Free Katie's Choice by Amy Lillard Page A

the father were neighbors. Yet out in the country like this, he knew “neighbor” was a loose term.
    He hooked his thumbs through his suspenders and glanced down at his feet. He was going to have to do something about these pants. And while he was at it, get that suspicious light of mistrust out of Katie Rose’s green eyes. How was he supposed to get a good look at the school if she wouldn’t let him within three feet of her?
    That was the only reason he cared. Truly, the only reason.
    He smiled to himself and continued on his way to the Fishers’.

    The chickens were fed, the cows milked, and he had helped Annie and Ruth pick the last of the tomatoes from the garden. Now it was time to put his plan to befriend Katie Rose Fisher into place.
    Zane dusted off the knees of his ugly Amish pants and knocked on the door. He was surprised no one had already come out onto the porch, considering the ruckus the dogs made, barking at him as if he were a rabid vacuum cleaner salesman.
    Yet nothing stirred inside the rambling, white house. There were no curtains on the windows, something he was beginning to think was part of the Amish culture, so he peeked through the glass. He made a mental note to ask about window coverings at the next opportunity. The inside looked quiet and dark. Dark he could attribute to the lack of electricity, but quiet? With six kids? That could only mean one thing—no one was home.
    So much for his brilliant plan, but it wasn’t like he could call first. Now he’d have to get John Paul to take him into town to pick up his computer and his cell phone from the charging station at the general store.
    He sighed and made his way back down the steps. Oh well, the walk had been good for him. The fresh air, too. In fact, there was a lot about this trip that had been good for him. In the barely three days that he had been here, his shoulder had started to limber up. Evidently the Amish Farm Workout was proving to be better than organized, paramilitary physical therapy.
    Zane rolled his shoulder to test the range and was pleased with the results. By the end of his three months in Oklahoma he’d be more than ready for whatever awaited him in Mexico.

4
    S omehow—maybe by the grace of a higher power—he’d made it into town and back in the front seat of John Paul’s rattletrap of a Ford.
    Zane dropped his laptop bag on the bed and fished his phone out of his pocket. He was long overdue to call Monica. She’d probably think he’d forgotten all about her. Knowing her, she’d expect more attention during this trip since he was barely six hundred miles away, but assignment meant work, no matter the distance. He had to keep focused on the task at hand and not get distracted. The sooner he finished here, the sooner he’d be on his way across the border. After the wedding, of course.
    He punched up his phone book, and scrolled through the contacts until he found her name.
    She answered on the second ring. “Hi, darling.”
    He smiled at the sound of her cultured tones, hating that he compared them to the gentle German-country twang of Katie Rose. And Ruth and Mary Elizabeth. Annie was the only one who didn’t sound like a cross between a good-natured hillbilly and a German scientist.
    “Hi, yourself.”
    “I was hoping you’d call today.”
    “Sorry, it’s been busy here, and there’s no electricity at the house.”
    “Are you serious?”
    “Very.”
    “I thought that was like an urban legend. So they really live that way, huh?”
    “And of course without electricity, my laptop and phone died. We had to take them into town to charge. So I’ll be incommunicado at least every other day, depending on the work schedule.”
    “I understand.” This was one of the things he appreciated most about her.
    “It could be worse,” he added.
    “Who’s ‘we’?” she asked. “You said ‘we’ had to take it into town.”
    “Oh, me and John Paul, the youngest Fisher. He has a car so he drove me into