Page 1 of Carnal Magic
1
I’d inherited a freakingmountain.
Evidently Great Grandmother Martha Redwine had left an entire mountain to me named after our family. I never even heard of the woman.
Crazy, right?
The catch: Redwine Mountain was in bumfuck Arkansas.
I craned my neck to scan the hilly horizon, wondering which one of those rocky piles was actually mine. I’d envisioned a tall, magnificent peak, but these mountains were more like steep, forested hills with deep valleys in between.
As I drove down yet another winding road, a small town appeared on either side of the narrow blacktop. A sign welcomed me to Sweetbriar Hollow. According to Google, this was the closest town to my grandmother’s home. Though I’d hardly call a few buildings and a church a town. If I’d blinked, I would have missed my stop entirely.
The last building on the right looked to have been built before the Civil War. A sign hung on the lower level of the two-story red-brick building.Woodward Law Firm, which managed Great Grandma Martha’s estate.
I turned off the main road and pulled around behind the building to park in a small gravel lot. There was only one other vehicle, a Cadillac Escalade, which might have been pearly white underneath all the dust. I pushed my car door open and slowly got out, groaning and stretching my back. My poor knees ached too. It’d been a long drive from New Orleans. Hopefully this trip wouldn’t be a complete waste of time, though I honestly had no idea what to expect.
A few bungalow-style houses lined the opposite street. An older-looking woman sat in a rocking chair on the porch of the closest house. She leaned forward to get a good look at me, and I was pretty sure she was on the phone, probably gossiping with one of her friends.
I blew her a kiss and waved before turning around to stride proudly toward the door. I’d dealt with plenty of busybody ladies, clutching their pearls when I wore my favorite witchy clothes or when my gay mother and her partner kissed in public. Times had definitely changed—but there were still people who liked to gasp and whisper. Especially in such a rural area.
Might as well give them a damned good show with something really juicy to talk about.
The inside of the building had been renovated thirty years ago with what had probably been classy at the time. Now it just looked sad and cheap. The building had good bones though, with high tin-covered ceilings and original trim around the windows and doors. Dark wood paneling made the room feel like a cave, which wasn’t helped in the slightest by the windows on the rear wall.
“May I help you?” A pretty brunette asked behind a heavy antique desk.
“I’m Arwena Redwine. I have an appointment to see Mr. Woodward.”
“Oh, yes. I’ll let him know—”
A balding man in his thirties stepped out of his office. “Thank you, honey. I heard the door. Please come in, Miss Redwine.”
Honey? I hoped he was married to or dating her and wasn’t just a misogynistic pig. I didn’t care if he was the best attorney in the state or how long he’d worked for the Redwines. I’d fire his ass before he could say “honey” again.
He held the door for me and shut it once I stepped inside the even darker cave of his office. I blinked, trying to get my eyes to adjust to the gloom. The secretary’s desk outside was larger than this cubicle, and every inch was stuffed with books and memorabilia. Tacky golden baseball trophies, old ribbons, signed balls in clear covers, plaques, plus tons of dusty old law books.
“Pardon the mess,” he said, catching my eye. “My main office is in Little Rock, but I do drive back up to Sweetbriar Hollow on Fridays to work out of my grandfather’s original office.”
It took me a moment to realize he meant the town’s name, since he pronounced it,“Sweetbar Holler.”
“Oh,” I replied slowly. “Was he Great Grandmother Martha’s attorney?”
Grinning, he sat behind the desk. “He sure was, and you can probably tell that he was quite the baseball player back in the day.” He put on a pair of glasses and reached down to heave a large banker’s box onto the desk between us. “I’ve got all the Redwine documentation ready for you to look at if you’d like.”
My eyes widened as he pulled out fat accordion folders and several long black booklets. I wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d unrolled a parchment scroll next.
“These are income and expense books dating back to 1952.” He flipped one open, showing me neat columns of numbers. “When I took over, I moved the bookkeeping to digital, but Amy can print out whatever you’d like to look at.”
I grimaced, leaning closer to look at the numbers. Hundreds and thousands of dollars moved across the page, but nothing large. Which was fine, really. I hadn’t expected to inherit anything. I lived quite comfortably in New Orleans thanks to Mama and Keneesha’s shop, though I hadn’t bought my own house yet. I had the money saved for a down payment. I just hadn’t found the right place.
Or maybe subconsciously I’d known about this land waiting in Arkansas.
The thought made me huff with disgust. I’d never in a million years consider moving so far away from where I’d grown up, let alone to the middle of nowhere. Though I couldn’t deny the kernel of anticipation humming inside me.
While I was raised by a witch to be a witch, I found most of what we did more performative than spiritual. I’d grown up running around my parents’Mystic Magick Shoppelearning about the properties of herbs and crystals. All great information that I’d soaked up like a sponge. But I also felt like a fraud. None of it really resonated with me. I one hundred percent believed in magic and my mothers’ abilities.
But I’d never had a personal magical experience.
