They all took off.
Kade rode his horse hard, rising up from the saddle as he let the animal take the lead. He passed the stretches of trees and grass drying from the heat of the sun. He could hear the hooves thundering against the ground as his siblings all vied to beat him. His heart thundered from the exhilaration of the race. Kaeden's silhouette increased in size as Kade neared him.
Risking a look back to check his competition, Kade glanced over his shoulder. Kaleb was on his heels. Kahron was coming up strong, with his shades making him look like a robot. Kaitlyn brought up the rear but was fighting to close the gap.
Kade faced forward, but his expression went from that of victory to confusion as his horse suddenly reared up and then stopped, causing his body to go flying over the horse's head. He landed on the ground, with a thud.
"Shit," he swore, with a grimace, as pain radiated across his body.
"Paco, come and eat," Garcelle called out to her brother as she left Marta's house. She counted her poker winnings as she walked into the house. Two hundred and thirty dollars, she told herself. She walked straight into her room and grabbed the empty pickle jar, where she kept her money until she went to the bank. She rammed the money atop the bills already crunched in there.
She loved playing poker. Joaquin had taught her how to play, and she had taken to it like a fish to water. She hated when the state outlawed those video poker machines, because it had been nothing for her to win five hundred dollars or better in one sitting. Most times when men heard she was a skilled poker player, they laughed and tried to play her like a joke ... until she had their pockets empty or their backsides bare.
She wasn't addicted to gambling at all. In fact, she only played with her friends on Sunday afternoons, and even then, once she lost her fifty-dollar table stake, she sat out or went home. Oh, she loved poker, but the game wasn't serious enough to cut into her money for school or make her borrow money to play.
Garcelle left her room. "You awake, Papi?" she asked her father.
Carlos laughed as he wiped his hand over his mouth. "Yes, and I'm starving," he answered.
"Coming right up," she told him over her softly rounded shoulder as she headed for the kitchen.
"Paco, wash your hands, and go and set the table," she heard her father tell her brother in Spanish.
They always ate their dinner together as a family. It was their way of honoring her mother, because family meals had been so important to her. Even when Garcelle worked late, watching Kadina, or her father and her uncles had an emergency at the ranch that held them up, no one would eat until everyone was home.
Paco set the table as Garcelle placed steaming platters of food in the center of the table. Her father came into the kitchen and walked to the back door. "Anthony and Raul," he called out to his two twentysomething younger brothers. They shared the same father, but had different mothers. Once he was settled in America, Carlos had sent for her uncles and got them the jobs at the Circle S Ranch.
Garcelle enjoyed the family banter as they talked freely and with ease in Spanish while she fixed the plates and handed one to each of the men. As their talk turned to the ranch, Garcelle immediately thought of Kade.
The women of Holtsville were on a full-blown campaign to see who would be the woman to snag the very eligible but very reluctant bachelor Kade Strong. In the two weeks since the package had been left on Kade's step, Garcelle had intercepted letters, cards, phone calls, and even more risque packages from the single women of Holtsville, South Carolina. She swore, if she laid eyes on one more nudie shot, she would retch.
All of it smelled of man-hungry, desperate women. Not to say there wasn't a good woman out there for Kade, but so far these women, who were trying to lure him with sex, were hardly great candidates to be Kadina's stepmother. No, these women only wanted to lie up in Kade's bed and probably send Kadina to her room or outside to amuse herself.
She was the type of active and smart little girl who needed someone to talk to her and spend time with her. Take her to the parks and museums she loved. Take her to the bookstore to carefully select the next book she would read. Tell her about little boys when the time came. And do all the things women knew that a man didn't do, such as help her through her first menstrual cycle.
Kadina needed someone patient, loving, and fun like ... Garcelle herself. Garcelle literally shook her head at the thought. She definitely was not throwing herself in the running to be the second Mrs. Kade Strong. In the last two weeks, they had settled into a cool friendship. They joked with each other. They asked each other for advice. They laughed at the antics of the women.
Yes, she thought Kade Strong was hotter than a dozen Playgirl centerfolds combined-she could admit that-but the last thing she wanted was to get involved with a man who was so deeply in love with his dead wife. Besides, she enjoyed their newfound friendship, and after the Joaquin BS, she wasn't looking for love right now, anyway.
Kade Strong was her friend and nothing more. She was more than fine with that.
