Mairwen gave Jessa a look she didn’t quite understand.“Ye enjoy cooking, do ye?”
“I enjoy dabbling.Sometimes my experiments end up outside for the strays, and I eat peanut butter and jelly.”
“Strays?”
“She feeds every cat, dog, raccoon, and any other creature that shows up hungry on her doorstep,” Emily said before selecting another shortbread cookie and dipping it in her tea.She ducked her head.“And I should not have said that.Sorry.”
“Why?”Mairwen asked.
“Because it makes me sad,” Jessa said, her bright mood dipping with thoughts about the troubles back home.“The neighbors promised to feed everyone while I was in Scotland, but I don’t think they’ll do it after I move.”
“They will,” Emily said with a squeeze of her arm.“Mrs.Garducci always keeps her word.”
“I know.I’m going to miss having her as a neighbor.”
“People come into our lives and then leave once we’ve learned what we are meant to learn from them,” Mairwen said, her tone gentle but firm.“All we can do is cherish the memories we make with them while they are with us.”
“Brighten up now,” Emily told Jessa.“It’s your favorite sort of day, raining buckets.We’re here in Scotland, and we’re about to enjoy what I’m sure will be a phenomenal massage.”
“That it will be.”Mairwen nodded.“Phenomenal and then some.”
“And then a dip in the healing waters for good luck and help in finding my Mr.MacSexy,” Jessa said, determined to enjoy the day and not wallow in self-pity.
Mairwen laughed.“I dinna believe I am familiar with that clan.Are they reported to live in the Highlands?”
Jessa pulled out her phone, tapped on the app, then tapped again until her handsome, broody Highlander glowered at her.She showed him to Mairwen.“This is Mr.MacSexy, and I’m trying to find him because he keeps popping up as a match for me on this tarot dating app.You wouldn’t happen to know him, would you?”
“Ahh.”Mairwen nodded her approval.“Very bonnie indeed.”Then she tilted her head and eyed Jessa.“And he listed his name asMr.MacSexy?”
“No, that’s the name Ems and I gave him because there was no name or profile for him.”Jessa closed the app and tucked her phone back into the tiny crossbody bag she always used when she traveled.“Seriously, you wouldn’t happen to know him, would you?”As soon as the question left her lips for the second time, she felt silly.Just because Mairwen lived in Scotland didn’t mean she knew every person there.Jessa laughed away the notion.“Never mind.He’s probably an AI image built into the app by Scotland’s tourism board or something.”
“A…I?”
“Artificial intelligence.These days, it’s hard to tell what’s real and what’s not.”
Mairwen laughed.“I leave those things to Keeva.She’s better suited to them than I am.”She nodded at the windows while motioning for them to follow her through the door behind the bar.“Come.The rain has let up to a wee drizzle.Ye willna get too wet getting to my truck.I’m parked in the back alleyway.”
“We need to pay Lilias.”Jessa rooted through her tiny bag for a ten pound note as she hopped off the stool.
“She’s already put it on yer accounts.”Mairwen shooed them along like a mother duck keeping her ducklings in a row.“She had to pop into her office and settle up with the delivery lad from the distillery.She sent her best wishes that ye enjoy the waters.”
They followed Mairwen through the narrow kitchen with its gleaming stainless steel counters, the dry goods pantry that was heady with the nose-tingling aroma of spices, and then on into the back storage room that held crates and barrels of spirits strategically stacked to the rafters.
“Wow,” Jessa said.“I didn’t realize this place was so big.It doesn’t look like it from the outside.”
“Looks can be deceiving,” Mairwen said without slowing.“Here we are.”She pushed open the back door and held it.A hard wind gusted against the door, making her brace and lean against it to keep it open.“Hurry, ladies.”
Then the lively old woman muttered something so deep and low that Jessa couldn’t make it out.It sounded like an ancient language, and yet it struck a chord, niggling at a memory just out of reach and making her feel as though she’d heard those words before.Chills rippled across her.Every hair stood on end.She shook off the feeling.It must be static electricity from the storm, and Mairwen was probably cursing at the wind and didn’t want them to overhear any Scottish profanity.
“Hurry into the truck, ladies.The skies won’t hold back long.”Mairwen pointed them at a rusty red truck with a missing headlight.“And mind the door once ye’re in.Ye have to slam it hard to make sure it catches.”
Jessa climbed in first.As the shortest, it would be easiest for her to sit with her feet propped on the hump between the driver and passenger floorboards.Emily’s long legs would hook over her ears if she had to sit in the middle.That mental image had Jessa snickering while Emily repeatedly slammed the door, trying to get it to stay shut.
“Put some ire into it, lass,” Mairwen said as she climbed in behind the wheel and banged her door closed.“Think of it as the last person who crossed ye.”
With a loud bang, the door caught and stayed shut.Emily grinned and waggled her eyebrows.“Thank you, Jack Ass Jeremy.”
“Emily!”Jessa rolled her eyes but still laughed.
