They set their own sultry rhythm as old as the act itself. And as he topped her and thrust inside her again and again, one thought remained at the forefront of his mind.
Lindsey belonged to him. She belonged to his brother.
Now, they had to convince her that her name may have been Lindsey Leland, but she was a Stallard, too. She’d been their neighbor but she’d always been their family.
They cared about her. Hell, they probably even loved her.
One thing was certain—no one, especially the likes of Bonzo Maldeni—would ever take her away from them. Maybe he needed to convince her. Seemed like a perfect day to try.
* * * *
Across town, Seth entered The Beer Well. A couple of strippers he knew wasted no time in offering a lap dance. Not one to strip a person of their pride, Seth forced a smile and said, “Maybe later.”
He never looked, and that alone should’ve set off alarms inside his head. He was a tit guy and loved staring at topless dancers. Then again, he was also a committed man when he had a cause.
Right now, his cause was the most important thing on his mind.
He wanted to save his woman. He wanted to make things all right for Lindsey again.
“Hey, Sharon. How’s it going?” He sidled up to the bar and met the redheaded bartender he’d known for more than half his life. His father had supposedly dated Sharon in their youth so she’d always been overly kind to Seth and Beck. She’d become their surrogate mother of sorts, at least when they were tying one on and needed a safe ride home.
?
?Haven’t seen you around in a while,” Sharon said, grinning at him suspiciously. “Does this have anything to do with your cute little neighbor?”
“Everything now,” he admitted. “Before yesterday though, we were mending fences and doing a bunch of remodeling over at the house. You ought to stop by and see it sometime. White picket fence around the whole place, along with new paint on the porch. We even bought some leather furniture for the den.”
She laughed. “Sounds like someone had a reason to throw out the old and bring in the new.”
“You might say that,” he said, grabbing his spot at the bar when she set a beer in front of him.
“What’s up, hon?”
“I need to talk Bonzo.”
She took a deep breath. “That’s the last person you need to talk to today.”
“Why would today be any different than any other?”
“Some information came flying through the door about three this morning, right around closing time. Seems there were some guys who paid Lindsey’s aunt a visit. She pulled a shotgun on them.”
“What’d they expect? She was Nathaniel Daniels’s old lady for nearly fifteen years. Woman knows how to use a gun.” He was downright proud of Lisa. She didn’t take any shit.
“Hon, she may have pulled on them, but she didn’t use it.” Sharon leveled one of those knowing looks his way. “Bonzo is sending the crew back out this afternoon.”
“The hell he is,” Seth said, standing. “Where is he?”
“Back room. They’ve got a poker game going. Some guys you might recognize joined the game.”
“One of them a banker by chance?”
“Well, he was,” she drawled. “Rumor has it Farmer’s Lending fired him when they found out he was planning to refinance Lindsey’s place.”
“Who else is back there?”
“Bonzo, Bob Callaway, and one of the Leonard brothers.”
Seth’s lips twitched.