"Garcelle ... Garcelle?"
She turned her head and focused her attention on her father, who was handing her the cordless phone. Did it ring? she wondered as she took the phone from him.
"Hel-"
"Garcelle, this is Kade. You're on a speakerphone, okay?"
Garcelle placed her fork on her plate as she sat back from the table a bit. She furrowed her brow. "Okay," she said, with obvious hesitation.
"Long story short. I fell off a horse during a race-
"You fell?" she shrieked. "Are you okay?"
"I'm fine. I'm more than fine. That's my whole point."
"You call breaking two ribs fine?" Garcelle heard a woman say in the background.
"You broke your ribs?" Garcelle gasped in horror.
"What is going on, Garcelle?" her father demanded in Spanish.
"Kade fell off a horse and broke his ribs," she told her father, holding the mouthpiece away from her mouth.
"I ... didn't ... break ... anything," Kade roared into the phone. "I bruised my ribs."
"Oh, he bruised his ribs," Garcelle relayed to her father. She frowned as she focused again on the phone conversation. "And why were you horse racing at your age?"
"For the love of God, Garcelle-"
"Okay, okay. Go ahead." She placed the phone between her cheek and shoulder so that she could use both of her hands to twist her hair atop her head-a nervous gesture of hers.
"I know looking out for a grouchy injured man in his midthirties isn't a part of your baby-sitting duties, but I need a favor."
Garcelle rose from the table when she saw three sets of velvet brown eyes resting on her in open curiosity. "I'll do it," she said before he could even ask. She waved her hands to let her family know to continue with dinner. She left the kitchen, then walked through the living room and out the front door to sit down on the top step of the porch.
"Garcelle, are you sure? Because he could stay at Strong Ranch until he's better," Lisha Strong called out.
"It's no problem at all," she assured Kade's mother.
"Garcelle, I'm taking you off speakerphone, okay?" said Kade.
She heard the background noises disappear. "Kade, are you really okay? Just say yes or no."
"No. Hell, no," he said, with emphasis.
She bit back a smile. "It hurts like hell, doesn't it, Mr. Tough Guy?" she asked, her accent making mister sound more like meester.
He grunted. "Yes."
"When will you be home?" she asked as her eyes drifted up to watch the sun set.
"They're keeping me overnight to make sure I don't have a concussion."
Garcelle snorted in laughter. "For you to be horse racing, you had to have bumped your head before the race."
"Don't make me laugh, Garcelle," he said in a strained voice.
"You want me to come tonight?" she asked.
"No, don't bother. I'm about to run the whole Strong bunch out of here now." She heard protests in the backgr
ound. "Kadina will spend tonight at my parents'."
"Well, I will pick you up from the hospital tomorrow," she told him as she rose from the step. She brushed any dust from her backside.
"You don't have to do that."
Garcelle shrugged as if he could see her. "Okay. I just thought I could get you and Kadina and take you home. That way we could part from your family at the hospital and not have to worry about clearing them out of your house."
The line went quiet for just a second. "Good idea," he said quickly. "I'll call you when I'm ready."
Garcelle laughed low and husky. "I thought so."
"Garcelle?"
"Yes, Kade?" she said as she walked back into the house.
"Thank you," he said warmly.
She ignored the shiver that raced down her spine and made her bare feet tingle. "No problemo. That's what friends are for."
5
Garcelle had just walked through the automatic doors of Colleton Medical Center when she spotted Rita and Pita climbing from their white station wagon. She didn't even break a sweat as she rode the elevator to the second floor of the three-story hospital. She smiled sweetly at the nurses at their station.
"Hello, I'm Kade Strong's sister," she lied, hoping none of the women knew the family and caught her. "Two women are on their way up to visit my brother, but we would like them barred from his room. Aggravation, you know?"
A petite blonde leaned forward in a conspiratorial fashion. "The women have been in and out of that room all morning. Even the hospital workers have been sniffing around like crazy. His room has got to be cleaner than an operating room."
Garcelle smiled.
"I must admit, he's not even my patient, and I've been in there twice to check on him," said the blond nurse.
"I'm glad you understand," Garcelle said, turning away from the station.
"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 cafe," 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.
K-ide 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 cafe.
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 decor. 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."
Hot Like Fire (Dafina Contemporary Romance) Page 6