I kept the safety on as I headed out toward the barn, barrel pointed down. Walking as silently as I could, I peered around the barn door. My cat, Basil, wound himself around my legs and meowed. He didn’t seem spooked.
A good sign.
Still on guard, I made my way deeper inside. It was a decent-sized structure with a large hay loft and plenty of space to comfortably house my animals. As I moved in farther, I saw the back of a blue T-shirt. Shoulder-length light brown hair.
I let my breath out with relief.
Not a biker but a kid. A little girl. She was watching a couple of my alpacas, who stood near their water trough. She looked to be about the same age as the kids I’d taught spinning and knitting classes to at the community center.
“What are you doing in here?” I asked.
The girl startled and spun around. Her eyes were large and dark. Except I’d gotten it exactly wrong.
It wasn’t a girl but a boy. The long hair had thrown me.
“Can I help you with something?” I asked. “This is private property.”
“I didn’t mean any harm. I was only looking.”
I blinked with surprise. The kid spoke with a British accent. “Who are you?”
He opened his mouth, but then his gaze dropped to the shotgun I was holding. Those dark eyes grew wide. They flashed up to my face again, and before I could stop him, he ran. Hightailed it right past me. Maybe I should have grabbed him, but it didn’t occur to me.
“Hey, come back!”
But he kept on running. I strode outside to follow him and found the kid was already halfway across the pasture. I watched with admiration as he ran. Fast and steady with an even gait. Definitely a natural. Scrambling smoothly over the fence, he disappeared into a copse of trees that stood near the woods that bordered my property.
I glanced down at my shotgun and thought, Smart kid. Never mess with an armed woman.
Chapter Three
~Leah~
I wished I’d left my gun inside the house. I’d rather not have scared the kid away but talked to him and found out who he was.
A few minutes later, after I’d put my shotgun safely back in the closet, Lars’s silver truck pulled into the driveway next to my white one.
I walked outside to meet him. “You just missed it.”
“Missed what?” He closed the driver’s door.
“There was a kid here. He ran off into the woods.”
My brother looked around.
“He was about ten years old. He was British.”
Lars gave me a strange look. “How do you know he was British?”
“Because he spoke to me.”
He walked around to the rear of the truck and opened it. “What did he say?”
“Nothing really. He was looking at my animals, but then he got scared and ran off.”
He shrugged. “Probably just some neighbor kid.”
“None of my neighbors have kids that age. And how do you explain the accent?”
“Maybe he was putting you on, or maybe he’s friends with your Nietzsche bikers.” His voice was dry. He pulled out the fencing supplies. “We should store these in the shed.”
“Thank you for the repairs. I can make some lunch if you want to stick around.”
“That’s okay. I have to head out. I’m meeting someone later.”
“A date?”
“Not really. Just a friend.”
I could tell he didn’t want to discuss it, so I didn’t push further. Like me, my brother was single, but unlike me, he’d never been married—though I liked to pretend my horrible marriage never happened.
I helped carry everything over to the shed. Before he left, I gave him a couple of dozen eggs from my flock and a batch of chocolate chip cookies I’d made last night as a thank-you for his help. Once he was gone, I took a shower. My shoulders and arms ached from shoveling chicken poop and fresh straw all morning. The hot water felt like heaven.
When I was done, I made an egg salad sandwich for lunch and checked on the white alpaca fleece I’d dyed forest green recently. It came from my herd’s spring shearing, and I’d never forget the way it felt seeing all those bags of raw fleece for the first time. Fiber from my own animals. I felt richer than a rock star.
I had an online shop where I sold my fleece along with the various yarns I spun. The owner of the local yarn store in Truth Harbor sold it as well.
I checked my online orders and was pleased to see three new ones. I liked to send purchases right away, so I went and pulled the skeins from my overstuffed shelves to be packed. Even before I had this farm, I was a spinner, so I’d always had a crazy amount of yarn. Every color and texture. Some women bought shoes, but my weakness was fiber.
Some of my dyed fleece was ready to spin, so I sat down at my wheel in the dining room, which I’d turned into a yarn den. I’d put hooks in the ceiling to hang some of the freshly spun skeins. It gave the room a colorful appearance.
Often when I spun, hours flew by, and today was no exception. It wasn’t until a couple of my cats meowed for dinner that I looked at the time. I inspected the yarn I’d been working on. Satisfied things were in order, I put everything away so my seven cats couldn’t get to it.
Yes, I had seven cats.
Three were mine from before I bought the place, and four were barn cats who already lived here. Those barn cats loved coming inside the house, and I was too softhearted to make them stay outside.
After putting out bowls of food, I went to give my girls their evening pellets. My alpacas and llamas had grass and fresh hay available at all times, but I supplemented their diet to be sure they stayed healthy. Plus, I had two—Lilith and Ruth—who were nursing, and they got some extras.
As I stood in the barn filling the trough with water, I watched everyone eat. There were grumbles as they bumped against each other, but nothing concerning. Rhiannon, the matriarch of the group, helped keep the peace.
Straw crunched behind me.
Surprised, I jerked my head around.
There was no one there, but my pulse kicked up a notch. I thought I’d heard a footstep.
I turned back to my animals, but then I heard the straw again, and this time I knew I wasn’t alone.
Skin prickled on the back of my neck.
It might be that kid again. Maybe he was hiding.
But what if it’s someone else?
I kept my breath steady and glanced around for a weapon. A pitchfork leaned against the wall nearby. I continued to fill the trough as I moved closer to pick it up.
Holding the pitchfork, I turned the hose off and pretended everything was normal as I walked out the west barn door. Instead of leaving, I sneakily slipped to the side of the structure so no one could see me.
I wasn’t planning an attack, just wanted to see what I was dealing with. I hoped it was only the kid.
The pitchfork was there in case it wasn’t.
It didn’t take long for the trespasser to emerge from their hiding space. I heard straw underfoot again. The sounds of someone walking grew closer.
My grip tightened on the pitchfork’s wooden handle.
A blue T-shirt and light brown hair emerged from the barn.
Thank God. Just the kid.
When he was about eight feet away, I called out to him. “Hey, what’s your name?”