FOURTEEN

Rowdy had finally managed to convince Kelly and her mother to leave the bedroom alone until morning. They were both exhausted when he and his father walked into the bedroom at three a.m to find the two women crying in each other’s arms.

Rowdy had taken Kelly to his bedroom where he held her as she slept, and Ray had taken her mother to their bed. Rowdy was certain his father had gotten no more sleep than he had though, despite the fact that Dawg and Natches had slept downstairs until the security system could be repaired.

At eight, Rowdy met Ray in the hallway heading downstairs.

“Kelly still asleep?” Ray kept his voice low.

Rowdy nodded sharply.

“Coffee?” His father’s eyes glittered with anger.

“If I know Dawg, it’s already on.” Rowdy was certain he had smelled it moments before he left his bedroom.

Ray tugged at the band of his jeans and sniffed sharply, his jaw bunching. “Let’s go get some. I’ve had about all I can take of sitting around and thinking.”

Rowdy knew exactly what he was talking about.

They met Dawg and Natches in the kitchen. Both men were hunched over steaming cups of coffee, talking quietly as Rowdy and Ray entered the room.

“It’s fresh.” Dawg nodded to the pot on the counter.

“Did you manage to find anything this morning?” Rowdy asked as he moved to the cabinet and pulled two cups down.

“Nothing.” Dawg sighed. “Me and Natches went over this place with a fine-toothed comb. Whoever it was slipped in like a damned ghost and back out the same way.”

“Bastard!” Ray snapped. “I’m about tired of this, Rowdy. Maria and Kelly are losing enough sleep. They don’t need this.”

“I know, Dad.” Hell, he didn’t need it. He was having nightmares the way it was.

“He was just watching her until you came back, Rowdy,” Dawg informed him. “We found several places where he’s been watching the house from. The rains have wiped out most of the evidence of someone watching, but he likes to snack while he’s watching. A few candy papers, a couple of soda bottles. No prints though. We checked for that. He’s watching from points above the house, several different areas.”

“She said she knew she was being watched,” Rowdy sighed. “She felt it.”

“We’ll find him.” Natches’s eyes were flinty, cold. “He’ll make the wrong move soon.”

Rowdy rubbed the back of his neck as he pulled out a chair and sat. His cup smacked the table as he sat it down.

“He destroyed every fucking piece of clothes she owns. Every goddamned hair bow and frilly girly thing she possessed. He destroyed her.”

And Rowdy would destroy him, it was that simple. Once Rowdy got his hands on the bastard, he was dead. Painfully dead. The hurting, screaming kind of dead.

“How do you catch a damned ghost?” Ray snarled as he sat at the other end of the table. “The sheriff has been looking for him, I’ve been watching out for anyone suspicious, and no one has seen shit.”

Rowdy’s gaze connected with Dawg’s and Natches’s. The bastard had come after Kelly again because he knew she was on the boat with Rowdy. He was pissed. He would make a mistake soon enough.

“Don’t you three think you’re going to keep me out of this,” Ray warned knowingly. “You’re not as good at those sneaking little looks as you think you are. Tell me what you’re up to.”

“We’re not up to anything, Dad.” Rowdy pushed his fingers wearily through his still damp hair. “He’s mad. He had to have known Kelly was on the boat with me last night. He considers her his good girl. She’s not waiting for him, so he’s punishing her. He’ll make a mistake soon enough.”

“Especially if you have your way?” Ray growled. “Be careful, Rowdy. Don’t try to play games with this bastard.”

“No games.” Rowdy lifted his cup to sip at the coffee as he stared back at his father. “I won’t have to play any games. He won’t be able to stand her being with me. He’s trying to scare her away from me with this. When it doesn’t work, he’ll come after me.”

“Or Kelly?” Ray snapped. “What if he goes after Kelly?”

Dawg shook his head at that one. “He’ll come after Rowdy. And when he does, we’ll all be waiting.”

Ray stared at the three of them harshly. “Don’t play with Kelly’s reputation, Dawg,” he warned him. “I won’t like that.”

Dawg glanced at Rowdy.

“The three of you are going to piss me off,” Ray snapped.

Hell, just what he needed, his father getting in on this. If Ray was suspicious, then Maria would be too and then she would start working on Kelly. Rowdy knew what it was going to take to bring Kelly’s attacker out of the woodwork. If they didn’t push him, then he would strike when none of them expected it. They couldn’t take that chance.

“I’ll take care of this.” He stared back at his father firmly. He wasn’t arguing over it. He wasn’t debating it. One way or the other, he would make certain Kelly was safe.

“Without hurting Kelly further?” Ray’s expression was suspicious.

“There’s no way to keep Kelly out of this,” Rowdy warned him. “She’s the one he’s after.”

“And she’s the one that needs to know how we’re going to stop him,” Kelly’s voice stated from the doorway.

All eyes turned to her. She was dressed in one of her mother’s gowns and a robe, her long hair flowing around her, her gray eyes stormy.

She was scared and fighting to be strong. Enduring. Kelly was enduring. He had known that years ago, but he was learning it more now. She wouldn’t go down easy. She might have her weak moments, but she would come back fighting. And what he needed her to do now was fight.

