Dade

by Delores Fossen

  Frantically, she looked around the room for anything she could use as a weapon. The first thing she spotted was a heavy silver-framed photo of Dade and his brothers. Kayla snatched it from the counter and brought it down, hard, on Carrie’s head.

  Carrie made a sound of outrage and tried to turn the gun on Kayla.

  Dade cursed and held on despite Carrie kicking any and every part of his body that she could reach. She also managed to get off another shot.

  “What’s going on in there?” Deputy Lopez yelled from the other side of the door.

  “It’s Carrie,” Kayla shouted. She didn’t know whether to tell the deputy to come in or stay put.

  “To hell with this,” Dade snarled, and he rammed his elbow across Carrie’s chin.

  The woman’s head flopped back, but she didn’t stop fighting.

  Kayla could only watch in horror as Carrie managed to maneuver her body, twisting it, until she broke free of Dade’s grip. For just a second. In that second, Dade grabbed at Carrie again, but Carrie’s attention was focused only on Kayla.

  “You’re a dead woman,” Carrie threatened. And she brought up the gun.

  Just as Dade latched onto it and Carrie’s hand.

  He bashed both against the floor. But not in time. Carrie pulled the trigger again.

  Kayla immediately knew something was wrong. The sound was different this time. Not so much of a blast but a deadly sounding thud. And she knew.

  Someone had been shot.

  “Dade!” Kayla yelled. She grabbed him by the shoulder and dragged him away from Carrie.

  She saw the blood then.

  So much blood.

  And Kayla felt her heart stop. God, had she lost him? Had Carrie managed to kill Dade?

  The timing was horrible, but the only thing that kept going through Kayla’s head was that she hadn’t gotten the chance to tell him that she loved him.

  “Dade,” Kayla said through a sob.

  He turned his head and caught her gaze. “I’m okay,” he assured her.

  But Kayla shook her head and stared at the blood.

  Dade climbed off Carrie, and in the same motion, he hooked his arm around Kayla to move her away from Carrie. But Kayla still saw the woman.

  Lifeless, the front of her green scrubs soaked in blood.

  Carrie still had a grip on the gun that she’d fired. And when she fired that last bullet, she’d accidentally shot herself.

  “It’s over,” she heard Dade say.

  And he pulled Kayla into his arms.

  Chapter Seventeen

  “Are you sure this is okay?” Kayla asked—again.

  Dade tried to give her a reassuring nod—again. It had only been two hours since Carrie had tried to kill them, and he figured Kayla would need a lot of reassuring until it was nothing but a bad memory. He took Robbie from the infant seat in the back of the cruiser. Robbie flashed Dade a big sloppy grin and babbled some sounds. Happy sounds. Unlike his mom, Robbie had no apprehensions about coming to the Ryland ranch.

  “Da da da,” Robbie babbled.

  Dade knew he was just trying to say his name, but it melted his heart anyway.

  “The ranch is big,” Kayla commented as she stepped from the front passenger’s seat. She looked up at the sprawling two-story redbrick house.

  Dade took a moment to try to see the place through Kayla’s eyes. Yeah, it was big and getting bigger. Three thousand acres, but Mason was constantly in “buy” mode when it came to adjoining land. And the house, well, it had gone through changes over the years, too.

  “Grayson and Eve are having a new wing put on so they’ll have more room for their baby,” he let them know. He tipped his head to the addition that had already been framed. “Nate and Kimmie live in the left wing with Kimmie’s nanny, Grace. I already called and talked to Grace, and she said she’d help out taking care of Robbie.”

  “That’s kind of her,” Kayla said softly.

  Yeah, and it might become a necessity because Connie had decided that she needed a break. Dade couldn’t blame the woman because she’d spent the last couple of days in danger, in hiding and on the run. Before that, she’d been in hiding with Kayla. Hardly the best employment situation.

  Kayla’s gaze went from the left wing to the porch that extended across the entire front of the main house. Unlike her estate, the ranch was homespun and didn’t have a high-end decorator’s touch.

