by Meg Benjamin
She sighed. Tomorrow, she’d start calling around, maybe starting with the counter job. The waitress job would provide a few extra bucks in tips, but the cost of driving to and from Marble Falls would eat that up fast.
None of the jobs would give her time to look for gigs, but that wasn’t important any more. You know that, right, MG? Right. She did know that. Absolutely.
She took her plate and glass to the sink, glancing out the back door window as she did. Robespierre was strutting around the chicken yard in the fading light, patrolling for predators. MG wasn’t sure what kind of predators he might find or what good he’d be if he found them. The fence was a good five feet high, with boards along the bottom edge to discourage any wandering paws that might try to reach through the wire. Still, the rooster looked impressive. Give him a shako and a rifle and he’d be ready to guard Buckingham Palace.
Maybe she could turn him loose on Aunt Nedda. Now there was a predator worth confronting. MG sighed. Best wash the dishes and then go check the food and water in the hen house. She didn’t do gigs anymore. She did chickens.
Chapter Three
MG had one central thought as she stumbled to the hen house at five forty-five the next morning—no sane person got up at five thirty. Even Robespierre looked surprised to see her. Or maybe he was just sleepy too. At least he didn’t make his customary foray at her ankles, but that might have been the result of the handful of chicken feed she dropped in front of him. Maybe Joe LeBlanc knew what he was talking about.
The roosting hens gave her a few token clucks, but they weren’t interested in waking up yet either. She collected the eggs from the nesting boxes, fifteen in all. In the middle of the row, Hen Nine was still on her nest box, as usual.
“Broody,” MG muttered. “According to the Internet, you need a change of scene. We’ll see about moving your nest box when I get back.” She reached under the hen, got the usual flurry of pecks, and extracted a single egg. “Bingo.”
Hen Nine produced a few more angry clucks, then subsided into sleep.
MG considered putting the eggs in a carton, but decided against it. She was just going up the road to the inn, and she didn’t want to waste a carton.
The inn looked very dark and very quiet as she drove up. Its stately white expanse spread silently across the well-clipped lawn, canopies of live oaks lining the circular walk through the early spring flowers. Yard lights illuminated a parking lot at the back, and since that was where she figured the kitchen entrance was, she pulled her Kia into a slot near the door.
The farm was actually close enough to the inn that she could have walked the eggs to the kitchen, although she didn’t want to do that until it started getting light earlier in the morning. Jogging down a country road in total darkness with a basket full of eggs didn’t strike her as a particularly smart thing to do.
As she approached the back entrance, she saw a figure move across the lighted window. Clearly, the kitchen staff was already at work at six fifteen. She shifted her basket to her other arm and pulled open the door.
In the hall on the other side she paused for a moment, trying to get her bearings. From the door at the end she could hear what seemed to be kitchen sounds—the thud of knives on chopping boards, the hiss of running water, the murmur of voices.
A woman leaned around the side of the door, wearing a white coat and black cap. MG blinked. The blonde hair that stuck out from the edges was tipped in bright green.
She stared in MG’s direction, not smiling. “What do you want?”
MG held up the basket. “Eggs. Mr. LeBlanc told me to bring them here early.”
Green-hair gave her another cool look, then turned back toward the kitchen. “Joe,” she yelled. “You got a delivery here.”
LeBlanc appeared in the doorway a moment later. The transformation from his appearance yesterday was a little jarring. She hadn’t really expected him to still be wearing sweaty jogging clothes, but she also hadn’t expected Super Chef. Somehow his white coat and dark pants made him look twice as large, particularly across the chest. But his lips spread in the same slow grin when he saw her.
“Mornin’, Ms. Carmody,” he drawled. “What you got for me today?”
MG held up her basket. “Sixteen. Fresh from the hens. I brushed them off for you.”
“Omelets.” LeBlanc’s grin widened. “Guests won’t know what hit them. Most of them never tasted a fresh egg before.” He reached into his pocket, pulling out his wallet and extracting a five dollar bill. “Here you go.”
