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.”
“You’ll never lose Rowdy, Kelly,” he spoke behind her, far enough away that she wasn’t jumping out of her own skin, but close enough that she could clearly hear him. “He’s waited on you for eight years now. You’re not going to get rid of him easily.”
Her breathing hitched.
“If it doesn’t happen tonight, Kelly, then he’ll wait until you’re ready.” His voice was soothing, gentle.
Kelly turned to him, staring into his compassionate expression, ignoring the flame of fury that burned behind the sympathy in his eyes.
“And you and Dawg?”
His lips tugged into a crooked smile as his pale green eyes seemed to darken with a hungry cast.
“You belong to Rowdy, Kelly, and vice versa. If that’s what you want, then Rowdy will let us know. Until then, nothing has changed with us. We’re no different than we’ve always been to you, and our feelings for you haven’t changed.”
His gaze flickered over her quickly, and Kelly remembered that he had looked at her the same way for years. With a tinge of teasing lust that he never allowed free. Dawg had always done the same thing, knowing the day would come that Rowdy would claim her, and possibly they would as well.
She glanced at the doorway as Rowdy suddenly filled it, his green eyes bright as they went over her body. He paused at her thighs, centering his gaze on the black material of the bikini bottom she wore before lifting to the fabric that stretched over her br**sts.
“I never mistook you for a good girl,” he murmured, his voice deep, rough. “You were my girl, Kelly. Always.”
His girl. Her breath caught in her throat as she stared back at him. Not his good girl, his bad girl, or his naughty girl. Just his.
“I bet you fantasized about it.” Rowdy’s voice sent curls of heat whipping through her womb before they struck at her clit, her ni**les.
She had fantasized about it. Of Rowdy holding her, whispering in her ear, watching…. She bit back her moan at the thought of those fantasies.
“Come back in, Kelly.” His voice was a rough growl now, his expression heavy with lust as his eyes darkened to an emerald depth.
She stared at the hand he extended to her before her gaze flickered to Natches. He was watchful, tense, but rather than the driving hunger, his eyes held warmth and desire.
“I’m scared, Rowdy,” she whispered.
“We’re just going to go in and pilot the boat to the cove, babe. We’re going to relax, nothing heavy, no decisions to be made, I promise.”
Kelly reached out to his outstretched hand, feeling his heat and strength. Then he was pulling her to him, flush against his body, his hand carrying hers until her arm curved behind her back and she was arched into him. The length of his c**k pressed into her belly, a thick wedge of heat and hardness that left her knees trembling.
“Just let me touch you, Kelly. Just me. That’s all.” His head was lowered until his lips caressed the shell of her ear, sending shivers racing down her spine.
He was seducing her. She lifted her free hand to his biceps, holding on tight as his lips traveled to her neck, smoothing over her sensitive flesh, sending sparks of intense need slicing through every nerve ending.
He lifted his head, a sensual smile curving his lips as he drew her back into the cabin, retaining his hold on her hand as he returned to the wheel.
Dawg moved aside, returning to his post at the balcony doors as Kelly glimpsed the narrow opening into the sheltered cove ahead.
They were staying the night, she knew that. The first step in drawing out a madman. Kelly allowed Rowdy to pull her in front of him, between him and the wheel. Her breath caught as his hand settled on her bare stomach, just over the butterflies beating violently within.
He stood behind her, flush against her, his erection resting in the small of her back, covered only by the thin material of his cutoffs.
“Do you think he knows where we’re going?” She could barely force the words from her lips.
“He studies his victims,” Rowdy sighed. “He’ll know about me, about Dawg and Natches. If he doesn’t follow, he’ll at least be aware of where you are.”