Read Online My Very Best Friend by Cathy Lamb - Free Book Online

on an island off the coast of Washington. I was vague about my job when they asked and started talking about the tomatoes I grew, three types, and my garden. I told them I had four cats and enjoyed studying the latest in science research and development. They asked if there were whales, and I said yes, many.
    In the end everyone left and it was Toran and I, and Silver Cat, who meowed.
    “I will pay you for your employees’ time.”
    “No, luv. It’s my favor to you.”
    “That’s against my feminist leanings.”
    “Your what?” His brow furrowed.
    “My feminist leanings. My feminists ideals. My belief system on what it means to be a woman independent of men, rebelling against a society that says women need to be paid for and taken care of.”
    “I hardly understood what you said, Charlotte, but it’s a gift, and we don’t need to talk about it anymore. Make me a pie in exchange. Here, let’s test your aim.” He reached down for a pile of cracked plates. We stood fifteen feet away from the bin.
    I glanced at the plates. They had naked women on them. “How can you eat staring at a crotch?” I muttered.
    Toran chuckled. “Well, I suppose it depends on whose it is.”
    I blushed.
    “But not these, for sure,” he said. “Toss ’em.”
    “I want you to take the money, Toran. It’s my house. I’ll pay to have it cleared.”
    “Make me a pie, as you did before. I love your pies. The best ever.”
    I admit I blushed with pride, then put my hands on my hips.
    “Don’t do that, Charlotte. I remember that expression from when you were younger. Stubborn. Accept a gift.”
    “That’s hard for me, especially from a man.”
    “You’re back in Scotland.” He grinned. “Let me be the man.”
    Let him be the man?
    He saw my hesitation. “I’m the man, you’re the woman, I pay to clean out your house.”
    “That’s not part of the rules.”
    “Aye, lass. I don’t like rules. But I do like you. Very much. Here, let’s have a throwing contest. I’ll bet I’ll win.”
    He knew that would get me. It always did when we were kids.
    I grabbed a naked girl crotch plate. Who would believe that tossing dishes into a bin would make me laugh so much.
    We threw plates, then cracked tea cups that said, “Bash Your Balls and Bagpipes.” Next we cracked bowls with women’s busts barely covered by Scottish tartans. Toran won every time, though I did try to calculate angle, length of toss, and wind velocity, of which there was little.
    “I will have to practice this,” I told him.
    “It’s rather fun, isn’t it? Takes your mind off things.”
    We stared at each other and he smiled, his blue eyes comparable to blue heat. The years fell away and we became who we were as kids: King Toran and Queen Charlotte. Two of the four rulers of the Enchanted Woods. Dragon Slayers. Evil Emperor Destroyers. Champions of the Scottish people. Enemies of a tyrannical King of England.
    “I’m glad you’re here, Charlotte.”
    “Me too.”
    He put a hand up. I placed my hand against his. “Let victory unite us,” we said, together.
    I blinked. It was still there.
    “We always knew what chant to say, Char.”
    “We did.” There had been many chants, but we repeatedly picked the same one.
    It had been uncanny how connected we were, but I had loved him as if he was part of my own soul.
    My soul had missed Toran.
     
    As I drove back to Toran’s, I thought about what I was doing. It would cost a fortune to remodel the house. It would be cheaper to bulldoze it and sell the land.
    I thought about flattening the house my great-grandfather built.
    I absolutely could not do it.
    I turned toward the green Play-Doh-like hills in the distance, now covered in nighttime’s shadows. Beyond them was the Mackintosh/Ramsay graveyard.
    It was where my father was buried. I would go and see my father at his grave, covered in daffodils and bluebells. I would go and pay my respects. Not yet, though.
    Not yet.
     
    In my field, romance writing,