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Gripping the doorframe, she turned back, shock filling her as she watched Rowdy struggling with the smaller man. Rowdy was bigger, but the blood at his temple showed the earlier blow which was now slowing his reflexes.

The gun John had carried slid across the room as he fought to get to it. Kelly rushed for it, crying out in rage as a hand snagged her ankle, bringing her to her knees.

Her head turned as she saw the knife in John’s hand and Rowdy’s reached to grab at his wrist as the other man aimed at her leg. She kicked out, breaking loose before scrambling for the weapon.

Her fingers latched onto the handgrip as she flipped over, bringing it up with both hands as she fought to get a clear shot.

The two men were snarling now, wrestling for the knife as she heard the sound of sirens in the distance. The gun shook in her hand as she blinked back her tears, terrified that the deputy would manage to actually find a way to wound Rowdy with that knife. There was no way to shoot yet. No way to be certain if she did, that she would miss Rowdy.

There had to be something she could do. But if she did the wrong thing, it could mean Rowdy’s life. She prayed, sobbing in terror as she watched the two men grappled until the knife was between them a second before Rowdy jerked the other man closer to him.

They both froze.

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A whimper left Kelly’s throat as the front door crashed inward, and as though in slow motion, she watched Deputy John Barnes slide slowly from Rowdy’s grip to collapse on the floor.

His head turned toward her, his hazel eyes filled with shock and surprise.

“My good girl…” he whispered before his gaze dimmed and his body went limp.

Kelly stared back at him, the sounds of police filling the room receding to the background as adrenaline began to crash inside her. She lifted her head as the gun dropped in her lap, watching as Rowdy began to move toward her, only to have the sheriff block him as the room continued to fill up. She could hear her mother, or was it merely wishful thinking? Rowdy was yelling and Sheriff Mayes was barking orders.

She knew she should get up, knew she should do something. But all she could do was turn her gaze back to the dead deputy as she heard his final words ringing in her ears. “My good girl…”

She wasn’t his good girl. A sob tore from her throat as she pushed to her feet, fighting past the shock winding its way through her. He was dead. He was dead, and Rowdy was surrounded by the police.

“Let him go!” she screamed out hoarsely, fighting past Sheriff Mayes as she struggled to get to Rowdy. She kicked at someone, her fist landed against another, but they parted, staring back at her in shock as she flung herself in Rowdy’s arms.

“Thank God! Baby.” Rowdy’s arms closed around her as his voice whispered in her ear. “Sweet Lord, Kelly. Don’t ever terrify me like that again.”

She was crying and couldn’t stop. She could feel the sobs shaking her body as her arms tightened around his neck.

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She could hear Rowdy explaining the deputy’s insanity as he held her close. Somehow, he had managed to regain consciousness and call the police, informing them of who was there and what was going on as he slipped down the stairs.

They were prepared, but questions had to be answered. Dawg and Natches were brought around by the medics and the house continued to fill with people. But Kelly refused to leave Rowdy’s side. He refused to let her.

She held onto him through the evening, answering questions when she had to, but otherwise remaining silent as the knowledge slowly filled her mind that it was over. The stalker had been John Barnes, and he was gone. He was dead. It was finally over.

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Kelly stared around the living room the next morning, amazed that there had been nothing left, not so much as a spec of blood, to prove that the night before had been no dream.

The only proof left was the egg-sized knots that had been left on Dawg’s, Natches’ and Rowdy’s heads. John Barnes hadn’t come to the front door, he had known about Dawg’s back entrance through his father, who had spent years spying on the Mackay cousins, and used it to slip into the house.

He had gotten Dawg first, while Natches was outside getting the last supplies from his truck. When he came in, he had seen the same thing Kelly had, what appeared to be Dawg napping on the couch.

He had moved into the kitchen with the supplies where the deputy had moved in behind him, and knocked him unconscious as well. He had waited until Kelly had left the bedroom upstairs, hiding in the other room until she started down the stairs before he had disabled Rowdy. Or thought he had.

