“You were always a beauty, Megan, with that wide-eyed innocence that makes a man want to corrupt.”

She shuddered. He smiled.

“What are you doing here?” Kevin was all she could think. Thank God Kevin wasn't with her.

“Funny, I was going to ask you the same. Just what are you doing here, Megan?”

“I live here.” She hated hearing the hesitancy in her voice, like the throb of an old scar. “I work here.”

“Tired of Oklahoma, were you? Wanted a change of scene?” He leaned closer, until she backed into the filing cabinet. Bribery, he knew, wouldn't work with her. Not with the O'Riley money behind her. Intimidation was the next logical choice. “Don't take me for a fool, Megan. It would be a terrible, costly mistake.”

When her back hit the filing cabinet, she realized she was cringing, and her shock melted away, her spine stiffening. She wasn't a child now, she reminded herself, but a woman. Aware, responsible. “It's none of your business why I moved here.”

“Oh, but it is.” His voice was silky, quiet, reasonable. “I prefer you in Oklahoma, Megan. Working at your nice, steady job, in the midst of your loving family. I really much prefer it.”

His eyes were so cold, she thought with dull wonder. Odd, she'd never seen that, didn't remember that. “Your preferences mean nothing to me, Baxter.”

“Did you think I wouldn't find out that you'd thrown your lot in with my ex-wife and her family?” he continued, in that same reasonable tone. “That I haven't kept tabs on you over the years?”

With an effort, she steadied her breathing, but when she tried to shift away, he blocked her. She wasn't afraid, yet, but the temper she'd worked so hard to erase from her character was beginning to bubble up toward the surface.

“I never gave a thought to what you'd find out. And no, I wasn't aware you were keeping tabs. Why should you? Neither Kevin nor I ever meant anything to you.”

“You've waited a long time to make your move.” Baxter paused, struggling to control the fury that had clawed its way into his throat. He'd worked too hard, done too much, to see some old, forgotten mistake rear up and slap him down. “Clever of you, Megan, more clever than I gave you credit for.”

“I don't know what you're talking about.”

“Do you seriously want me to believe you know nothing about my campaign? I'm not going to tolerate this pathetic stab at revenge.”

Her voice was cooler now, despite the fact that she could feel her skin start to tremble with an intense mixture of emotions. “At the risk of repeating myself, I don't know what you're talking about. My life is of no concern to you, Baxter, and yours none of mine. You made that clear a long time ago, when you refused to acknowledge me or Kevin.”

“Is that the tack you're going to take?” He'd wanted to be calm, but rage was working through him. Intimidation, he realized, simply wouldn't be enough. “The young, innocent girl, seduced, betrayed, abandoned? Left behind, pregnant and brokenhearted? Please, spare me.”

“That's not a tack, it's truth.”

“You were young, Megan, but innocent?” His teeth flashed. “Now, that's a different matter. You were willing enough, even eager.”

“I believed you!” She shouted it—a mistake, as her own voice tore her composure to pieces. “I believed you loved me, that you wanted to marry me. And you played on that. You never had any intention of making a future with me. You were already engaged. I was just an easy mark.”

“You certainly were easy.” He pushed her back against the cabinet, kept his hands hard on her shoulders. “And very, very tempting. Sweet, Megan. Very sweet.”

“Take your hands off me.”

“Not quite yet. You're going to listen to me, carefully. I know why you've come here, linked yourself with the Calhouns. First there'll be whispers, rumors, then a sad story to a sympathetic reporter. The old lady put pressure on me about Suzanna.” He thought of Colleen with loathing. “But I've made that work for me. In the interest of the children,” be murmured. “Letting Bradford adopt them, selflessly giving up my rights, so the children could be secure in a traditional family.”

“You never cared about them, either, did you?” Megan said in a husky Voice. “Alex and Jenny never mattered to you, any more than Kevin.”

“The point is,” he continued, “the old woman has no reason to bother about you. So, Megan, you'd better mind your step and listen to me. Things aren't working out for you here, so you're going to move back to Oklahoma.”

“I'm not going anywhere,” she began, then gasped when his fingers dug in.

“You're going back to your quiet life, away from here. There will be no rumors, no tearful interviews with reporters. If you try to undermine me, to implicate me in any way, I'll ruin you. When I've finished—and believe me, with the Dumont money I can hire plenty of willing men who'll swear they've enjoyed you—when I've finished,” he repeated, “you'll be nothing more than an opportunistic slut with a bastard son.”