Her conscience gave her a quick kick. “That’s more than we agreed on.”
He shrugged. “Don’t worry about it. Looks like most of them are large, with maybe a few extra large. That’s worth five bucks.”
“Okay.” She stuffed the bill quickly into her pocket.
“If you get any more, bring them on up. We’ll use them later on.” He was already turning back toward the main part of the kitchen again.
MG leaned forward quickly. “Mr. LeBlanc?”
He turned back, one eyebrow arching. “Just call me Joe, darlin’. I don’t answer to Mr. LeBlanc. What do you need?”
She blew out a breath. “Could I get my basket back? It’s the only one I’ve got.”
He stared at her for a long moment, and she wondered if she’d made some kind of kitchen faux pas. Tough. She needed the freakin’ basket.
“Sure.” He shrugged. “Let me unload it, then you can have it back. Wait here for a second.”
She stepped up to the doorway. A man with dark hair stood at the stove frying bacon. At the counter across from her, Ms. Greenhair was chopping mushrooms at an incredible rate, tossing them into a bowl at the side, while LeBlanc piled the eggs into a bowl on the counter beside her.
He turned back toward the door, then did a double-take when he saw her standing inside. “Here you go.” He smiled, handing her the basket.
“The three of you do breakfast for all the guests?” The kitchen looked big enough to hold a small regiment.
LeBlanc shrugged. “It’s a small inn. Only twenty or thirty guests as a rule. We can handle that many with no trouble—especially since a lot of them just want coffee and pastry.”
She nodded slowly, taking in the gleaming stainless steel cabinets, the cement floor with its green rubber mats, the black cooktops and overhead ovens. “Quite a place.”
“Yeah.” LeBlanc shifted slightly, as if he wanted to get back to the pile of onions and peppers on the table.
MG managed another smile. “Okay, if I get any more eggs I’ll bring them by. Thanks.”
“Don’t mention it.” He was already turning back to his prep table before she walked back down the hall.
The breakfast rush wasn’t big, but it was steady. Darcy’s yogurt parfaits went fast, the way they always did. Oatmeal wasn’t a big hit, but they had to have a pot of the stuff for the handful of health nuts—some of them just nuts, in Joe’s opinion. Bacon and eggs moved briskly.
Maybe a little more briskly than usual, in fact. Joe held back one of MG Carmody’s extra-large eggs for himself and was, as he’d expected to be, blown away. He’d grown up with eggs like that, and once you’d had them, the supermarket kind never tasted quite the same again.
He wondered if there was any way he could convince Carmody to add a few more hens. Hell, all she had to do was let that randy rooster loose and then let one or two of the hens brood up a flock of chicks.
Of course, he hadn’t been inside her hen house. Maybe she didn’t have room for any more chickens. He should probably take a look, give her some advice about expanding.
Yeah, right. Mr. Altruism here.
Joe grimaced as he watched Placido load the dishwasher. MG Carmody still looked like she could use a good meal and a quick trip to Kohl’s, but even at six thirty in the morning, she also looked like someone he’d like to know better. Which was a sort of polite way of saying she looked hot, even in a pair of cargo pants and a T-shirt, with no obvious make-up and a certain amount of straw
in her hair.
As he recalled, straw in the hair was an occupational hazard around hen houses. In fact, you were lucky if it was just straw.
Darcy took a load of chopped vegetables into the cooler, ready for the lunch crowd, then emerged wiping her hands on her towel. “You talk to Kit about the prep cook?”
He nodded. “We’ll put out some feelers to see who’s available. Meanwhile, I’ll get you somebody to do the basic scut work.”
“All right then.” She pulled off her apron and tossed it in the laundry bag. “I’m going out for coffee. You can tell the Beav I’ll be back in time to finish the lunch prep and get the quiches going.”
Joe managed not to grin. Calling Fairley the Beav wasn’t going to endear Darcy to him, particularly if he heard her do it. On the other hand, it struck Joe as a spot-on description. He did a cursory check to make sure Leo was doing lunch prep, then headed for his cabin.
