Once Bitten, Twice Shy

His face turned red. “You’re beginning to sound like Lori.”

“So what are you waiting for?”

He snorted. “I’m waiting for her to stop making eyes at your stud.”

She gave him a level look. “His name is Alex, and I don’t want to hear you call him stud again. Alex isn’t the problem between you and Lori, and he wasn’t the problem between you and me. You turned me away with your suspicious actions, long before Alex came along. Keep it up and you’ll loose Lori as well.”

She turned and left him at the gate. She was sick of hearing him talk about Alex as though he was a testosterone driven wild man. None of which explained why Alex had stopped to see Lori first. She pushed it from her mind. The only thing jealousy did was make people miserable. Josh was living proof. The fact that Alex stopped to see Lori merely gave Carmen time to get cleaned up.

Behind her, Josh roared his engine as he turn the truck around, and slung gravel on the road as he took off. He’d get glad the same way he got mad. Maybe he’d even think about what she said.

Three goats were on the porch. She glanced around to see if a gate was open. Nothing. There must be a bad spot in the fence, and it couldn’t be too far away from the house. They hadn’t wandered that far today. She shooed the goat back into the pasture and grabbed a pair of linesman pliers and some bailing wire from the barn. Ed lifted his head and nickered, but he continued to work on the salt block when she didn’t call him. By the time she could saddle him, she could be in the hills.

Somewhere in the distance a horn honked. Even eighty acres couldn’t hold back the population growth in this area. She wandered along the fence line examining every post for possible weakness. No brush grew within three feet of the fence. Wasn’t it like a goat? Twenty acres and they were always at the fence line, poking their heads through to eat the brush on the other side. Ed whinnied down by the barn, and then nickered in a higher tone. It was getting close to feeding time.