“Watch me, Kelly.”

“I can’t,” she gasped. “It’s too good.”

His eyes dilated at the admission.

“Watch me, or it stops,” he growled firmly. “See who’s touching you, baby. It’s me. You’ve been mine forever, Kelly. We’re just going to ease into it now. Let me show you what I’ve dreamed about for the last eight years.”

She was shaking in his grip, but not from fear. Hunger was consuming her as his lips covered hers again, and she struggled to keep her eyes open, to keep her senses from drowning beneath the full-lipped kiss that threatened to dissolve the strength in her knees.

Twining her arms around his neck, she arched against him, barely retaining enough thought to keep her eyes open. If she closed them, then the incredible pleasure tearing through her would be gone. His lips on hers, his tongue stroking along her lips as hers licked back, desperate for more.

Her hips tilted to him, arching as his knees bent enough to tuck his erection at the notch of her thighs.

Oh, that was good. She whimpered as she twisted against him, feeling the heavy rasp against her clit as he lifted her to him, turning her and bearing her to the counter behind them.

“There. No need to worry.” He stepped between her spread thighs, pressing firmly against her as her back arched and her hands clenched at his shoulders.

“See how good it feels.” His hips moved, dragging a ragged cry from her throat as his lips covered hers again.

Oh yes, it felt good. It felt as though tiny electrical charges were exploding across her flesh, sensitizing her.

His hard, bare chest pressed against her breasts, the lacy material of her bra scraping over her hard nipples, making them ache for a harder, firmer touch. This part of her hunger for Rowdy had always frightened her. The part that refused to accept a gentle touch, that ached, screamed out for more.

Powerful, possessive, Rowdy’s kiss consumed her, but his hands didn’t touch her. They were flat on the counter beside her, despite her need for them on her body.

“Rowdy,” she gasped as his head lifted.

“See how sweet it can be, baby?” he crooned. “So sweet and easy.”

“No.” She shook her head fiercely. “Touch me. I need you to touch me.”

There were no shadows of fear now. The overriding hunger Rowdy filled her with left no room for fear, no room for shadows. There was nothing but the demand for his touch, and that demand was rising by the moment.

“Where?” he whispered the question against her lips. “Where do you want me to touch you, Kelly? Show me, baby.”

His powerful biceps flexed at her side as he held back. She shuddered, realizing the demand in his voice and the fact that whatever she wanted, she was going to have to initiate.

Her lips curled at the corners in amusement.

“You think I won’t do it?” Her body was humming with need now.

“I think you could make me lose my mind if you wanted to try.” Heavy-lidded eyes, his lips full and sexy, he stared back at her with wicked intent. “But will you?”

The muscles of his chest twitched; the blood pulsed in his neck. A small rivulet of moisture rolled from his neck, drawing her gaze and her hunger. Leaning forward, she moved her tongue against his skin, licking at his flesh and drawing in the salty male taste.

The groan that rumbled from him had a shiver racing up her spine.

“Touch me,” she whispered against his neck, her teeth raking over the hard column.

“Show me where.” His voice was tight, dark with lust. “It’s up to you, baby.”

Up to her. She breathed in deeply.

“I want your lips on my nipples.” Her breathing grew harder as she let him hear the words, words she had only whispered in her dreams. “Then your teeth—”

“Sweet mercy.” The heavy groan tore from his lips. “Oh, baby, the things I’m going to do to those tight, hard little nipples. Lift that shirt for me, baby. Give me those pretty breasts.”

Her hands fell to the hem of her shirt, lifting it as she leaned back to stare into his eyes, wanting to see the lust and need flaming in the green depths.

As the shirt cleared her belly and began edging over her bra, a shockingly familiar voice drawled from the doorway. “The door’s open; does that mean I can join you?”

Laced with amusement, heavy with interest, Natches’s voice had Kelly jerking the shirt down and staring back in shock at the deepened lust in Rowdy’s eyes.

There was no anger that Natches had invaded the moment, there was added arousal, a deepening flush of lust on his hard face.

“Ever been watched?” he whispered, his expression heavy with dark desire.

Breathing heavily, Kelly stared back at him. She wasn’t shocked, she realized. She had heard too much about the Nauti Boys. Too many tales of their sexual excesses, their uninhibited immersion into their sensual games.

She swallowed tightly, staring back at him as the flames between her thighs began to burn with insistent demand.

“Rowdy…” She shook with indecision. She had guessed over the years that the day would come when she would face this choice. That she would run headlong into the hungers the three men shared; she just hadn’t expected it nearly this soon.

“As much as I would love this,” Natches sighed, “and I surely would love it, I just came to let you know Uncle Ray is headed this way. And he has that bulldog look on his face for sure.”

Was it relief or regret that raced through her mind? Whichever it was, there was no doubt her body was howling in protest.

“Well hell.” Rowdy dropped a quick, hard kiss to her lips as he stepped back, his hands gripping her waist as he sat her gently on the floor. “Guess the cavalry is going to rescue you, baby.”

She didn’t need rescuing.

“I’ll talk to him,” she whispered.

