A Kiss for Cade (11 page)

Cade cleared his throat. “I’m afraid that’s not possible.”

“Why not?” Will asked. “Do you have to go shoot bad guys again?”

“I might, but not until we get you settled.” He glanced at Brody when the child reached for a third piece of cake.

Licking his fork, Brody said, “Pass the cream, please.”

“If you have to go shoot bad guys,” Missy said, blinking heavy eyelids, “why can’t we stay with Zoe?”

The sun, the swimming, and the long day were taking their toll on the little ones. Red was right. The kids needed a bed as much as they needed supper.

Will yawned. “Did you shoot that bad guy that shooted Zoe’s husband?”

Cade avoided the boy’s question and changed the subject. “Finish your supper, Will. You’re getting sleepy. Look at your little sister. She’s already asleep—oh! She’s fallen into her pie.” Springing to his feet, he grabbed Missy and lifted her head from her plate, pulling peaches out of her hair.

“Uh-oh.” Brody pushed back from the table and doubled over. “My belly hurts.”

“Mine, too.” Will groaned. “And my skin’s on fire!”

Glori-Lee rushed over to help as the children’s moans increased. Cade was aware of unhappy expressions on the other diners’ faces as the complaints escalated. “These young’uns are in pitiful shape. They need a hefty dose of castor oil and then their beds.” Still grumbling, Glori-Lee wiped Missy’s peach-covered face with a dishcloth. “Law, feeding these babies cake, pie, and cream. Kolby, where’s your brain? You’re gonna kill ’em.”

Cade frowned, stepping around the table to check on Holly. “Are you all right?”

She got up slowly, her face pasty white, her balance unsteady. She shook her head. “I feel kinda sick.”

He hoped there were enough bushes along the way home to accommodate his poor judgment. Pie, cake, and cream. He should have known better.

“I’ll take them home,” he told Glori-Lee.

Shaking her head, she said, “I’m glad I’m not the one to take them back to Zoe in this condition.”

He lifted Missy into his arms and took hold of Holly’s hand, trying to herd Brody and Will ahead of him as he left the café. Outside a clap of thunder rattled the sidewalk seconds before the heavens opened.

Glancing up, he frowned.
Man alive
. A stiff wind whipped the treetops and sent tumbleweeds bouncing haphazardly across Main Street.

Walt Mews shouted hello to him as he locked the barbershop door and then made a dash for the livery stable, holding a
Police Gazette
over his head.

Cade glanced toward the land office as Woodall Thompson consulted his watch and closed the upstairs window.

Jagged lightning lit up Ben Pointer’s metal weather vane as Brody broke for the bushes, Will close on his heels.

Whimpering, Missy buried her face in Cade’s neck. Using his hat as a shield, he covered her head, and then he pulled Holly close and wrapped one side of his vest around her head and shoulders.

“I don’t feel good, Uncle Cade,” Holly moaned.

“I know, honey. I’ll take you home as soon as the boys,” he glanced at the bushes, “finish up.”

Missy snuggled closer, her breath sweet against his face. “I don’t want the lightning to get me.”

“I’ll protect you, sweetheart. Nothing’s going to happen to you while Uncle Cade is here.”

He winced as the rain fell harder. Looking up, he released a noisy breath.
Is this your way of setting me back on the path of righteousness?

Within seconds he was drenched to the bone, and so were the children. They turned piteous eyes on him, their lips quivering. Their noses were sunburned, they were worn out, and their bellies ached. It didn’t take a crystal ball to tell him he wasn’t cut out for fatherhood.

And the worst was yet to come. He still had to face the redhead.

Chapter Twelve

Y
ou ordered rain? You got rain.” Cade’s voice broke through the downpour.

Zoe held the lamp higher and stared at the sopping assemblage standing at her back door. Cade held Missy in one arm, and Holly’s head was tucked under his vest on the other side. Brody and Will were green around the gills, and there wasn’t a dry thread to be seen on any of them. Water streamed off Cade’s hat brim onto Will’s head. Blinking, the boy swiped at the running stream.

Cade shifted Missy on his hip. “Are you going to make us stand out here all night? We’re not getting any drier.”

Hurriedly sliding a rag rug to the door with her foot, Zoe unlatched the screen. “Wipe your feet.” Cade brushed by her and carried Missy into the kitchen. The other kids followed, quickly wiping their shoes on the rug.

“If you’ll excuse me?” Cade turned and walked back out the door and threw up on Zoe’s rosebush. Supper hadn’t set real well with him, either.

“It’s stowming, Zoe. I was scawed, but Uncle Cade didn’t let anything happen to me,” Missy informed her.

Zoe set down the lamp and led the little girl to the sink. She started to peel off her wet clothes.

“Holly, help Will. Brody, get out of your wet things and put them in the sink.”

