“I have. Every time I’ve ignored your petty little efforts at flirtation. Or didn’t you notice?”

“I noticed that kiss earlier, too.” Black velvet seduction. His voice raked over her nerve endings and reminded her just how good it had been. “That wasn’t force, Crista. Stop fooling yourself. You loved it.”

Okay, he had her there. Her stomach tightened at the memory and at the knowledge that she had no defenses against him.

“I agree to one night—”

“And I said one night isn’t enough. I want the summer. All summer.”

Crista froze. Three months? Summer had just begun, and he wanted the rest of it.

“Why?” She forced the word past her numb lips as she stared back at him.

“It takes time to determine guilt or innocence, Crista Ann. I want you close while I figure which one to attach to you. If you’re really innocent, then at the end of the summer, you’re free to go. I find out you’re guilty, and your ass heads to jail. Consider it your trial period. Except instead of sitting in a jail cell, you’re enjoying all the comforts I can provide you.”

His smile was dangerous, sensual. It curved like a predatory smirk that had her heart racing in her chest.

And he was messing with her head again. Her mind filled with memories, the touch and the taste of him. How the slightest brush of his fingers could steal her defenses and leave her shaking in his arms.

His kiss. It was drugging, fiery. And what he could do to her heart, her emotions, should be illegal.

He could tie her up in so many knots on the inside that she wondered if they would ever be untangled.

Crista swallowed tightly against the onslaught of remembered sensations and pleasures.

“You keep thinking about it.” He shrugged easily. “You can take a shower, rest a bit before you decide. I’ll loan you a clean shirt.” He smiled again. “You won’t need it for long.”

“You’ve changed, Dawg,” she whispered then. “You didn’t used to be such a cold-blooded bastard.”

“Sure I did,” he drawled. “You were just one of the few that hadn’t recognized it. Didn’t you hear all about that nasty little court battle after my parents died? Hell, honey, even my parents knew I was a lost cause.”

She had heard about the court battle. How his aunt had tried to take the entire estate his parents had left him based on a few letters his father had written to his aunt. Letters that were filled with disgust over his son’s lifestyle and his belief that Dawg didn’t deserve to share his name.

It had lasted for years. Even after he was in the Marines, he had been plagued with legal conflicts and the fight to hold on to his inheritance. It had finally ended after his return home four years ago, but he had lost tens of thousands of dollars in the fight.

“No.” She shook her head. “You weren’t like this before. You would have never forced this on me then.”

“But I am now. You can make your choice while you’re cleaning up. But when you step back into this room, you damned well better have made your mind up. You’re mine for the summer, or you can belong to the federal government, it’s all up to you.”

Dawg didn’t let out a relieved breath until Crista disappeared into the lower bathroom long minutes later, one of his T-shirts clenched tightly in her fingers, her large brown eyes watching him warily as she closed the door behind her.

Minutes later he heard the shower running and ran his fingers through his hair as he blew out another hard breath.

For a while there, he honestly thought she was going to choose the alternative. When she had finally headed for the shower, he had to force himself to hold back, to keep from assuring her that nothing in hell could convince him to turn her over to the authorities. To just let her go.

He rubbed at the back of his neck as he grimaced at the thought. Eight years he had dreamed about her. When he least expected it, when he was weak, tired. Dreams so blistering hot he would wake up pumping his own dick like an adolescent and moaning her name.

The past year had been worse. He was like a damned love-starved teenager going out of his way just to see her. Hoping to catch her smile, craving the sound of her voice.

Damn, he had missed her after she left town. Not that he had stuck around for long. He had signed up with the Marines before his parents’ death, and he shipped out just months afterward.

Long-distance court battles and the hell of trying to hold on to his parents’ estate had consumed him, but through it, he had thought of Crista.

She had left so suddenly, before he had the chance to gather up his nerve and do more than flirt with her a little bit.

When she returned to Somerset the year before, he thought maybe, this time, he could make it work. Until she stared at him like a slug crawling out from under a rock.

Why the hell did he even care? It wasn’t like she was the only game in town. He could have his pick from dozens of women. One night, one week, one month, one whole fucking year if he wanted to keep one that long.

Instead, he was blackmailing a woman who clearly had no interest in doing a damned thing about the attraction burning between them like wildfire.

And it was there. It sparked and exploded every time they were within seeing distance of each other. He could see her response to it. The widening of her eyes, the accelerated breathing, her hard little nipples pressing beneath her clothing and a wild flush to her creamy cheeks. She wanted him almost as damned bad as he wanted her, but she was denying it, fighting it with everything inside her, and Dawg wanted to know why.

He knew women. They didn’t fight something that strong without a damned good reason. Now, he just had to figure out the reason.

Breathing out roughly, he moved upstairs to his own shower and quickly stripped before stepping beneath the spray.

He showered quickly. He didn’t want to give her time to run. He wanted to give her time to think, though––to consider her options as they stood.

She wanted him, that much he knew. Wanted him enough that the whole time she was arguing the deal, her nipples were pressing harder beneath her shirt and her gaze was flashing with a subtle spark of lust.

