Witchful Winking (Midlife at the Magnolia #4)

Chapter 1

I’d never rolled my eyes at a patient before.

No matter my personal feelings, I’d never shown frustration or impatience with someone seeking my help. I’d always managed to maintain my professionalism. At least to their faces.

Even six months ago, when my estranged benefactor Agatha had rushed into my office seeking advice about her impending doom, I’d held it together. I was at the lowest of my low and thought she was two eggs short of a dozen, but I’d still somehow managed to keep my cool.

Okay, saying I kept my cool isn’t entirely accurate. I was a hot mess. But I didn’t laugh in her face or make jokes about her death or anything. I’d pulled my shit together and set my return home in motion without even knowing it. That counted, as far as I was concerned, as being a pro.

If I was at a therapist’s convention, and we all went to the bar to play that never-have-I-ever drinking game about our clients, I would have walked away sober.

And bored because that’s a weird game to play.

But that’s beside the point. What was the point?

Oh, yeah … I’d never shown a client how annoyed I was with them, no matter how much they deserved it.

Granted, I insert a bit of personality and humor into my sessions. I’m not a robot. But roll my eyes? At a client? Never.

Never, that is, until I began treating Cupid.

Three grueling months had passed since he’d sent me an urgent text, desperately seeking my, in his words, “magically potent” counsel. He’d begged a number of times, since Brianne had already told him I was not taking on new clients. But nothing deterred him.

Brianne was right. Technically, I wasn’t taking on new clients.

I did, however, have a recent opening in my schedule.

Shortly after Brianne’s surprise birthday party, Lyra fired me as her therapist. Well, it wasn’t that dramatic.

She was feeling more stable from our few sessions, and after the madness of our coven bonding ceremony, she wanted to stand on her own two feet.

Or something like that. I was happy for her, and assured her that I would always make space for her.

But at the time, I was still reluctant to treat someone new, even if I couldn’t put my finger on why.

Therapy aside, my workload was once again in flux.

Brianne had taken to her new position as PEARL like white on rice.

My physical therapy was done thanks to a fully healed leg.

I was working out on my own, which was pretty cool.

Overall, I had no real reason not to accept new clients. I’d reached a point where my life was, if not boring, definitely stable. I had the time and space to work full-time and maximize my client load.

Just not the desire.

So I’d initially said no, even though a small voice nagged at me from the back of my brain, telling me that I should establish my brand, whatever the heck that meant, and push for more visibility to expand my business and blah blah blah.

You were supposed to work forty plus hours and constantly be stressed out, right?

That’s when I’d decided to start questioning all of the shoulds that wiggled around my head like a dozen Miss Manners were living in my cranium constantly passing judgment on my every thought and action.

And man was she bitchy. But the more I paid attention to her voice, the more I realized how nagging and dated her voice was.

She wasn’t saying anything of consequence.

She was parroting all the nonsense society had battered into me my entire life.

The more I dismissed each thought, the quieter Miss Manners became.

There was, however, one solid reason to work with a new patient.

And that reason was pretty dang convincing.

Somewhere along the line, I’d forgotten the reason I became a therapist in the first place.

The big why behind my decision to follow in Agatha’s footsteps.

I wanted to help people. Sure, I did it too often, but overall I enjoyed making other people’s problems my own.

And I got a rush from showing others how to solve their complex issues.

The world was all kinds of gray and could be hard as hell to manage alone. I knew that from experience.

I knew pain. I didn’t want others to wander that path without a hand to hold.

Between a failing marriage, a complex relationship with my son, and a general weariness that had coated every aspect of my life, the joyful part of my job had been squeezed out over time.

Being at the Magnolia, with all of those challenging new opportunities, had brought that joy back to the surface.

Over the holidays, Gabe came into town after finals and spent a few weeks with me.

The two of us played tourist, visiting parts of Louisiana I’d never seen despite living here my entire life.

We chatted about his graduation plans and stayed up all night debating technology and binge-watching TV shows.

I’d shared the Magnolia Codex with him and answered dozens of questions about my magic. My son and I were closer than ever.

