Free SECOND CHANCES AT MG RANCH by Karen England

have forgotten my manners. Please forgive me,” she said, taking Loren’s hand in a friendly manner. “I’m Missy, and it is a pleasure to have you in my home.”
    Now that Loren had turned everyone’s attention towards her, she wasn’t sure what to say. “Thank you. You have a lovely home,” she finally managed.
    Missy took Loren by the arm pulling her in the direction of the kitchen. “You can help me set the table while we get acquainted.” Missy looked back at Sam and gave him a wink as they entered the kitchen.
    The kitchen was spacious like the rest of the house. Rustic wood cabinets lined the walls. Missy began pulling the dinnerware from the cabinets and stacking it on the counter top.
    “You set the plates and silverware. I’ll get the glasses,” Missy said.
    Loren picked up the plates and silverware and carried them into the adjoining dining room and began setting out the places on the large round oak finished table.
    Missy followed with the glasses and a huge pitcher of iced sweet tea. She had prepared a country dinner of cubed steak, mashed potatoes with brown gravy, green beans, slaw, and rolls.
    “It smells wonderful, Missy. You shouldn’t have gone to so much trouble.” Loren said, setting the last place.
    “It was no trouble at all. Didn’t Sam tell you that I love to cook?”
    “No, but he did tell me that you love to talk.” They both burst out laughing right as Hal and Sam entered the dining room.
    “What’s so funny?” Hal asked.
    “Nothing really, we were just having some girl talk,” Missy said. Both girls looked at each other and burst out laughing again. Loren knew that in spite of whatever secrets Missy might hold with Sam, they were going to be good friends.
    Sam and Hal both just looked at each other with raised eyebrows and a shrug of their shoulders. They both knew better than to try to figure these two out and they were more interested in eating anyway.
    The food was good and offered proof that Missy knew her way around the kitchen. The meal was followed with an apple pie made from scratch and a scoop of vanilla ice cream.
    While Missy and Loren cleared the table and cleaned up the kitchen, the men walked out to the barn. A new foal had been born the night before and Hal wanted to show it off.
    Hal sold most of his foals, but according to Missy he planned to keep this one. It had been born the same day that Missy had found out that she was pregnant with their first child. Hal had declared that he would raise this foal, and train it for his first-born.
    Missy had confided in Loren that they had tried for years to become pregnant without much luck. It had finally happened when they had almost given up hope of having a child of their own and were considering adoption. This was a very special time for them.
    Seeing how happy Missy and Hal were, Loren realized that they had that special kind of love that most people only dreamed about. If the truth were to be told, it was the same kind of love that she dreamed about sharing with Sam.
    Knowing that he would never love her like that, she pushed the thoughts to the back of her mind with a heavy heart. It was only a dream and would never be anything more because he was still in love with his high school sweetheart, Stephanie. She doubted that she would ever be able to change his feelings.
    After the kitchen chores were done, Missy led Loren out to the stables to see the new foal. The night air had gotten cooler and the stars were shining bright. She leaned over the railing to get a better look at the newest addition to their family. He was a golden colored palomino male, with two white socks on his back feet and a white star on his face.
    “We have already named him Shining Star with Two Socks, but we will call him Two Socks,” Missy told her.
    “That name suites him,” Loren replied.
    Two Socks got up from his sleeping position, still a little wobbly on his new legs and began to drink milk from his mother.
    “Hal tells me