Long, Tall Texans: Boone by Diana Palmer

Author:Diana Palmer
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2019-06-14T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER NINE

KEELY HAD LAUGHED at the predicament Hayes Carson was in with his cousin Macreedy, but it was impossible for her to talk about him or think about him without remembering her mother’s pained confession about Hayes’s brother, Robert.

She was feeling guilty about that when Clark phoned her.

“I’m sorry,” she said as soon as she recognized his voice.

“You are?” He hesitated. “Oh. I guess you mean about Nellie. Boone knew all along, Keely,” he added heavily. “I thought I was pulling the wool over his eyes. I always underestimate him. He’d hired his girlfriend’s father’s detective agency to investigate Nellie. I can’t say I’m really surprised at what he found out. Well, I’m surprised that she was married and…fooling around with me, I mean.”

“Boone is very intelligent,” she said noncommittally.

“Yes, and he knows how to make people talk.”

She grimaced. “I didn’t mean to…”

“No! Not you. Me! He asked me what the hell I thought I was doing, leaving you at a dance alone all evening. He was furious.”

“But I was all right.”

“He knows that your father and his partner in crime might make a grab for you, Keely. I knew it, or should have known it, and I put you at risk. Boone said anything could have happened. I’m really sorry, Keely. I was so crazy about Nellie that she was all I thought about. You’re my friend. I should have been looking out for you.”

It made her warm inside that Boone was worried for her safety. “It’s okay, Clark,” she said. “Honest, it is.”

“He gets hot about you,” he continued. “I’d almost say he’s possessive of you, but that’s ridiculous. He is fond of you, in his way, I think.” He paused. “There was some talk about the two of you at the dance. You went outside together…”

“To talk about you,” she countered. “He wanted to know where you were and what you were doing. He’s very insistent.”

There was a relieved sigh. “Yes, he is.” He paused again. “Keely, you don’t want to ever get mixed up with him,” he said, in a stumbling sort of way that made her heart fill with disappointment. “Something happened to him overseas. He hated women for years after that she-cat dropped him when he was wounded. God knows why he’s letting her lead him down the same path again. Maybe he wants revenge. He doesn’t like women at all. He just uses them. Sort of like me,” he added miserably.

Keely didn’t know what to say, how to answer him. “He’s not a bad person.”

“I didn’t say he was, just that he’s hateful toward women. He’s keeping Misty on a tight rein, and he doesn’t watch his words when he talks to her. It’s almost like he’s keeping her around for some mysterious reason, but he doesn’t really want to have anything to do with her. He couldn’t care less if he’s late for a date, or if he doesn’t even show up. She spends most of their time together complaining about the way he treats her, and about you.

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