Rowdy had been coming out of his nap as he was struck; the blow had dazed him, taking precious minutes for him to get his bearings enough to struggle from the bed.

The sheriff had called that morning after running a night-long investigation on his dead deputy. He had indeed been Loren Barnes’ son,

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kidnapped by his father several years before the Mackay cousins had become her lovers.

There was a long history of abuse as a child, foster homes and disappearances that hadn’t been followed up on at the time. As the full story emerged, everyone who had known him on the force had been shocked. His father had molested him for years, punishing him for the supposed crimes his mother had committed. Richard Barnes, the father, had been insane, and his insanity had been forced upon his son until it had warped his view of women.

Four women had paid for that crime.

“Feeling better?” She turned her head as Dawg moved from the kitchen, followed by Rowdy and Natches.

She stared at the three men, feeling the tension that suddenly filled the room, the intensity in their eyes. She had known this was coming, had known Rowdy’s cousins would soon put his decision to the test. She could see it in the ready tension of their bodies. There was none of the expected anger in Rowdy’s expression though. His body was relaxed, easy, his gaze simmering with amusement.

“Do we have a problem?” She crossed her arms over her breasts and stared back at the three curiously.

“Rowdy’s being greedy,” Dawg grunted. “How do you feel about that?”

“I’m rather greedy myself, Dawg,” she informed him fondly. “I can’t do it.”

“We wouldn’t hurt you.” She could see the frustration in his face.

“Hell, Kelly, our cousins in Texas have survived just fine.”

The Augusts. They didn’t even live in Somerset and they had a reputation here.

She breathed in deeply.

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“I’m not Marly or their other wives,” she informed them as Rowdy straightened, slowly tensing.

Dawg glared back at Rowdy then. “You didn’t even give us a chance…”

“You don’t love her, Dawg,” Rowdy snapped, striding across the room to Kelly’s side.

When he turned to face Dawg and Natches, his arm curled around Kelly’s back, pulling her closer to his hard body.

“We love her enough,” Natches protested, his jaw pulsing tightly.

“Oh give it up!” Kelly stepped away from her lover, staring between the three men incredulously, laughter bubbling from her throat at their fierce expressions. “Geez, do I look like a bone between the three of you?”

They stared back at her in surprise.

“Dawg, how many times did I flirt with you, just for the hell of it, while Rowdy was gone?”

“You did what?” Rowdy turned to her in surprised irritation.

“Save it.” She rolled her eyes back at him. “You were gone so the jealousy is a little late.” She turned back to Dawg. “And I’m waiting on an answer, Dawg?”

Dawg shifted nervously, rather like a little boy caught in a fib.

He cleared his throat, glancing at Rowdy with a grimace.

“You belonged to him first.”

“I’m his always, Dawg,” she informed him gently. “Now, forever and always. And that’s my decision. Not Rowdy’s. And it’s one you won’t change.”

“I told you she were trouble,” Natches griped. “Dammit, Kelly, we didn’t ask you to mess things up like this.” He cast her a brooding glare.

“You’re welcome.” She smiled back placidly.

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They weren’t angry, she could see it in their eyes, feel it in the affection in their gazes.

Natches turned to Dawg and lifted his fist.

“We’re the last.”

Dawg lifted his fist in return, touching it to his cousins. “The last.”

He appeared firm, decisive. Kelly tilted her head and watched both men curiously. Natches may never let go of the more extreme needs, but there was something there in Dawg’s expression. Something hesitant.

Something uncertain.

“Let’s go.” Rowdy’s arm hooked around her waist, dragging her toward the stairs.

“Where?”

“To bed,” he growled.

“But, Rowdy, I’m not sleepy.”

“I promise, you will be. Later…”

She was laughing as he swept her into the bedroom. Hunger was a physical force that whipped around her. Sexual, heated, insistent.

Rolling from Rowdy in waves.

As she turned to him, she felt Rowdy’s hands at the hem of the overlarge shirt she wore, lifting it, easing it over her hips. She lifted her arms silently, allowing him to strip it from her before his fingers snagged in the waistband of her shorts and pulled them down. He didn’t stop there. As soon as the material cleared her feet, he was kneeling before her, pushing her thighs apart and licking into the already damp folds of her pussy.