Instead of doing as she was asked, Holly sank to the nearest chair and laid her head on the table. “I don’t feel so good.”

“Me, either,” Brody seconded.

Will didn’t have to say a word. Zoe could see he was sick as a dog. Cade walked back into the kitchen. “What did you feed these children?”

“Supper.”

Exasperated, Zoe plucked a slice of peach from Missy’s wet hair. “What’s this?”

“Supper.”

Will groaned. “We ate peach pie and chocolate cake.”

“And cream,” Brody added. “A great big pitcher of it.”

“Oh, Cade!” A vein throbbed in Zoe’s temple as she watched him lift Missy to the counter and strip off her wet shoes and stockings. What would happen if he took a notion to assume full responsibility for them?

Missy reached up to Cade, holding out her arms. He bent toward her, and she kissed him on the cheek. Cade’s expression softened and he kissed her back.

“We had a good time, didn’t we, Uncle Cade?”

“A very good time.”

“You can call me Sunflowew. That’s what Pa called me.”

He hesitated and then obliged. “All right. Sunflower it is.”

Zoe brushed by him on her way to wring out the wet clothing. He knew it irked her that even though he wasn’t pa material, the children took to him like flies to molasses.

He trailed her to the sink. “I’m sorry. I made a mistake feeding them all those sweets. I wasn’t thinking—but it was a special occasion.”

Rinsing peach juice out of Missy’s dress, Zoe grumbled, “Anyone with a lick of sense knows you don’t feed kids peach pie, chocolate cake, and cream.”

“It’s not going to kill them to eat what they want once in a while.”

“Oh, no? Look at them. They look half dead to me.”

He glanced at the children. “Have you forgotten the time Addy and I got into Pa’s communion wine?”

“No. Have you forgotten that you thought you were going die?”

“That’s my point. We didn’t. And I learned my lesson.” And his stomach hurt too.

She turned to face him. “What? Not to drink half a bottle of wine?”

“No. Not to let you catch me.”

She wrung out Missy’s dress and hung it near the cookstove to dry. “Haven’t you got somewhere to go?”

“As a matter of fact, I don’t. I haven’t been to the jail since this morning, but I can tell you that bunk is floating in water.”

“Too bad.”

“Yes, it is. I’m not sleeping there.”

“Then go over to Pop’s. It’d serve him right for not fixing that leaky roof months ago.”

She shooed the children to the bedroom for their nightclothes, and then she bent over to pick up wet towels, bumping into a broad wall of warm chest.

Cade smiled as she slid up his length, her senses simmering.

“Will you kindly get out of my way?”

“Can’t. Room’s too small. No place to go.” He tweaked her nose and she shrugged away.

“Cade—”

“I don’t want to stay with Pop. He might be contagious.”

“Gluttony is not contagious.”

Brody came out of the bedroom buttoning his nightshirt. “He can sleep with me and Will.”

Will jumped up and down. “Yeah! That would be fun!”

“I’ll fix you breakfast, Uncle Cade,” Holly offered. “I can cook eggs almost as good as Ma.”

Missy ran into the kitchen and latched onto her uncle’s leg. “I want you to sleep with me and Zoe so we won’t be scawed of the stowm.”

Patting the child on her head, Cade grinned at Zoe. “On second thought, I’ll sleep with the boys. Your bed is a little short for me.” He eyed Zoe. “And a little cold.”

“Uh-uh,” Missy said. “It’s wawm…weal wawm.”

Zoe lifted a brow. Sleep with the boys? That quick, and he’d moved in. Taking her for granted, never thinking she might have enough on her hands as it was. She didn’t like it, but there was no point protesting. She was outnumbered.

“No one would get any sleep if you slept with the boys.”

Cade grinned. “What a dilemma.”

Zoe threw a dirty towel on the table. “Jim kept a cot in the mercantile. He favored naps. For tonight
only
, you can sleep there. Be careful. I keep my mother’s figurines close by.”

Brody smiled. “We ain’t allowed to play near them cause they cain’t be bought again. Ever.”

“On account we might break something,” Will clarified.

“A tiny cot?” Cade asked.

“There’s the floor. Take your pick. You’re only going to be here one night.” She strode past him, speaking in a low tone. “Don’t get too comfortable.”

After dosing the children with castor oil to ease their bellyaches, Zoe rounded up an extra pillow.

Leading Cade to the cot, she warned again, “Be careful of my figurines.”

He glanced at the assortment of delicate angels, swans, and butterflies sitting on a table to one side.

“I heard you.”

“Just so you understand.” She closed the door. A second later she heard something hit the floor. Clamping her eyes shut, she held her breath before yanking the door open.

Cade was down on his knees in front of the counter with the broken lid to the pickle jar in his hand. “I’m hungry.”

Slamming the door shut, she went to bed.

Chapter Thirteen