“Uh, why are you the only one with a Spanish accent?” the blond nurse called behind her.
Garcelle’s steps slowed, and she turned. “I’ve been living in Mexico for a year. I guess you pick up more than just Montezuma’s revenge.”
She didn’t give the woman a chance to say or ask anything else as she walked into Kade’s room. Kadina jumped up from her seat by the bed and threw her arms around Garcelle’s waist. Garcelle tugged on her ponytail playfully as she smiled in greeting at Kade’s parents and then shifted her eyes to skim Kade’s face.
He was sitting up on the side of the bed, in a black sweatsuit. His face was pensive but bruise free. “Hola, Kade Strong,” she said softly.
Kade rose to his feet with effort. “Am I glad to see you,” he said. “If I get one more flower or tin of cookies or pie or card or visit . . . I’m going to scream.”
Garcelle looked around the room and thought she’d never seen so many flowers at a funeral. Some even lined the floor under his window. “Word sure travels fast,” she said.
“Small-town living at its best,” Kael said in that deep, gruff tone of his.
Garcelle sat down in the chair by Kade’s bed. She looked up at him, with a huge grin. “What is it about you that’s driving all these women crazy?” she asked in a low voice that was teasing and meant for his ears only.
“Don’t see it, huh?” he asked as he pressed his hand to his side.
“You’re all right,” she said flippantly. “I’ve seen worse.”
Kade laughed and then winced.
“Come on, Kadina. Let’s all go see what snacks they have downstairs in the café,” Lisha said, rising and reaching her hand out to her granddaughter. Kael rose as well.
Kade looked over his shoulder at them. “Don’t be long. The nurse said she’ll be right back with my release papers.”
They ignored him and filed right on out of the room.
Kade shook his head. “You know they left us alone on purpose,” he told her.
“No,” Garcelle said, with mock disbelief.
“As soon as they see a pretty face, they get to plotting.”
Garcelle tilted her head to the side. “Ah. You think I’m pretty?” she asked, with saccharine sweetness.
Kade copied her arched eyebrow. “I’ve seen better.”
“I don’t get no complaints, baby,” she told him, with Latin spice, before she rose from the chair and walked back over to the window.
“Do you have a boyfriend?” he asked suddenly.
“I used to,” she said, looking out the window at the cars driving past the hospital. “It ended kind of bad, you know. So right now I’m just working to save for nursing school by baby-sitting this pretty little girl and playing bodyguard for her grouchy daddy.”
Kade reached for one of his pillows and tossed it at her, with effort.
Lisha watched her granddaughter select and pay for a slice of chocolate cake. She thought of her son and Garcelle upstairs, and her eyes, which were so like Kade’s, lit up.
“Uh oh,” said Kael.
Lisha smoothed her hands over her jean slacks as she glanced over to her handsome husband. “What?” she asked, with mock innocence.
He shook his head. “Kade already told me that he and Garcelle are just friends, so just erase the thought from your mind.”
“But didn’t you see how comfortable they are with each other?” Lisha asked, lowering her voice as Kadina made her way across the café.
Kael’s eyes rested on her. “Friends usually are comfortable with each other, Lisha.”
She winked just like Kahron. “And sometimes friends become lovers,” she whispered behind her hand as Kadina reached them.
A sharp dart of pain roused Kade from his nap. He winced as he smacked his mouth at the taste of sleep. It wasn’t tasty.
Kade was propped up on pillows and in pajama bottoms. Both were a type of torture, because he loved sleeping on his stomach and in the nude. Releasing a deep breath, he turned his head on the pillow.
He hated being cooped up in his bedroom—this bedroom—all day. Everything about it reminded him of Reema. The brown, khaki, and gold décor. The wedding portrait on the wall. Even her perfume bottles still sat on the dresser top.
Since he’d moved back into the house, he’d purposely spent little time in the room. He left for work early and went to bed late. In the morning, he was dressed and out of the room in no time. At night he would shower and drop to sleep before he could even think about being in that room alone.
