Page 35 of Fall for Me

The girls. I’d been so distracted I hadn’t put the girls in their coop for the night. It was perfect.

“How do you feel about chickens?” I asked. “Live ones.”

She lit up. “Good, I think? Well, I don’t really have any experience.”

I lay down the onion. “This way.” I led her out the back door and toward the enclosed area holding my half-dozen birds.

Once inside, I gave Chelsea instructions. It was a pretty straightforward job, and a moment later, after making her promise to call me if she needed me, I left her with the fussy girls. That ought to occupy her for at least a few minutes.

Then I went in, cranked up some Sam Cook on my speakers and felt my shoulders relax.

This was good. I was good. I could handle this.

But burgers were too easy. Ten minutes later, they were on the grill on the side porch, and even though my head was finally in a decent place—this was cool, I was cool, being friends with Chelsea was cool cool cool—I couldn’t help glancing in the direction of the coop. Chelsea still hadn’t come back inside. She hadn’t called for me either, and I’d left all the doors open so I could hear. Putting the chickens away should have been a two-minute job, even for a novice, so after setting some onions in a pan with oil on low to caramelize inside, I went out back.

I don’t know exactly what I expected to find, but it wasn’t Chelsea laughing as she ran around the open dirt, half-heartedly chasing after Muffin, my most rebellious bird.

I couldn’t help grinning. I folded my arms and leaned against the back doorframe to watch.

I’d turned on the floodlight when I got her set up, which I mainly used when I heard noises out there at night. But now, it had the effect of making her running around after Muffin a vaudeville stage act. She’d get up close to the brown and white bird, who for her part, acted like she didn’t notice the human with the outstretched arms behind her. Then the moment Chelsea swiped, Muffin would squawk and flutter out of reach, sending Chelsea into hysterics. Most people would get frustrated, but not Chelsea. She was practically crying she was laughing so hard.

I almost didn’t want her to catch her.

Finally, she spotted me. “You have a rebel in your ranks!”

“Muffin’s too smart for her own good.”

“Muffin!”

I walked over and stepped inside the enclosure.

I tried not to focus on Chelsea, who’d unzipped the hoodie she was wearing. Her chest heaved as she spasmed with laughter, and when she stood up and saw Muffin practically shake her tail at me, she burst out into new gales, throwing her head back so once again the soft skin of her neck was exposed, long and smooth.

That tingling came back, running down low now. Straight to my dick, in fact.

Not good.

Focus on the damn chicken.

I sidled up to Muffin, slowly, with my hands poised like I was doing a martial art. “You have to fight clever with clever.”

I slowly walked around Muffin so that if she wanted to get away from me, she was forced to move in the direction of the coop. “And then you have to act like you don’t care if she goes in or not.”

“So you’re playing it cool with a chicken?”

“Exactly.”

She snorted with laughter again and I swear to God my dick jumped. Down, boy.

I picked up a metal pail I’d left in here at some point last week when I’d planned to clean out the coop. “If she thinks you’re doing something else, she lets her guard down.”

I waited until Muffin began pecking idly at the ground near the ramp to the coop. Then I softly lowered the can to the ground…

…and pounced.

My hands landed on her soft little back. I grasped her tight, holding her so her feet kicked away from me. Muffin squawked and protested with a fluff of feathers. But by then I’d gently footballed her into the open door of the coop, where the other chickens began crying out after her.

I lowered the little door. “I leave the talking-to to the other girls.”

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