the bastard. christopher didn't deserve to hear his father's voice. didn't deserve to know that the man who had lost a brother and countless friends in the service of his country still loved him.

it would bring christopher winston more comfort than it would bring his father, but even a small amount of comfort was reason enough.

and what of the widow? she asked herself. what was she going to promise her? what about the wife and two small children of another man they had taken? a man with a promising career, who had laid it all on the line to betray his country.

she pushed her fingers through her hair and fought the scream welling in her throat. what about those children who had lost their daddy and didn't understand why? the wife whose eyes were haunted in the surveillance pictures, who hid in her home and tried to ignore the gossip swirling in this small town?

she rose to her feet and paced to the window. she stared out at the darkness falling over the mountains, the lights of the city around her, and she could feel the tears inside her.

when had she ever cared before? the men they had arrested had made their own decisions, yet she was beating herself up over the fact that she had to question their families.

it wasn't those men facing the consequences of what they had done to their families, staring into their haunted eyes. it was her. her and the people who had loved them.

as she stood there, she heard the door to the suite open. through the reflection in the glass, she watched as natches entered the room, and she had to clench her teeth to hold back a sob.

his expression was somber as he crossed the room, his gaze dark, concerned.

she expected him to castigate her for questioning clayton winston. for making his pain worse. instead, she was shocked as he came to her and turned her against his chest.

"it's okay to cry, chay," he whispered at her ear. "clayton wouldn't think less of you for it. and neither would i."

she shook her head, but she felt the tears building in her chest. crying didn't help. it wouldn't bring back clayton winston's pride in his son, and it wouldn't ease the pain of a widowed mother or a family damaged by betrayal.

this beautiful town. these people that she had somehow let into her heart right along with natches were tearing her apart.

"he deserved better," she whispered, holding on to natches, desperate to find some way now to control the emotions she didn't know how to handle. "this is why i hate you," she cried out. "i get around you, and i start feeling. i start laughing over two nitwits who broke into your apartment because they thought i was going to somehow hurt you. i cry over old men who deserved better but are a whole lot better off knowing the truth. and i start aching for things i never needed before. i hate you for this."

she was shaking in his arms, felt them tighten around her as she dug her nails into his back and held on for dear life.

"you love me, chay," he whispered against her hair, his voice quiet and deep. secure. damn him, he was always so secure, always so confident, and at this moment she felt as though she was struggling just to hold on to reality.

"you make me feel too much," she whispered. "make it stop, natches."

make the pain go away.

she shook her head against his chest and jerked away from him.

"i didn't mean that." she had done that to him once before, asked him to take away the pain. she had never forgotten the way he had looked at her. the regret in his eyes, the sorrow. because it wasn't him she was asking for; it was solace.

"chay, come back here." he pulled her back to him, one hand holding her head to his chest as his arm wrapped around her. "do you think i mind being your shield against the world, or the pain?" he tipped her head back, forced her to look at him, and her vision blurred with tears. "sweetheart, my shoulders are broad enough for your tears, your fists, or those sharp little teeth. however you need to hold on to me. i'm here."

"what about you?" her voice shook now, almost as badly as clayton winston's had trembled earlier. "always a shield and never shielded, natches?"

he chuckled at that, his gaze gentle. "is that what you think?" he touched her cheek, ran his thumb over her lips. "that i have no shield? don't you know, chay? you've been my shield since the day i met you, whether you were here or not. the memory of your laughter, your tears, the memory of your touch and your kiss. you changed me, chay, and i think it's only fair that i'm changing you as well."

changing her, and that change was destroying her. before he could say anything more, before the tears welling inside her could fall, she reached up, grabbed his head, and fought for his kiss.

she needed this. she needed to feel him burning inside her, just one more time, because she could feel parts of herself unraveling that she didn't know how to handle.

she was being attacked by emotions she had promised herself since she was a girl she would never feel. all her life, she had maintained distance, but distance wasn't possible with natches.

he lifted her off her feet as his lips controlled the kiss despite her battle to lead it. he chuckled at her attempts to nip his lips, and nipped hers in turn. he slanted his lips over hers, pushed his tongue inside, and lit a fire in her that she knew would burn her to ashes.

she was tearing at his clothes as he laid her on the bed and stripped her of her robe. she couldn't get him undressed fast enough.

she fought him as he wrestled her to the bed, his lips and tongue burning over one nipple, then the other. he sucked one into his mouth, lashed at it with heated licks of his tongue, and filled her with passion.

she had never known passion until natches. she had never known this heat, this fire that became a void of loneliness and loss when she walked away from him.

how had she ever walked away?

she twisted beneath him, gasping, crying his name.

"i need . . ." she arched as his teeth raked the hardened peak, and he growled against it. "i need you, natches."