He watched as she moved to the coffeepot, filled her cup, then turned back to stare at the four of them in determination.

“Whatever happens, Ray, it’s my decision,” she stated. “You and Mom can’t protect me forever.”

Ray’s jaw bunched with the anger that acknowledgment brought.

Turning back to Rowdy, his eyes narrowed warningly as he rose from the table. “She better not get hurt,” he snapped. “Or the three of you will answer to me.”

He stalked from the kitchen then and stomped up the stairs, obviously heading for the bedroom he shared with Maria.

Silent, Rowdy watched as Kelly moved to Ray’s chair and sat down gingerly, placing her cup carefully on the table before asking, “What’s the quickest way to draw him out?”

FIFTEEN

Knowing what Rowdy had planned and actually seeing it being put into effect were two different things. Kelly found that watching the men converge on a project was almost scary.

The Nauti Boys weren’t known for playing nice, in any way. But seeing the hard, cold men studying the banks as they maneuvered into the wide, deserted cove two days later, reminded her that they had been warriors for years, Marines who had survived a long, bloody war.

The men gathered in the living room. Dawg stood at the sliding glass doors that led to the deck, while Natches watched the back, and Rowdy kept a check on the bank along the side of the river.

Their eyes were narrowed, bodies tense and prepared, and all Kelly could do was worry. And try to stem the butterflies rising in her stomach.

She knew the plan was to make her stalker believe she was playing with all the Nauti Boys at once while protecting her from the three of them. They believed he was unbalanced enough, angry enough to show himself. But there was more. She could feel the tension between the three men, the knowledge that they were waiting on her. Wondering if she would give to the three of them together as she had given to Rowdy.

“You’re too quiet, baby.” Rowdy’s voice was soft, filled with hidden depths as he glanced back at where she sat on the couch, staring back at him.

“There doesn’t seem to be much to say,” she responded quietly, seeing the shadows that filled his eyes.

She wished he wasn’t so handsome, wished he wasn’t so male. And she wished his cousins didn’t draw her almost as much as Rowdy himself did. It was one of the issues she had struggled with since the attack. Her rapist had called her a good girl, but she knew she wasn’t, not really, and that scared her. No woman had ever held even one of the Mackay cousins’ hearts—what made her think she could? What made her think she could hold all three?

“I told you, Kelly, whatever happens, it will be just you and me.”

Yes, he had. On the way to the marina, his voice quiet and throbbing with lust, but she had heard the tinge of regret as well. As though he were torn in his needs, in his wants.

She was aware of Dawg listening, his back to them, his body tense.

“The Nauti Boys playing separately.” She arched her brow at the comment. “That’s just about unheard of, Rowdy.”

Dawg snorted. Rowdy shook his head, his green eyes chastising.

“Your tongue has grown sharper over the years, darlin’,” he growled. “I’m a hungry man right now. It’s not nice to tempt hungry men.”

She settled into the corner of the couch, lifting her legs to the cushions and stretching them to the side. Rowdy’s gaze followed the movement with a spark of interest.

“My tongue has always been sharp, you just haven’t been around enough to notice.” She shrugged. “Dawg and Natches should have warned you of that. Wasn’t that part of their job description?”

Knowing they had been watching her and running off potential lovers hadn’t suited her well. It was a damned good thing she hadn’t known before Rowdy came home.

“The job was hard enough as it was, brat.” Dawg turned his head, flashing her a mock frown over his shoulder. “There was no sense in making it more complicated.”

Rowdy chuckled as Kelly glanced back at Dawg archly. He winked with a slow, sensual lowering of one thickly lashed eyelid. And she knew that move shouldn’t have affected her; unfortunately, it always did. Dawg was a natural-born flirt.

“You make it sound like I was hard to watch.” The pretend pout was aimed at Rowdy. “And here I thought I was being a…” The words trailed off as she caught what she was about to say.

She thought she had been a good girl.

She jerked from the couch, ignoring Rowdy’s soft protest as she stalked through the cabin of the houseboat to the back deck.

For a moment, she wasn’t certain she could keep her dinner in her stomach as fear lurched through her. A cold sweat covered her skin and she felt naked, exposed in the tiny bathing suit she had managed to let Rowdy convince her to wear.

Ignoring Natches, she moved to the rail, staring down at the water churning at the hull, and swallowed tightly. She had been a good girl. She had waited for Rowdy, instinctively knowing she belonged to him. She may have moments of insecurity in holding his heart, but she had always known she loved him. Always known that he would be her first. She gripped the rail, forcing back her fears as the remembered sound of her own screams echoed through her head.

“He’s won.”

The sound of Natches’s voice had her breathing in roughly as she shook her head.

“I bet you feel like you’re naked, on display,” he continued.

“Don’t, Natches.” She fought back the fears rolling through her. “Please.”

“Is your skin crawling, Kelly?”

It was. The feel of him behind her, knowing he could see her bare skin, that he wanted to touch her, was suddenly terrifying.

This was Natches. He was almost an extension of Rowdy, a protector, a friend.

“I don’t want this,” she whispered. “I don’t want to be scared because I’m about to say the wrong thing. I don’t want to forget every dream I ever had, or lose the man I’ve loved forever because I can’t control the nightmares.”