ciara years ago? Could she have saved Ronna from having to defend herself against a knife-wielding contract killer? If she had been open to her abilities, if she had actually known how to use them, how much good could she have done?

Karma hated the visions, had always hated them, from the moment they first crashed into her brain as a child, but was that hatred selfish? How could she claim to be fighting on the side of the angels if she wasn’t willing to take a little personal hardship for the greater good?

She pulled up her schedule for tomorrow. The Gray Knight at ten o’clock. Prometheus.

He’d offered to teach her. Had he been serious? She could never tell. But if he could help her, like he had today—no, not like he did today. No kissing.

She would need ground rules. If she let him teach her how to use her powers. Absolutely no touching. No kisses. No feather-light brushes along her neck. No crowding into her space with that you-know-how-good-I’ll-be temptation in his black eyes. Her knees would not go weak. They would remain on professional footing and once he’d taught her how to control her psychic impulses, rather than repress them, her people would find his heart and he would be on his merry way. He didn’t want her; he wanted what she could do for him. No risk of attachment there.

Karma nodded, decision made. She would speak to Rodriguez in the morning, confirm that the exorcist didn’t have any misgivings after dealing with Prometheus, then make a new business arrangement with the Gray Knight at ten o’clock.

And perhaps tomorrow she would get a full night’s sleep, uninterrupted by unwanted visions.

Her eyes and body aching with exhaustion, Karma made her way to her meditation corner, knelt and went through the ritual to clear her head, establish control and block the visions for as long as the barriers held. There had to be a better way. Hopefully tomorrow she would learn it.

“He apologized to Brittany and fixed my sister’s car—it’s never run so well. Not even when it was new. Adela thinks he may have replaced the fuel injection system and she loves the new color.”

“He changed the color?”

“Snapped his fingers and there was a shiny new paint job. Never seen anything like it. Then we go up to Sutherland and he put a curse on the frat boy who’d been summoning nymphs into coeds and banished a roomful of nymphs with a wave of his hand. He’s fucking powerful, Karma.”

“I know. But do you trust him?”

Rodriguez hesitated a long time, longer than she would have expected, given his history with Prometheus. “No. Probably not,” he finally admitted.

And there was the catch. Neither did she. But he was still the best option. There weren’t a lot of genuine magic users out there who were capable of training her—let alone who needed her goodwill for their own survival. As long as he needed her, she might be able to trust him. Within limits. “Thanks, Rodriguez.”

“No problema, boss.”

Karma hung up the phone. It was an older model, pulled out of storage to replace the one they’d short circuited yesterday with the pyrotechnics to save Ciara. Karma had spoken to her finder this morning. She was fine, better than fine. She sounded happier than Karma had ever heard her. Alive—and not only in the thank-God-she’s-not-dead sense, but with a vibrancy that had always been missing. Joy.

A tiny jab of jealousy spiked down into Karma’s heart. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d felt joy. Happiness, sure. She was happy all the time. Happy for her brother at his wedding. Happy for all her consultants who were jumping on the love train. Happy for the continued success of the business. But joy? She lined a pen up at a perfect parallel to the edge of the desk. Was joy really necessary? The extremes were dangerous. The extremes were where control was forfeit and Karma needed control. That was the entire point behind the possible sessions with Prometheus—to refine her control. Teach her better control. To improve her grip on her abilities. Not to set them free, no matter what the chaos master thought. She would be very clear about their objectives.

He’d already seen her without control yesterday—which still mortified her to recall. No one had seen her so unhinged, except perhaps her brother. Karma didn’t lose her cool. And it wouldn’t be happening again.

She ran her hands over the smooth, dark expanse of her desk. She was in control here. She was the boss.

So why these butterflies deep in her stomach? Why this breathless little hitch of anticipation?

The intercom buzzed. “Prometheus to see you, Karma.”

Karma wet her lips, one hand going automatically to her hair before she forced it down. “Send him in.”