Dawg had made it a point to know women before he had any business knowing them. Too young and too dumb to even understand why, he had been drawn to their softness, their veneer of sweetness.

The dark undercurrents of passion, power plays, and feminine wiles.

Women who were the exact opposite of his cold-blooded, crazy mother. Women who gave soft touches and whimpered for the pleasure he gave them. Who reached for him, who whispered his name in ecstasy rather than cursing it in hatred.

He knew how to read them, how to pleasure them.

And he knew that look of veiled hunger they gave to indicate their willingness to be pleasured.

Oh yeah, Crista wanted him, but for some reason she wasn’t willing to accept the fact that he was there for the taking.

Dawg grinned at the thought as he quickly toweled dry and dressed. The cotton briefs and sweats did nothing to hide the hard-on raging beneath the soft material. Pulling on a clean T-shirt, he moved back downstairs, his gaze roving around the dimly lit room as he searched for her.

And there she was. His T-shirt draped past her thighs as she sat nervously on the couch, her long hair still a little damp. She had obviously made use of the blow-dryer he kept in the guest bathroom.

Beautiful long, thick, dark chocolate hair that fell to the middle of her back and gave her a waiflike appearance.

Damn, she was small. Barely five feet six inches tall in her bare feet, with delicate bones and a nicely rounded figure. She wasn’t stick skinny, and he liked that, though he was well aware of the delicacy of her body in comparison to his.

Her face was still pale, her eyes too dark, but she looked composed. Hell, she looked like she was heading to the gallows rather than his bed.

“You aren’t the best salve to my ego, fancy-face,” he told her as he moved through the room, watching her with an edge of amusement.

She rose slowly to her feet.

“I wish you wouldn’t call me that.”

She had never liked being called fancy-face, but that was how he saw her. Her face was a little irregular, her lips pouty and winsome, her nose pert with the slightest little tilt, and high, glorious cheekbones.

She was different in a way that stood out. She wasn’t beautiful in the acceptable sense of the word, rather she was eye-catching, mysterious. Unique.

“Why?” He glanced at the clock and almost winced. Damn, it was nearly two in the morning; no wonder she looked like she had been run over by a truck. She was exhausted. And so was he.

Now, if he could just convince his cock how tired he was.

“Because I hate nicknames,” she retorted.

Dawg shook his head. “Look, it’s damned late. I just had a killer day, and from the looks of it, yours wasn’t any better. Let’s sleep on this, then we’ll see how things look in the morning.”

She licked her lips warily. “In separate beds?”

“In your dreams,” he grunted back. “Damn it, Crista, stop waffling like a damned little sissy. Either you’re going to fuck me or you’re not. Let’s get this over with now so we can both get some sleep.”

“I haven’t decided yet.” Crista narrowed her eyes on Dawg, considering the irritation in his expression and the flash of lust in his gaze.

She was trying to keep her eyes off the erection clearly displayed beneath his sweatpants. Okay, she had already made her decision. Sort of.

She was furious over it. It wasn’t enough that she had tried to stay out of his way, that she had rebuffed every overture he had made. Now he had to take the decision away from her, force her to risk her heart to him again, knowing the outcome.

As the minutes had ticked by, she had only become angrier as she showered. It had taken her years to put him behind her enough to even date another man. And still, when the nights were the darkest, she felt the same ragged pain and loss that she had felt that summer, as clearly as she had felt it then.

He crossed his arms over his chest. “You haven’t, huh? What are you waiting for?”

Crista clenched her teeth in anger. “I’ll sleep with you.”

His brow arched.

“But I won’t just spread myself for you, Dawg. I can’t just fuck you like that.”

“Spread yourself?” he asked softly, his voice dark as his gaze narrowed back at her. “Like what, Crista?”

“Like one of your damned playmates,” she bit out.

The more he stared at her like that, the more angry she became. Nerves, exhaustion, and the fallout from terror were crashing through her system. On top of that, she had to deal with blackmail by a man she could have never expected blackmail from.

“You are my playmate now.” He grinned back at her, his expression becoming one of intense satisfaction. “And I do like to play, Crista. You should be aware of that by now.”

“Aware of it!” The anger snapped through her then. “Dawg, I was aware of it eight damned years ago when you decided you were drunk enough and horny enough to fuck me without your cousins standing by to join in. I’m not the one that forgot that fucking night; you are.”

Horror slammed through her. Her hand clapped over her mouth, and the breath stilled in her throat as his expression slowly stilled from amusement, then shock, then outright fury.

She had never seen Dawg mad. Few people had ever seen Dawg really mad. Crista had only heard of it, and she had decided long ago she never wanted to see it.

“You’re lying.” Cold, brutal certainty filled his voice.

She was already too pissed off to take that one silently. Her hand lowered from her lips as her gaze raked over his body with heated memories and fiery anger.

“You know better,” she sneered. “You were falling down drunk outside of town the night you buried your parents, Dawg. How do you think you got home? I brought you home, and you spent the night screwing me. All night,” she cried out. “Before you told me exactly how those Neanderthal bastard cousins of yours were going to fuck me. Where and how, and how long.”