Page 32 of Bedding the Baby Daddy

“Oh, yeah. It’s a healing crystal. But yours won’t work right now.”

“Why not?”

“Well,” Aurora rose, held out her hand to Michelle to help the little girl up. “Crystals have energy fields. And so do you. And crystals can kind of be used like energy soap, to clean up your energy field.”

“Cool.” Michelle’s eyes were huge and riveted on Aurora. When Aurora glanced his way, she could see that Dante’s eyes were riveted on her as well. She swallowed hard, naturally resistant to sharing this part of herself that she normally kept close to her heart, but she’d already piqued Michelle’s interest. Plus she wanted Michelle to get the healing qualities of the crystal, so…

“If you use one crystal to clean too many things, or if you wear it for a long time without cleaning it, it gets kind of dirty itself,” she explained.

“Like if you use a rag to dust too many shelves, the rag gets all dirty.”

“Exactly.” Aurora brushed the little girl’s messy hair back from her face in an absent gesture. “So right now your crystal has all sorts of energetic grit and grime. We have to cleanse it if you wanna keep wearing it.”

“How?”

“Well, my mother uses sage smoke, but I don’t suppose you have any of that.” Aurora raised an eyebrow at Dante and he raised one right back. “Well, in a pinch there are a few other things you can do. Clear, fresh, running water is one or dirt where something new is growing. Like a garden.”

“We don’t have one.”

“Alright, then the last resort is moonlight.”

“Really?” Michelle was vibrating on her feet.

“Sure. You find a patch of moonlight and lay it there all night, and in the morning it will be safe to wear again.”

Michelle was off like a shot, unclasping her necklace and flipping off the lights so that she could locate the best patch of moonlight.

“Where’d you learn all that?” Dante asked gently before tugging Aurora onto the couch next to him.

She shrugged. “My mother is Louisiana Creole. Born in the bayou and then lived in New Orleans most of her life. She has a different set of beliefs and understandings than you Northerners do. But it’s not that uncommon down there.”

“If I don’t believe a word of it is she going to take a lock of my hair, sew it to a doll and prick it with a pin?”

Aurora frowned at him. “She’s not Voodoo. Or Hoodoo.”

“What the hell is Hoodoo?”

Aurora threw her hands in the air. “Google it for fuck sakes. I’m just saying that my mother is not crazy. And neither am I.”

Dante stilled for a second. Well, most of him stilled. His hand, however, kept tracing patterns on the silky skin of her thigh. “So you believe it too. That wasn’t just for Michelle’s benefit.”

Aurora sighed. Sometimes she missed New Orleans so much she could barely breathe. This would never be something she’d have to explain on a date down there. “It’s easy to believe in something that is real for you.”

He pulled back from her. “What do you mean ‘real’?”

Aurora dragged a hand down her face. “I don’t usually talk about this stuff to people who I want to see me as a competent business woman.”

“Aurora, I stopped thinking of you as just a competent business woman the night I fucked you against the steering wheel of my car.”

“Shhh.”

“If you’re asking whether or not I’m going to stop thinking you’re competent because you believe in mystical juju whatever, well, no. I won’t stop thinking you’re competent. As far as I’m concerned, you’re the engine behind that company.”

Her eyes narrowed on his, thoughtful. He really thought that she was that essential to Gio’s company?

“Alright, then,” Aurora said. “If you’re so eager to know, I just mean that I know energy like that is real because I can feel it, sense it. Auras are real because I can see them, sense them. You call it ‘belief’, but I call it ‘reality’.”

Dante narrowed his eyes just as Michelle’s bare feet slapped back into the room. “I did it. There was a big patch in the laundry room. How will I know if it’s clean in the morning?”

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