Page 56 of Single Mom's Mountain Men
"I want to work on a farm," Maddie says. "I wanna have an egg farm."
"You want to raise chickens?" Mitch adds. "Not a bad idea actually. We have an empty shed in the back we can use."
"I don't want chickens. I want eggs."
"Eggs come from chickens, Maddie," Katie explains patiently.
“No, they don’t. Fibber.”
"I’m not fibbing. Mom, Maddie called me a fibber."
"Don't call your sister a fibber, Maddie," I say as Mitch glances back at the window and chuckles.
After Mitch drops us off, I head into the store with my two beautiful girls and Mitch heads to his meeting. I try to do enough shopping for the month which ends up taking a lot longer than I expected, in between comparing different discounts and refereeing my daughter's arguments.
Luckily, Mitch texts to tell me his meeting is taking long as well, so I take my time with each selection.
A couple of hours later, as we're heading back home, Maddie is dozing off in the backseat and Katie is reading a new book Mitch presented her with when he picked us up. He also gave Maddie a toy to avoid any sibling rivalry, and the girls were excited about their presents.
His act gave me an idea to bribe his brothers into making up. With the allure of honey-glazed cinnamon rolls, I can probably get Charlie to agree to talk to Wes. And for Wes, maybe I'll promise him some extra ribs the next time I make them.
As Mitch pulls into the parking lot of the main cabin, we instantly tense up at the sound of Wes' raised voice followed by Charlie's gentler murmur.
"Oh no," I turn to Mitch in dismay. "Are they fighting again?"
"They better not be," Mitch growls. "Or I'm going to knock some sense back into them."
CHAPTER 20
Wes
Istep out of my room, rub the last smear of lotion into my hands and get ready to go through into the kitchen.
I pause when I see a filthy, mangy little creature in my living room, sitting on my mother’s favorite couch, blood leaking from a raw-looking wound in one leg.
“What the fuck?” I glance at the front door, expecting to see it cracked open, but it's closed.Did I leave it open?Neither Charlie nor Mitch were home so it would have to have been me. Although we don't have much wildlife around these woods, occasionally a random coyote wanders into our home. The last time it happened, my mother screamed bloody murder while my dad practically shot up the place trying to get rid of the creature.
This one looks a little big for a coyote. It takes up most of the room on the couch. Its hair is a patchy mix of white and brown, curly and straight and it looks like it’s been dragged through mud several times. It bares its teeth and raises its hackles as I approach. It even tries for a menacing growl, but its heart isn’t really in it and it looks too tired and weak to have much fight left in it.
"How did you get in here buddy?"
It growls again in response.
“Don’t growl at me, you’re the one sitting on my mama’s couch.” I faintly wonder where my dad’s gun is as I analyze the creature. Soil clumps cling to its hair like a dirty mop, and it has tracked muddy paw prints all over the floors that Patty cleaned this morning. Up close, it looks like some kind of sheepdog mix, and even with all the growling it's doing, I'm not worried that it'll bite me. It doesn't look too violent, but you never really know with animals. Still, even if it attacked I could take it.
Right now, though, I can try luring it out with some leftover turkey wings from last night. While I hate to waste Patty’s food on the mongrel, it’s more humane than shooting the damn thing.
“Alright." I go into the kitchen and open the refrigerator to retrieve the Tupperware container holding the turkey wings. “Now we’re going to do this nicely and no one is going to get hurt, understand?” I hold up a turkey wing. “I’m going to throw this meat outside and you’re going to get your ass off my momma’s couch and run to get it. And then I’m going to close the door behind you and you’re going to fuck back off to where you came from. Got it?”
The dog growls again and I frown at it.
“Now that doesn’t sound very friendly, does it?"
It lets a loud yip.
"Hey, I'm giving you a pretty good deal here. You should be grateful. Why the heck are you barking at me?"
“Maybe he doesn't like you.” A deep voice interrupts and I turn around to find Charlie coming out of his room with a gauze pad and some bottles of antiseptic. "Or maybe because you're threatening a wounded animal.”