“No talking needed, baby.” He shook his head as he sighed wearily and tucked her hair behind her ear, then ran his fingers gently down her cheek. “Go on to the marina. I’ll check in later. Okay?”

“He doesn’t understand.”

“Go, baby.” He shook his head. “Me and Dad don’t have a problem here. He’s just being who he is, that’s all. And who he is means he’s going to worry about the little lamb staying too long with the big bad wolf.” And that was her fault. She had been so hysterical over Rowdy knowing about the attack that she knew Ray was now worrying about her being alone with Rowdy at all.

She had sworn his cousins to secrecy, begging them to hold their silence on the attack, pleading with them not to tell him. Reluctantly, they had agreed. And now Kelly knew why the reluctance had been so thick. They knew Rowdy, and they knew he’d be angry with all of them. And he was. He was hiding it well, but she saw the flash of it in his eyes, mixed with the hurt. Being kept in the dark never had sat well with him. He was the type of man who faced the monsters and fought them back however much it took. He wasn’t a man that appreciated being protected or deliberately left out.

“I better go,” she sighed, glancing at the door. “Will you be at the house tonight for dinner?”

“Tomorrow,” he promised easily, reaching up to tuck her hair behind her ear. “Wear something pretty for me.”

Something pretty. She hadn’t done that for a year.

“I can do that.” She moved away from him slowly. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Count on it, baby.” He leaned against the counter, his gaze heavy lidded, his body hard, aroused as she slid past the doorway.

Her heart was racing in excitement, drumming with latent fear, but for the first time in a year, she felt alive again. Rowdy was home now. A smile edged at her lips. He was home, everything would be fine now.

FOUR

The Nauti Boys were together again. Rowdy finished off his beer as he stared at the other two men who had followed him topside later that evening.

Natches, the youngest of them at twenty-nine, tossed the pizza box on the table and moved into one of the chairs that set beneath the awning. Dawg, the oldest at thirty-one, flipped on the CD player he had carried up and set it on the spare chair. The better to drown conversation. They had learned young to watch their discussions here at the marina and on the lake. Sound carried on the water, and they had learned more than one secret eavesdropping themselves.

“You’re pissed.” Dawg sprawled back in his chair as he stared at Rowdy through narrowed, green eyes.

Rowdy took his own chair and stared back at the two men. They had run wild through town and the Marines together, though Dawg and Natches had gone reserves after their first tour rather than staying in longer. Dawg managed the lumberyard his father left him, while Natches had opted to permanently distance himself from his parents’ thriving restaurants and owned a garage of all things. His dad stayed elbows deep in flour and Natches was a grease monkey. The family fights over that one had been interesting.

“I’m pissed.” Rowdy shrugged, knowing there wasn’t a damned thing he could do about it.

Uncapping another beer from the cooler beside him, he stared at his cousins soberly, wondering if he would have made the same choices.

They were the bad boys of the county. The three of them had been the terror of Somerset, Kentucky, when they were young. Fathers locked their daughters up at night in fear of the three of them. They hadn’t exactly gained a good reputation where women were concerned.

“Damn, Rowdy, I’m glad you’re back.” Dawg shook his shaggy head, his raven black hair reflecting the lights of the marina. “Even pissed, it’s a hell of a sight better than dealing with this without you.”

Natches sipped at his beer, his own black hair not nearly as shaggy as Dawg’s but longer. It was pulled back in a ponytail at his nape, giving his features a harder, more savage appearance.

They knew why they were there.

Rowdy turned back to Dawg.

“You could have told me when you picked me up,” he informed his cousin, his lips flat, anger tightening his skull.

Dawg shook his head, lowering it briefly before sighing.

“Some things you just don’t know how to tell a man.” Dawg grimaced. “I figured you’d get a hint soon enough. It’s not like she’s the same girl she was last year.”

Rowdy bit back the angry response burning on his lips, but hell, this was Dawg. When Rowdy hadn’t been around to watch out for Kelly’s skinned knees and the bullies who liked to pick on her, then Dawg had been there.

“We’ve pulled all the info on this that we can find, Rowdy.” Natches straightened in his chair and reach for the pizza. “We’ve been working on it since it happened, trying to figure out who the bastard was.”

“And?” If anyone could figure it out, it was Dawg and Natches.

“Not much,” Natches admitted. “We’ve had four other rapes in surrounding counties over the last two years. All anal rapes, beatings, cuts, much more severe than Kelly’s. She got lucky. Her neighbor’s boyfriend heard the single scream she was able to get out. The boyfriend was a tough guy, broke in and tried to apprehend the bastard, but once he caught sight of Kell he let the guy go to help her.”

“All this shit going on at home and neither one of you were good enough to tell me what the fuck was happening?” Rowdy snapped.

He had talked to both of them over the past year and never realized that the distance he had felt had been something they were hiding rather than his own impatience to finish his tour.

“What could you have done, man?” Dawg tilted his head to the side and stared back at him questioningly. “We didn’t want the trouble of hiding an AWOL Marine the rest of our natural lives and didn’t figure Kelly needed that on top of everything else. We took care of her until you could get home.”