“Tomorrow.” He smoothed her hair back from her face as she settled into the bed. “I’m going downstairs for a while, baby. I’ll leave the door open and I won’t be long—”

“I’ll be okay, Rowdy,” she assured him, a thread of mockery filling her voice. “Go. Just let me sleep.”

Rowdy paced the house. Nervous tension was a bitch, and suffering from it wasn’t something he normally did. But damn if he wasn’t just about to cut his own throat just to ease the thoughts tormenting him.

What the hell had he done?

When he first came downstairs on the Nauti Buoy, the sight of Kelly standing next to Dawg had sent his cock to full erection and the blood racing through his veins. Just as it had earlier when his cousin had moved behind her, his lips moving over her buttocks, spreading them, caressing her.

It had been hot as hell, feeling her pleasure as her hot little mouth surrounded the sensitive crest of his cock. Holding back had been iffy. His balls had drawn up in tortuous need, desperate to explode as the pleasure of it had seared his nerve endings.

He had ignored that unfamiliar tension that began to hover at the back of his mind. Fought with it. Then later, as his lips suckled at her tight nipple his eyes had watched as Natches pleasured the other, and he heard the words Dawg whispered to her. How snug she was, how hot, and the lust that filled his cousin’s voice had slapped at Rowdy.

Jealousy. Possessiveness. He wasn’t used to those emotions, but now they raged inside him until his fists were clenched and violence simmered just beneath the surface. He prayed for the chance to get his hands on the little son of a bitch stalking Kelly. To take out the fury and aggression rising inside him on someone who deserved it. Neither Dawg nor Natches deserved it, but it was building, growing inside him until Rowdy wasn’t certain he could contain it.

Stalking back to the living room, he moved to the small bar Ray kept at the side of the room and poured a measure of whiskey into one of the tumblers sitting ready. The liquid burned going down, but did nothing to calm the beast raging inside him.

“Liquor doesn’t help, boy.”

He turned, his hand tightening on the butt of the pistol he carried before recognizing his father.

Ray stood just inside the doorway, dressed in a pair of dark cotton pajama bottoms and a faded T-shirt. His expression was sober, lined with worry, and his eyes gleamed with knowledge.

“We’ll catch him.” Rowdy shrugged. “He’s losing focus—”

“I wasn’t talking about her stalker.” He moved farther into the room. “I was talking about what happened on that boat before he attacked.”

Rowdy brought the glass to his lips and threw back the rest of the whisky before grimacing tightly. Damn, he didn’t need this conversation with his father.

“Let it go, Dad.”

“Doesn’t set well, does it, Son?” Ray moved closer to the bar, lifting one of the clean tumblers and pouring his own drink. “It starts eating at your gut first thing, tearing at you, making you wonder where your mind was.”

Rowdy narrowed his eyes on his father, hearing the knowledge in his voice, the assurance that only came from experience.

“They didn’t take her,” he muttered, wondering why the hell he was bothering to explain this to his father of all people.

“Might not have, but something happened. Something strong enough to make you panic, to keep you awake. To tear your guts up with guilt.”

Son of a bitch.

“She was shot at, Dad, that’s enough to shake any man’s insides.”

Ray sipped at his drink, staring at him over the rim of the glass. Rowdy couldn’t hide from the knowledge, no matter how much he suddenly wanted to.

“I know what’s going on, Son,” he finally sighed heavily. “You think you and those two hardheaded cousins of yours are the only men in this family to think they know what they want in a woman? And in her pleasure?” Ray frowned heavily, his eyes darkening. “You’re not. I’ve tried to warn you since I first caught wind of what was going on, and you’ve never wanted to listen.”

Rowdy watched his father curiously then. Through the years, there had been whispers that Ray Mackay and his best friend had been up to some sexual little games, but nothing concrete and nothing his dad had ever confirmed.

Ray grunted mockingly. “Your generation thinks they know everything. You don’t. Mine knew what a reputation was, and we knew what should be kept private and what should be flaunted. Women like Calista James were steered clear of except for a certain few. We knew our actions would always backfire on us, if not at the time, then later, on our wives, our children. I thought I taught you that, but maybe I failed there too.”

Ray shook his head as he nodded to the chairs Maria and Kelly had sat in earlier. “Come over here, Rowdy. Let’s talk.”

“What’s there to talk about?”

“Saving face,” his father sighed. “Those two cousins of yours have waited nearly as long as you have for Kelly. They don’t love her like you do, but when you yank something like that out of a man’s hands, he’s bound to get pissed. And you don’t want that kind of pissed from men you’ve been as close to as brothers.”

Ray leaned forward in his chair, staring back at Rowdy intently. Damn, that look had the ability to send him right back to his teenage years and the memory of his father’s chastisements.

He wasn’t a teenager anymore, but at the moment he felt as uncertain as one.

Rowdy turned his gaze to his drink, wondering what the hell he was supposed to say. He’d already figured out the fact that he was making a hell of a mistake—he didn’t need his father to point that out to him.

“It’s tough, being as close to men as you are to Dawg and Natches,” Ray sighed. “You three are closer than brothers, you always have been.” He shook his head, staring down at the glass in his hand as he grimaced painfully. “I had a friend like that once, Rowdy.” He lifted his eyes then. “A damned good friend.”