Now he was looking at at least three days of relaxing for his ribs to heal, and there was no way he could spend it in this room. No way in hell.
He took his time flinging back the covers and sitting up on the side of the bed. He winced as a sharp pain vibrated across his side. “Damn,” he swore.
“You are so damn hardheaded, Kade Strong.”
He turned his head to find Garcelle leaning in the doorway and looking at him, with a chastising expression. “Leave me alone, Garcelle,” he growled as he attempted to rise to his feet.
She rushed forward to help him, mumbling something in rapid Spanish under her breath.
“At least cuss me out in English,” he grumbled as he rose to his feet.
Garcelle stood before him, with her hands on her deeply curved hips. “You get back in that bed, Kade Strong, or I will call your mama to come and get on your nerves while I go home.”
He looked down into her vibrant eyes. “You do know that you work for me, and it’s not the other way around,” he snapped.
Garcelle licked her lips and looked down at the floor as she tapped her sandaled foot. She looked up at him, with a sigh. “What I do know is your mama’s number.”
Kade knew he had lost the battle. If he let his mother in his house, she would continue coming on the regular. He loved his mother, and he appreciated everything his parents did for him and Kadina after Reema died, but he needed his space. Giving Garcelle one last scowl, he eased back down onto the bed.
“Ha!” she said mockingly as she bent to position the covers over him.
“When this is over, I can fire you, you know,” he told her.
Garcelle paused, with her body still bent over him and her nose just inches away from his. “I could quit before this is over, you know,” she countered, her cool and fresh breath lightly fanning his mouth.
“You . . . ” Roses. She smells like roses.
“Yes?” she asked, obviously awaiting his words.
Kade turned his head and looked at the adjoining bathroom. “Nothing. Never mind,” he groused.
“Perfecto,” Garcelle said as she kicked off her shoes and walked around to the opposite side of the bed.
“Where’s Kadina?” he asked, his eyes locked on her.
Garcelle reached in her back pocket for a deck of cards and flung it next to him on the bed. “She fell asleep watching Maid in Manhattan. We just love us some Jennifer Lopez.”
“What are you doing?” Kade asked as he watched Garcelle climb onto the bed.
She froze, with one knee pressed into the thick and plush mattress, as she looked at him with a critical eye. “What do you think I’m doing, Kade Strong? I know you are not conceited enough to think I’m jumping in bed to have nookie with you.”
“Of course not.”
“Good.” Garcelle carefully climbed on the bed, sat cross-legged, and then shuffled the deck of cards. “I know this room must be driving you crazy, so I’m here to keep you company until your brothers get here after work.”
He had to admit that ever since she’d walked into the room, it hadn’t felt quite so claustrophobic. “You know how to play whist?” he asked.
“No,” she said, handing him the deck. “But teach me. I’m a quick learner.”
“Learning how to play whist isn’t that easy.”
Garcelle shrugged. “My ex told me the same thing about poker, and now he can hardly beat me.”
Kade was surprised. “Yo
u play poker?”
Garcelle lifted a brow. “A little something,” she said, with a saucy grin and a wink.
Bianca washed her hands at the small sink in the tack room of the barn. She dried her hands with disposable towels as she walked out of the metal building. Her full and pouty lips curled into a soft smile as she read the sign on the door:
KING EQUINE SERVICES /
BIANCA KING VETERINARY CLINIC
A FULL-SERVICE EQUINE FARM
So far every decision she’d made concerning her business, her family, and her love life had been a good one. The equine veterinary practice, which she’d opened right on her father’s horse farm, was already thriving and showing a profit. That was mainly because more than a few of her clients from her old Atlanta practice would drive the distance to South Carolina or had highly recommended her to local farmers. The small metal building she erected on the east portion of the property was smaller than her old practice, but she was pleased with the setup and with the fact that she was still able to work with her father daily.
