Page 4 of Fencing Her In

I have to chuckle. “Oh trust me. If you lived next to someone who kenneled dogs, it would be a lot noisier than my place,” I say with all the confidence I can muster, hoping he doesn’t follow up with a request for any data to back up my claim.

I continue, “And also, these dogs mostly stick to the house and the barn.” I gesturing toward my home and say, “it’s plenty far away from your house. You might not even notice we’re back here.”

A grin plays at his lips as he says in a low voice, “Oh, I doubt you ever go unnoticed.”

This comment catches me off guard. I notice the heat pooling in certain regions of my body. Oddly, coming from him, this comment doesn’t make me feel smalI. He means it. Coming from one of my former managers at the restaurant, this kind of comment would make me deeply uncomfortable.

He doesn’t seem to have anything to add, but doesn’t look away or turn to leave.

I feel a grin creep over my face. I self-consciously cross my arms in front of my chest. As we both stand there staring at each other for a few more seconds, I study him. He doesn’t look like an asshole, despite not being much of a dog person. His eyes are a deep green I’ve never seen before. Plus, he’s got biceps like canned hams. Maybe he’d look better if he took off that derpy golf shirt.

“You swing for the Texas Rangers? ’Cause you got the arms for it.”

“Thanks…”

I can see from his expression that he’s looking for some kind of equal compliment.

“You…you kinda remind me of Anne Hathaway.”

“…No I do not.”

He laughs. “You’re right; you don’t look like her at all. I don’t know why I said that.”

It’s not fair of him to try to be self-deprecating now. It’s far too cute a look on this house-flipper for me to stay suspicious.

“OK. Good talk. Great meeting you, Daniel. Good luck with the house flipping business and…whatever else you don’t feel the need to tell me about.”

Chapter Two

Daniel

It’s three o’clock in the morning and a dog is barking at my back fence.

I can only guess who that dog belongs to.

I toss and turn. I try ear plugs, but they don’t help. When I get up and turn on the back porch light, the barking increases in intensity.

I open the sliding glass door and plod toward the fence. It’s one of those wiener dogs, whatever you call them. Hell if I know; I’m not a dog person. Not since my neighbor’s pit bull nearly chomped my hand off when I was a kid.

It sees me coming toward the fence and its yapping gets yappier.

Watching it, I realize it doesn’t look like it’s barking at me. Its snout is pointed directly behind me at about 11 o’clock, and its barks and yips are punctuated with growls.

I look behind me and see a huge, gray-brown coyote staring down the wiener dog. I freeze. The coyote is completely ignoring me, totally focused on his early breakfast of German sausage. It might as well be saying, “I crap bigger ’n you, son.”

I am not a dog person, as I said, and I’m especially not a yappy lap dog person.

And I’m not exactly a big fan of Molly, either. Not much to like there, apart from her pouty lips, striking eyes, cute body and scent like a Texas ruby red grapefruit—sweet, tempting, and totally unique. But other than all of that, I definitely do not like that woman. She’s an animal hoarder, plain and simple.

But I am pretty certain that coyote could easily clear the fence if he were hungry enough.

The thought of Molly losing one of her dogs, well, I couldn’t have that.

And I have no idea if I’m being brave or incredibly stupid, but I before I can think it through, my body reacts. I turn toward the coyote with my arms up in the air, clapping and growling, pretending I’m a bear.

Isn’t that what you do when you see a predator? Make yourself bigger to scare it off?

Source: www.allfreenovel.com