The Cowboy is a Daddy by Mindy Neff

Author:Mindy Neff [Neff, Mindy]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-9911141-2-2
Publisher: Mindy Neff

9

With the cookbook open on the counter and an apron tied around her waist, Maddie studiously ignored the mess in the kitchen. She’d been here almost a month and she still kept forgetting to adopt the clean-as-you-go method.

“I’m going to cook a decent meal if it kills me,” she said to Abbe, who happily kicked her stocking feet against the infant seat. “You doubt me, munchkin? Wait and see. We’re handicapped without a microwave, but never let it be said that your mother doesn’t have determination.”

She was supposed to dredge the steak in flour. What the heck was dredging? She grabbed her cell phone and consulted the Internet.

“Oh. Sprinkle or dust with flour before cooking.” She eyed the flour as though it were a snake. Every time she tried something that had to do with the contents of that particular canister, it ended in inedible disaster. Even now, the kitchen looked as though it had snowed indoors rather than outside.

But the directions said to dredge, so she dredged, erring on the side of caution with only a light sprinkle.

Through the open window came the sound of horses hooves beating against the ground. And the familiar sound of a truck shifting gears.

She grinned. “Put on your best baby smile, Abbe. Ken’s here.” The brown UPS truck came up the drive at his usual breakneck speed, regardless of the ground’s condition. He made so many trips out here, she was starting to feel as though they were old friends. And since the young man and his wife had a baby of their own, he always stopped to chat, to exclaim over Abbe’s growth.

Wiping her hands on her apron, she frowned when the truck stopped short of the front door. Brice had intercepted him by the barn. The two men exchanged greetings, then Ken unloaded a box into the barn, waited for Brice to sign the delivery receipt, then looked toward the house and gave a wave.

Maddie waved back, disappointed when he backed the truck through the open gate of one of the stock pens, then headed out toward the road. She was almost relieved that the order wasn’t for her or Abbe—Brice really had gone overboard. But she missed the chance to talk to the friendly young UPS guy.

As she watched his taillights wink in the overcast day, another truck turned down the lane—this one a sport utility driven by Letty Springer.

She recognized the vehicle. Since the wedding, neighbors of the community had been stopping by regularly, regardless of the weather.

And they never came empty-handed. That was hard for Maddie to accept graciously. There were only ten families living along a fifty-mile stretch of roadway, but they were wonderful, caring, giving people who had genuinely accepted Maddie and Abbe into the close-knit community.

Never before had she experienced this feeling of neighborliness. At her rented house in the city, she’d hardly spoken to her neighbors, and they were only a rock’s throw away. Still, she couldn’t imagine any of the busy acquaintances in

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