And I recognized we were closer in part because I’d given us time to devote to rebuilding our relationship properly.

Time I wouldn’t have had if I’d been in my office hour after hour every day, or so overloaded with my own life that I didn’t pay proper attention to him. Like I’d done when he was growing up.

Having a robust personal life and a rewarding professional life did not have to be mutually exclusive. I think. I just needed to find balance. As for how I achieved that balance, that was up to me. Not Miss Manners. Not society.

There’s a litany of information in the codex that I still had to digest and understand. I was a full-fledged Supreme. I had an amazing, if a bit quirky, coven, and a lot to learn about magic. I was a strong, single woman. For the first time in my life, I felt good about myself.

Kinda weird.

Why would I waste that by working a traditional nine-to-five gig?

Dolly was right. It’s no way to make a living.

So while I was mulling over all of my future life decisions, Cupid was appearing in the lobby every morning at the exact time I arrived to work with a new reason I should treat him.

I couldn’t deny I was intrigued. He was persistent.

And charming. But most of all, he had a very real problem that I believed I could help with.

Finally, and I’m a bit ashamed to admit it, but what the hell, Cupid is a straight up hottie. A dirty-thoughts-at-night, hand-slipping-low-in-the-shower, squirming-in-my-seat level of hot.

Adorable little diaper wearing cherub with stubby wings and an angelic face?

Nope. Not even close. His face was angelic, that much was true.

But it was more like gazing at a fallen angel, with a defined jawline and a long, narrow nose just asking for trouble.

His long, wavy golden locks and bronzed skin made him look like a god out of some Greek novel. Which … I guess he was?

Zeus would have put him to death in some bizarrely intricate fashion just to protect whatever women he was screwing, that was for damn sure.

Come to think of it, Zeus was probably like his grandfather or uncle or something.

Actually, I’m pretty sure Cupid was his Roman name, not Greek.

I never could keep all of that straight.

Heck, most of my thoughts went crooked as soon as he entered my office.

And those wings. They draped across his shoulders the way an expensively tailored suit would: molding to his skin like a heavenly blanket of clouds gently hugging him close.

Unless he was ruffled or uncomfortable. Then the whisper-soft feathers with rounded tips fluttered, leaving behind an unmistakable whiff of roses that wafted toward you on a gentle breeze and beckoned you forward like a finger from a fresh pie in a cartoon.

The man made me wish I’d kept Agatha’s old couch just to see him stretched out on it. Ahem. Not that I wanted him on his back. After all, that would be insanely unethical. And I was the epitome of professionalism.

Well, I had been.

Until I rolled my eyes at him.

Did I mention his eyes? Woo, boy. Those massive, long-lashed, ice blue peepers pierced your soul. Heck, he didn’t need an arrow. He had the eyes. They got right to the heart of matters.

Which was a good thing because, as it turned out, the arrow was his problem.

Poor, charisma-laden, sexy-as-sin, long-suffering Cupid had himself a flaccid quiver.

Okay, technically it wasn’t the quiver that couldn’t, um, perform.

That just held his arrows. Technically, the center of the arrow was having trouble staying, well, firm.

But a basic internet search told me that it was called the shaft and while I was a pro I also had my limits and discussing Hot Cupid’s Limp Shaft every week went way beyond my capacities.

Maybe the therapist side of me would have been able to handle it. Eventually. But the woman in me was super-duper frustrated and definitely wasn’t gonna go there.

A few months ago, I’d realized I was finally ready to swim in the proverbial dating pool again.

Not just ready, but itching to dive in. In more than one way.

Apparently, all of the trauma processing, empty-nesting, and super-fun trial-facing I’d done as of late had my libido behaving like the shower in my old college dorm: scalding one second, ice cold the next.

For months, I’d alternated between horny goat and old nun like I was swinging on that Miley girl’s wrecking ball.

I needed to date. I needed to regulate. The problem was that, after recognizing my own growth and finally being ready to embrace my inner Venus, I was stuck on hold. By her son, no less.

Because Cupid’s limp bow was affecting us all. Well, anyone who had magic in their blood.