Boone, not privy to her inner thoughts, closed the door after she sat down and made his way to the driver side. When he got in, the car automatically cranked up and he looked at her. “Ready or not,” he said, “here we go.” And he drove them away.
But Charly felt as if he was saying a whole lot more.
Ready or not, here we go.
Why she felt that way? She couldn’t say. But she felt it.
The restaurant he had chosen wasn’t even in Hemingway. It was in Lexington, some twenty miles outside of Hemingway. And unlike Danley’s, the first restaurant he had taken her to for their business dinner, this was elegant with a capital E.
It was a beautiful, sprawling restaurant with valet service and a roof-deck terrace. And what she liked about the chief was the fact that when the valet went to open her door, he, instead, hurried around to open it himself. And he took her hand to help her out of the car. Simple things, she knew, that any self-respecting man would do. But it had been a long time since a man had done so for her.
But they were so close as she got out of his car, that she could smell his fresh cologne and could see the beauty of his color-changing irises as she brushed past him. She was on a date with a very sexy man, she realized, as he closed the door, buttoned his Armani suit coat, and then briefly placed his hand on the small of her back as he escorted her inside the restaurant.
That brief moment evoked yet another strange feeling for Charly. It had been a long time, since before Darryl died, that she could recall any man touching her that intimately. And it felt good. She actually wished he’d kept his hand right there instead of removing it once he apparently realized he was touching her.
Once seated and their drink orders taken, the chief had to field a phone call from the station. As he talked to his guys, Charly looked around. There was a dance floor in the restaurant, and many couples had populated it. The music playing wasn’t necessarily to her liking: more like elevator music to her. But those couples seemed to be having a ball.
But then a less elevator music type song came on, a Celine Dion tune, and she began to bob her head to the sound too.
Boone noticed Charly was watching the dance floor as he ended his phone call. She apparently liked to dance. He did too. But not yet. He needed to get to know this woman.
“Nice place,” she said when she realized he was no longer on his phone.
“Yeah, it is. I enjoy it whenever I’m in town. Which is often.”
“Oh, okay,” Charly said. “You have business in Lexington?”
If partying with some of his wilder friends, and sleeping around with some of his wilder women qualified as business, then he had plenty in Lexington. “I know some people here,” was all he decided to say.
Charly understood that response. It was a non-response as far as she was concerned. Which was fine. She needed to mind her own business anyway.
“What about you?” he asked her.
She looked at him. “What about me?”
“Tell me about yourself.” Boone leaned back, turned sideways, and crossed his legs. “Where are you from?” he asked her.
“Texas originally.”
Boone smiled. “Really? I wouldn’t have taken you for a Texas girl.”
“That’s because I was adopted when I was a baby, and my family relocated to California when I was something like two or three.”
“Ah. Got cha. So you’re a California girl.”
Charly smiled. “Yes.”
“A Malibu Barbie.”
“Ha!” Charly said with a smile. “Not hardly.”
Boone grinned. But he got right back on topic. “What’s it like being adopted?”
“Not great for me.”
“What do you mean?”
“I had the kind of adopted family that felt, whenever I disappointed them or disobeyed them, that they could give me back. When I married Darryl, whom they despised, they gave me back.”
“That’s cold,” Boone said.
Charly nodded. That sounded about right, she thought.
“I know you aren’t married now, but have you ever been married?” Boone asked her.
“Yes. He died.”
“That’s right. But how long ago was it?”
“Three years ago.”
“What happened? He was ill? Got in an accident?”
“He stole money from the mob and was executed.”
Boone leaned his head back. “Whoa,” he said. “Are you serious?”
Charly nodded. “I’m afraid so.”
“But what makes you so sure that’s what happened?” he asked her.
“I was there when it happened. And because I saw his killer, he was trying to execute me too.”
Boone’s heart ached for her. He could hardly believe it. “You? Are you serious?”
Charly nodded. She wished she wasn’t.
“What happened to the killer?” he asked. “Did he get away?’
“No. I was able to identify him in a book of mugshots. After they stopped looking suspiciously at me anyway.”
“And they found him?”
Charly nodded. “They found him. There was a trial. I testified for the prosecution, and he was sentenced to Life in prison without the possibility of parole.”
Boone was pleased to hear that. “Well that’s good,” he said.
“He died in his first year there.”
Boone nodded. “That’s even better. But you don’t worry about any other members of the mob looking for you?”
“I was right there in L.A. for three solid years after Darryl died. Darryl was my husband’s name, by the way. Nobody bothered me then. Besides, Darryl took that money. I didn’t. And that killer was a hired gun. He wasn’t in any mob family. They left me alone.”
“Thank God for that.”
Charly nodded as the waiter brought their drinks. “I do,” she said.
When the waiter took their food orders and left, Boone looked at Charly. “How do you feel about all of that? Still too painful to talk about?”
Charly nodded. “Not really, no. It just never comes up. And how do I feel? I feel like I made it to the other side. I’m grateful.”
“But it hasn’t been easy?”
“Lord, no,” Charly said as if he’d just said the understatement of the decade. “It’s been hell. The Feds took everything I owned because Darryl had stolen what they claimed was legitimate, not mob money. Darryl told me it was mob money. The guy who killed him was a hit man for the mob. So go figure. But I lost it all. I had to start from the bottom again when, before Darryl died, I was heading straight for the top. It’s been tough.”
Boone stared at her. He could only imagine.
“What about you?” Charly asked him. “What’s your story?”
“Nothing like yours,” Boone said and they both smiled.
But then Boone’s look turned decidedly sad. Charly wanted to ask him what was that about, but she didn’t. She waited for him to tell her. But he didn’t.
“Were you born and raised here in Kentucky?” she asked him.
“Yep.”
“In Hemingway?”
“Yep.”
“And you prefer to be called Boone rather than Robert?”