Her vision hazed. It wasn't the threat that frightened her, or even infuriated her so very much. It was the term bastard in connection with her little boy.

Before she fully realized her intent, her hand was swinging up and slapping hard across his face. “Don't you ever speak about my son that way.”

When his hand cracked across her cheek, it wasn't pain she felt, or even shock, but rage.

“Don't push me, Megan,” he said, breathing hard. “Don't push me, because you'll be the one to take the fall. You, and the boy.”

As crazed as any mother protecting her cub, she lunged at him. The power of the attack rammed them both against the wall. She landed two solid blows before he threw her off.

“You still have that passionate nature, I see.” He dragged her against him, infuriated, aroused. “I remember how to channel it.”

She struck out again, a glancing blow, before he caught her arms and pinned them against her body. So she used her teeth. Even as Baxter cursed in pain, the door burst in.

Nathaniel plucked him off the floor as he might a flea off a dog. Through the haze of her own vision, Megan saw there was murder in his eye. Hotblooded. Deadly.

“Nathaniel.”

But he didn't look at her. Instead, he rapped Baxter hard against the wall. “Dumont, isn't it?” His voice was viciously quiet, terrifyingly pleasant. “I've heard how you like pushing women around.”

Baxter struggled for dignity, though his feet were inches off the ground. “Who the hell are you?”

“Well, now, it seems only fair you should know the name of the man who's going to rip out your damn heart with his bare hands.” He had the pleasure of seeing Baxter blanch. “If s Fury, Nathaniel Fury. You won't forget it—” he rammed a fist low, into the kidneys “—will you?”

When Baxter could breathe again, his words struggling out weakly, he wheezed, “You'll be in jail before the night's out.”

“I don't think so.” His head snapped around when Megan started forward. “Stay back,” he said between his teeth. The hot leap of fire in his eyes had her coming to a stop.

“Nathaniel.” She swallowed hard. “Don't kill him.” “Any particular reason you want him alive?”

She opened her mouth, shut it again. The answer seemed desperately important, so she offered the truth. “No.”

Baxter drew in his breath to scream. Nathaniel cut it off neatly with a hand over the windpipe. “You're a lucky man, Dumont. The lady doesn't want me to kill you, and I don't like to disappoint her. We'll leave it to fate.” He dragged Baxter outside, hauling him along as if the man were nothing more than a heavily packed seabag.

Megan raced to the door. “Holt.” A shiver of relief worked down her spine when she spotted Suzanna's husband near the pier. “Do something.”

Holt merely shrugged. “Fury beat me to it. You should go back in, you're getting wet.”

“But—he's not really going to kill him, is he?”

Holt considered a moment, narrowing his eyes against the rain as Nathaniel carted Baxter down the pier. “Probably not.”

“I hope to God you can't swim,” Nathaniel muttered, then threw Baxter off the pier. He turned away and was striding to Megan before the sound of the splash. “Come on.”

“But-”

He simply scooped her up in his arms. “I'm knocking off for the day.”

“Fine.” Holt stood, his thumbs in his pockets, a look of unholy glee in his eyes. “See you tomorrow.”

“Nathaniel, you can't—”

“Shut up, Meg.” He dumped her in the car. She craned her neck, and wasn't sure whether she was relieved or disappointed to see Baxter heaving himself back onto the pier.

He needed quiet to pull himself back from violence. He detested the temper that lurked inside him, that made him want to raise his fists and pummel. He could rationalize it, under the circumstances, but it always left him sick inside to know what he was capable of if pushed.

There was no doubt in his mind that he would have come very close to murder if Megan hadn't stopped him.

He'd trained himself to use words and wit to resolve a fight. It usually worked. When it didn't, well, it didn't. But he continued, years after the last blow he'd taken from his father, to remember, and regret.

She was shivering by the time he parked the car in his driveway. It didn't occur to him until that moment that he'd forgotten Dog. Holt would see to him, Nathaniel figured, and plucked Megan from her seat.

“I don't-”

“Just be quiet.” He carried her in, past the bird, who squawked greetings, and up the stairs. Megan was ready to babble in shock by the time he dumped her in a chair in the bedroom. Without a word, he turned away to rummage through his dresser drawers. “Get out of those wet clothes,” he ordered, tossing her a sweatshirt and sweatpants. “I'm going to go down and make you some tea.”