Free Nauti Nights by Lora Leigh

They don’t have a record for the delivery.
    Someone set her up.”
    Dawg tucked the note carefully into the pocket of his sweats until he could lock it in the upstairs safe later.
    “Looks like you were making progress, anyway,” Natches smirked.
    “We were doing fine until you opened your mouth. But I think you were aware of that.”
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    Natches glanced toward the stairs then. For a second, regret sliced across his features, then his
    ever-present mocking smile was back on his face.
    “One-man woman, huh?” he asked, though from his look, it was more a statement.
    Dawg stared back at him, seeing the flash of loneliness, of knowledge that filled his cousin’s dark, forest green eyes.
    “She’s not as agreeable to being my woman as I would wish, though.” Dawg raked his fingers heavily
    through his hair as he glanced at the stairs again. “I blackmailed her.”
    He glanced back at Natches in time to see his cousin shaking his head.
    “I knew you were going to do something dumb like that.” He chuckled, though the sound carried little
    amusement. “Good luck on that one. I just stopped by to drop these off.” He dropped Crista’s keys on the counter. “And to tell you Cranston wants our final reports in his office by the end of the day. Oral and written. He’s still a little upset over losing the woman. But he seems certain the men he captured will
    talk.”
    “They probably will.” But who would they identify?
    If Crista had been led there, then it was for a reason. The thieves would spill their guts in a heartbeat, either way.
    “I don’t know.” Natches shrugged. “I followed them to the van when they were loading them up. All
    Cranston got from them were vague looks when he was questioning them. They might not know.”
    Dawg stared at him in complete disbelief.
    “Hey, we can hope,” Natches snickered, holding his hands up in surrender before straightening from the
    bar and heading for the door. “I came in the back, I’ll leave through the front. Give the gossips something to crow about. While you’re having fun, I’ll see what I can find out, see who’s too interested in the setup you have going on here. I don’t like this a damned bit, Dawg, I’ll tell you. She shouldn’t have been there tonight. It’s a setup.”
    Dawg couldn’t agree with him more. “Let me know what you find out.”
    As Natches left, Dawg relocked the doors behind him and reset the alarms. But he didn’t immediately
    follow Crista to the bedroom on the upper deck. He stared around the lower level instead, seeing more
    than the crisp, clean lines of the interior and the nice furnishings.
    He’d been living on the Nauti Dawg for years. Only through the coldest months did he leave the marina
    and stay in the small apartment he had above the lumber store. He rarely stayed at the underground home
    his father had built before his death.
    He sat down slowly on the couch, leaned back, and breathed out wearily. God, he was exhausted. Tired
    and horny and conflicted. It was a hell of a state to be in at three o’clock in the morning.
    His silent laughter was bitter and mocking. Hell, he was turning into the bastard his father had always
    predicted he was. Maybe he was more like his grandfather, Nate August, than he wanted to admit. The son
    of a bitch had left three bastard sons and a daughter in Somerset before returning to his Texas home more than fifty years before. Of the four children, Dawg’s father and his uncles and aunt, only Ray Mackay,
    Rowdy’s father, had shown any sort of decency to his wife or his children. His aunt didn’t count. She
    worshipped the ground her son, Johnny, walked on, but many suspected she had driven her husband,
    Ralph, to his grave.
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    Dawg rubbed at the ache in his knee,