“This man, Jock,” he persisted. “You look frightened when you say his name.”
“He…hit me,” she confessed, fascinated by the expression on his face. “I was just barely thirteen. He’d been watching me while I was cooking. He made me nervous. He’d been in prison. He said he’d killed a woman. I let the biscuits burn.” She bit her lip again. “He hit me so hard he knocked me down. My father heard him yelling and came into the kitchen and managed to get Jock out of the room.” She wrapped her arms around her chest, cold with the memory. “It was just after that when Dad brought me back here to live with Mama.”
“Good God.” Boone’s eyes were soft and quiet with sympathy. “No wonder you’re uncomfortable around men.” He was remembering. His jaw tautened. “That’s why you were afraid of me in my office.”
“I don’t really know you,” she confessed apologetically. “And you don’t like me,” she added uneasily. “You don’t like me being friends with Winnie and you don’t like me going around with Clark.”
“No, I don’t,” he replied honestly. But he looked troubled.
“I understand,” she said unexpectedly. “You know that I’m poor and you think I use Winnie and Clark…”
“The hell I do!” He lowered his voice quickly, looking around to make sure he hadn’t drawn the attention of the librarian. He looked back at Keely, scowling. “You don’t use people,” he bit off. “You work like a soldier for your paycheck. Unpaid overtime, trips out to old Mrs. McKinnon’s place to give her dog its diabetic injections because she can’t do it, walking dogs at the shelter on weekends so the staff can handle adoptions…” He stopped, as if he hadn’t wanted her to know that he was aware of her activities.
“Mrs. McKinnon loves her dog,” she replied. “Maggie handles the shelter on Saturdays and feeds and waters the animals on Sunday. There’s this tiny little budget. She already spends twice the hours she gets paid for to do all that. I just help a little.”
His dark, quiet eyes studied her soft, oval face in its frame of thick blond hair, down to her pretty bow mouth. She wasn’t a beauty, but she radiated a sort of loveliness that most women didn’t.
“It’s a pity,” he said, almost to himself, “that you aren’t older.”
“I’ll be twenty in December,” she said, misunderstanding.
“Twenty whole years old.” He looked down at her hand. It was a useful hand, not an elegant one. Short nails, immaculately kept, no polish. No jewelry on those fingers, either. He frowned. “No rings?” he asked. He looked up at her ears where her hair was pushed back. “No earrings?”
She flushed. “I have little silver studs, but I forgot to put them on….”
“Clark hasn’t given you anything?” he persisted. “He walked out tonight with a huge jewelry case.”
“Oh, that was for—” She stopped at once, horrified.
His eyebrows arched and the corner of his mouth tugged up. “Not for you?”
She swallowed hard. “I don’t like jewelry.”
“Liar.”
She flushed. “I don’t have to be paid to give a man attention,” she said curtly, and then realized how that sounded, and flushed even more. “I mean, I don’t want expensive things from Clark.”
He cocked his head to one side and watched her like a hawk. “In the past few weeks, he’s gone through half the inventory of a jewelry store. I see the receipts, Keely, even if I don’t pay the bills. I have an accountant to do that.”
She was in a quandary now. She couldn’t admit that Clark hadn’t given that expensive jewelry to her, and if she denied it, she’d only get him in trouble.
“Your car is a piece of junk,” he persisted. His practiced eye swept over the blouse and slacks she was wearing, the coat hung over the back of the chair beside her. “You’ve worn that same outfit to the house half a dozen times. You don’t drive unless you have to, so you can save on gas money. And you won’t let Clark give you a pair of earrings?”
Her teeth clamped down. She wasn’t telling him anything else. She tugged at her hand.
He wouldn’t let it go. “That waitress he brought to the house,” he said softly, “was looking around between every bite, cataloging paintings and silver and furniture and putting mental price tags on the rugs and the chandelier.”
She was horrified that she might react to that statement. Her eyes were almost bulging.
He pursed his lips and his dark eyes twinkled. “Clark thinks he’s putting one over on me,” he said in a hushed, soft tone. “He doesn’t realize that Misty’s father has a private detective agency that I can hire when I need to. Apparently, Nellie doesn’t realize it, either, or she’d be more careful about going with Clark to motels.”
She made a soft exclamation and her horror showed.
“You don’t use people,” he continued. “But Clark does. He’s using you. And you’re letting him.”
“You don’t know that,” she protested weakly.
“I’m only surprised that your boss is so forgiving about it,” he added, and his expression hardened. “Isn’t he the jealous type?”
She sank down into her chair. She felt limp. She’d failed Clark. He’d never forgive her. “Dr. Rydel is thirty-two, Boone,” she said gently, and didn’t notice the reaction when she spoke his name. His eyes had flashed.
“Thirty-two.” He parroted the words. He’d gone blank for an instant.
“Thirty-two,” she repeated, looking up. “I’m nineteen. Even if I were a femme fatale, I’d have my work cut out. Dr. Rydel hates women. He only likes me because he thinks of me as a child. Like you do,” she added in a different tone.
His eyes were unreadable. “There are times,” he said softly, “when you seem older than you are.” He frowned slightly. “Why don’t you date, Keely?” he asked suddenly.
She was shocked by the question. “I…my job takes up so much
