Heart of Stone Read online

  “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 time…” She’d walked right into the trap. She glared at him. “I date Clark,” she said doggedly.

  “Clark loves you,” he replied unexpectedly. “Like a sister,” he added almost at once. “He never touches you. He doesn’t light up when you walk into a room. His hands don’t shake when you’re close to him. That doesn’t add up to a romance.”

  What he was describing was exactly what happened with Keely when she saw Boone. She didn’t dare admit it, of course. What had he been saying about Clark?

  “When he brought the waitress home with him,” he continued, “he spilled coffee all over the linen tablecloth trying to pour her a second cup. He actually fell out of his chair when he touched her hands as she passed him the salad bowl.”

  She grimaced.

  “And I don’t need a declaration to tell me who got that diamond necklace. It sure as hell wasn’t you.”

  “You won’t tell him?” she asked worriedly. “He’s my friend, he and Winnie. I don’t have many. I gave my word…”

  His eyes glittered. “It bothers me that you didn’t mind helping him get around me.”

  Her eyes were apologetic. “He said she was the most important thing in the world to him and that he’d die if he had to give her up. He thought it would make you so angry, seeing me with him, that you wouldn’t think about Nellie.”

  He looked down at her hand. He caressed the back of it absently with his fingers. He didn’t want to admit how angry it had made him. Uncharacteristically angry. Keely was a child. He couldn’t afford to become involved with her. Just the same, he didn’t want Clark taking advantage of her. Odd, how relieved he felt that she wasn’t sleeping with Bentley Rydel. Her mother had been lying to him, trying to hurt him because he rejected her.

  “Your mother is a piece of work,” he muttered angrily.

  She was puzzled, not having been privy to his complicated thoughts. “Why do you say that?”

  He looked up. “What do you think of Nellie?” he asked, changing the subject.

  She hesitated.

  “Tell me,” he prodded.

  She sighed and met his eyes. “I think she’s the worst sort of opportunist,” she confessed. “She adds up presents and gives sex in return. Clark thinks that’s love,” she added cynically.

  “You don’t.”

  Her eyes were old. “Living with my father taught me some things. He was almost broke when he lost the game park because this woman played up to him and pretended to be awed at the way he handled the animals. She stroked his vanity and he bought her expensive things. Then there was a lawsuit, and we had absolutely nothing. Meanwhile,” she added, “there was this sweet woman who kept the books for us, who took me to church and dated my fathe
r. She was shy and not beautiful, but he dropped her as soon as the other woman came along.”

  “What happened?”

  “When he went bankrupt, his flashy girlfriend was suddenly interested in a local Realtor who’d just inherited a lot of property from his late father.”

  “I see.”

  “Clark is a sweet man,” she said quietly. “He deserves better.”

  He leaned back, finally letting go of her hand. His eyes narrowed on her face. “She works for a living. So do you. I expected you to take her side.”

  “She’s a snake,” she returned. “And she doesn’t exactly work that hard for a normal living. Her coworkers say she plays up to her male customers to get big tips. Clark told me. He thinks they’re jealous because she’s pretty.”

  He had a faraway look. “Beauty is subjective,” he said oddly. “It isn’t always manifested in surface details.”

  She smiled. Then she laughed. “Maybe I’m subjectively beautiful and nobody noticed,” she said.

  He realized, belatedly, that she’d made a joke. He laughed softly.

  She looked around. The librarian was starting to close doors and turn out lights. She bit her lip. Clark was nowhere in sight.

  “I don’t think they’ll let you stay the night,” he pointed out.

  She got up, grimacing. She picked up her coat and her purse. “At least there’s a bench out front. I told Clark they closed at nine.”

  He got up, too, towering over her. “You haven’t learned yet that intimacy makes people lose track of time.”

  She couldn’t meet his eyes. He sounded very worldly. She put her purse down and gingerly eased her left arm into the coat. He was behind her at once, easing the rest of the garment over her other arm and onto her shoulder.

  “What happened to your arm?” he asked.

  She felt his warm hands on her shoulders, the warm strength of his body behind her. She wanted to lean back and have him hold her. Insane thoughts.

  “An accident,” she said after a minute. “Nothing terrible,” she lied. “But it left a weakness in that arm. I can’t lift much.”

  There was a pause. His usually impassive face had a ragged look. “I have a similar problem with one of my legs,” he said hesitantly. “If I overdo, I limp.”

  She turned and looked up at him. She’d noticed that. She’d never expected him to admit it to his enemy. “You were hurt overseas worse than you told Winnie and Clark,” she said with keen insight. “Worse than you’ve told anyone. Except maybe Sheriff Carson.”

  His jaw firmed. “You see too much.”

  “In my own way, I’ve been through the wars, too,” she replied quietly. “Scars don’t go away, even if wounds heal. And they destroy people.”

  She wasn’t looking at him as she said it. Her eyes had the same expression as his did. It was a moment of shared tragedy, shared pain. He moved a step closer to her. She looked up at him expectantly. It was as if the wall between them had lowered just a little, letting in new light. But even as he started to speak, a car drove up outside.

  Boone tugged Keely back into the shadows of a row of books. Outside the tinted glass windows, they saw Clark glance furtively at Boone’s big Jaguar sitting next to Nellie’s SUV. He bundled her out of his car and into the SUV and waved her out of the parking lot. He looked hunted. He stood at the front bumper of his car, looking toward the library and hesitating.

  “The jig’s up,” Keely told Boone with twinkling eyes.

