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He started toward the door. “Come on, goats this way.”
She followed him through the back door and gasped.
It was love at first sight. A second barn, this one in better shape than the one out front, stood off to her right, and in front of her lay a giant goat pasture—full of adorable goats of all sizes, shapes, and breeds.
He chuckled, and she realized he was looking at her. “I’m glad you like it.”
“Are you kidding? This is paradise!”
He laughed heartily, which made her feel good about herself. She didn’t know him yet, but he didn’t strike her as a man who laughed easily. He strode toward a gate, and she followed. “Do you want to go in?”
“Are you kidding? Of course I do!”
He swung the gate open and let her go first.
Goats flooded toward her, half of them screeching their greetings. She reached down and started patting them, trying to get to them all at once so that no one would feel left out. She strode deeper into the pasture and then lay down on the ground.
“Watch out for the ...!” Gunner cried.
“It’s okay!” she said. She’d checked the ground for Cocoa Puffs before going down. Of course, one of the goats might hit the eject button while she was lying there, but she wasn’t afraid of a little herbivore poop. The goats crowded around her, sniffing her and tickling her with their noses. One of them nibbled on her fingers, giving her one of the strangest sensations of her life. “Gosh, Gunner, don’t you ever pay attention to these poor souls?”
He laughed and came closer. “All the time, but it’s never enough. They are attention gluttons.”
She rolled onto her side and propped her head up on her elbow so she could look at him. One of the goats behind her gently butted her horns into Nova’s behind. This alarmed her, and she thought about getting up, but she didn’t want to admit that she’d been naïve to lie down in the first place. She looked at Gunner. “Did you see that?”
His smile suggested that he had.
“Should I be concerned?”
He shook his head. “I’m watching them closely, don’t worry, and General Lee wouldn’t hurt a flea. We do have some cranky ones”—he glanced at the barn—“but they’re sequestered.”
She laughed. “Sequestered?”
“Yeah, they’re in goat jail in the barn. If they can’t get along with others, they have to stay in their cells. Sometimes I let them out for a little isolated yard time, but not often. I’m usually too busy.” He suddenly looked worried. “I mean, there are only two of them in there.”
“Gunner, you have saved their lives and not given up on them. I’m not going to criticize you for having a goat jail.”
His face relaxed.
“It actually sounds really smart.”
Another goat, this one’s face speckled with gray hairs, lay down beside Nova’s stomach as if they’d been best friendsforever. She was chewing her cud. Nova ran a hand down her back and looked at Gunner. “Is this one of your senior citizens?”
“Not at all. She’s only about two, but she acts like an old lady. I think maybe she’s done some hard living.”
Nova laughed at his phrasing. “How do you know she’s only two? Do they come with birth certificates?”
He chuckled. “No, I can tell by their teeth.”
This impressed her more than it probably should have. “Where are the babies?”
“They are in a separate, smaller pasture. The youngest are still in the barn.”
She wanted to go see them, but she didn’t want to take up any more of his time. Surely he had other things to do, like going to the grocery store. “You don’t have to stay here with me if you trust me to hang out with them. Or even if you don’t, I guess I don’t have to hang out with them. Or I can do it from the other side of the fence.” Ugh. She was babbling. “I mean that I’m sure you still have things you were supposed to do today before you threw off your whole schedule by rescuing me.”
He shook his head. “It’s Sunday. I try to rest on Sundays, so we have all the time in the world. And I do trust you with them, but I also want to keep an eye on them. One of them might get jealous of your affections and get a little feisty.”
For some reason, Gunner using the wordfeistydelighted her in the best way.