  “It’s really beautiful,” Kayla said, looking back at him. She smiled both at Dade and Robbie, but her smile couldn’t hide her nerves. “But I probably should have gotten a room at the hotel while my place is being repaired. Especially because I don’t think I’ll be going back to the estate.”

  Dade stopped. This was the first he’d heard of this, and Kayla and he had spent the last couple of hours talking.

  “Too many bad memories,” she added.

  He didn’t doubt that, but he didn’t like that Kayla was making plans that she hadn’t talked about. Of course Dade had done the same.

  Her attention drifted to the other vehicles in the drive. Mason’s truck. Nate’s Lexus. Grayson’s SUV. “Your brothers are here.”

  “Yeah.” Dade had made certain of that. It was part of the plan.

  And that led him to his next thought.

  This might be a mistake. A huge one. But sooner or later he wanted his family to meet Kayla and Robbie—really meet them—not with bullets flying or while neck-deep in an investigation. That investigation was over now. The danger, too. And it was time Kayla faced his brothers under normal circumstances.

  Normal.

  Finally.

  It wasn’t perfect, but they were getting there. No more threats to Kayla’s life. No more Brennan. No more Carrie. Heck, Kayla had even managed to reconcile with her sister. Over the phone anyway. In a day or two Dade would see about getting them together face-to-face for a little mending time because they now knew that Misty hadn’t had a hand in the attempts on Kayla’s life.

  “Kade, my youngest brother, is at work at the FBI office in San Antonio, but he’ll be here later tonight,” Dade let her know. “They won’t bite,” he whispered and nudged her onto the porch.

  “Even Mason?” Kayla questioned.

  Dade shrugged. “He’ll behave.” He hoped. With Mason you were never quite sure what you were going to get.

  The front door flew open, and a silver-haired woman came rushing out onto the porch. Kayla would have taken a step back if Dade hadn’t caught onto her arm to anchor her in place.

  “Kayla, Robbie, this is Bessie Watkins, the woman who takes care of us.”

  “I do at that. I cook, clean and give ’em you-know-what when they need it.” Smiling from ear to ear, Bessie went straight to Robbie. “Now here’s a handsome little angel.”

  Robbie approved of the compliment and gave her a grin.

  Bessie scooped the baby right out of Dade’s arms, kissed him on each cheek and then hugged Kayla. “Welcome to the Double R Ranch.”

  “Thank you,” Kayla managed, but she still didn’t sound comfortable.

  “The others already had lunch,” Bessie let them know. “But if you’re hungry, there’s plenty of roast beef and pecan pie left. And I’m fixing a big pot of chili for dinner.”

  Yeah, and Dade could smell it. Walking into the house was always like coming home for Christmas, and he would never take that for granted.

  With Robbie cuddled in her arm, Bessie ushered them inside, past the foyer and into the massive family room. Again, no fancy stuff here. Hardwood floors, leather furniture and a floor-to-ceiling limestone fireplace with some log simmering in the hearth. The only artwork was family portraits and paintings of some of the ranch’s prize-winning livestock.

  To Kayla it must have been like walking into the lion’s den.

  There was a basketball game on TV, volume blaring, and Mason, with a beer in his hand, had claimed one of the oversize recliners. Nate was stretched out on the floor while Kimmie, his daughter, arranged li
ttle plastic horses on his stomach and chest. Grayson and Eve were on the sofa making out.

  Well, kissing anyway.

  “Newlyweds,” Dade whispered to Kayla, and he cleared his throat so it would get their attention. It did. Everyone stopped, even Kimmie, and stared at Dade and their visitors.

  For one bad moment, Dade thought this had been a mistake to spring Kayla on them and vice versa, but then Eve leaped off the sofa and hurried to them. Like Bessie, she gave Kayla a hug. Dade, too.

  “Thanks,” Dade told Eve, returning the hug. Eve might have been only his sister-in-law, but he loved her as much as he loved his brothers.

