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Maybe the past eight years would have been
    different. If nothing else, she might not have been tormented with so many what-ifs and the fact that she had been a coward.
    Dawg grunted at that. “Too bad you weren’t smart enough to stay out of dark warehouses at night. If you
    had, you wouldn’t be here now.”
    Too bad she hadn’t been smart enough to stay in Virginia to begin with. But no, she had to come home.
    She missed being home. She missed the mountains, the lake, and home. And she had known it was time to
    lay old ghosts to rest. She had come home to make peace with the memories and with herself. And with
    Dawg. She just hadn’t expected to make peace with him in quite this way.
    Instead, she found more demons. She found herself in the untenable position of relying on Dawg for
    something as imperative as her freedom. And there wasn’t a doubt in her mind exactly how he intended to
    manipulate this one.
    He had been after her ever since she had returned to Somerset a year ago. He hadn’t stalked her. He was
    just always around. Always smiling that rakish grin of his, giving her that mocking once-over, that
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    invitation to play. If he wasn’t doing that, he was glaring at her. And he filled her dreams. Heated dreams, memories of one unforgettable night and the consequences of it.
    She watched the miles pass by, feeling his hand on her knee when he wasn’t shifting gears in the powerful pickup, and feeling the warmth of his touch burning through her skirt.
    At least he wasn’t groping her. Her body was so hyped on nerves right now that she wondered if she could bear that. If her heart could bear it.
    She thought she had learned her lesson before leaving Somerset. After all, she knew what Dawg was, she
    knew what he intended, and she knew she could never live with it.
    The Nauti Boys were legendary in Somerset and the surrounding counties. Their prowess, dedication to a
    woman’s pleasure, and insistence on sharing those women had been well-known. Her brother, Alex, had
    warned her about Dawg repeatedly.
    Her head had warned her about Dawg, but her heart hadn’t wanted to listen. She could tame the bad boy,
    she had assured herself. Love would make him possessive. All she had to do was touch him, love him, and
    he would realize he loved her.
    She snorted silently as she peeked a look at his hard profile.
    What a fool she had been. Naive, impossibly innocent, incredibly foolish. And she still hadn’t learned her lesson, not all the way to the soul. Because a part of her had never forgotten that one night. That sultry summer night when he had taken her with singular determination and fiery lust. When he had taught her
    the true depths of carnal pleasure and the ultimate despair.
    “This isn’t going to work.” The words tore from her lips as he pulled into the small marina his uncle Ray Mackay owned.
    She could feel the panic building in her chest now, the certainty that the Nauti Dawg was going to hold
    more memories and more heartache than she could bear.
    “I can’t do this.” She was shaking as Dawg pulled the truck into the private parking slot in front of the marina.
    He turned off the motor. Pulling the key from the ignition, he turned and stared at her silently.
    Him or jail. She could see it in his expression.
    Crista shook her head slowly before swallowing tightly.
    “I’m not one of the Nauti Boys’ whores,” she whispered harshly. “I can’t play one to stay out of jail,
    Dawg. I’d rather rot in prison than buy my freedom at the expense of my soul.”
    He stared back at her, his light green eyes icy, unemotional, as he watched her. His expression was as dark as the shadows around them and as still as death.
    This wasn’t the man she had known eight years ago. Charming, though brooding, James “Dawg” Mackay
    had had a will of iron, but he hadn’t been cold. He’d been hard