“Zach is offering to sell me his part of the construction business,” Daisy blurted as she wound a ribbon around her crown.
“Seriously?” Nora asked.
“Yes. But I’ve been hesitant to say yes because it feels ... wrong. He’s the one who invested his money into the company.”
“But you spent years helping to keep it running,” Soraya pointed out.
“True.” Daisy started to weave in a second ribbon.
“You have to take it,” Nora said. “You just have to.”
Daisy looked into the fire, and a slow smile crossed her face. “Okay. As soon as he’s out of the hospital and back in the office, I’ll let Jonathan know.Ifyou’ll help me with my hostile takeover.”
Nora clapped her hands together. “Oh, Daisy, I was born for hostile takeovers.”
When Soraya completed her first crown, she put it on her head and stood up, twirling in a circle, her damp dress and ribbons swirling around. Nora finished hers and stood up, joining Soraya, spinning and twirling in front of the flames. They were shortly followed by Daisy. They grabbed each other’s hands and spun in a circle, the flame serving as a backdrop, until they separated and flung their arms up in the air. Nora felt exhilarated. She felt brave. She felt like she had shed twenty years’ worth of baggage today. She could still laugh. She could still be a fool. Maybe for the first time, she could believe she was magic.
I have the love I deserve.
She felt it. Coming from the earth, coming from the flames, coming from her friends.
There was love all around her.
She wasn’t alone.
With Ben out of her life, she wasn’t alone.
With Sam angry at her, she wasn’t alone.
She was surrounded by friends. By their strength.
Their support.
Their joy.
They collapsed into their chairs, laughing, breathless, and Daisy picked up her glass of wine and held it up. “The next time Aggie asks when we were wild, we can tell her it was today.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Daisy
Men cling to false power, money, and status. It is not the highest power. But it can be used against them.
—Rules for Witches
The morning that she signed the papers to buy out Zach’s 51 percent of the business, she slid a penny across the table, and he slid the contract back toward her.
“This is the hottest thing that’s ever happened.” She stared at the paperwork.
Though, truthfully, it was much more than hot. It was something that felt dangerously like a partnership.
She wasn’t supposed to want more from him. But he was so good. Something she really hadn’t expected out of her gorgeous, ill-advised fling.
Shouldn’t the hot actor from your teenage fantasies be good for nothing other than multiple orgasms? He was good for that. Last night, he’d joined her in the shower and covered her mouth so her screams wouldn’t frighten the children while he did things to her she’d never even imagined were possible. Then he’d gotten up early and made pancakes for everybody.
It was intoxicating, and far too tempting to believe that it could be something.
But it was silly to fall for somebody this soon after splitting up from the man she’d been with all her life. The responsible thing to do would be to be single for a good long while.