  “Kayla and this handsome little angel are staying with us a few days,” Bessie let them know.

  She sat Robbie on the floor next to Kimmie, and the little girl—God bless her—immediately offered Robbie one of her toy ponies. There was only two months difference in their ages, with Kimmie being slightly older, but they were almost identical in size.

  “Mason will get your bags from the car,” Bessie insisted. “Won’t you, Mason?”

  Mason stared at them. And stared. Before he finally grumbled something and climbed out of the recliner.

  “I’ll help,” Nate said, getting off the floor.

  “The bags can wait,” Dade insisted, and that drew everyone’s attention back to him.

  He swallowed hard. It was a do-or-die moment. And everything hinged on what happened in the next few minutes.

  Dade took a deep breath and turned to Kayla. “I’m in love with you,” he blurted out.

  Other than the TV, the room went stone-cold silent. Even Robbie and Kimmie quit babbling.

  “I didn’t know,” Dade continued, “until I saw Carrie holding that gun on you.”

  “Now, that’s romantic,” Mason snarled.

  Dade shot him a scowl. So far, this wasn’t going well. He could deal with Mason’s snark, but Kayla’s mouth was partially open, and she was staring at him.

  A dozen things went through his head, none good. She was about to run for the hills. Or laugh. Or tell him that it was the adrenaline crash talking. After all, it’d been only a couple of hours since Carrie had tried to kill her.

  Kayla caught onto his arm. “Uh, we should probably talk about this in private.”

  Dade held his ground. “I considered that, but I figured sooner or later, preferably sooner, I wanted my family to know how I feel about you.”

  She nodded. Got that deer-caught-in-the-headlights look. And nodded again. “Okay.” She scrubbed her hands down the sides of her dress. “I’m in love with you, too.”

  That hit him like a sack of bricks.

  Oh, he’d wanted the words, but he hadn’t expected Kayla to admit it without some prompting. He also hadn’t expected to feel this way after hearing those words come from her mouth.

  Yeah, it was shocker. His knees were weak. His thoughts spinning a mile a minute. But most of all, Dade was over the moon.

  “It’s true?” he checked.

  “Yes,” she verified and cast another uncertain glance at his gob-smacked siblings. That yes was enough for him. Dade put his arm around Kayla’s waist and hauled her to him for a kiss. And not just a peck. He wanted this to be a kiss they would remember for the rest of their lives.

  He caught the sound of her surprise with his kiss, and he moved into it, letting the taste of her slide right through him. Like hot whiskey. And sex.

  Especially the sex.

  But he tried to put that on hold for a moment even though the kiss was a reminder that he would like to drag her off to his bed and soon.

  Someone cleared their throat—Bessie, he realized. “Why don’t I take the little ones to the nursery?”

  “In a minute.” Dade figured he might as well go for broke. He looked at Bessie, Eve, his brothers and the babies. “I’m going to ask Kayla to marry me. I just want to make sure nobody has a problem with that.”

  More stares.

  Except for Kayla.

  She made another of those happy melting sounds of surprise and launched herself into his arms. Dade realized then that her response was the only one that mattered. And Robbie’s, of course, but Dade and the little guy seemed to be on the same page because Robbie clapped his hands and babbled, “Da da da.”

  The baby was clearly a genius.

  “I love you,” Dade reminded her.

  Kayla kissed him. Again, not a wuss kiss. This one had Mason growling, “Get a room, all right?”

  Both Kayla and Dade were smiling when they finally broke the kiss. “And your answer to that marriage proposal?” Dade reminded her.

  “Yes.” No hesitation whatsoever, although she did cautiously eye the rest of the clan.

  There it was again. The feeling that he’d just been hit hard and loved hard all in the same moment. Dade never considered himself a gushy kind of guy, but he suddenly felt like gushing.

  “Well, it’s about time you got a good woman in your life,” Bessie declared. She hugged them both again.

