She sighed. “I haven’t watched the national news for weeks. I can’t stand the monotony. The only news they report is on the presidential election and every detail of the private lives of celebrities.”
“The Spanish channel has the real news,” he pointed out. “If you want to know what’s going on in the world, that’s where to find out.”
She smiled. “I can’t speak Spanish.”
“I’ll teach you,” he said quietly, and his eyes were insinuating that he had in mind teaching her other things, as well.
She flushed a little. Her life had been a closed, painful book, her future a dream that she never thought would be realized. Now, here was this dishy man with whom she’d been in love for years, looking at her with acquisitive eyes and smiling at her. It felt as if her heart might burst from joy.
He smiled. “Mrs. Johnston has an assistant cook, Melinda. She’s from Guatemala. She’s teaching us Mayan. You can learn, too.”
“Mayan?” She caught her breath. “Their culture had astronomy and the concept of zero and raised beds for planting and irrigation while Europeans were knocking each other over the head with rocks.”
“I know.” He chuckled. “You spend your time off at the library reading books about them. Or so I hear from the head librarian.”
She flushed. It flattered her that he’d learned things about her. “I’d love to go and see some of the Mayan ruins,” she said. “I’d love to go to Peru and see the Inca ruins, too.”
“So would I,” he told her. “Maybe we can both go, one day.”
For her, that was a pipe dream. She’d never save enough to pay for a plane ticket even to south Texas for a vacation. Her smile was wistful.
He saw that. “What else do you like?”
She smiled. “Ancient history.”
“The Caesars, the philosophers, the politicians…?”
“Don’t mention politicians!”
“What sort of history?” He chuckled. “And which historians do you read?”
“Tacitus. Thucydides. Strabo. Arrian. Plutarch. Those ones.”
“Deep authors for a young mind,” he commented.
“You listen here, I may be young, but I have an old mind,” she told him. “I was pretty much on my own when my father took me out to west Texas to live in an animal park, and I was really on my own when I came back here, because Mama was drunk so much.” Mama. The thought sobered her, made her aware of her recent tragedy. “I can’t believe my own father would kill her,” she said. “He was a little out of the bounds of law sometimes, but he never hurt anybody.”
“He sold drugs,” Boone reminded her. “That does hurt people.”
“Yes, but you know what I mean,” she replied. “He isn’t a killer.”
“Baby, all people are killers, given the right incentive,” he said. “Anybody can kill.”
She sighed. “I suppose so,” she said sadly.
He bent and kissed her, gently, on her mouth. “I’m going to get a cup of decent coffee. What can I bring you?”
“A nice juicy steak with hash browns?” she asked hopefully.
“No chance I could get that past the nurses’ station, unless they were all wearing nose plugs. Try again,” he invited.
“I guess I’ll wait for supper here,” she said with resignation.
“When you’re well again, I’ll fly you up to Fort Worth and take you to this little steak place I know,” he said.
Her heart jumped up into her throat. “You mean it?”
He drew in a long breath. “I had to date Misty to feed information to Hayes, and I gave him hell twice a day about it. I was over her years ago. But I had to put on an act, to keep her from getting suspicious.” His eyes darkened. “Hayes has a lot to answer for. She’s vindictive. She set you up, and I was too angry to think straight when I saw those photographs.”
Keely recalled that Misty had promised to get even with her. She’d done a good job of it. “She’ll get her just deserts one day,” Keely replied.
“We all do,” he said philosophically. He glanced at his watch. “I have to make a few phone calls and get something to eat, then I’ll be back.”
Her eyes lit up. “Okay.”
He smiled slowly. Disheveled, her hair uncombed, her face devoid of any makeup, she was beautiful to him. So easily, she could have been dead. He’d never have been able to live with that, knowing he caused her death.
He bent and kissed her again with breathless tenderness. “I’ll be back soon,” he whispered.
She smiled. “Okay. I’ll wait.”
He chuckled as he walked out.
Ten minutes later the phone rang. She answered it, thinking it must be Carly or Winnie or Clark.
“Keely, is that you?”
It was her father’s voice.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“YOU KILLED MY mother!” Keely choked, overwhelmed with rage at just the sound of his voice. “How could you!”
“It wasn’t me. I swear it wasn’t!” he replied, and he sounded frightened. “Keely, I’ve never killed a person in my life. You have to believe me.”
“You threatened her for money—”
“I had to! Listen, if I don’t pay them, they’ll…well, they’d already threatened to kill your mother, now they say they’ll get you, too,” he said nervously. “It’s the Fuentes gang! I got mixed up with them because of Jock,” he said bitterly. “He’s been working for Fuentes for years. He even went to prison for him, just after you came to live with me. He said they paid better than any of the other distributors, and that he’d get me in because he had a cousin in the organization. But there was trouble right upfront because Jock double-crossed one of the bosses and pocketed some drug money. Then he hid out and left me holding the bag. They’re after me, now.” There was a sigh. “Your mother was right about Jock. She said he’d destroy me if I stuck with him, and he has. He keeps calling me, making threats toward you if you don’t come up with enough money to help him to get out of town before the drug lords kill him.
