Free Wolf Creek Father (Wolf Creek, Arkansas Book 3) by Penny Richards Page A

mean is that it sounds like even though your hearts might be in the right place, you and the sheriff are looking at this all wrong. Ornery as they are, those children aren’t an assignment given to you by the mayor....” After seeing the shock on Allison’s face, Hattie offered a shrewd smile. “Surely you didn’t expect
that
to stay a secret, did you?”
    The idea that everyone in town knew that she and Colt were not only trying to help the children, but that they were also fighting for their jobs, was disturbing to say the least.
    “Anyway,” Hattie continued, “Cilla and Brady aren’t an assignment or a project that needs to be done by a certain day. If you and Sheriff Garrett go into it with that attitude, all you can hope for is failure. It will take having the right mind-set to make any meaningful changes.”
    Hattie was right, Allison thought. She had been looking at it like a tiresome chore, a necessary duty to be dealt with by the beginning of the school year.
    “So,” Hattie said, her voice scattering Allison’s uneasy thoughts, “I’ll agree to help you, at least a time or two, but if that child doesn’t work hard or if she won’t listen or if she talks back, the deal is off.”
    “I understand.”
    Allison hugged the older woman and left, her heart much lighter. Wearing a broad smile, she practically skipped across the street back toward the café. Now she just had to try to talk Ellie into helping teach Cilla embroidery. She’d thought about asking her when she was there earlier, before she and Colt left, but hadn’t wanted him around, in case her sister declined. Of course, Allison doubted she would. Ellie was such a softy that it shouldn’t be too hard to convince her to help.
    “Oh, Allison!” her sister wailed when Allison explained what she and Colt hoped to do. “You know I’m stretched pretty thin.”
    “I realize that, but I also know that you’re much better at needlework than I am, and I know that you’re teaching Beth in the evenings. I wouldn’t expect you to take her every night, just an hour or so once or twice a week to show her the different stitches and watch her progress.”
    “Well...it sounds like a good plan,” Ellie conceded.
    “I think it will be,” Allison said, knowing that she’d won. “I feel fairly confident that in time I can make some inroads with Cilla, but Brady’s another thing altogether. I hope I can find the key to help him learn.”
    “You’re a good person, sister dear,” Ellie said with a fond smile. “Some man should snatch you up, love the living daylights out of you and give you a house full of babies of your own.”
    The image that flashed through Allison’s mind robbed her of breath. Colt loving the daylights out of her. Two little boys with sun-streaked hair who looked just like him, running and flinging themselves into her arms.
    “Allie?”
    Allison’s head jerked around, a faraway expression in her eyes. “Hmm?”
    “Are you okay?”
    “Fine.” A sigh whispered through her lips. Pipe dreams. Hadn’t she already acknowledged that a man like Colt would never be interested in someone like her?
    “How was Colt about all this?”
    “Hmm?” Allison said again.
    “Allie...what is it that you aren’t telling me?”
    Rats! She’d better get control of herself and her errant daydreams. Ellie was as sharp as a tack. “Nothing. It’s just been an eventful morning and I still have a lot to do.”
    Still wearing a look of skepticism, Ellie let the comment pass.
    “I think I’ll go over to the mercantile and see what Gabe has in the way of embroidery notions. It would make a nice gift for Cilla, don’t you think?”
    “It would,” Ellie agreed. “When you get finished, stop back by and have a bite of lunch. I’m making a big kettle of chicken and noodles.”
    “I don’t need noodles,” Allison said. “They’ll go straight to my hips.”
    “Silly girl. When will you ever get over the fact that you are not