When he’d first arrived at the Woodrose Inn, he’d been happy enough to have a house on the premises, even if it was a converted guest cabin. Now the space had begun to feel downright claustrophobic. One of these days he needed to find somewhere else to live, but it was still low on his list of priorities. He hung up his jacket and pulled a Hawaiian shirt on over the undershirt he wore underneath, then headed toward the parking lot.
He’d had an idea when MG Carmody had wandered into his kitchen that morning, and cooking breakfast for the relatively small number of guests had allowed his thoughts to percolate. He figured he’d need to do a little selling to convince Carmody herself, but he was ready to give it a try.
As he walked through her front yard, he noted the patches of bare dirt under the pecan trees and the slight sag in the front steps. MG Carmody might actually be a dotcom billionaire who liked living off the land, but he doubted it. He raised his hand to knock on the front door when he heard clucking from the rear.
As he walked around the side of the house, he noted the remains of a well-established vegetable garden at the back, including some telltale asparagus stalks. Definitely worth checking out later on.
MG Carmody stood in her grassy back yard near the chicken coop. Five or so hens moved around her ankles, industriously snipping at the grass. The rooster stood on the other side of the fence, squawking loudly in what sounded like indignation.
Joe put a hand on the fence post, leaning back to watch. “Trying fresh feed?”
MG jumped, then turned toward him, frowning. “You should wear a bell or something when you come back here. That’s the second time you’ve startled me.”
He shrugged, trying for apologetic and failing. “Herding chickens?”
“I read an article on the Internet that said you should feed them grass and let them scratch. They can scratch in the chicken yard—” she gestured toward the largely dirt patch inside the fence around the hen house, “—but there’s no grass there. And I can’t afford to build one of those ‘chicken tractor’ things where you move them around the yard to a different spot every couple of days.”
“So, like I say, you’re herding chickens.”
She nodded. “I figure I can look after four or five at a time and then switch them out with four or five others.”
“You know which ones have had their time in the yard and which ones haven’t?” Joe folded his arms across his chest. He was, against all odds, enjoying himself.
She shrugged. “Sort of. I mean, some of them have sort of distinctive markings. The white ones are pretty much identical, though.” She moved to the side, gently channeling one wandering chicken back toward the rest of the flock with her foot. Behind the wire fence, the rooster let loose with another indignant squawk.
“You know they need grain too, right?”
She nodded. “This is just sort of supplemental. Did you come for the eggs?”
He raised an eyebrow, momentarily sidetracked. “Which eggs?”
“The extras. The ones they laid after I brought the first bunch to the kitchen.”
“Oh.” He shrugged. “Sure. How many do you have?”
“Just two.”
“You ever thought about increasing your flock?” He stuck a foot in the path of another wandering hen.
She frowned. “I’ve got enough to do just keeping the ones I’ve got healthy. I mean I really don’t know all that much about raising chickens. My grandpa told me what he could, and I spend a lot of time on the Web. Plus I’ve got this dummies book about chicken farming.” She gave him a dry smile. “I qualify, believe me.”
He leaned back against the fencepost again. “If you produced more eggs, we’d buy them. And my guess is, you’d find a lot of restaurants around here that would say the same. Ten more hens would be a good investment.” The wandering chickens took another turn, pecking happily at the grass.
“Thanks, I’ll look into it,” she said absently.
“Look,” he began and then stopped. He hadn’t really thought about how he was going to start talking about this without insulting her. On the other hand, sometimes it was best to just confront things head-on.
She turned toward him, eyebrows raised. “What?”
“Do you have anything else you can draw on besides these chickens?” He said quickly. “I mean sources of income?”
Her cheeks flushed slightly. In the lemon-colored sunlight, her red-gold hair, glowing cheeks, and sun-warmed skin made her look like some kind of barnyard goddess. It was faintly perverse that embarrassment actually made her look hotter. “Why do you want to know?”