  “No, it isn’t. Come here.” He took her hand and tugged her farther down the row of books, out of sight of the glass windows. “I hope you’re a good actress.”

  “Excuse me?”

  They heard the door open. Clark whispered something to the librarian. There was a returned whisper and muffled footsteps on carpet coming closer.

  Boone let go of Keely’s hand. “You won’t tell me a damned thing,” he said in a low voice, but one that carried at least to the end of the aisle. “I want to know where Clark is, why he isn’t here with you.” He nodded at her meaningfully.

  She caught on at once. “I told you, he just went to get gas—”

  Clark turned into the aisle where they were. His look of fear eclipsed when he overheard what Keely said. He seemed to relax.

  “I’m back,” he told her. “In the nick of time.” He joined them and grinned at his brother. “What are you doing here?”

  “I came in to get a book and found Keely,” Boone muttered. “Why didn’t you take her with you to get gas?” he asked suspiciously.

  “I told him that I wanted to check out that canine anatomy book I was telling you about,” she said to Clark.

  “Oh. Right,” he agreed quickly.

  Boone gave them both a glare as the light overhead went out. “Now I won’t have time to check on mine, no thanks to both of you.” He turned on his heel and stalked out, pausing only long enough to speak to the librarian.

  Keely rushed back to grab her own book and take it to the desk, telling the harassed librarian that she’d be back on Monday to check it out and apologizing for keeping her late.

  The librarian smiled and said it was all right, but she followed them right out the door, locking up behind her.

  “That was close!” Clark exclaimed when they were in the car heading back toward Keely’s house. “How long had he been there?”

  “Just a couple of minutes,” she lied. “I thought we were in big trouble!”

  “We would have been if he’d seen Nellie get out of my car and into hers,” he said. “What a break that he was talking to you down an aisle instead of in front of the window!”

  “Yes, wasn’t it?” she agreed.

  “I’ll have to plan better next time,” he said, almost to himself.

  “Did she like the necklace?”

  He chuckled. “She loved it! I ordered her a Gucci suit to go with it and had it sent to her apartment,” he added. “She was very grateful.”

  She could imagine the form that gratitude took, but she wasn’t saying anything. She was still wondering what Boone expected her to do now. She couldn’t bear to tell Clark she’d sold him out. Not that she had, really. Boone wasn’t stupid. Clark underestimated him, as usual. It was par for the course that Boone was always three steps ahead of everybody else.

  “Nellie really is beautiful,” she commented, for something to say.

  “Absolutely.” He grinned at Keely. “You didn’t have any trouble before Boone showed up?”

  “None at all. I was fine.”

  “I’ll have to plan better next time,” he repeated. “Boone’s smart. I have to work hard to keep him in the dark.”

  “I’m sure you’ll come up with something,” she replied.

  “We will,” he replied. “We’re in this together, remember.”

  This was likely to end in despair for Clark, either way, and she hated having agreed to being a party to it. Especially now that Boone was clued in. She wondered if she should tell Clark the truth. Probably she should, but she was wary of Boone’s temper if he found out. She felt stifled.

  “Don’t look so worried,” he said gently. “Everything will work out. Really it will.”

  “Did you know that Misty’s father had a private detective agency in San Antonio?” she asked abruptly, and then could have bitten her tongue for the slip.

  “Some agency,” Clark muttered. “I had them check out a cowboy for us when we were hiring on a new horse wrangler. He had a rap sheet and their brilliant staff didn’t find a thing.”

  She stared at him. “How did you find that out if they didn’t tell you?”

  “Boone found it out,” he said. “He was suspicious of something the man did, so he asked Hayes to look into the man’s background. He had a prior for burglary. A conviction, no less, and he’d served time. Boone fired him the same day.”

  “I thought even a bad detective could find out something like that,” she replied.

  He frowned. “That’s what I thought. I mentione
d it to Boone, too. He said that they hired a man with false credentials, but found it out only after they assigned him our background check. They thanked us for flushing him out.”

  She was curious about that. It seemed a little easily explained. But they were already pulling up in front of her house, and there was no more time for questions.

  When Clark pulled up at the porch, Ella was standing just outside the screen door in just her slip with a full glass of whiskey.

  “So there you are!” she raged as Keely opened her door. “Where have you been?”

  “Why don’t you come back home with me?” Clark suggested quickly, leaning over the passenger seat to look out at her.

  Even her mother in that shape was preferable to being in the same house with Boone after their awkward conversation. She needed time to think over what he’d said. Not to mention her disquiet at having to listen to another long recital of Nellie’s assets, which had lasted all the way home. She forced a smile. “I can handle her,” she told him gently. “It’s okay.”

  “If you say so.” He sounded dubious. “You never did say what happened in Boone’s office the last time you were at the house. We heard him close the door.”

  “He was just warning me off you,” she prevaricated, and smiled again. “It didn’t work.”

  He laughed, relieved. “Thank God. I couldn’t handle having all my plans go south before we even get started good, and this is just the beginning for me and Nellie! You’re positive you want to stay?” He gestured toward her mother.

  She nodded. “Thanks for the ride. I’ll see you soon.”

  “Sure. Take care.” Keely closed the passenger door. He waved to her mother, who ignored him, almost dancing in her impatience to talk to her daughter. He drove away with a wave.

  “What’s wrong?” Keely asked when she got onto the porch, because this wasn’t a simple case of a few drinks too many. Her mother’s face was stark-white and she was visibly frightened.

  Ella bit her lip. “Your father called again.”

  “Again? Where is he?” she asked. “Is he coming here?”

  “I don’t know.” She took a big sip of her drink.