Adele (Angel Creek Christmas Brides #18) - Cynthia Woolf Page 0,7

but the cats. They have to find their own food.” He angled his head toward her. “Don’t you start feeding them either, except for the first few squirts of milk. If you do, they’ll expect it and won’t keep the house, barn and hay free of mice.”

Squirts of milk? She lifted a brow. “Do you expect me to milk the cows?”

“Of course. That’s one of your chores, at least, until Lissa is old enough to do it by herself. But that won’t be for another three or so years.”

“Oh, no.” She shook her head. “I haven’t milked a cow since I was a child.”

He laughed. “Don’t worry, I’ll teach you. I didn’t expect you to know how to do the chores except for cooking, cleaning and laundry—”

We obviously should have corresponded more, but I wouldn’t have changed my mind even if we had. Adele held up an arm bent at the wrist. “Stop right there. I haven’t done my own laundry in more than seven years. I’m not sure I remember how. As for cooking and cleaning, I can do those but you’ll have to have someone teach me anything else you want me to do.”

He chuckled. “I have a housekeeper, Mrs. Underhill. She’ll help you with the laundry and whatever other chores in the house that you need to know. She lives in a room off the kitchen and although you will be responsible for the upkeep of the house, I have no plans to relieve us of her services. I don’t want all of your time taken up with chores. I want you to spend as much time as possible with Lissa.”

Adele’s stomach turned over. “What if she doesn’t want to spend time with me? I don’t want to alienate her right from the start, but I do know that children her age like to learn new things. When my little sister was small, she would watch intently as my mother and I mended clothes and darned socks. She wanted to learn and she was younger than Lissa. By the time my father broke his hip and we all had to get jobs to fill the void, Madeline was very good at mending and helped mother with it to bring in money. Father’s jobs didn’t pay well, but better than all of us together.” Her hands fisted in her lap. “My brother took over both of father’s jobs but they started him at a very low wage because they knew they could.”

“She may want to learn or not. You’ll have to find out for yourself and then find things she wants to do with you or you with her. She loves being in the barn with the kittens. Go with her. Make friends with her goats. Do you know how to ride?”

She widened her eyes. “Ride a goat? Definitely not.”

Edward laughed. “No, ride a horse.” He muttered under his breath. “Ride a goat? Whoever heard of such a thing?”

Heat invaded her face and then she laughed. “That was a rather silly answer wasn’t it? Oh well, in response to your question, yes I know how to ride.” Richard took me riding in the park once a week at what seemed like the busiest time he could. Like he was showing me off. I never minded. I was just glad to ride.

“Good. I’d like to show you the ranch and many places a wagon or buggy can’t go.”

“I’d like that. Will we take Lissa?”

“Probably not the first time, but some places we’ll see are good for a picnic and when the weather is warmer we can bring her then. One I like best is by a shallow, slow moving stream. We all can go wading.”

“That would be fun if the season was summer, but being that it is fall and the temperature of the water is probably freezing, I don’t think a wading picnic is the best idea.”

He shrugged. “That’s true, but we will still have some very hot days until the first snow. Indian summer, they call it.”

I guess there were some days in the fall in New York that were very warm. I do remember riding in the park when the leaves were changing and the weather was warm enough that even my riding outfit was too warm. But the water in the streams was still very cold when the horse splashed it up on me as we galloped through. “Hot enough to wade in cold water?”

“Yup.” He flicked the reins on the horses’ backs. They walked