for him to help her, then went in the back door with his hand at the small of her back. Her first impression was of all the modern conveniences in the kitchen, and how perfectly they’d blended them into the character of the house. From a long oak table and chairs in the kitchen to the antique sideboard and an old cuckoo clock hanging above it, ticking away the time.
“It’s perfect,” Cathy said, running her fingertips along the surface of the old table.
“Nobody has ever lived in this house but Talbots. I was born in a room down the hall.”
Cathy stopped, and then put a hand on Duke’s arm. “Are you going to be sad to leave?” she asked.
Duke shook his head. “Not like you mean. I’ve never lived life for me before.”
Cathy slid her arms around his neck. “I wouldn’t mind if you saved a little spot in your life for me while you were at it.”
Duke pulled her close. “Fair warning…I’m saving more than a little spot.”
“Is that a promise?” she asked.
“No. It is a fact,” Duke said, and then kissed her—softly at first, and then longer…harder—until they were lost in the feel of being in each other’s arms.
Pillow-soft breasts pressed against a hard, muscle-toned chest—both of them forgetting to breathe—then the sensation of floating in the passion building between them.
A gasp of wonder. The undertone of a moan from the want for more. The ache of unfulfilled urges.
All it would have taken was one word, and Duke would have taken her to bed right there and then. But she didn’t ask, and he wouldn’t push it, so he ended it with a deep, heartfelt sigh of longing.
“You destroy every ounce of good sense I ever had,” he said softly, and brushed one last kiss across her lips. “So if you want to see the rest of the farm, I suggest we get as far away from my bedroom as possible.”
Cathy laughed out loud.
“What?” Duke asked.
“That was the most perfect invitation not to make love that I’ve ever heard. And I’ll go along with it…for the time being.”
Duke grinned. “What do you want to see first? The chickens or the—”
“The chickens! We had chickens when I was a kid. They were my pets.”
Duke sighed. “Doesn’t do much for a guy’s ego to know the woman he’s falling for chooses chickens over making love.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Cathy said. “I’ve been practicing being naked for you in front of my mirror. I’m not choosing chickens over you, but I am chicken about the big reveal.”
Her honesty was a suckerpunch to the gut.
“I’m pretty sure anything I say right now is gonna be wrong, but I can relieve your worries about that. I dream about you…about making love to you. I’ve already seen you in my dreams, and you’re too beautiful for words, so no more talking about being naked unless you’re ready to get that way.”
Cathy slipped her hand in his. “Show me your chickens, please.”
He led the way out and pointed to the chicken house and the chicken-wire fence around it.
“The henhouse awaits,” he said.
Their arrival set a few hens to clucking, thinking it was time to eat, but Cathy was enchanted with the fat red hens.
“What kind of chickens are these?”
“Rhode Island Reds. Hope started them because she wanted brown eggs,” he said. “She likes tending to them and gathering eggs when she can, but her work schedule doesn’t always permit it.”
Cathy squatted down beside a chicken feeder, eyeing one big fat hen pecking at the scratch scattered about.
“Just look at you,” she said softly. “You’re a beauty and you know it, don’t you?” Cathy stroked the chicken’s head and down the back of its neck with her fingertip, cooing and talking in a singsong voice until the hen was clucking back at her.
“I think she likes you,” Duke said.
Cathy gave the hen one last stroke on her back and then stood and looked up at him.
“You are so lucky to have grown up in this place,” she said.
“Come walk with me,” he said. “There’s far more to see.”
And so she did…from the barn to the machine shed, and then the corrals and the stanchions where they used to milk, to the farm pond just below the house.
“Are there fish in it?” Cathy asked.
“Oh sure,” Duke said. “Dad stocked it years ago with large-mouth bass and catfish. We fish out of it and usually have a big fish fry for our neighbors at least once a year.”