Free Mail Order Annie - A Historical Mail Order Bride Romance Novel (Mail Order Romance - Book 1 - Benjamin and Annie) by Kate Whitsby Page A

bring herself to explain to him the reason her feelings had changed. She dared not tell him about Forsythe’s visit. “It was wrong,” she repeated. “I won’t do it again. Thank you for everything. Now, come on. Let’s get up and get back to work. You have things to do and I have a big mess to clean up. I just hope that animal didn’t eat too much of the food out in the lean-to.”
                  Moran looked in the direction of the footprints leading through the doorway into the lean-to. “It doesn’t matter if he did. I’ll skin him and jerk the meat and render the fat. We’ll be dining on heart and kidney for the next three days, and we’ll have more than enough for the winter, too. I mean, if you decide to stay on, of course. And the skin will make a nice warm blanket for the bed when the snow comes.”
                  “Can you do that?” Anne stared at him. “I didn’t know you could eat bears.”
                  “Sure, you can!” Moran brightened up. “Bear meat and bear fat? It’s just about the best you can get! I’ve been thinking of going out hunting for one, anyway. It was mighty nice of him to come down here, close to the cabin. Saves me the effort of carting all the meat back home. I could even make a nice hat from the skin of his head, and you can make all kinds of tools from his bones and his teeth and his claws. It’s a windfall. I should be the one thanking you, and for keeping him still while I got a good shot at him. Now that the danger’s past, it looks to be about the best thing to happen all year. I mean, next to you coming, that is.”
                  They got up together, and when Anne demonstrated that she could in fact move around normally on her leg, Moran went back to the clearing to start processing the bear. A few hours later, he fetched a kettle from the lean-to, and brought it back to the cabin loaded with reeking fat. He placed it on the fire to heat, and made several more trips to bring in the meat and skin while Anne cleaned the house and assessed the damage in the lean-to. Every time she mentioned some ruined item to Moran, he laughed it off, so delighted was he with his prize of the bear.
                  Throughout the rest of the day, Anne appreciated his company around the cabin. The sound of him moving and banging around at the periphery of her awareness comforted her and brought her an unexpected pleasure. Several times, she broke off her work to stand in the cabin door and observe him outside, watching his muscles moving under his shirt and his hips swaying with the exertion of his tasks. She appreciated for the first time his industrious energy and willing dedication to the enterprise of his homestead. To every job he undertook, he committed the sum of his strength and concentration, and as the Proverb repeated in Anne’s mind, he seemed the perfect complement to a woman devoted to supporting and advancing this mutual endeavor. She smiled at him behind his back, and to herself at the notion of yoking herself with him.
                  Towards midday, after preparing their meal, she lost the sound of him in the immediate area and went to search for him. She found him up the creek in another glen, sawing logs into round sections. He halted in his work at the sight of her.
                  “Lunch time,” she announced.
                  He grinned gratefully and dropped his saw, arching his back and limbering his shoulders from the strain. She fell into step beside him on the way back to the house, and then found herself instinctively linking her arm through his. He darted a quick glance at her, but immediately turned away to hide his surprise, and they strolled through the shady trees to the cabin together. After a companionable meal, she walked him back in the same way, and loitered at the edge of the glen, observing him at his work, before returning to her own