The Barefoot Believers Read Online Free PDF Page B

formed some pretty strong opinions of me.”
    â€œI’ll just bet.” Jo moved inside, but not fully. She hung back by the open door, halfheartedly wishing she could slip into the hallway alone, take one fortifying deep breath before she and her sister became roomies for who knew how long.
    Kate managed a rather pitiful-looking grin. “Why else do you think I told him I planned to go out of state for an extended recovery period?”
    â€œYou lied? ” All right, that shocked her. Kate was more perfect than Mary Poppins, after all.
    â€œI did not lie,” Kate snapped in something that seemed like pain…or panic. She struggled to move forward with her cane and cast on the plush carpet.
    â€œYou lied to get out of having a doctor pester you to make follow-up visits.” Jo took two hurried steps to lend support. “Visits that might save you from a lifetime of limping, I might add.”
    â€œSave your adding for that abacus you plan on buying.” Kate swatted away any attempt by Jo to aid her. “And don’t be so…literal.”
    Jo stood back and folded her arms. “Literal?”
    â€œ Lying? It’s such a harsh word.”
    â€œWhat would you call it?”
    â€œI was thinking out loud.” The comeback came quick and sure, as if Kate had maybe rehearsed it in her head a few times trying to convince herself. “Mom was standing there telling my caregiver that she intended to make sure I didn’t spend any time at my practice, like she actually had that kind of influence with me, that kind of power over what I do with my time, that say-so about my work.”
    â€œAnd you couldn’t stand the idea of it. You wanted to run so you invented a place you could run to and told yourself that was wishful thinking, not an outright fib.”
    â€œMom started it,” Kate protested. She attempted to put some of her weight on the foot in the large purple-and-white cast.
    She looked so small. So vulnerable. Now, in the unkind artificial tract lighting, the circles under her eyes seemed so dark and the usually taut skin on her face and neck, drawn. It gave the impression of Kate being older than her years and much more intense, if that was possible, and anything but happy.
    It made Kate look…
    Jo drew in her breath and held it.
    It made Kate look like their father.
    Not that Jo remembered him so much as she remembered pictures of him. Pictures that had long ago disappeared from their home and faded from her memory. There was one in particular of him with his hand on her shoulder. Kate stood nearby. Dad had insisted it be taken to show off his new truck—the truck their father would drive away in forever a few days after the picture was taken. But being Mom, she’d only gotten the front fender and a part of their family. If other photos had been taken that day, Jo could not recall. Her parents had fought. They’d always fought. And their dad had left.
    Now Jo looked at her sister and could see something familiar of him in her. It spooked her a little.
    No, given Kate’s suddenly uncharacteristic behavior and their father’s bitter betrayal, it spooked Jo a lot.
    Jo edged forward, her hands out.
    Kate sucked air through her gritted teeth, her shoulders drew up but she still motioned to Jo to keep back. She took a step, gasped then shifted her weight back onto the antique cane and exhaled, her shoulders drooping. “Anyway, when my surgeon asked me what I might do with my time off, I looked at him and I looked at Mom and I couldn’t help thinking about what she had said she planned to do and that I had promised I’d stop her from doing it, or doing anything so rash and—”
    â€œKate!”
    The front door fell shut with a wham.
    â€œAnd I said I might go to Florida.” Kate didn’t even pause in her rambling. Step, gasp, shift. Rambling and shuffling. “Just like that. Might go to Florida. Now is that