Secondhand Horses Read Online Free PDF Page B

flat after each knuckle rub.
    “A—a truck?” She widened her eyes and turned in a big, slow circle, shading her eyes as though searching. “Mom says you walked in your sleep when you were a kid, Uncle Dave.”
    Hooonnkkk!
    Sunny stood motionless, her back to her uncle. She had to do something. If the girls
hadn’t
gathered up the zoo, those goofy animals would scatter again, every which way, right in front of Uncle Dave. If the girls
had
the zoo under control—sort of—they’d herd that zoo right in front of Uncle Dave. Either way, if Sunny did not warn them, Uncle Dave was going to wake up faster than if she’d poured ice water on him. Now, while Sunny did not have a Great Idea, she
did
know the zoo parading in front of Uncle Dave right after he woke up was
not
any sort of a good idea.
    Finishing the turn to face her uncle, she froze. On the left, pushing through the evergreen bushes, was a dirty snout and Vee tapping the pig’s back with a stick. To Vee’s left marched Esther, the goose under one arm on one hip, her fist perched on the other hip. Uh-oh. To Esther’s left, Aneta held the rope leads of the goat and the mini. Even from many feet away in the driveway, Sunny saw Aneta was dirty and the closest thing to a glare she’d ever seen on the usually tranquil blue-eyed girl’s face. And Aneta was limping.
    Turning back to her uncle, she asked, “Are you awake?” She stepped to his left and took his arm with her right arm. With her left arm, she smacked desperately at the air, hoping the girls would read that as “go away, not now!” More than that, she hoped Esther wouldn’t decipher her arm and decide anyway to introduce the zoo to Uncle Dave because Esther thought it was the right thing to do.
Trust me, Esther.…
Sunny shot her a silent message and a quick
AHHHHH!
face as Uncle Dave yawned.
It is not a good idea
.
    “I hope not,” he said inside a second yawn. “Did you feed and water Shirley and Mondo yet?”
    Ughness
.
    She’d forgotten her regular ranch chores with the horn blast that announced the arrival of the zoo.
Sunnneeee!
she yelled at herself. How would Uncle Dave say yes to the zoo when Sunny hadn’t followed through with the regular stuff?
Ugh. Ugh. Ugh. Ugh
.
    Darting around to his right side so he wouldn’t look at her and see the zoo still hovering by the corner of the house, Sunny ran through possible ideas. She could pretend to have a choking fit and make Uncle Dave help her into the house. She tried an experimental cough. No, that wasn’t good. Then her uncle would want to know if he should call her mother to come get her. There’d be no escape from the house to tell the girls what to do.
    She shot a glance toward the girls. Esther was frowning. Vee was glaring, and Aneta was close. Since English was Aneta’s second language, Sunny figured that the “Sunny-arm speak” was probably something she didn’t understand. At least they had stopped moving forward.
    “I’m on it, Uncle Dave. And then I’ll come in, and us girls will make breakfast for you. So go back inside and sleep a little more, okay?”
    “Servants,” he muttered, following her obediently and yawning again. “I like the idea of servants. There’s eggs, bacon, and, um, stuff in the fridge.”
    “Right. You just leave everything to us.” She had him in the front door in another second and pulled the door closed. A whoosh of breath escaped.
    That was too close.
    Leaping off the porch, she flung her hands high and sprinted to the side of the house.
    “I don’t like this,” Esther said, shaking her head. The goose grumbled.
    Vee agreed. “I don’t think the pig does either.” She gestured to the dust that coated her legs up to her knees. “He didn’t want to come back. He was at work rooting up an old garden like he was hired to do it.” She brushed at her capris. “Now I look like
I
did the digging.”
    Behind her, Sunny heard the door begin its early groaning. “What? He’s coming