Read Karma (Karma Series) for Free Online

and headed out to...who the hell knows?
    I saw Hank waiting out front , with the stretch Mercedes, as I shut and locked the condo.
    “ So, boss, where we heading?” I asked once I'd gotten in the car.
    “ Work.” Harold settled into the other seat and was nose deep in papers before I could get my next question out. Harold wasn't much of a talker.
    I took the opportunity to get my own head together. Today was the first day I actually felt like myself and if I wanted to get through the rest of this month, there were certain things I couldn't do. Seeing my parents was one of them. That had been a huge mistake. I was stuck for now and I had to remain calm about t he situation, and work within its confines, until I got out of here. I'm a logical, sane woman. I could handle this.
    One internal pep talk and fifteen minut es later, the Mercedes pulled into the lot of an unassuming three-story office building. I got out of the car and took in the average structure on Highway Seventeen. I'd driven past this exact location hundreds, maybe thousands, of times in my life and never given it a second glance.
    “ This is work?” I slapped my hand against the brick. “This is where the powers of the almighty universe reside?”
    “ Yes.”
    When we approached the door, it had one of those black boards that listed all the residents hanging on the wall next to it. I read through the list quickly. It included everything from an accountant's office, counselor, and a dentist on the third, exactly what I'd expect from a structure like this.
    “Here?” I turned from the board to Harold, who was already waiting for me just inside the door. “This is where work is? The universe and all that? Just sitting in an innocuous office building, on regular road, in the middle of South Carolina?”
    “ Yes, our offices reside within this building.”
    “ Then how was I going to live in Texas?”
    “ Commute.”
    “ From Texas?”
    “ Yes.”
    He pointed to the lettering on the large glass windows framing the door above him. “This building is owned by UFU, LLC. If you looked that name up on Google, UFU stands for Units for Use, LLC, but the real name is Unknown Forces of the Universe.”
    He stopped talking abruptly and moved inside. Harold wasn't much of a teacher. If he were human, I'd think he might be diagnosed as having som e sort of social disability.
    I circled through the doors after him into the average looking, if slightly dingy, lobby. The dark brown tile gave me the impression it hadn't been decorated since the seventies, and not well even then.
    We made a left when we hit the carpeted hallway. We passed an ancient looking elevator that made me glad it looked like we were on the first floor and proceeded past several doors.
    “ You might be tempted to visit other offices, but I would discourage that.”
    “ Why?” I had no intention of visiting, but you couldn't have a statement like that thrown out there and not ask why. Well, some people could, but my life was about knowing every detail of a situation. Being dead hadn't changed me much.
    “ Until you know what you're dealing with, it's inadvisable.”
    He stopped at the final door at the end of the corridor. The plaque by the entrance read “Life Management Associates.”
    We walked into a typica l looking waiting room. It had chairs that looked like they'd actually been used and tables littered with fliers that read “Be the best you, you can be!” and “Find your passion, unlock your future!”
    “ This is Trudy.” Harold pointed to the young redheaded female sitting behind the Formica desk—another fabulous piece leftover from the rocking 70s décor—in the front room who looked to be barely eighteen.
    We smiled at each other in greeting as I followed him to an interior door across the room. He held it open and I walked into a space that could've belonged to any small company. If I had to make a movie set for an office scene, this was exactly what I'd make it look