“Oh God!” She jerked, her eyes widening at the hungry desire of the caress as Rowdy’s hands flexed at her thighs. She wasn’t going to be able to stand for much longer. The pleasure was too heated, too intense. It stole the strength from her legs and left her feeling helpless, weak. It was

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a sensual attack, an ambush of the senses. Rowdy held her steady before him, his tongue a devilish conqueror as it flicked and probed and drew the slick juices from her aching vagina.

“There you go,” he whispered before placing a gentle kiss at her clit before looking up at her once again. “Your eyes are getting all stormy, Kelly, so big and dark. Are you enjoying it?”

She couldn’t speak. The pleasure was overwhelming, different. There was a difference to his tone of voice, to his touch. A possessiveness, a dominance she gloried in.

“I bet you are,” he answered his own question as gentle fingers parted the folds of her pussy and began to press inside, stroking her, adding to the sensations tearing through her. “Do you know how fucking sexy you look, Kelly? How sweet and hot you taste?”

Her hands tightened in his hair, though she wasn’t certain she remembered how they got there, pressing him to her again as his tongue swirled around her clit, pushing her closer to climax as his fingers thrust slow and easy inside her pussy, filling her, stretching her, preparing her.

“Rowdy…” She could feel the orgasm building in her womb, knew she wouldn’t last long.

“Not yet, baby.” His smile was filled with lust. “Soon, but not yet.”

He eased the friction, causing her to whimper and arch to his mouth as he slowly drew back.

“Come on, baby, to the bed. I want you beneath me when you come for me,” Rowdy growled. She gasped as he suddenly swung her into his arms and moved to the bed.

“Come here, baby,” Rowdy whispered as he placed her in the center of the bed, laid back and spread open. He returned to her pussy, stretching out below her and easing her thighs wider before his tongue plunged into the needy depths of her cunt.

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Oh God, she was so close. She could feel the warning pulses of sensation tightening in her womb, dragging across her nerve endings.

And she was lost. A ragged scream tore from her lips as her orgasm ripped through her, blazing across her body and mind as she arched, eyes closed, lights blazing across the canvas of her mind.

Her breath was lost as she felt Rowdy move, felt his cock tunnel into the clenching depths of her pussy as she writhed beneath him. Her release was still tearing through her, refusing to ease as he began a hard, intense rhythm.

Rowdy was lost within Kelly. The hard contractions of her orgasming pussy around the thick length of his cock was milking him straight to paradise. But it was the knowledge that he alone was driving her to this, that no one man had known her perfect body, had felt the hard contractions of her cunt, or her sweet cries of release that pushed him higher, drove him deeper into the pleasure racing through his bloodstream. He was locked into a sensation that built by the second, a pleasure that tightened not just his muscles, but his soul.

He could feel her. Deep inside her, not just with the part of his body fucking her like a madman, but with his soul. He could feel her wrapping around him, threading through his heart with the precision of a surgeon and binding together wounds he had no idea existed.

Within the pleasure was solace, ease, never-ending, forever ecstasy.

“Hold me, Rowdy.” Her voice was desperate, ragged as her arms tightened around his neck, her whispered plea tearing into his heart.

With his elbows braced on the mattress, his forearms slid beneath her, pulling her tighter to his chest, holding her as close to his heart as he could pull her. Electric energy pulsed from his scrotum, along his spine. Pleasure sizzled through the shaft of his cock, and as he felt her tighten around him once again, her gasping cries in his ear, he spilled

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himself inside her. Violent pulses of semen jetted deep inside her pussy as he slammed his hips against her, a harsh, guttural groan tearing from him as their releases merged.

“Mine. Mine.” His lips were at her neck, kissing, nipping, relishing each touch, each sensation.

“Always…yours…” One last, keening cry tore from her before she finally collapsed beneath him.

Shaking, sweating, Rowdy rolled to the bed, dragging her limp body with him as contentment and satiation surged through him.

She was his. Always. Only his.