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“Natches,” she drawled with tight mockery, “you’re so full of bullshit.”
He merely grunted at the accusation.
“Why were you and Chaya arguing over me to the point that Chaya’s sending Bliss shopping with Janey and Kelly?” she tried again.
The look he shot her was classic Natches. Playful, charming, with a barely there glint of cunning that locked onto any weakness and used it instinctively. He was a master manipulator, a man with instinctive perception, and a sharp-eyed, merciless sniper. A man who in the past had taken aim between a cousin’s eyes and pulled the trigger.
“Sometimes Bliss only hears part of a conversation . . .”
“Stay away from Graham, Natches.” She didn’t beat around the bush.
She could do that with Rowdy and Dawg, laugh and playfully tease and still get her point across. She knew better than to even attempt it with Natches.
“Then you stay away from him.” Natches dropped the pretense instantly, his emerald green eyes narrowing on her as he hooked his thumbs in the front pockets of his jeans.
Lyrica stared at him in disbelief. “You’re kidding me.”
“No, I’m not kidding you.” At least he wasn’t lying to her. He’d been known to do that.
“Why are you doing this, Natches? Why take a stand like this over s
omething that’s none of your business?” she asked him, confused now.
“Who says it’s none of my business?” A dark frown flitted at his brow. “You’re my business, Lyrica. And Graham Brock’s bad news for you.”
She would have laughed at him if the disbelief hadn’t run so deep.
Her lips thinned. There were very few ways to convince Natches to let something go. He was worse than Dawg. Her threat to move away and let him deal with Dawg’s anger had obviously not worked.
“Natches, stay out of this,” she warned him softly.
“Why should I?” He seemed to be laughing at her, albeit silently.
“Because if you don’t, then I’ll be too concerned you’ll hurt him, and I’ll give up on the one man I can’t seem to stay away from.” It was the truth. Stark. Simple.
“So why would I bother to back off if it’s working?”
He wasn’t a stupid man, though. Tension filled his shoulders, his expression veiled as he watched her carefully.
“Because then I’ll have given up not because the man isn’t in my best interests or because it’s my choice; I’ll have done it because it’s your choice. I’ll never stop resenting you for it and once I’ve accepted that’s how it will end, then I have to accept that it doesn’t matter who I love, because you’ll always stand between us. Why should I bother to love then? Why should I bother to care that whoever I sleep with cares for me in turn?”
“Stop trying to snow me, Lyrie. You might say that, you might mean it right now, but you’re too damned stubborn to actually do it.”
“Natches, at this point, I’m struggling to decide for myself if Graham Brock is something I want or merely something I’ve been fascinated with for years. Don’t turn the question into a quest to prove to myself and to you that you have no control over me, or a lesson in the fact that you can control me by hurting someone I care about. You wouldn’t like either outcome, and neither would I.”
Unlike her sisters, she believed in facing Dawg, Natches, and Rowdy in ways they understood rather than from a stance of pure stubbornness. She loved them, very much respected them, but she knew that if given the chance, they would wrap her and her sisters in cotton batting and do whatever they thought necessary to avoid ever seeing them hurt. And they’d never realize how the total sterility of such a life would destroy them.
“How much do you expect me to let him destroy you?” he growled, anger beating just beneath the surface. “I know things about him that you don’t, Lyrica. Things that would hurt you if you ever learned the truth of it.”
“You’ll tell me that, but I know you—you will never tell me what those things are, will you, Natches?”
His expression was the only answer she needed.
“Until you can tell me, then let’s drop all the dark hints as to the man he is, was, or could be.” She sighed wearily. “He saved my life. And I know he tries to be a good man. No matter what kind of man he may be, he’s a good man.”
“He’s a dangerous man!” he snapped. “He may have saved your life, but he could also end up getting you killed.”
“And how many times was Kelly warned of that where the Mackays were concerned?” she argued bitterly. “Or Christa? You forget, Natches, I know your pasts, I know the men you were before you fell in love, and I know how dangerous the three of you were. What if Chaya had walked away from you because of Johnny?”
