A Late Thaw by Anna Blaze Read Free Book Online

naughty white stockings well hidden in the folds of the dress. I can do this. He was still just Cole. She picked up the pile, walked downstairs, and set her things on a small table near the couch.
    Water was running in the kitchen. She stepped in soundlessly. Cole was rinsing a pepper and a few mushrooms off in the sink. The domestic sight was so unexpected that Kiley briefly forgot her nerves. “What are you doing?”
    He glanced at her over his shoulder. “I was going to make us some breakfast.” He chuckled as though she should have expected that, as though she’d seen this odd and startlingly sexy domestic side of him before.
    She laughed. “You cook now?”
    Cole turned around, drying his hands with a yellow flowered dishtowel. “Did you really think my Ma left for Florida without making sure I could feed myself?”
    Kiley very clearly remembered his mother making them both promise to never touch a thing in her kitchen ever again after they’d set a potholder on fire while trying to make a batch of brownies, but she supposed that had been nearly a dozen years ago . Still, Cole cooking? “What are you making?”
    “Omelets. But I need you to go out to the coop and fetch some eggs.”
    “There’s none in the fridge?” Kiley tried to sound casual.
    “No. Funny, I actually had a full basket in there yesterday, but I didn’t think I’d get a chance to eat them all so I brought them over to Robin. You know she had her third little one three months back?”
    “Oh. That’s nice.”
    “You’re not still afraid of chickens, are you?” He was smirking again. The bastard.
    “What? No! Of course I’m not…afraid of chickens. That would be …” She scoffed. “Who’s afraid of chickens?”
    “Great.” He handed her a basket. “I think Ma left a pair of boots in the trunk by the garage door.” He turned back to the counter and started gathering a cutting board and a knife.
    Okay, maybe she didn’t like chickens. Maybe she was still occasionally visited by a nightmare in which she got stuck in the coop with a couple of particularly aggressive Rhode Island Reds. That didn’t mean she was afraid of them. It meant she was rational. People who thought eggs came in pretty cartons at the store might not know where the phrase pecking order came from but she did. Kiley had cuddled the all-too-cute chicks at the farm only to watch in horror as they became fierce, beaked war machines. The truth, quite simply, is that chickens are mean. They’re mean to each other, and they are mean to knobby-kneed little girls who want to pet them.
    She wasn’t about to let them get the best of her though. Cole said he could make an omelet and she, for one, wanted to see that. Kiley dug out his mother’s old work boots, tugged them on over the giant socks , and grabbed an old broom before heading out the door.
    The ice-covered grass crunched like Rice Krispies beneath her soles. An overnight frost wasn’t too unusual in Vermont, even in mid-May, but it would normally have melted off during the early morning. Today the cloud cover held down the cold air. She shivered slightly as the chill snuck down the loose neckline of her shirt, but she squared her shoulders. The cold would only serve as extra motivation to move quickly.
    Kiley had learned young that t he key to dealing with chickens was not letting them see her fear. She had to be the biggest, baddest bird of them all. Kiley started yelling and flapping her arms about ten feet before she got to the coop. She banged the broom against the chicken wire and stomped her feet to make the feathered monsters flock away from the entrance. Hollering the entire time, she collected eggs.
    She shut the gate with a victorious whoop. A college education didn’t mean she was some helpless city girl. She could collect some eggs if it meant a hot man would cook her breakfast. Holding the basket proudly in front of her, Kiley marched back to the kitchen.

Chapter Twelve
    COLE BIT THE INSIDE of