“Thanks to Boone, I wasn’t. He was there.”
“Yeah, I heard that,” said Freddy. “What, he was spending the night or something?”
“Oh, no! It was nothing like that.”
“No? I thought you were Boone’s girlfriend.”
Where were they getting this from? “I’m not his girlfriend,” Charly said yet again.
“You aren’t? Really?” asked Freddy. “Has anybody told Boone?”
They all laughed at the table. Charly smiled and sipped more coffee, but she didn’t get it at all. Was Boone telling them something he hadn’t yet bothered to tell her? Or were they, as she suspected, taking too little information and running with it?
Whatever the reason, she refused to go along with what was an obvious lie. They were just getting to know each other. As far as Charly knew, that was all they were doing.
Freddy would be gone, Babs and Charly would have prepared breakfast for themselves and Duke by the time Boone returned. Charly had hoped to go to church, and so had Babs, but Duke made clear they all were going to stay put. They didn’t know if the person who tried to take out Charly had been caught yet. “Boone didn’t bring her here for nothing,” he said. “He expects us to protect her. And we shall.”
They were all sitting on the porch, in rocking chairs of all things, with the rifle at the ready, when Boone’s Ferrari turned into the long dirt driveway and began speeding toward the wraparound porch.
Charly was so happy to see his return that she got up from her seat and walked up to the porch railing, waiting for him.
Babs touched Duke on his arm. “Not his girlfriend indeed,” she whispered to him.
He smiled. “Oh, she’s got it bad,” he whispered back.
CHAPTER THIRTY
Charly didn’t know what Babs and Duke were whispering on about, and she didn’t care. She was too happy to see Boone in one piece. She knew he had to go on a dangerous mission.
When he got out of the car, she couldn’t help it. She made her way down the steps. “You okay?” she found herself asking him.
She’d never know how happy Boone was to see her walk down those steps. His heart leaped with joy as he was driving toward the porch and he saw her get out of her seat to greet him. It was a happy, unfamiliar feeling that he liked a lot. He was amazed at how quickly she was growing on him.
“I’m good,” he said as he closed his car door. “I hope my parents haven’t given you too many fits.”
Charly smiled. Boone understood that smile. “I knew you’d be safe here, that’s why I brought you here. They’re good people once you get used to their ways, which aren’t so great.”
“I understand. And you’re right: they’ll take some getting used to. But they’ve been kind to me, I have no complaints trust me.”
Boone smiled and placed his hand on the small of her back. “Good,” he said.
“How did it go?” Charly asked him.
“We got Dalbert Lee in custody,” he said.
“That’s a good thing,” Charly said.
“Yes, it is. We also found out what Tabloski is up to.”
“So he’s not a ghost?”
“No ghost. He’s the son of the man who killed your husband. He thinks he’s going to be meeting you tonight at Danley’s after closing time. Around eleven.”
“Meet me? Why?”
“He paid Dalbert to set you up. Dalbert told him he contacted you and told you he had some information to give to you about who shot up your place, and you agreed to meet him at Danley’s tonight. Only he wasn’t going to be there. Tabloski will be there with plans to take you out.”
Charly was spooked. “Goodness,” she said.
Boone rubbed her back. His parents were staring at them. But Boone’s sole focus was Charly. “It’ll be okay,” he said. “You’ll be right here under the protection of my folks, and me and my men will meet Tabloski ourselves.”
“Oh, Boone, that’ll be so dangerous!”
“I’m a cop. I can handle danger. But I can’t allow him to harm you. I won’t allow that. Meeting him is the only way. You’ll have to stay in the lion’s den a little while longer.”
Charly smiled. “I wouldn’t call it that.”
“With my old man around? Yes, you would.”
She nodded. “Yes, I would.”
“But don’t let him disrespect you, Charly. He’ll never respect you, if you let him get away with any of his nonsense. You understand that?”
She nodded again. “I do, yes,”
“Come on,” he said, and began escorting her back up the steps. It wasn’t lost on her, nor his parents, that he did not remove his hand from her back.
“Welcome back,” Babs said with a smile. Charly could see that Boone was the apple of her eye.
“Thanks,” said Boone. “Thanks for looking out for her.”
“Is it over?” Duke asked.
Boone shook his head. “Not until later tonight.”
“So we get to keep her all night?”
“Until I return, yes.”
Duke exhaled. “And I planned to skinny dip tonight. Oh well!”
Babs shook her head. “Ignore him, Charly,” she said.
But when Boone and Charly sat down in the bench seat together, and Boone folded his legs and kept his hand around her waist as if he was protecting her, not from the forces from without, but from his parents within, Duke didn’t let up.
“What I don’t understand,” he said, “is how in the world could you allow your woman to live in Low Town like that? That’s insane, Robert!”
“That had nothing to do with Boone,” Charly said. “It’s the apartment the board selected for me. It’s a part of my contract.”
Babs shook her head. “That board,” she said. “They should be ashamed of themselves.”
“Freddy’s supposed to be working on it,” Boone said. “He’s going to talk to Fritz.”
That was news to Charly, but she wasn’t going to put Boone on front street with his parents.
She, instead, allowed them to small talk all morning long, and she just listened.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
On purpose, Boone and his men arrived late at the scene. An SUV was already there, and Boone was careful to be driving Charly’s vehicle, since that was what Tabloski would have been expecting to see.
“They’re in place,” Boone said to Morley and Dontay, who were bent down in the backseat. “I’m going to be seen as soon as I get closer to that SUV, so I need both of you to be ready to fire as soon as I give the word. If these guys mean to shoot it out, that’s what we’ll do. No hesitation, just do it.”
“Yes, sir,” said Dontay.
“You know I will,” said Morley.
“But only on my call or I’ll kick your ass, Mor,” Boone said.
Dontay smiled. “That won’t be necessary, sir,” Morley said.
But all of them were tense as Boone inched his way toward that SUV.