  So did Eve. “Welcome to the family,” she told first Kayla, then Robbie.

  Nate came next, and Dade knew this was a huge concession for his twin. Nate was still reeling from the news of Ellie’s killer, but that didn’t stop him from pulling Kayla into his arms.

  “You’ll be good for Dade,” Nate whispered to her.

  “He’ll be good for me,” Kayla whispered back.

  And Dade hoped like the devil he didn’t disgrace himself by getting misty-eyed.

  Nate pulled something from his pocket. A silver Double R concho. “I picked it up from the parking lot,” Nate explained. And he took Kayla’s hand so he could put it in her palm. “I would give it to Dade, but he might throw it away again.”

  Dade just shook his head. Throwing it away just wasn’t working because this was the second time it’d turned up. “Kayla can decide what to do with it,” Dade let her know.

  Her hand immediately closed around it. “Then, I’ll keep it.”

  Eve pulled her neck chain from beneath her blouse to reveal her own concho. It was a gift Dade had given her for Christmas. “It makes me feel like part of the family.”

  “You are family,” Dade clarified.

  Eve smiled, brushed a kiss on his cheek. “Soon Kayla will be family. Robbie, too.”

  Grayson was waiting right behind Eve, and when she stepped to the side, his big brother was there to give Kayla his own welcoming hug. This was like the Ryland version of a receiving line.

  “This family can always use some more females,” Grayson teased. “And apparently another wing of living quarters.” But his expression turned more serious when his gaze met hers. “Welcome to the family, Kayla.”

  Oh, man. That put some tears in her eyes. Eve’s, too. This was going much better than Dade had expected, but then, this was his family. There was a lot of love in this room.

  Then, Mason stepped forward. He didn’t snag Kayla in his arms. He just stared at her. And stared.

  “You could do better, Kayla,” Mason told her. He lifted his shoulder. “But not much.”

  Coming from Mason, that was a warm fuzzy welcome, and much to Dade’s surprise, Kayla leaned in and kissed Mason on the cheek. Dade couldn’t be sure, but he thought Mason might have actually blushed. It was hard to tell under those multiple layers of stubble.

  “I’ll get the bags,” Mason said, strolling out. Nate was right behind him.

  Eve scooped up Kimmie. Grayson took Robbie. “We’ll show Robbie the nursery. It’s like a toy store in there.”

  “And I’ll check on dinner,” Bessie piped in, following the others out.

  Dade knew it was a ploy to give Kayla and him some alone time, and he was thankful for it. He didn’t waste even a second before he pulled Kayla to him and kissed her.

  “Marry me?” he said against her mouth.

  “I’ve already said yes.”

  “Yeah, but I wanted to hear it again.”

  Kayla smiled, and he caught that smile
with another kiss. “Yes,” she repeated. But then she pulled back, blinked. “Are you sure about this?”

  He didn’t blink, but he did frown. “You’re not sure?”

  “No, I’m positive. I love you. I really love you. But I have so much baggage with a bad marriage under my belt.”

  “Then it’s time you had a good marriage. To me,” he clarified, causing her to smile. “Because I really love you, too.”

  But again, her smile faded. Because there was nothing she could say or do that would make him change his mind, Dade decided to end her doubts with another kiss.

  He backed her against the wall, next to the portraits of his family, and he put his mouth to hers. Dade didn’t stop there. He pressed his body against hers, until there wasn’t a sliver of space between them. And he kept kissing her until he heard that sigh. That little sound of surrender and pleasure. Kayla melted against him.

  “Well?” he challenged. “Got any doubts now?”

  Kayla eased back, her chest pumping for air, her heart racing. “None. I love you, Dade Ryland, and more than my next breath, I want to be your wife.”

  Good. That’s exactly what he wanted, too.

  Dade smiled and pulled her back to him for another kiss. “Welcome home, Kayla.”

  ISBN: 978-1-4592-8228-5

  DADE

  Copyright © 2011 by Delores Fossen

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  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

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