Caleb + Kate Read Online Free

muy bonita .”
    â€œNo, Dad, not yet.”
    â€œYou’ll see her, there’s no doubt. She’s a good kid. She’s been working here part-time.”
    I pause in handing Luis a bag. “Why is she working? Doesn’t her dad provide her with everything?” I want to say, Doesn’t daddy pamper his princess ? but my father might take offense.
    Respecting people is essential to Dad.
    Luis is giving me the any-day-now look. I toss him a bag and it nearly knocks him over. I smirk and raise my eyebrows at him.
    â€œYou wait, see,” he threatens with a wink.
    â€œI look forward to it, amigo ,” I say. A challenge.
    Dad laughs at us. I pick up the last bag. It’s soft and pliable and the scent of earth fills my nose.
    â€œLast year she got into trouble, almost got expelled,” Dad says.
    Now this is interesting. “What did she do?”
    â€œI’m not sure, exactly. Something about driving without her license or driving with an intoxicated minor or disturbing the peace?” He shrugs.
    That’s solid information, Dad , I think but don’t say. Sometimes my sarcasm can sound disrespectful, and that won’t work with my dad as Dad or my dad as Boss.
    â€œYou father good for news, si ?” Luis says with a chuckle. He reaches out, then pulls back suddenly and I nearly fall out of the truck trying to keep the bag from dropping. I realize as he starts laughing that he did it on purpose.
    â€œRevenge. Sweet.” He narrows his eyes.
    â€œYes, it is.”
    â€œShe’s a good girl,” Dad says from inside his own little world. He’s staring out across the golf course beyond the truck. “Whatever it was, I think she got the bad end of the stick. Her friends are more trouble than she is. And someone told me she took the fall for one of them, but I couldn’t tell you who; maybe Duncan knows.”
    The subject is starting to wear on me. The last person I want to think about is the heir to the Monrovi Inns. Their chain of hotels dots maps around the world. It all started here, on this land—land that rightfully belonged to someone else.
    â€œYou should meet her. She might be a friend at both school and the inn.”
    I sit on the edge of the truck bed and pull off my gloves. Luis walks to the shade to grab his water jug. “Dad, you know it’s better if I stay away from Kate Monrovi.”
    Our eyes meet and Dad frowns thoughtfully.
    Finally he says, “A friendship between our two families might be a good thing. It might be time.”
    â€œWhy haven’t you and Kate’s dad made amends? You work for the guy, after all.”
    Dad rubs his chin. His brown calloused hands are starting to show his age. But his black eyes sparkle with contentment— he has a peace within him that I’m jealous of. Other times, I think about how he could have been so much more. Instead, he returned to this land, leaving so much behind, and for what?
    â€œReed and I have mutual respect. We don’t need friendship. Besides, it’s already a betrayal to the family that I work here. Your grandfather and your uncles are only okay with it because they hope it will offer them leverage some day.”
    Grandfather. I’ve tried not to think about him too much since I left Hawaii. But I realize some of what I always thought was my grandfather’s indoctrination is probably more truthful than I want to admit.
    â€œFriendship with the grandchildren.” Dad stares off again, thoughtful.
    I grimace and hop from the tailgate. “I’m not planning to get to know her.”
    â€œGo to the party, son.”
    Glancing up to the sweeping, arched roof of the Monrovi Inn, I think of Kate. She doesn’t know me, and I don’t want to know her.
    â€œI think there’s a dress code,” I say.
    â€œI have a couple of suits in the closet.”
    Luis walks up with a half-unwrapped Snickers bar dangling from his mouth.