She had had to travel back to Holtsville to snatch the family business from ruin because of her father’s alcoholism, but every bit of the success was now his doing. He had been sober for over a year. His divorce to his treacherous wife was finalized. He was in full control of the business and was delivering that special Hank King touch with the horses.
And Kahron. Bianca moaned a bit in pleasure as she thought of her love for her husband. He had once asked her to trust him, and when she finally did give in, she found a love that plenty of folks would give their right hand for.
In fact, she was headed home early for the first time in weeks so that she could spend some quality time with her man. She would warm up one of Garcelle’s frozen dinners, take a hot bath, slip into something that was barely there and wait for Kahron to walk through the door for a helluva surprise.
“Headed home?”
Bianca turned to find her father, a tall, big, barrel-shaped man, walking up behind her. She slowed to a stop and threw her arm around his waist when he caught up to her.
“Yes. Yes. Yes,” she said, with emphasis.
He laughed, and his laughter rumbled like a thunderstorm in his chest. “You and Kahron have a special night planned?”
“I’m gonna try my best,” she said as they neared the front porch of her father’s home.
“Good. Because I have some plans of my own for the weekend,” he said, with a chuckle that was decidedly boyish.
“Who?” she asked, surprised. Bianca hadn’t even known her father was dating anyone.
“An out-of-town guest,” he admitted as they climbed the stairs together.
“Do I know—”
Honk-honk.
Bianca’s curly head whipped around and her eyes widened as a gold convertible Jaguar came barreling toward the house. It lurched to a stop just in time to miss hitting the front porch.
“Surprise, surprise, sweetie!”
Bianca forced a smile to her face. “Mimi?” she said, watching as the petite spitfire hopped out of the car in a getup that could only be called urban cowgirl. A jean pantsuit, cowboy hat, and a belt buckle large enough to knock a bull unconscious.
“My daddy’s . . . dating . . . Mimi,” Bianca said in a confused voice before her older friend enveloped her in a hug that was all Chanel parfum.
Garcelle and Kadina were in the kitchen, making Kade’s favorite double chocolate and walnut brownies. Kadina wanted to do something special for her father, and Garcelle knew he could use a treat after the spanking she’d given him in poker earlier that day. Thank God they’d played for Monopoly money and not clothes, because Kade Strong would have been as naked as the day he was born.
Not that she wanted to see Kade nude.
Garcelle’s eyebrow rose and her lips pursed as she envisioned Kade naked and bronzed, with his muscles oiled and well defined. She already knew from seeing him without his shirt that the man’s body was sculptured from his long hours of farm-work. He had just the right amount of fine silver hair on his chest. Just enough for a woman to play in as she lay in bed with him.
Garcelle looked down into the bowl of chocolate, and she bit her bottom lip as she clearly pictured herself nude and riding Kade, astride a galloping horse and through a field of flowers. As he rode the horse faster and faster, she rode him harder and harder. Each movement of the horse’s hindquarters sent his shaft deeper inside of her as she held on to him for dear life.
Was it possible to ride a man while riding a horse?
The doorbell rang, and Garcelle frowned as the image faded away in her mind. Having a freaky daydream about Kade Strong was just plain stupido, and having a freaky daydream about being on a horse with Kade Strong was ridiculous, because she didn’t fool with horses at all.
“I’ll get it,” Kadina said, jumping down off the stool and running out of the kitchen.
Garcelle was spreading the brownie mix into the glass bakeware when she heard Kadina say, “My daddy’s sleeping. He don’t need no prayer.”
Garcelle grabbed the dish towel to clean her hands as she made her way out of the kitchen to the front door. She rolled her eyes heavenward at the woman standing there, holding a bible, but dang near dressed for the club. “Can I help you?” Garcelle asked as she pulled Kadina behind her.
The woman looked Garcelle up and down with a slow thoroughness before she visibly stiffened her spine. “And you are?” she asked, with attitude.
Oh no, she didn’t, Garcelle thought, with sistah-girl spunk. “I’m Garcelle Santos, Kadina’s niñera. Can I help you?”
