But in her own mind, Brandy was tarnished goods. When she was sixteen, her high school heartthrob had gotten her pregnant, right before his family abruptly relocated to Edinburgh. Old man MacDonald wasn't too keen about his daughter's obvious lack of celibacy and promptly threw her out of his house, forcing her to move into a shelter. Though she'd lost the child at the start of the second trimester and eventually returned to high school, Brandy was on her own, having never been invited back in her bitter father's home again.

At nineteen, Brandy met Jack Townson, an American stockbroker vacationing in Loch Ness. Seeing an opportunity to escape the Highlands, she returned with him to the States, and two months later they were married—more to spite her father than out of love.

Brandy enjoyed living in southern California and for a time things were fine. Then one afternoon, on a bike ride through the Hollywood Hills, she was struck by a car, and in that instant everything in her life changed.

The extent of Brandy's injuries were severe, a skull fracture and bruised brain, to go along with multiple fractures to her arms and legs, a punctured lung, a broken left eye socket, and a shattered jaw. She would undergo three major surgeries, spend weeks in intensive care and five months in physical therapy, during which time her husband had an affair.

Townson stayed with his wife through most of her recovery, waiting until she was well enough to leave the hospital before presenting her with divorce papers. Fourteen months after leaving Scotland, Brandy returned to the Highlands, divorced, lonely, and depressed.

As Darwin once said, there are exceptions throughout the natural selection process. Brandy was a swan with an injured wing, and that's how ducks like me land swans.

What I didn't know was Brandy's phobias ran as deep as my own. "So, the son o' Angus Wallace returns. Quit starin' an' give me a hug."

We embraced, my nostrils inhaling her pheromones, my groin awakening for the first time in months.

"I'll get us some drinks," said True. "You two keep getting' reacquainted."

She smiled and sat opposite me, the light catching the burnt orange highlights in her ink-black hair. "If I know my brother the matchmaker, he'll no' be back anytime soon."

"So, how're you feeling? I mean, you look… amazing."

"True told ye about my wee accident, huh? I'm fine now, but it was bad, plus we had no insurance, leavin' the lawyers tae sue the driver's company. It was a nasty fight but we won, then in the end, my ex- husband confessed he was screwin' my private nurse."

"Geez."

"It gets better. Seein' how I wasn't yet a citizen, the ex an' his new whore helped themselves tae all the insurance money. Sixty grand they stole from me, the no-good thieves."