Goddess for Hire Read Online Free PDF Page B

warmth inside me seethed into pure intense power. My nerve endings were buzzing.
    The wind swelled with hurricane force. It was all I could do to keep on standing, but I felt better than I ever had in my life. Laughter spilled from my mouth, and the wind carried the sound until it echoed all around me.
    I was sheer energy. I was light.
    I was invincible.
    Then, like tendrils of a venomous creeper, an image of Kali I’d glimpsed in one of the books slowly spread through my mind. Dark, fierce, holding a bloodstained sword in one hand, and a decapitated man’s head in the other. Threads of cartilage hung where his neck used to be.
    â€œNo!”
    My hands fell to my side. In haste, I jumped back from the water and fell hard against the sand. “Stop!” I didn’t know who or what I was talking to.
    I only hoped someone was listening.
    My adrenaline rush of atomic proportions was swallowed up by sheer panic. What if I’d opened some sort of Pandora’s box? What if I’d unleashed an unstoppable force?
    But the wind died down to nothing, the sky cleared, and the surface of the water was once again calm.
    Whoa.
    If Starbucks bottled a jolt like that, they’d make millions.
    Oh right, they already had.
    Hours passed, and the sun hovered along the rim of blue. I continued to sit, watching the water gently caress the sand. I didn’t try the womb-tomb exercise again. There were now some scattered surfers paddling out into the ocean, and I didn’t think they’d appreciate tsunami-force waves, even if they did manage to catch the ride of their lives, literally.
    The more I thought about what happened, the less strange it began to feel. It wasn’t just the surreal nature of it all. With that power inside me, everything had felt so—right. Like all the pieces inside of me finally clicked together.
    God, I was starting to sound like New Age guru Deepak Chopra. But maybe people like Deepak had itright? There was another world beyond this world. A world I had neither seen nor believed existed, until now.
    Besides, there was a Mehra family reunion coming up in a few months, and I was curious about what else I could do.
    Standing, I dusted the sand from my jeans and slowly walked back to the car. Retrieving my purse from the passenger seat, I pulled out my cell phone along with the paper Ram had given me and began dialing.
    Oprah always said every woman was a goddess…
    As the phone began to ring, I knew exactly what I was going to ask Ram first—
    How much did this job pay anyway?

Chapter 13
    RAM WANTED to meet immediatel.
    I called home, left a message on the answering machine that I was having dinner with a friend, and hung up. Both my parents had cell phones but I wasn’t about to call them and deal with potential questions. Tonight, Mom, Dad, and their guest could have a nice quiet dinner without me. Sooner or later Tahir would criticize the food or the furniture, and my parents would see the man for the ass he was.
    Around seven I pulled up outside the Woodbridge apartment complex in Irvine. Ram was waiting outside, wearing orange robes as usual. I imagined he had quite a few of them hanging in his closet.
    With anticipation I watched him approach the car. What was going to happen next? What would he teach me? He took a seat, and I caught a whiff of sandalwood. He’d also added a necklace of wooden beads.
    â€œWhere to?” I asked.
    â€œSanjay says there is a very good restaurant just down the lane. Why not go there?”
    Not exactly the exciting beginning I’d imagined, but I was the student, and he was the teacher. I drove slowly down the street, keeping an eye out for restaurants.
    â€œThere! There!” He pointed excitedly. “That is the one!”
    The familiar neon sign featured two words. I turned to him. “You can’t be serious. Taco Bell?”
    â€œYes, yes, it is Sanjay’s favorite place.”
    â€œOkay…”
    I