“A nina what?” the woman asked.
“She’s my nanny,” Kadina said, moving forward to stand beside Garcelle.
“Oh . . . okay then,” the woman said, with a big, cheesy grin. “My name is Portia Klinton. I attend church with Kade. Could you let him know I’m here to check on him?”
It was Garcelle’s turn to take in the woman’s skintight pants and formfitting T-shirt. “Listen, he’s asleep. I’ll let him know you dropped by.”
She started to close the door, but Portia put her foot in the doorway. Garcelle backed up, opened the door wide, and looked at the woman like she was crazy.
Portia went in her bag and pulled out a small pad and pen. “If you’re not too busy to take a message?” she said, with false sweetness.
Garcelle held her hand out. “Of course not,” she said, with mock sincerity.
Portia pressed the note into Garcelle’s hand. Garcelle looked down and immediately recognized both the handwriting and the phone number. It was 555-0000. The woman was the freaky secret admirer. Since that first grotesque dildo, the woman had sent Kade eight other gifts, each more sexually explicit than the last.
“I’ll make sure it’s properly delivered,” Garcelle said, with her heavy accent.
“Please do,” said Portia.
“You know, I’ve been watching reruns of this show called Martin,” Garcelle told Portia.
“And?” Portia retorted, with attitude.
“I learned something that I want to show you.”
Portia looked confused.
“Step back a little,” Garcelle said in a friendly tone.
Portia took a step back. “Now what?”
Garcelle tilted her head to the side. “This,” she said sweetly before she stepped back and swung the door closed.
“Now to make sure it’s properly delivered, the way I promised,” Garcelle said over her shoulder to Kadina as she strolled back into the kitchen. She balled up the paper and threw it up into the air like she was making a free throw. It landed in the trash, with a swoosh.
Kadina covered her mouth with both of her hands as she burst into a fit of giggles.
6
Garcelle tossed and turned in her bed. She flipped from her back onto her stomach and onto her back again. Her smoky brown eyes opened, and she turned her head on the pillow to look at her nightstand clock. 12:15 a.m.
She co
uldn’t sleep.
She pulled back her curtain and looked up at the night sky. The moon was completely full and seemed close enough to touch. It was beautiful and haunting all at once.
Kicking back the covers, Garcelle hopped out of bed in her wifebeater and an old pair of men’s boxers. She padded barefoot to the kitchen and headed straight to the fridge for a can of light beer. She popped the tab and took a deep gulp.
“It’s a little late for that, isn’t it?”
Gabrielle nearly choked on the beer as she whirled around and found her father sitting at the kitchen table, cloaked by darkness. “Papi, what are you doing up?” she asked as she reached over to the wall to turn on the light.
“I sit here sometimes and look at your mother’s picture as the moonlight comes through the door.” Carlos leaned forward and pushed back the chair at the head of the table. “Bring me one,” he told her in Spanish.
Garcelle grabbed another beer before she walked across the small kitchen to take the seat. She passed him the beer before she took another sip of her own. “Papi, you know we wouldn’t be upset if you wanted to start dating again,” she told him. She hesitated before she said the rest. “I don’t think Mami would mind, either.”
Carlos took a long swig of his beer before he looked over at his daughter, with his boyishly handsome face. “When you love somebody the way that I loved my Maria and you lose them, your heart is so tied up with trying to heal. You feel like a piece of you—a big piece of you—is gone. So your heart doesn’t have room to fill it with love for someone else. It wouldn’t be fair to that person. Until the heart heals, you would forever make comparisons. It takes time.”
Garcelle used her fingertip to trace the top of the can as she fell silent. She was up at midnight, sipping beer while she talked to her father, because she couldn’t sleep. And she couldn’t sleep, because with each passing day, her physical attraction to Kade Strong was growing. The man was gorgeous. Temptingly delicious. Devilishly handsome. Devastatingly sexy. Disarmingly charming. Distractingly appealing.
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