Loving You Read Online Free Page A

quilt. The ocean wind danced in and out of the trees, and a leafless tree limb scraped eerily against the windowpane, sounding like fingernails on a chalkboard.
    She shivered, reached for the detergent, and tossed a scoopful into the already agitating water. Then she threw the clothes in, slammed the lid down, and moved into the kitchen. No time to stand around and idly watch the night pass. There was just too much to do.
    Once the last of her customers left, Tasha had to deal with the rest of her life. Laundry, cooking, cleaning,making sure Jonas did his homework and hit the showers. There never seemed to be enough time for everything, and not for the first time, she wondered how Mimi had made it all look so easy.
    She stopped short and smiled to herself. “She was Mimi, that’s how,” she muttered. And that said it all, didn’t it? Mimi Castle had been one of a kind. Unique. From the long rope of silver hair she’d worn in a braid that dangled to her waist, right down to the hot pink polish on her toes. Age hadn’t meant a thing to Mimi. If she liked something, she wore it and would cheerfully tell anyone who didn’t like it to “shove off.”
    At seventy, Mimi had still been a force of nature. She started every morning by draping herself in her beloved turquoise jewelry—from earrings and dozens of necklaces and armbands to the concho belt she habitually wore around her waist. Her long skirts usually dusted the tops of her worn leather moccasins, and the wildly flowered peasant blouses she favored combined to create the perfect picture of an elderly hippie.
    Her lined face was perpetually wreathed in a smile that welcomed the world and warmed the heart. She cried over telephone commercials and laughed loud enough to rattle the dishes.
    And Tasha missed her desperately.
    Only seventeen when she’d first encountered Mimi, Tasha had been on the streets, homeless, for two years. She’d run away from a home where her parents had chosen Jack Daniel’s over their only child. And despite the fear and loneliness that accompanied a life on the streets, it had been better than what she’d run from.
    And then there was Mimi. Mimi had taken her in, offered her love and a home. The older woman hadn’t been Tasha’s foster mother—officially—but for tenyears she’d been more of a
real
mother than Tasha had ever known before.
    And the ache of missing Mimi never went away.
    Tasha reached into the hot soapy water, found the sponge, and on autopilot wiped the first of what looked like a hundred dishes. The hot water seemed to soak into her bones, her blood, and warmed her through. Bubbles frothed against her skin and she watched them slide away under the stream of hot water gushing from the tap. There was something peaceful, nearly comforting, about the act of washing dishes. Maybe it was remembering those plates on the table and the conversations you’d had over the meal. And maybe it was just a mindless task that left you free enough to wander whatever mental freeways you felt like traveling.
    â€œGod, Mimi, what am I supposed to do?” she asked, then held her breath, almost waiting to hear an answer. When none came, she sighed and kept talking. Even if Mimi couldn’t reply, Tasha knew she was listening. “Something’s up with Jonas.” There. She’d said it. She hadn’t wanted to even think the words, but bringing them out in the open, if only to the ghost of a woman she wished were still here, actually felt pretty good. As if once the words were said, things couldn’t get worse.
    â€œNow
there’s
a direct challenge to the gods,” she said softly. Though how things could get worse, she just didn’t know. “And maybe you don’t
want
to know, Tasha,” she told herself, and got back to the matter at hand. “Mimi, he’s hiding something. I don’t know what it is, but he won’t talk to me