Page 11 of Hogging the Hunk
“No.” Heading for the broom, I chuckled softly at Ellie. “Mishaps. Even if you’re not trying to take care of wild animals, stuff happens with animals that you can’t possibly predict. When they want to eat or play, they don’t think about whether or not they might knock all your trinkets off your dresser or that they’re chewing on your favorite pair of shoes. Even them figuring out a place to sleep can be a pain. Think of all the hair a cat might leave on your pillow. You’ll be spitting it off your tongue all night long.”
Ellie frowned as I swept. “You sound like you’re already trying to backpedal.”
“I’m not. Call me a realist. You just need to be aware of what you’re getting into.”
“Which is why I think it’s important that you don’t saddle me with a stepmother. They can ruin things, too. Her hair would be all over the place and she might try to poison me with a rotten apple to get me out of the picture.” Ellie held up her pinkie again. “You never promised me you wouldn’t bring home an evil stepmom.”
No amount of reassuring Ellie that I wasn’t looking for a wife, and by default, a stepmother, for her would make any difference if I couldn’t look her straight in the eye and lock my pinkie with hers right then and there.
Reassuring Ellie with a smile, I nodded. “No goldfish and no evil stepmother.”
“Good.” Ellie nodded curtly. “Then I won’t ask for a raccoon as a pet.”
Chapter Four
Beckett
The rooster crowed at five-thirty every morning without fail. I understood his need to release his gloating squawk as it was his duty to alert everyone to the heathen early morning hours. It was ingrained in his very nature.
What irked me was Becky, who beat the raspy old rooster by half an hour with her incessant bleating.
No one should be awake at four fifty-eight in the morning.
Becky was my sister, Maren’s, favorite Nubian goat. That meant no matter how obnoxious, she would always have a premium spot in Maren’s heart and on her farm. As a complete diva, Becky had no problem letting everyone know what was bothering her. Heaven forbid Maren was ever late getting her breakfast, or she’d let the entire world know that she was dying of starvation.
I already had mixed feelings about mornings long before Becky came into my life. Becky only exacerbated them.
“Ugh, Becky…” I put a pillow over my face and tried to drown out the bleating for another half an hour. Becky must have been able to sense when I was dozing off because the second I teetered on the edge of sleep, she’d bellow again.
“Becky!” Instead of blocking the barnyard noise, I used my pillow to smother my exacerbation.
It hadn’t escaped my notice that Maren had named her favorite nanny goat Becky. A sister named Beckett and an annoying nanny goat named Becky? The correlation was too uncanny to be coincidence. Maybe I’d get a skunk and name it Marley. See how Maren liked that.
Throwing off the covers, my feet hit the bare wood floor, and I recoiled when my left foot landed. Apparently I’d slept fitfully, kicking off my left sock sometime in the night. I searched in vain for it in the mound of covers I had cocooned myself in. With no luck retrieving it, I gave up and shuffled to the creaky antique dresser that had been updated with new drawer pulls and a fresh coat of paint. When I’d moved out to go to college, it’d been all of two seconds before Granny and Maren raided my bedroom and turned it into a country chic guest room. Joke’s on them because I happened to like the update.
What I didn’t particularly like was that I was back to living with Granny and Maren, and her new husband, Parker. I loved them all, but being under the same roof was sometimes too much proximity.
It’s only temporary. Short term. Brief.
I inhaled through my nostrils and exhaled it through my mouth. If I reminded myself enough, maybe it would make this stopgap in my living arrangements end sooner.
Peering in my underwear drawer, I pushed aside my unmentionables. No socks.
“Wake up, sleepyhead,” Granny said cheerfully as she banged on the door like she’d hired ten strong men with a battering ram to get my attention. “It’s time for breakfast.”
Sighing, I glanced toward the window. Through the gauzy curtains, the sun was barely warming the horizon. The faint glow was like a campfire that had been left to smolder all night—more ashes than embers. An involuntary shiver rattled my bones and I clutched my arms around me to ward off the cold. This hour of the morning should be illegal.
Remember the impermanence of this hiccup. Greg will be back. Things will work out. You can do anything. You—
A gurgling, desperate bleat from Becky sounded like she was right outside my window. My jaw clenched so hard I was in danger of losing complete sets of molars. Give me a thousand rambunctious two-year-olds. I’d cheerfully vaccinate every single one of them over listening to Becky’s constant complaining.
Thoughts of manifesting my dream life, where I was happily married to Greg, living in the suburbs in a newly built, custom brick home, with two point five children, were blasted away. The bliss I was trying to conjure dropped me unceremoniously into reality and I was reminded one foot was cold.
“Beckett?” Granny called from the kitchen.
“Coming!” I shouted back. “Some of us aren’t morning people, you know!”
Granny’s retort was downright chipper. “We can’t all be perfect!”