The chick topples over in my palm happily and I set her down, picking up another one who is slightly bigger.
“Have they all been sexed?” I ask.
“Yeah,” he says, in a sort of husky way. He flicks his chin. “They sure have.”
I stroke the chick’s downy pinfeathers and look at Rob. It’s hard for me to see his face perfectly clearly, because of the sunshine and his baseball cap. But it’s clear enough even to naïve little me that he’s flirting with me.
“You’re really pretty, you know.” He bends the bill of his baseball cap in a well-practiced and cocky way.
I smile up at him. “Thank you, but…” I stammer. I look down at the twelve balls of feathers, searching for anything else to talk about. Any way to break this tension. I have no interest in him but I’m not sure how to make him know that.
Some of the pinfeathers make me think three of them might be males. I had some books with pictures back at Judith’s that were like farm encyclopedias or something. I couldn’t read the words, but I’d stare and study the pictures for hours.
“You’re sure they’ve been sexed?”
Rob nods. He leans in, placing his hand on the side of the van, getting in close. “I can promise that there’s only one cock out here. And that’s…”
Suddenly, out of the corner of my eye, the back door flies open and Dane barges into view. About 250 pounds of pure power. And rage. Muscle with a mission. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing, dickhead?” Dane growls.
The chick man rocks backwards. “Sir, I was…”
“You don’t fucking think I know what you were doing? Looking at her? Talking to her?”
I set the chick down in the box and try to calm him. “Dane. He was just making conversation.”
But Dane isn’t hearing me. He’s pissed. Full on, wolf-defending-his-mate pissed.
Geez, it’s so hot. He’s protective. Of me.
Carefully, I take the wooden box of chicks from the back of the van and begin to bring them inside in the hope that maybe Dane will follow me.
But he isn’t a pet Labrador. He’s a man. And he’s angry. “Don’t fucking look at her. If you touched her, you wouldn’t be walking away. You’ve got three seconds to get the fuck off my property or else I’m gonna…”
My mouth falls open.
“Y—yes sir,” he says. “I’m sorry. All I did was tell her she was pretty. I had no idea you’re…”
Dane smacks the hood of the van hard enough to leave a visible dent. “That I’m what? That I’m protecting what’s mine?”
Oh god. Mine. His.
“Yes, sir. Apologies,” says Rob. He holds up his hands like he’s surrendering, and backs away. “I’ll be on my way. Just,” he looks past Dane at me. “Just be careful with them when they’re so little.”
Dane cracks his neck back and forth, and I watch him tighten his right hand into a powerful fist. “Two seconds until you’re bleeding from your fucking ears.”
I nod and smile at the chick man, who looks like he’s literally shitting his pants. But inside, I’m bubbling with inappropriate joy at seeing Dane so possessive. Because yet again, this feels so wrong and so right. I’ve never had anybody to defend me. Anybody to protect me.
And as scary as he is, I’m so turned on I’m about to combust.
Dane cocks back, getting ready to throw the first punch. I have a flashforward of Rob picking his front teeth up off the driveway.
Yikes.
I intervene in the only way I know how. With kindness. And gentleness. I put my body between Dane and the chick man. “Thanks, Rob! Have a good one! Drive safe!”
Rob seizes his chance at an escape. He jumps in the van, slams his door, locks it, and then backs out, speeding down the driveway as fast as he can go.
Once the dust has settled, I turn to face Dane. In my hands is the box of chicks, cheeping sweetly between us.
“Sorry,” he sniffs, all gruff and dark.
As my trickling wetness proves, he’s got nothing to be sorry for. He really is just so handsome. Out here in the crisp fall light, his eyes are even more alluring. His presence even more powerful.
“Sorry…for?” I tilt my head. “For scaring the chick man to death or…”
“Fuck the chick man,” he growls. “I’m sorry for earlier. The way I was. The way you make me act.”
“Don’t apologize,” I say, shaking my head, looking up at him in the sparkling light. An oak leaf swirls softly down from a branch above and lands on his shoulder.
I hold the box on my hip and take it off, spinning it by the stem as I search for the right words. They aren’t difficult to find.
“I liked it. A lot.”
He runs his massive hand through his thick dark hair. “Don’t lie to me.”