The Bride Wore Spurs (The Inconvenient Bride Series, Book 1) Read Online Free PDF Page B

jacket as instructed. The sleeves were a wee bit long, but otherwise, it was a decent fit: She wondered briefly who it might belong to—it was much too small to have covered the Indian's broad shoulders—but then she heard what sounded like pots clanging together in the other room, and in the next instant, Hawke returned. In one hand he held a straw basket, in the other, a bucket.
    Offering both items to her, he said, "I'll fire up the stove and put on a pot of coffee. Do you think you can manage to go out to the barn to get the milk and eggs?"
    Again rising to the challenge in his tone, Lacey cocked her chin. "I'll be doing my best. Where is this barn?"
    Hawke led her back across the threshold to the covered porch, lifted a lantern from its hook, and then lit it. "Go back down the path, veer to right and you'll walk right into the doors."
    The sky, she noticed, had lightened considerably; making it easy for her to see the bell-shaped barn from the porch. Finding her place of work would be no problem. Accomplishing tasks she didn't know the first thing about might not be so easy. Should she tell him she'd never gone after milk and eggs before? Of were these simple chores that even a child would be expected to manage?
    "You'll need to light the inside of the barn," Hawke explained as he handed Lacey the lantern.
    Shifting her load, she hooked the basket over her arm, gripped the pail with her left hand, then took the lantern with her right; careful to hide her scarred palm from him. The lamp swayed, nearly slipping off her wrist, but she managed to right it again.
    "Be very careful with that!" Hawke warned. "I lost one house due to a careless fire. I don't plan on losing another." He thought of his other "guest" and the anxiety this woman's presence might cause. "There is one more thing; stay out of the loft."
    "The loft?"
    "Yes. Don't even climb the ladder to have a look at it. There's nothing but bedding straw up there anyway. Any other questions?"
    Tons , but she wasn't sure which, if any, should be asked. So Lacey repeated his instructions. "I go to the barn, get milk from what? A goat, a—"
    "My cow, Hazel. She's the only one out there."
    "Get milk from Hazel." Lacey nodded to herself. "And eggs, from the chickens?"
    "Yeah. I let my chickens have the run of the barn, so you'll find them everywhere. Just don't disturb the brooder in the stall against the north wall. She'll be hatching chicks in the next week or so. And stay away from the three closed stalls. I've got my best brood mares in them due to foal any day now. I don't want them upset. Understand what you're to do?"
    North? Which way was north? And stalls, brooders, and brood mares? Lacey really didn't know what he meant by any of that, but Hawke's impatient tone pretty well told her that she'd better have understood, so she gave him a wan smile. "I'll be doing my best for you."
    "Well? You can't do your best just standing there—get a move on. It'll be noon before you get done at the rate you're going."
    Although inflamed by his consistently critical tones, Lacey didn't want to give Hawke another reason to bark at her. Careful not to trip over the split-stone walk, she hurried down the path and made her way to the barn. The big double doors were closed, but not latched or padlocked, so she didn't even have to set part of her load down to gain entrance. She caught one of the doors with the toe of her shoe and pulled until the crack was wide enough for her to fit through. Then she stepped inside.
    Lacey was at once struck by the warm, somehow comforting aroma of the animals, the pungent, earthy scent of horse and cow sweat in contrast to the almost odorless air of the frigid morning outside. As the animals detected her presence, chickens began to cluck, horses nickered softly, and a cow, Hazel, she assumed, cut loose with a loud bellow.
    Fascinated by this strange new world, Lacey stepped deeper into the cavernous building and carefully hung the lantern on a hook