Rowdy stared back at him, knowing what was coming. Knowing he didn’t want to hear it.

“It was before your mother.” Ray cleared his throat. “And there was this woman. One that made the blood boil in my veins, made me want forever. But I was dumb. Brick dumb. I thought I’d always be the man I was then. That what I wanted sexually would always be a part of my life. And I shared that woman. Because I thought that pleasure was the greatest gift I could give her…”

He tossed back the rest of his drink before meeting Rowdy’s eyes once again.

“Kelly should have been your sister, Rowdy. If I hadn’t been so stupid, I wouldn’t have lost Maria all those years ago. She chose the lover willing to love just her, rather than his own selfishness. Willing to give her all of himself, without the childish need to have it all his own way.”

Rowdy’s jaw bunched tightly.

“Dad, let it go.” Rowdy shook his head sharply.

“You’re figuring it out, I can see that in your eyes. The same way I thought I was figuring it out. But I let that bond I thought I had with my buddy get in the way. I was torn between the loss of friendship, and my own wants. And I thought the woman would be there either way. It wasn’t the friend I lost, Rowdy. It was the woman. And trust me, when it comes right down to it, Kelly is no different than her mother.”

Rowdy breathed in deeply. Damn, he hadn’t wanted to hear this. He lifted the whisky before tipping more of the liquor into his glass.

His father was silent then, finishing his drink as Rowdy sipped from his.

“I love her,” Rowdy finally breathed out roughly. “I didn’t expect this though.”

“Love changes us, Son.” Ray rose to his feet, crossing the room slowly to set his empty glass on the bar. “Don’t make the same mistake I did, Rowdy. Once it’s over that first time, once you’ve let another man claim what’s yours and yours alone, you lose a part of your soul. Getting it back is hell. A hell I hope you never know.”

Rowdy stared back at his father silently, finally hearing what the other man had always tried to teach him. What was fair, what he wanted alone, wasn’t all that mattered. He had begun learning it in the Marines, but it was slapping him upside the head now.

“James Salyers was still a friend when he died, Rowdy. And I grew up and learned some damned hard lessons. Maria gave me a second chance, but that chance came at a cost. A very high cost. The daughter that should have been mine came from another man, and the son I love more than life is about to fuck up not just his own life, but that girl’s as well. Watching it and knowing I can’t stop it is hell. Remember that while you struggle between what you love and what you want.”

As Rowdy watched his father leave the room, a heavy sigh slipped past his lips. Maria’s objections to his relationship made more sense now. He shook his head, realizing how well his father, James Salyers, and Maria had kept that secret. Reputations. Theirs was intact, but his wasn’t. And now, he was risking Kelly’s as well.

Kelly was awake when he returned to the bedroom a little after midnight. Sleep wasn’t coming, no matter how hard she sought it. Each time she closed her eyes she saw…herself…surrounded by the Mackay cousins, their hands touching her as pleasure whipped around her. But it wasn’t pleasure she felt in the memory. She felt the dark swirl of shame.

The same emotions she had felt each time she swore she wasn’t waiting one day longer on Rowdy and she was going to find someone to love her. To stick around and be with her. Each time she had tried, each time she had attempted to allow another man to touch her, shame had eaten her alive for days later.

The door closed behind him, the click of the lock causing her to open her eyes, to stare through the darkness as his shadow moved toward the bed.

God, she loved him. If she could give him his every desire then she would do it in a second, but some things she knew she couldn’t do. Dawg and Natches she couldn’t do. And she had no idea how to tell him. No idea how to broach what she knew could destroy the relationship she had dreamed of.

“Everything’s quiet,” he said softly as he pulled his shirt from his body.

The room was dark, too dark to make out his expression, but she could hear his voice, see the gleam of his eyes.

“I couldn’t sleep.” She could feel the tension between them.

Rowdy sat at the edge of the bed, pausing before he sighed tiredly and bent to take off his sneakers.

“Rowdy?” She whispered his name, uncertain what to say, what to do as he rose to his feet and shucked off his jeans.

He was naked. As he turned to her she glimpsed the heavy, engorged length of his erection a second before she was suddenly jerked to him.

“Rowdy?” She gasped his name as his lips covered hers, stealing her breath, her startled cry.

And from there, her strength. His hands were hard, dominant as he tore the shirt from her body, tossing it carelessly to the floor before his lips took hers again. Her muted cries built in her head as he bore her to the bed, spreading her thighs, sinking into her.

There were no preliminaries. No foreplay. One moment she was empty, the next she was full, her pussy stretched to its limits as he groaned into her mouth.

She fought to breathe, and she could feel his struggle as well. The harsh sounds that tore from his throat were almost animalistic in their hunger, their intensity. His lips held back both their cries as he began to move, hard, furious strokes inside, sending her nerve endings into shock, the pleasure ripping through her with the same desperation with which his erection thrust into the slick, heated depths of her body.

Her arms wrapped about his neck, fingers pushing into his hair as one hard hand gripped her hip, holding her in place as he moved. The other arm curled beneath her as he supported himself on his elbow.