Total pages in book: 79
Estimated words: 80176 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 401(@200wpm)___ 321(@250wpm)___ 267(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 80176 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 401(@200wpm)___ 321(@250wpm)___ 267(@300wpm)
I would not get involved here. I would not.
“Where would you like me to drop the hay?”
She pointed in the direction of the south field where I could see a lone donkey staring at the two of us.
“There,” she gestured.
“Do you have a tractor?”
She shook her head.
I looked at all the property that she had, and my brows furrowed in confusion.
“How do you get anything done out here?” I asked.
She shrugged. “A push mower and a weed-eater for the grass.” She started digging with her shovel, and I watched, confusion on my face, for the first two shovelfuls before I walked over.
Taking the shovel from her hand, I used half as much effort and did the same amount of work in less time, digging a hole about fifteen inches deep before looking at her expectantly.
“Good?”
She nodded, then picked up the bird that lay at her feet before depositing it inside. Gently. Reverently.
“Thank you,” she whispered.
She held her hand out for the shovel, and I ignored it and scooped the dirt up myself, covering the bird.
“Thank you,” she repeated, watching me work. “Thank you for bringing me the hay, too.”
I nodded once.
“How many did you lose?”
She looked out over the yard.
“I don’t know yet. All of them probably.”
“All of them?”
She nodded. “Yeah.”
“How many did you have?”
“Twenty-six.”
Twenty-six. She’d lost twenty-six fucking chickens.
Holy shit.
“Where does the dog live?”
She gestured to the end of her driveway. “Straight across the way.”
My stomach churned.
“I’m going to drop the trailer and go get the tractor. I’ll get the hay and put it in there with the donkey.”
She held up her hand, her dirt smudged face already set in an unforgiving line.
“Don’t,” she said. “You’ve done a lot already. I can get it.”
“How?”
She stiffened. “What do you mean how?”
“How will you get it?”
She shrugged.
“You won’t be able to lift it,” I told her bluntly. “And I have a tractor. It’s not a big deal.”
She looked away.
Then her shoulders started to shake.
I bit my lip and wondered what I should do.
I knew that she was crying, but I didn’t do well with criers.
I hated it, actually.
I hated the helpless feeling of watching someone else lose it. I hated not being able to do anything. I hated watching the tears fall down their faces, remnants of their pain.
“This sucks,” she whispered, her voice breaking.
I looked down at my hands.
“Come on, you can come with me.”
“Where?”
I took hold of her wrist, trying not to think about how freakin’ small her wrist felt in my hand, and pulled her to the truck.
“You can come with me.”
She followed behind me like a zombie, and I felt sick to my stomach at seeing her so dejected.
I didn’t know this woman from the next, but she’d been kind to me when a lot of people in town hadn’t. I felt some sort of kinship to her.
And I wouldn’t leave her here, hurting, while she wondered how to fix something that was obviously not going to be an easy fix.
“Gertie doesn’t know about personal space,” I told her as I opened the door.
She got in, and I tried not to notice her backside, or how good her ass looked in her jeans as they stretched across said backside.
Ten minutes later, I gestured for her to climb up into the cab of the tractor. She did, and I climbed up directly behind her. Then promptly groaned.
I obviously hadn’t thought this through.
Because, if I had, I would’ve realized that there was only one seat on the tractor, but I hadn’t.
Now she was stuck either staying at my place, or riding with me on the tractor where there clearly wasn’t room unless I wanted her in my lap.
But witnessing the fall of her face when she realized she’d have to stay behind was enough for me to reach down for her.
“Come on,” I held out my hand. “You can sit on the fender, babe.”
She sniffled. “My name is Kennedy.”
I refrained from saying, ‘I know’ and patted her thigh. “Let’s go.”
We lived in a small town. It literally took less than two minutes to find out who she was. I didn’t tell her that, though. She didn’t seem ready to hear it.
***
I should’ve known that the person who would let her dog roam around free was the very same person who refused to give me my dog back just a few short weeks ago.
God, I hoped that she hadn’t done that with Gertie.
Had Gertie been one of the dogs that had been terrorizing Kennedy’s place?
I highly doubted it.
He wasn’t the type to care about that type of thing. He was more of a laze around and be watchful, kind of dog.
The work he used to do with me and my unit in the military had been a bunch of hurry up and wait kind of shit. But when we were actually on missions, he had his work cut out for him.