Chapter Eleven #2
Jorden picked up the deck, tapped on the cards twice, and took a deep breath.
“Tarot is based on timeless human experiences. Love, conflict, growth, and transformation. These patterns repeat throughout our lives. Tomorrow, like today, is a dance of choices, energy, and possibilities. When we shuffle and draw a card, we’re tapping into this moment’s vibration.
Can it tell the future?” She shrugged. “That’s not how I put it.
I’m helping someone like you uncover what your deeper self already knows. ”
“Someone like me?”
“Someone who is already highly intuitive, your subconscious knows things long before your conscious mind catches up. Like sensing a storm. You’re not ‘predicting rain,’ you’re seeing the signs that it’s coming unless something shifts.”
“Which is why the death card doesn’t mean death,” Luna concluded.
“Exactly. If it did, you’d shift the outcome by avoiding that skydiving trip you planned or see that doctor your subconscious mind has been telling you to see because you know, deep in here”—Jorden placed her hand over her chest—“that something is wrong.”
Luna blew out a breath. “Let’s do this.”
Jorden shuffled the cards several times, tapped on them again, and then set them down. “Cut the deck.”
“How many times?”
“However many you want.”
Luna cut the deck once, hesitated, and then did it a second time with the stack on her right.
Jorden picked them up and started to rapidly shuffle the cards from one hand to the other. One card popped out of her hands followed by a second. Jorden sat them next to each other and paused. Then she shuffled again until a third card jumped out.
“Seven of swords and nine of swords,” Jorden said.
Luna studied the images.
“See how the crow is flying away with several swords?”
“Yeah.”
“Someone has done you dirty. Took something that wasn’t theirs.”
Luna laughed. “My car.”
“Probably,” Jorden confirmed. “And the nine . . . see how the woman on the bed of swords is dreaming of the crow?”
“Her eyes are open,” Luna pointed out. “She’s not asleep.”
“Did you sleep last night?”
“No.”
“In this I see the theft of your car, and here I see that you’re anxious about it. All of this is easily interpreted knowing what you’ve told me and the questions you asked. But then this guy shows up. The knight of pentacles. Someone was or is going to be quick to help.”
“My brother drove in this morning and is putting an alarm system in at the house,” Luna said.
“Could be.” Jorden started shuffling again.
This time when a card jumped out of the deck, Luna read the number and name at the bottom before looking at the picture. “Two of cups?”
“That’s interesting.” Jorden was smiling.
“What?”
“The twos are about making choices. And the cups are about connection, love . . . could be family.”
“Then the knight is my brother.”
“Not necessarily. The two of cups is about a new choice, something that has or will enter your life. A new partnership.” Jorden picked up the knight card and the cup card and studied them.
The image of Nate walking around her kitchen that morning in nothing but a pair of gray sweatpants and a crooked smile circled above Luna’s head, much like the crow in the nine card. “It could be—”
Jorden lifted a hand. “Don’t tell me.”
The next two cards were the moon and the five of cups.
Luna smiled at the moon until she saw Jorden’s face.
“There is a period of calm and in that you’re going to be reminded of old pain, regret. Someone you lost is going to resurface, either in your memories or in person.”
None of this was feeling good.
“Whatever is going to happen, the only way out of it is through.”
And then the card Luna least wanted to see came immediately followed by another.
“The death card,” she muttered.
Only Jorden was smiling. “This is the death of the old pain. And this . . .” She tapped the ace of cups. “This is a new beginning. You can put whatever all this old shit is aside. But the old pain has to be addressed first.”
Jorden sat back and met Luna’s gaze. “You’re worried,” she said.
“None of this sounds easy.”
“Transformation is seldom easy. A caterpillar turning into a butterfly is bound to feel pain. But imagine being a bug that is easy to step on suddenly being liberated to fly. The pain is worth it.”
Luna moaned. “So right now, I’m the caterpillar.”
Jorden winced. “Do you feel like one?”
“I don’t know.”
“Your questions were about your lousy luck, will you get your car back, will the insurance company pay. If there was a simple yes or no to that, what do you think the cards suggested?”
Luna hated that she knew the answer. “I’m not getting shit back.”
“And did you think that was the case before you walked in today?”
Luna leaned her head on the back of the chair in defeat. “Yes. Statistically the car is already toast. Insurance companies are notorious for not paying for what the car is worth to replace.”
“The subconscious mind knew these answers. The cards just shed light on them.” She paused. “Now . . . who is he?”
“Who is who?”
“The person who wasn’t your brother that you thought of.”
Luna lifted her head. “Nate.”
Those damn gray sweatpants.
“A lover?”
“What? No! He’s just . . . We just started working together.”
“Just work?”
Luna didn’t know Jorden enough to read her, but the smirk definitely gave off the I don’t believe you vibe.
“It’s not what you think. I was talking to him on the phone, about work, when I discovered my car had been jacked. He came to the airport and picked me up.”
“That’s it?”
“Well . . . no, he—” Dammit, Luna couldn’t say what had happened the night before without looking at the knight card face up on the desk.
“My brother suggested that the car thieves might come by the house. The car has my address in the GPS, phone numbers. Nate stayed the night. On the couch,” she said quickly.
“He’s a private investigator. Armed, PI. ”
“Is Nate single?”
“Yes.”
“Attractive?”
Gray sweatpants!
“Yes. But no. I’m not . . . we’re not. There’s no way anything can evolve.”
“You sure about that?”
Luna narrowed her eyes. “Are you a psychic or therapist?”
“I’d make more money as a therapist,” Jorden said.
“Listen, I’m not saying Nate is your knight.
You’re the one that thought of him. All of this turmoil .
. .” She patted the first few cards. “And then this calm followed by even more is going to be worth it. My advice to you would be to be patient with yourself. Trust your intuition but don’t be afraid of a shift in your reality.
” She lifted the death card. “Something has to die before it’s reborn.
Like flowers in the winter. Right now is your winter.
Spring will be here before you know it.”
Miley was huddled over a book talking to Brianna when Luna and Jorden walked out of the room.
Miley smiled. “You’re getting your car back?”
“No.”
“Then why are you smiling?”
“Because I’m turning into a butterfly.”
Luna glanced at Jorden and they both started to laugh.