“And what were you doing?”
Ambia was going to love this. “I was an assistant for a street magician.” Harmony dropped her knees to the sides and crossed her ankles, settling in.
“Then you have to do it again.” Ambia clapped her hands excitedly. “You need to get your happy back.”
Harmony blinked in surprise. “I’ve been thinking the same thing. How weird is that?”
“It’s not weird. It’s the universe bringing together the elements that will set you on the path you were meant to follow.”
“Ihada plan, and it blew up.” Harmony rested her hands on her knees.
“Because that wasyourplan. Our lives are not our own—there are things we must accomplish, people we must love, and events we are to witness. If you step off the path, then heartache follows.”
Harmony squeezed her eyes shut. Was that what she’d done? Her parents had warned her away from Sam. Heck, Jenny hadn’t liked to double-date with him, though she’d never said why. A dozen other small signs popped into her head that she should have left Sam in her traveling dust and moved on long before he proposed.
If that was the case, then maybe she had been led to Breck. She hadn’t even been watching where she was going that day; she’d just followed the man in the black boots. She thought back to the video and couldn’t remember seeing him in it. Weird. “The magician offered me a part-time gig,” she said absently, still trying to remember where the man in the boots had disappeared to.
Ambia nodded sagely. “Of course he did. Because this is what you were meant to do.”
Okay, the whole conversation was making too much sense—especially coming from Ambia. “I need to think about this.”
“No.” Ambia covered Harmony’s hands with her own. “Listen to your heart. What does it want to do?”
Harmony paused, searching her feelings. “It wants to laugh again, to trust, to believe in something.”
Ambia lifted her hands, a look of triumph on her face. “There! You’ve communicated with your true self and received an answer.”
“I did?” She couldn’t remember having come to an actual conclusion.
Ambia stood and pulled Harmony to her feet. “You’ll call the magician and tell him yes.”
“I will?” The words settled into her heart like whipped cream on hot chocolate, warm and melty with goodness. “I will.”
“Wonderful. I feel very good about our performance review.”
So that’s what this was. Harmony bit back her snicker. Even as she mentally recoiled at the idea that anything that had happened in the last fifteen minutes was professional, she had to admit she felt better, clearer, and grounded. “Thanks, Ambia.”
Ambia pressed her palms together and bowed slightly.
Harmony left her standing in her doorway in that pose. She made her way to the break room and hit redial on her phone, needing to make this commitment now, while courage filled her veins. The sense of calm and understanding that came from Ambia’s confidence that this was the right path still flooded her system, and she didn’t want to chicken out.
“Hello?” Breck’s voice was so deep, it turned her insides to Christmas pudding.
“Breck, hey. This is Harmony.”
“Hi.”
She paused for a moment, her mind bringing up his handsome face and picturing a smile. Perhaps she’d even heard it in his greeting. Hurrying forward now, she said, “Listen, I’d like to change my mind—about helping you. I mean, I’d like to help you—with your show. If you still want me to.”
“That would be awesome.”
A smile tugged at her lips. His easy acceptance and obvious excitement could be a sign that she really was stepping onto the path she was meant to follow. “What did you have in mind?”
“Well, I have a couple of ideas, but I need a day to work them out. Can we meet somewhere on Thursday?”
Harmony’s neck relaxed. She hadn’t realized how worried she’d been that he’d say no—or that he’d ask about the “place” she’d been in only thirty minutes before that had her turning down his offer. He didn’t ask the uncomfortable question, and she didn’t volunteer the strange answer including colorful rocks. Which made her feel safe, like maybe Breck wasn’t out to score a date with her. “That would be great.”
They set up a time and place, and she hung up the phone. The peaceful feeling was still there, but the butterflies in her stomach didn’t listen. They were all aflutter. Meeting at a coffee shop felt an awful lot like a first date—the kind people do when they meet online. If everything goes well, then they agree to dinner.
