LITMIR.BIZ

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They’d fallen asleep in her bed. She rolled over to find his half of the mattress empty. A sick feeling came into her stomach as she considered the possibilities.

      Had he left sometime before dawn to return to the stone cottage? Had he gathered his belongings and sneaked away in the dark of night, finished with farm work and the woman who pretended to be his boss? Or maybe he was just an early riser, she mused.

      Pushing up on her elbow, she picked up the alarm clock and squinted at the time. “Six-fifteen?” With a cry, Rachel bolted upright and swung her feet over the edge of the bed. She’d overslept! How had she overslept? The alarm was set for four-thirty. She always woke up before it rang.

      She tugged her dress over her head and pulled on the first work clothes she could find. Slipping her feet into her shoes, she stumbled to the bathroom and grabbed a band to tie up her hair.

      The sun was already well above the horizon as she raced across the yard. It was crucial that she keep a regular milking schedule to maximize yield. After eleven months, she’d never missed milking time—except for today.

      “This is exactly what you deserve,” she muttered to herself. “A man comes into your life and you forget about all your responsibilities.”

      With a soft curse, she yanked open the door to the milking parlor. To her shock, a row of goats was lined up on the platform in the midst of being milked. She found Dermot nearby, scattering clean straw on the floor. Eddie and Benny stood to the side, watching him. Dermot glanced up and gave her a little wave as she approached.

      “What are you doing?” she demanded.

      “My job,” he said. Dermot lowered his voice. “You looked so relaxed, I didn’t want to wake you. I figured I’d give it a go on my own this morning.”

      “You can’t do this by yourself,” she said.

      “Sure I can. You taught me what to do last night. It didn’t seem too complicated. Eddie’s been here to help me along. I mixed and fed them their corn and pellets. I figure I’ll just be another hour. You can go back to bed if you like.”

      Rachel frowned. She could do the whole herd in four hours. How was it possible that he could best her speed after only one lesson? “You must be missing something,” she said.

      He held out his hands. “Check it out. I’m pretty sure I’m doing it right.”

      Rachel walked through the parlor, checking all the settings on the machines and going over her regular list of tasks. After a thorough inspection, she was forced to admit that Dermot was right. He’d done his job well.

      “All right,” she said. “I’m impressed.”

      His expression of concern was broken by a wide grin. “Yeah. I know what I’m doing.”

      She glanced over at Eddie and he gave her a wink and a reluctant smile, then walked out of the barn, Benny scampering after him. Was her uncle aware of what was going on between them? How long had Dermot stayed in her bed last night?

      Rachel kept her questions to herself as they finished with the last of the goats, washed up in the sinks in the pump room and then walked the herd to the pasture. Rachel stood on the gate as she watched the goats graze, smiling to herself. It was nice to know that she had someone to count on, someone who could take the pressure off her, even if it was just for a few hours.

      “There’s a kind of comfort in the routine,” Dermot said as he stood next to her. “I can understand why people would like this life. And they’re so smart. That little Benny is a riot. He jumped up on the ledge in the barn and was leaping around like a circus animal.”

      “Eddie treats him like a dog. But I draw the line at letting him live in the house.”

      “Why would you ever want to leave this place?” Dermot asked.

      Rachel leaned back, gripping the top rail of the fence. “Sometimes I can see myself staying here. It would be the perfect spot to raise a family.” She drew a deep breath. “And then there are moments when I’m so tired I feel like crying. When I feel like there has to be more than milking goats for the rest of my life.”

      “What do you want? What do you dream for yourself?” Dermot asked, his voice quiet. He reached out and brushed a strand of hair from her eyes, but she quickly turned from the gate and began to stride down the lane, frustration causing emotion to swell in her throat.

      He’d just proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that she wasn’t cut out for this. What took him just a few hours to learn had taken her a lifetime. The longer she stayed, the more she was coming to realize that her heart just wasn’t in it anymore. Yes, this was home, yet it seemed like a weight around her neck, dragging her down into a life she wasn’t sure she wanted.

      “Hey, wait up,” he called. When he caught her, he reached out and grabbed her hand, but this time Rachel wouldn’t allow herself to feel anything. She had six weeks with Dermot’s help, six more weeks to get her act together or admit that her siblings were right—running the dairy was no life for a single woman.

      “We need to bring some straw down from the barn,” she said. No doubt that would take him a few minutes at the most to complete, a job that took her a half hour to do.

      “What’s wrong?”

      “Nothing,” Rachel said. “Really. I’m just— I haven’t had breakfast and I’m hungry.”

      “Are you angry that I didn’t wake you? I just thought you might like to sleep in for once.”

      When they reached the barn, Rachel pulled open the huge sliding door and they both walked inside. Usually she was forced to bring the pickup truck around and wrestle the bales of straw and hay up onto the truck bed or break them apart and carry them to the goat pen in pieces.

      “I need you to bring four or five bales of straw to the building behind the milk parlor. Drop them down through that trapdoor, then carry them around to the parlor. Can you do that?”

      “Sure,” he said, frowning.

      His gaze searched hers and she knew he was wondering about the sudden shift in her mood. “You need some gloves.”

      He reached behind him and produced a brand-new pair of leather gloves. “Eddie gave me these this morning.”

      “Fine,” she muttered. “Let’s go.”

      As she stepped away, Dermot grabbed her arm and pulled her close. “There’s just one thing we need to take care of first,” he said. Wrapping his hands around her waist, he picked her up and drew them both down into a pile of straw.

      A huge cloud of dust and chaff rose up around them and Rachel began to sneeze. Dermot sat up and waved his hand in front of him, coughing. When the dust had finally settled, he glanced over at her and chuckled. “That always works in the movies.”

      Rachel couldn’t help but laugh. “What were you planning to do once you got me into the hay?”

      He cupped her chin in his hand and kissed her. “This,” he murmured. His lips moved to her neck. “And this.” He bit her shoulder gently. “And a little bit of this.”

      He pulled her onto his lap and wrapped her legs around his waist. Rachel closed her eyes and enjoyed the feel of his hands and his mouth on her body. When he moved lower, she held her breath and then his lips teased her nipple beneath the fabric of her T-shirt. Her frustration quickly dissolved and Rachel enjoyed the pleasant sensations pulsing through her body.

      He caught the hem of her shirt in his fingers and slowly drew it up, pressing a line of kisses across her belly, bending her back until she felt dizzy with desire.

      “Did you forget your underwear this morning, boss?”

      “I believe I did,” Rachel said.

      “Good. It tends to get in the way.” A moment later, his mouth came down on her nipple and Rachel gasped, the shock sending currents of pleasure through

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