keith clayton stared at beth as she left the house, knowing exactly what had happened inside. the more he thought about it, the more he wanted to follow her and give her a little talking-to as soon as she got back home. explain the situation in a way she'd understand, so she would realize that this sort of thing just wasn't acceptable. like with a slap or two, not enough to hurt, but enough for her to know he meant business. not that it would do any good. and not that he'd really do it. he'd never slapped beth. he wasn't that kind of guy. what in the royal hell was going on? could any of this possibly get any worse? first, it turns out the guy works at the kennel. next, they spend a few days having dinner at her place, trading the kinds of drippy stares you saw in crappy hollywood movies. and then—and here was the kicker—they go out to that dance joint for losers, and afterward, even though he couldn't see past the drapes, he had no doubt that she started putting out like a harlot. probably on the couch. probably because she'd had too much to drink. he remembered those days. give the woman a few glasses of wine and keep filling it when she wasn't looking, or spike her beers with a bit of vodka, listen for when her words started to slur, and then end up having some seriously great sex right there in the living room. booze was great for that. get her sloppy drunk, and the woman not only couldn't say no, but became a tiger in the sack. as he'd staked out the house, he'd had no trouble imagining what her body looked like as she took her clothes off. if he hadn't been so damn angry, it might have excited him, knowing she was in there, getting it on, getting all hot and sweaty. but the point was this: she wasn't exactly acting like a mother, was she. he knew how it went. once she started having sex with guys she dated, it would become normal and accepted. once it became normal and accepted, she'd do the same on other dates. simple as that. one guy would lead to two, which would lead to four or five or ten or twenty, and the last thing he wanted was for her to start leading a parade of guys through ben's life who'd wink at him on their way out the door as if to say, your mom sure is one hot lady. he wasn't going to let that happen. beth was dumb in the way most women were dumb, which was why he'd been watching out for her all these years. and it had worked out just fine, until thigh-bolt rolled into town. the guy was a walking nightmare. like his sole intent was to ruin clayton's life. well, that wasn't going to happen, either, was it? he'd learned quite a bit about thigh-bolt in the last week. not only that he worked at the kennel—what were the odds on that, by the way?—but that he lived in a ramshackle dump near the forest. and after making a few official-sounding calls to law enforcement in colorado, professional courtesy did the rest. he learned that thigh-bolt had graduated from the university of colorado. and that he'd been a marine, served in iraq, and received a couple of commendations. but most interesting, that a couple of guys in his platoon spoke about him as though he'd made some sort of deal with the devil to stay alive. he wondered what beth would think of that. he didn't believe it. he'd met enough marines to know most of them were as smart as rocks. but something fishy was definitely going on with the guy if his fellow marines didn't quite trust him. and why walk across the country and stop here? the guy knew no one in town, and from the sound of things, he'd never been here before. something fishy about that, too. more than that, he couldn't escape the feeling that the answer was staring him in the face, but he couldn't figure it out. he would. he always did. clayton continued to stare at the house, thinking it was time he finally dealt with the guy. not now, though. not tonight. not with the dog around. next week, maybe. when thigh-bolt was at work. see, that was the difference between him and other people. most people lived their lives like criminals: act first, worry about the consequences later. not keith clayton. he thought things through beforehand. he planned. he anticipated. which was the main reason he'd done nothing so far, even when he'd seen the two of them pull up tonight, even though he knew what was going on in the house, even as he'd watched beth walk back outside, her face flushed and hair all wild. in the end, he knew, this was about power, and right now, thigh-bolt had the power. because of the disk. the disk with photos that might cut off the flow of money to clayton. but power was nothing if it wasn't used. and thigh-bolt hadn't used it. which meant that thigh-bolt either didn't realize what he had, or had gotten rid of the disk, or was the kind of guy who generally minded his own business. or maybe all three. clayton had to make sure. first things first, so to speak. which meant he had to look for the disk. if the guy still had it, he'd find it and destroy it. power would shift back to clayton, and thigh-bolt would get what was coming to him. and if thigh-bolt had gotten rid of the disk soon after finding it? even better. he'd handle thigh-bolt, and things would start getting back to normal with him and beth. that was the most important thing. damn, she'd looked good walking out of that house. there was something hot and sexy about seeing her and knowing what she'd done, even if it had been with thigh-bolt. it had been a long time since she'd had a man, and she seemed… different. more than that, he knew that after tonight, she'd surely be ready for more that friends with benefits thing was looking better all the time.