Page 19 of Knot Your Karma (Not Yours #1)

Karma

Adrian’s coffee mug sits on my kitchen counter like evidence of a crime I didn’t know I was committing, which honestly sums up my entire life right now.

Sandalwood and pine cling to the kitchen air like the world’s most dangerous aromatherapy session, threading through my vanilla candles and old wood until I catch myself actually purring like some kind of satisfied cat, which is definitely not helping my I’m a professional antique dealer image.

The scent combination feels dangerously like home—like belonging—and that’s exactly the problem.

Declan’s business card lies next to Reed’s forgotten pen, while Adrian’s mug still holds traces of warmth and that grounding scent. Evidence of three different men scattered across my kitchen like breadcrumbs leading straight to emotional disaster.

“Okay, that’s it,” I announce to the empty kitchen, my voice echoing off Grandmother’s restored cabinets. “This situation officially requires wine. Emergency wine. The kind that justifies drinking directly from the bottle while having a complete emotional breakdown. ”

I pull my grandmother’s vintage Bordeaux from the rack—the good stuff I’ve been saving for a special occasion. Well, discovering you’re apparently compatible with an entire pack while actively deceiving them about grand theft compass definitely qualifies as special. Horrible, but special.

The cork stares back at me smugly.

I don’t have a corkscrew.

“Seriously?” I ask the bottle, holding it up to the light like it might reveal hidden opening mechanisms. “Tonight? You’re going to make me work for this tonight?”

My hands shake as I yank open kitchen drawers, searching through the chaos of utensils my grandmother collected over forty years. Wooden spoons, cake servers, that weird thing that’s either for olives or torture—everything except the one tool I need to survive this emotional crisis.

I attack the cork with a butter knife, but it crumbles under pressure—chunks breaking off and floating in dark wine like tiny pieces of my self-control.

Cork confetti scatters across my counter, mocking my inability to handle basic adult tasks.

“Come on,” I mutter, switching to a dinner fork that bends against the stubborn cork.

“I have been emotionally devastated twice today. I had a life-changing kiss by one alpha, an almost-kiss with a beta, and developed feelings for another alpha who can pick locks and makes coffee like it’s perfectly normal behavior.

The least you can do is open so I can drink my feelings about it. ”

The fork slips, nearly taking off my palm in the process.

I grab a screwdriver from the junk drawer and start working it into what’s left of the stubborn cork. This is what my life has come to—performing wine bottle surgery with hardware tools while three men who could be perfect for me are probably discussing the family heirloom I stole.

The screwdriver gets stuck halfway through the resistant cork .

“Oh, come ON!” I shout at the bottle like it’s personally responsible for every bad decision I’ve made since meeting Declan. “What did I ever do to you? I have treated you with nothing but respect!”

I’m yanking on the screwdriver with both hands, my knuckles white from gripping the handle, when my phone rings. I lunge for it without letting go of the bottle, managing to answer while still wrestling with my cork situation.

“Hello?” I gasp, slightly out of breath from wine combat.

Destiny’s voice sharpens immediately. “Okay, what’s wrong? And don’t tell me nothing, because you sound like you’re either having a medical emergency or attempting home improvement that’s going catastrophically wrong.”

“I’m fine!” I insist, giving the screwdriver another violent twist. The cork moves approximately half a millimeter. “I’m having a perfectly normal evening doing perfectly normal wine accessibility activities?—”

THUNK.

The screwdriver finally breaks free, but without the cork. I now have a wine bottle with a screwdriver-sized hole and a cork that’s definitely not coming out intact.

“Karma Rose, what the hell are you doing?”

“Wine,” I admit, abandoning all pretense and attacking the cork with pliers that screech against glass. “I am attempting to access wine for emotional processing purposes, and it’s not going well. Just a minor alcohol accessibility issue that may require power tools.”

“Why do you need emergency wine access?”

CRACK.

Half the cork disappears into the bottle with a wet plop. I now have wine contaminated with cork debris and no way to reach it without industrial filtration equipment.

“More like the gorgeous alpha brought backup, and now I have three different attractions to three different men, and I can’t figure out if my omega brain is broken or if this is what happens when you’ve been emotionally starved for attention, and also I’m still lying to all of them about the compass, and?—”

“Hold up. Three men?”