"i'm right here, chay." his voice was deep, rough. it grated across her senses and made the pleasure deeper, hotter. because she knew he felt it. knew he was as lost in it as she was.

"now." her head tossed against the mattress as he held her in place, his lips sipping at her flesh, his tongue licking it. "don't make me wait."

his hand cupped between her thighs, heated, calloused flesh meeting swollen, wet folds.

she arched and cried out as two fingers thrust inside her, throwing her higher, deeper into the maelstrom overtaking her.

and she let it have her. she let him have her. she arched, pulling at his shoulders, feeling him come to her. thick and hard, his erection worked inside her, stretching her, easing her, building sensation and emotion into a kaleidoscope of color and pleasure.

when he was buried to the hilt, his breath rasping, his expressiontwisted in lines of hunger, she felt his desperation to meld with her inside her very pores.

"hold on to me, sweetheart." he shifted and knelt in front of her, gripping her hips and pulling her to him until her rear rested on his thighs, his cock buried full length inside her.

her hands grabbed his wrists as his smile, strained with need, seared into her brain.

"you hold on tight now," he crooned. "i'm going to make you scream."

he braced his hands beside her on the bed as her legs curled around his hips. and he began to move. hard, driving thrusts that buried his flesh inside of her. again. again. sending lightning crashing across her nerve endings, fire building in her womb.

she held on and, as he promised, she screamed. she exploded around him, her back bending, her hands gripping his wrists, and heard his cry echoing around her. heated warmth filled her as he began to ejaculate, deep, fierce throbs of his release sending her arching into more pleasure.

he destroyed her. and he remade her. and when the final tremors eased, he pulled her into his arms as a tear fell from her eye. just one tear, she told herself. she could afford to shed just one.

and that one tear seemed to last forever.

nine

rebuilding her defenses against natches wasn't going to work. he bullied her into returning to the houseboat for dinner with him, then he made certain she was too exhausted to return to her hotel that night.

she fell asleep in his arms, drained emotionally and physically, and knowing that if she wasn't very careful, natches mackay could destroy her.

the next morning, as she had the morning before, she slipped out of his bed and off the boat. her cab was waiting at the marina office, and as she opened the back door and glanced behind her, she saw him. standing on the top deck of the nauti dreams, fog whispering around him, his chest bare. she wondered for a second why she bothered to try to run. and why it was so damned hard to face him after the wild loving he gave her.

it was a problem that followed her through the day, just as natches followed her from one interview to another.

the first two interviews didn't matter. they were surface tests, no more. former friends of johnny grace who had already been cleared in the investigation. but she had to make it look good. timothy had an idea of who was of major concern, and as the day progressed, chaya became more nervous over that particular interview.

because natches was following them in his black jeep, watching her, always there.

as they pulled into the driveway of nadine grace's home at about three o'clock that afternoon, chaya felt like drying her sweating palms on her jeans before getting out of the car.

"you sure about this?" sheriff mayes stared at the house, his expression concerned, before glancing at her. "johnny was her son. the only person in this town she really liked. she's not going to be polite."

oh, there was someone else in town nadine had liked, and the thought of it sickened chaya.

"i'm not here to win a popularity contest, sheriff," she told him as she gripped her briefcase and opened the car door. "i'm just here to get answers."

"and rile the mackay cousins up?" he asked as he exited the vehicle. "i ain't seen those two as pissed off at each other as they were yesterday morning in years. i'll end up having to lock them up tonight if they get into a public brawl."

she flicked him a disagreeable look. "they're not going to fight."

"and how do you know this? they nearly tore up that diner about two years ago or so. i had them in a cell for a weekend, and trust me, that's not pleasant."

she rolled her eyes. "to start with, dawg's not going to risk making his wife that angry. and natches wasn't nearly mad enough to fight yet. dawg won't push him that far either."

mayes shot her a disbelieving look but didn't say anything more as the front door jerked open.

"zeke. that's a mackay whore, and i don't want her on my property." nadine grace's pretty face was twisted in fury, her green eyes blazing with rage. "get her out of here."

slender, still attractive at fifty, and filled with anger, the other woman glared daggers at chaya.

"i wish i could, mrs. grace." zeke sighed, glancing at chaya as she stared back at the other woman coolly.

"mrs. grace, i'm agent greta dane, department of homeland security." she pulled her badge folder from her jacket and flashed the id at the other woman. "mackay whore isn't my title today. catch me tonight though, and you might hit it right."

nadine's nostrils flared as though picking up a disgusting scent. "get off my property."

"sheriff," chaya said to mayes. "please have mrs. grace detained and brought to your office. we'll change this from an interview to an interrogation. i'll call the main office and apprise them of the situation." she didn't take her eyes off nadine grace.

"now, agent dane, we don't want to do that." he sighed.