Total pages in book: 111
Estimated words: 105748 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 529(@200wpm)___ 423(@250wpm)___ 352(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 105748 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 529(@200wpm)___ 423(@250wpm)___ 352(@300wpm)
Scowling at what that probably meant, I opened my mouth to question my daughter, but Taran cut me off. “Romantasy is fantasy and romance put together. It just means they’re fantasy books that are heavy on the romance.”
For a moment, I just stared at her.
Taran Macbeth was talking to me. Actually having a conversation with me. It took me a minute to respond. “And by romance, you mean …”
Her full lips twitched, pressing together lushly in a way that was very, very distracting. My gaze dropped to her mouth for perhaps a moment too long because Taran suddenly swallowed nervously and looked away to take a bite out of her sandwich.
I dragged my attention back to Heather.
She studied me and Taran. Then she grinned cockily. “It means the characters fall in love and have hot sex, Dad. The books have hot sex in them.”
“Aw, yuck!” Angus wrinkled his nose. “Don’t ruin this sandwich for me.”
No one was surprised Angus knew what sex referred to. When you grew up on an island where farm animals could be spotted copulating outside your window, you learned these things quickly.
At Taran’s chuckle, my son grinned.
Taran sucked in a breath suddenly and gave Angus a pained smile in return.
I wondered at that response. Wanted desperately to know what was going on in her head.
“So, Taran, do you miss Glasgow?” Heather asked, changing the subject before I could grill her more about her reading material. It was hard for me to reconcile my wee girl was technically not a wee girl anymore. “I mean, I think I’d find it really hard to come back here after living in the city.”
Those words hurt because I would have given anything for my kids to want to live and work in Leth Sholas. I wanted its simple attractions to appeal to them as much as it did to me.
I wanted my kids to want to be near me.
Just like I’d wanted Taran to want the same thing all those years ago.
Frankly, I wasn’t sure I could bear to hear her answer my daughter’s question.
4. Taran
May, Twenty-Nine Years Ago
Iwanted to hide.
Dad was gone and never coming back, and Mum was acting strange. When she looked at me, it was like she was looking through me. Like she wasn’t there. It was really scary. It was scary enough with Dad gone. I couldn’t stop crying. I wanted to. But it felt like that time when Mum and Dad took us to the mainland, and I got lost when we were in a big shop. No one’s face was familiar, and I didn’t know where to go. I thought I’d never see Mum and Dad again. I did, though. They found me.
Now Dad couldn’t find me.
He’d died.
He had a block in his heart no one knew about, Laird said.
I didn’t understand. Dad had the best heart ever.
Mrs. McQuarrie’s living room was filled with lots of folks. Our neighbors. Friends.
They kept coming up to Mum and speaking in quiet voices. She looked right through them, just like she looked right through me. Yesterday was my birthday, but she’d forgotten. Everyone had forgotten. I wasn’t mad. I didn’t care about my birthday if Dad wasn’t here. But I was scared. It wasn’t like Mum to forget me. Laird sat next to her, holding her hand, which was weird because he usually got grumpy when Mum tried to hold his hand. She said he was such a teenager. The last week, though, he’d been nicer. Still bossy. But nicer.
I wish he’d hold my hand.
I wiped at the wetness on my cheeks, even though more spilled out of my eyes.
“Enough of that.” Ms. Crookshaw stomped her cane in front of me, making me jump.
She lived next door and was always blaming Laird whenever her cat went missing.
Laird never touched her cat.
Her cat kept running away because its owner was Ms. Crookshaw.
She terrified me. I always darted past her house because if she saw us, she would shout for being too close to her garden.
Ms. Crookshaw was dressed all in black like everyone else, but it was in her usual uniform of trousers, shirt, and thick cardigan. She bent her wrinkly face to me and slammed her cane down on the floor again.
“I said, enough of that.” Her spittle flecked on my cheek. “The last thing your mother needs is you crying like a wee bairn all the time. You need to be strong now, lassie. Your faither isna coming back, so noo it’s up to you and Laird to look after your mither. I said enough.”
I wiped frantically at my tears, wishing I could disappear because they wouldn’t stop.
“Children today.” She tsked. “Spoiled brats, the lot of you. Now is the time your mettle is tested. No crying. You should be home making sure the house is fit for your grieving mither to return to. Have you been looking after the house?”