“Three gorgeous, complicated men.” I give up on the wine and start pacing around my kitchen, bare feet slapping against cold tile, phone pressed to my ear like a lifeline to sanity.

“Declan, who makes me feel safe in a way that’s probably codependent considering I’ve known him for two days.

Reed, who caught me falling off a ladder and then helped me organize my office.

And Adrian, who showed up at my house in the rain looking like every omega fantasy about protective alphas, and when I attacked him thinking he was a burglar, he just.. . handled it.”

Silence stretches across the connection. I can hear Destiny processing this information, coffee machine hissing in the background mixing with rain against windows.

“You attacked him?” she asks finally.

“I tackled him in my front yard and kneed him twice because I thought he was trying to break into my house.” I stare at my ruined wine bottle, cork debris floating like tiny islands of my incompetence.

“Then he picked my lock and made coffee, and we talked about old buildings and maritime antiques, and Destiny, I think I might be falling for all three of them simultaneously, which seems like the kind of thing that requires professional therapy or at least really good wine.”

“Honey, are you having a panic attack?”

“No, I’m having a wine access emergency. There’s a difference.”

“There’s really not.” I hear movement—keys jingling, a door closing with solid finality. “I’m coming over.”

“You don’t have to?—”

“Mija, I’m already halfway there. Stay on the phone.”

So I tell her everything while pacing between kitchen and living room like a caged animal.

About Reed’s ladder rescue and the way he made me feel worth taking care of.

About Declan’s kiss during my panic attack and how his scent makes my omega brain go quiet and focused.

About Adrian’s storm-gray eyes and the way he listened to me talk about antiques like what I was saying actually mattered.

“And the worst part,” I continue, watching lightning illuminate sheets of rain in brief silver moments, “is that they’re all different.

Reed makes me laugh and feel safe enough to be spontaneous.

Declan makes me want to be protected and taken care of.

Adrian makes me want to be understood and valued for who I actually am. ”

“That doesn’t sound like the worst part,” Destiny says, her footsteps quickening on wet pavement, splashing through puddles with determined strides. “That sounds like you’ve found three people who complement different parts of your personality.”

“But I’m supposed to pick one! Normal omegas pick one person and bond with them and live happily ever after! They don’t collect entire packs like rare maritime antiques!”

“Says who? And where does it say you’re supposed to be normal?” Destiny asks.

Lightning flashes again, illuminating a figure hurrying up my front walk—Destiny, hood pulled up, moving like she’s personally offended by weather that dares to slow her down.

“I have to go let you in,” I say.

“We’re going to figure this out. All of it. Including the wine situation.”

I hurry to the front door, unlocking it just as Destiny reaches the porch. She’s soaked despite her rain jacket, black hair with auburn highlights escaping from her hood in wet curls, but she’s holding something triumphantly.

A corkscrew.

“I heard the wine emergency through the phone,” she announces, stepping into my hallway and shaking off rain like a very determined cat, water droplets scattering across Grandmother’s restored tile.

“Grabbed this from my kitchen and came to save you from whatever disaster you were creating with power tools.”

“You brought a corkscrew.”

“I brought a corkscrew because I know you, and I know that when you’re emotionally spiraling, you turn into a disaster magnet who somehow forgets basic life skills.

” She pulls off her jacket with practiced ease, and her warm cinnamon scent immediately wraps around me like familiar armor.

“Now show me what you did to that poor wine bottle.”

In the kitchen, Destiny takes one look at my wine disaster and starts laughing—not mean laughter, but fond amusement that comes from years of friendship with someone who specializes in creative chaos.

“Oh, honey,” she says, shaking her head, “this is advanced-level wine desperation. What did you use, a power drill?”

“Screwdriver and pliers. I was being resourceful.”

“Of course you were.” She moves to the counter beside me, close enough that her warmth steadies some of my shaking.

Opening cabinets with familiarity, she pulls out fine-mesh strainer and clean dish towel.

“We can save this. But first, I need dry clothes, and the full story about these three men who have scrambled your brain so thoroughly that you forgot how wine bottles work.”