“Because I had an idea,” he began and then stopped again. This had seemed a lot easier when it had just been something he’d been thinking about.
“An idea?”
“Have you ever worked in a kitchen?” he said a little desperately.
Her brows drew together in confusion. “You mean like the kitchen in the house?”
“No, I mean like professionally. A restaurant kitchen? Maybe a part-time job or something?”
She shook her head. “I know how to cook. I used to be pretty good at it, back before…” Her cheeks reddened slightly, although he wasn’t sure why. “Why do you want to know?”
“We need some help in the kitchen. Somebody to do basic prep work—you know, peeling, washing, chopping, like that.”
Her cheeks were still pink. He hoped it was embarrassment rather than being pissed at him for suggesting it. “You mean like peeling potatoes?”
“That would be part of it. And carrots. And onions. And washing lettuce. We go through a ton of produce every week, almost literally. And we don’t buy those bags of lettuce like you see in the supermarket. Our stuff comes straight from the farms, and it needs to be washed off pretty thoroughly.”
She narrowed her eyes, chewing on her lower lip. “How many hours a day would it be?”
“Around five or six.” He shrugged. “Could be more when we have special events. I’m trying to hire a prep cook, a professional, so I don’t know how long the job would last. But we need somebody right now.”
She shook her head. “I’ve never worked in a kitchen before. I don’t even know what half the words you use mean. And I can’t cut stuff anything like as fast as your cook does.”
He shook his head. “You don’t have to know how to be a chef. This job is just washing, peeling and chopping, like I said. Probably around ten bucks an hour, although I’ll have to talk that over with the restaurant manager, Kit Maldonado.”
Her eyes widened slightly. Apparently fifty bucks a day was a real draw. “How many days a week?”
“Say five. We’re closed on Mondays, and Sundays we just do brunch. So Tuesday through Saturday.”
“Starting when?”
“Tomorrow. Give me a chance to tell Kit so she can get the paperwork ready to go when you show up.”
An unholy squawk issued from the wire fence directly behind MG and she jumped. The rooster fluttered his wings, crowing as he did. MG stumbled back from the fence, narrowly dodging a ruffled hen. “Damn it, you stup
id bird.”
The rooster made another fluttering run at the fence, squawking furiously.
Joe moved forward, picking up the nearest hen and tucking it in the crook of his arm. “Time to put the ladies back. Your guy’s getting a little agitated.”
MG frowned. “That’s an interesting way to pick them up.”
He opened the gate and pushed the hen inside the yard, then picked up the next one. “Just tuck it under your arm.”
She looked at the other hens a little suspiciously, then leaned down to gather one carefully into her arms.
“Grab it by the legs,” he said. “Then put one hand underneath. If you put your fingers between the legs you can hold onto one leg with your thumb and index finger.”
The chicken settled into her arms easily enough. MG stared at him, eyes wide. “I’ve never been able to pick one up before.”
“It’s easy when you know how.” He grinned again, picking up the last one.
The rooster was still strutting around the yard, checking each hen carefully for something or other, maybe illicit congress with invisible roosters.
Joe leaned against the fence, watching Robespierre as MG put the last hen back inside. “You ought to consider a few more. Ten or twelve would make big difference in your egg production.”
“I’ll think about it.” She frowned watching the rooster stalk through his domain. “If I let some of the eggs hatch, won’t a few of the chicks be male? I definitely have all the rooster I can handle.”
He shrugged. “Sell them for meat when they’re a few months older. Roosters are good for fricassee.”
She turned toward him, wide-eyed. “I hadn’t…I don’t think I could do that. Kill them, I mean.”
“Sell them to a processor, then.”
She still didn’t look convinced.
“You don’t want to get too attached to them. The hens stop laying when they’re two or three years old. Then you’d be running a chicken retirement home.”
She blew out a breath. “I’ll think about that in two or three years. Right now, it’s hard to think beyond the end of the week.”
