Accidentaly Divine by Dakota Cassidy (best large ereader .TXT) 📗

She’d only mentioned her love of a turkey and swiss sandwich a couple of nights ago, when they’d all been talking about their favorite things.

But Marty must’ve heard her, and even though it probably appeared a small gesture to most, to George, it was enormous—it meant the world. Someone had remembered something she liked and had cared enough to take the time to listen. Someone had paid attention.

“I got you a peach Snapple,” Nina said, popping the top and setting it in the cupholder.

Another one of her favorites. “Thanks, guys,” she whispered, the warmth in her belly an unfamiliar but good feeling. She swallowed hard and fought the tears stinging her eyes. Blinking hard, George looked straight ahead and focused on driving.

“Now eat up, young lady!” Marty ordered with a giggle. “We can’t have an underweight guardian angel.”

She took a bite, munching on a sandwich prepared especially for her. “You know, Dex said I don’t need to eat. I can, but I don’t have to.”

The werewolf clucked her tongue. “Well, Mama Marty says if you enjoy it, and it’s calorie free, what better way to spend an eternity than eating the foods you love? Food is the universal language of love. People cook to show their friends and family they love them—”

“Or in Blondie’s case, they wanna fucking kill them,” Nina said on a cackle.

Marty flicked Nina’s hair. “Hush. So I’m not Gordon Ramsey—”

“You’re not even a GD Lean Cuisine.”

Marty laughed out loud. “You know what, you’re right, Vampira. I’m a crappy cook, but when I order takeout for Hollis and Keegan—or anyone, for that matter—I order it with love, baby. L-O-V-E-love. And if you’ll recall, when you had that moment in time when you lost your stinkin’ mind and you could eat, who made fifty-two thousand trips to Buffalo Wild Wings for you? Me, Night Dweller. That was me.”

“You lost your stinkin’ mind and ate chicken wings?” George asked with a giggle before taking a sip of her Snapple.

Nina popped her lips. “I wasn’t a vampire for like a fucking blip a couple of years ago. It’s a long damn story, but it had to do with a baby and Calamity, and a bunch of bullshit, and it was nice while it lasted, but yeah, I could eat.”

“Yeah, she could,” Marty snickered, covering her mouth with a gloved hand.

“Shut your piehole, Miss Clairol!”

George could sit and listen to these two women all day long. Add in Wanda and she was in Heaven, no pun intended. They argued, sure. They were chaos in Charlie’s-Angels-like packages, but they were the good kind of chaos. The kind that always had your back. The kind that would literally help you bury the body.

In her whole life, she’d never experienced that kind of loyalty—no one had ever put her first. She’d always seen it from afar, but never this up close, this in her face, and as she ate her sandwich and listened to Nina and Marty alternately razz each other, mingled with chatter about their children and husbands, George felt that lonely tug in her heart.

She felt the empty hole more deeply than she ever had before. And all she wanted to do was fill it up so it didn’t always hurt so much. Mind, she’d tried a million different ways. Parties, book clubs, rock climbing classes, yoga…you name it, she’d done it.

But she always ended up feeling like a misfit. Though, it explained why she threw herself headlong into everything she did—because she wanted to belong. She wanted to fit somewhere—anywhere. She wanted to fit the way these women fit—each other, their lives, their worlds.

And if it killed her, she was going to do her best to fit the role of a guardian, no pun intended again.

“Hey, looks like it’s up ahead, George,” Marty said, tapping the window with her nail before handing her a napkin so she could wipe her mouth.

George slowed on the snowy road, where nothing but an old rundown, peeling, white and black farmhouse sat in the middle of a snow-covered lawn the size of a football field.

As they turned into the driveway, snowdrifts on either side almost as tall as her, George didn’t turn off the car.

They all sat in silence for a moment until Nina read the cute painted sign on a post by the shabby front walkway. “The Furry Gates Animal Rescue. That’s pretty fucking funny.”

George nodded slowly. Yeah. It was.

Marty leaned forward in the backseat, poking her head between the two women. “Okay, so now we’ve done the recon, let’s get back so we’re not late. I don’t want Mrs. Neely to bite my head off if I’m late for her wash and set. I don’t want to say she’s a bit of a curmudgeon, but she’s a bit of a curmudgeon.” Then she giggled. “She reminds me of Nina in thirty years but with pin curls.”

Nina nudged her arm. “Kiddo? We did what you wanted, but Marty’s right. We gotta blow. I have like a bafrillion pudding cups to fill, and that Duckworth dude’s a real pain in the ass about them being filled all the way to the top.”

But George wasn’t ready to blow quite yet. “This is an animal rescue,” she murmured.

Probably the second-best thing she could think of as an occupation, aside from working with her seniors—being an animal rescuer.

“Yep,” Nina agreed. “And I need to get the fuck outta here before I leave with every damn thing that has fur. I love the shit out of ’em, but we work a lot. I’d never want to leave home. Then people stuck in a jam like you’d be shit outta luck. Can’t have that, can we? So pedal to the metal and all that shit. Put your foot in the kitchen and let’s roll.”

But George wasn’t ready yet. She was too enchanted by the wide front porch with the stone pillars, and the crooked stairs, and the possibilities of this sagging, neglected farmhouse.