Lori brushed her hair out of her eyes. She was sweating now and had dirt smudged across the front of her top and along her tights. But she wasn’t even close to giving up. No sir. If Grayson thought this was enough to send her packing, he was sorely mistaken.
She was already heading after the chicken again when Grayson cut her off at the pass. “I can’t let you upset her any more than you already have. It’ll throw off her laying cycle.”
“I didn’t mean to upset her,” Lori protested, immediately feeling guilty about having done irreparable damage to the chicken’s egg production.
He reached down to pick up the hen, and rather than reach for its tail or wings, he cupped his hands in a gentle V on either side of its body and lifted it. With one hand firmly under the chicken, he used the other to hold it close to his body as he carried it into the coop.
Well, she thought with more than a little irritation, he could have told her how to do that before she screwed up the hen’s life. While his back was turned, she bent down and reached for another chicken. This time around, it was a different—and much happier—story as she scooped up the hen and carried it over to the coop.
Grayson turned around just as she was about to put the chicken inside. “What the hell are you doing?”
She stopped right where she was and gathered the bird a little closer to her chest. The warmth of the plump body against her helped soften the sting of Grayson’s fierce glare.
“I figured you wanted all the chickens inside,” she said in a voice pitched low so that she wouldn’t spook her new feathered friend. “Didn’t you?”
“Yes,” he bit out, but his frown deepened rather than clearing. “How’d you pick her up?”
Wasn’t it obvious? “I watched what you did.”
He moved his glare from her to the chicken and she felt a little sorry for bringing the bird into this.
“Fine. Put her in the coop and then collect the rest. I’ve got to see how badly your car damaged my fence.”
This time, Lori was the one scowling at Grayson’s too-broad, far-too-muscular back. So much for getting a thank you or maybe even a little bit of praise for how easily she’d managed to rectify things with the chickens. It was, she thought, a very good reminder that it was never a good idea to do something to try to please a man.
Still, she didn’t let her frustration with him impact her gentle handling of the chicken. Or the next dozen of them. Unfortunately, even though she knew what she was doing now, it didn’t mean the chickens necessarily felt like cooperating. And she had to admit her heels weren’t exactly the best footwear for a muddy, gravelly, grassy farm, as the spikes kept getting stuck in the sod. Fortunately, she spotted a plastic dish with what looked like dried corn in it that the chickens seemed to have an inordinate interest in. Picking up the dish, she shook the “treats” and was thrilled when the rest of the chickens came running in at top speed toward the coop. Moments later she had them all safely inside.
All but one, darn it. She responded neither to the treats nor the actions of the rest of her chicken friends.
After the hen dodged her one too many times, Lori kicked off her shoes and, with renewed determination, used her years of quietly gliding across a stage to stalk the chicken.
“Aha! Gotcha!” she exclaimed when she finally had it safe and sound in her arms. The chicken let out a matching sound that had her laughing out loud. “Had a good time messing with me, did you?”
She was almost at the coop when she looked up and saw Grayson staring at her with such an expression of shock that she almost stumbled with the chicken in her arms.
“What’s wrong?” She looked down at her feet. “Is there a snake in the grass?” She couldn’t keep the horror from her voice as she went completely still.
“No,” he said quickly, “there isn’t a snake.”
“Thank God.” She let out a harsh breath, utterly exhausted from the past twenty minutes of chasing chickens on top of her red-eye flight and sleepless night. Heading again for the coop, she took every barefoot step only after careful consideration of the ground in front of her. “I’ll just go put her in the coop and then you can tell me what you want me to do next.”
Chapter Three
Next? She wanted him to tell her what to do next?
Get the hell off his property—and out of his life, taking her laughter with her—that’s what he wanted her to do next. At least, it was what he should have wanted.
But, for some strange reason he couldn’t understand, Grayson couldn’t bring himself to put her back in her car and order her to leave. Plus, after her rough start, she’d actually done a good job with the chickens and he couldn’t justify penalizing her for that.
She shut the coop door for the last time, then walked straight over to the hose and washed off her hands before wiping her hands off on her hips and turning back to him. Unfortunately, that drew his attention back to her spectacular figure. Not, of course, that his attention had ever wavered from it. His heart would have to stop before he could ignore the fact that he had a live, in the flesh, pin-up girl on his farm.
One who wanted to be his new farmhand.
Damn it, he needed to figure out a way to get her to leave before she could get under his skin any more than she already had. Because even in her ridiculous outfit, streaked now with dirt, she was still heartbreakingly beautiful. And, given what he knew of women, seemed to be shockingly low maintenance when it came to dirt and animals. Why wasn’t she losing it over the state of her clothes, her torn stockings, or the fact that her heels were now covered with wet dirt and grass stains? Clearly, something must have gone really wrong in her life for her to think this was a step up.
Unfortunately, it also wasn’t difficult to recognize in her an urge to leave her old life behind and start over someplace where no one would ever think to look for her.
Because that was just what he’d done himself after his wife died three years ago. And for the past thirty-six months, his farm in Pescadero had been his refuge from the past, from ever having to think about what had happened to his wife...or his role in it.
Damn it, he didn’t want this woman to think he cared, but he needed to know. “Are you in any danger?”
“Danger?” She looked at him as though it was the strangest question in the world.
“Are you hiding from someone who’s trying to hurt you? Is that why you’re here?”