Defying Asher (Knight Security 1) (19 page)

Asher put a hand on her arm. “You don’t have to do this.”

Lissa gave him a half smile. “Don’t worry, after all these years, I think I know exactly how to handle my mother.”

Ash bared his teeth in a smile. “You really are a dangerous woman.”

“I’m a survivor,” she corrected. “Now let me go do my thing.” She moved away from them all to a quieter part of the lobby.

Ash merely nodded acknowledgment as Gabriel told him he was going to make the obligatory call to Declan Rourke, informing the other man of their suspicions. A call meant to cover Knight Security’s asses. The police wouldn’t arrive in time to stop or hinder their visit, but neither could they claim they hadn’t been informed. This was Gabriel at his manipulative best.

Ash watched Lissa through narrowed lids as she made her call. Was it any wonder she had trust issues, having had a two-timing bastard for a fiancé and her family being so fucked up? Although, Ash still had no idea why she thought he was a two-timing bastard too. They were going to have a
long
conversation about all those things later tonight. Whether Lissa liked it or not.

“So I finally get to see your lady.”

Ash turned to frown at his brother Caleb. He and Ethan were fraternal rather than identical twins. But all the Knight brothers were tall and dark-haired. Only their eye color was different: Caleb’s eyes were a paler emerald than Gabriel’s.

“She’s definitely a lady,” Ash answered his brother. “But she isn’t mine.”

Caleb gave one of his hard smiles. “You’ve spent most of the afternoon and evening with her, you arrived together—”

“I’m her bodyguard.”

“You have bed head, bro.”

Ash’s hand moved instinctively to the back of his head, only to stop midair as he saw the look of triumph on his brother’s face. “Bastard.” His hand dropped back to his side.

“Takes one to know one.” Caleb shrugged before turning to give Lissa a considering glance. “She’s lovely.”

“Yes.” She was.
She is.
Lissa’s bone structure said she always would be.

“Going to keep her?”

Ash scowled. “Why this sudden interest in my love life?”

Caleb gave a waggle of his eyebrows. “You used the L word, bro.”

He moved restlessly. “I don’t have time for this—”

“We’ll keep her safe.” Caleb placed a reassuring hand on Ash’s arm. “Nothing is going to happen to take her away from you.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“Have you wondered why none of us, apart from Lily, has ever married? Why we avoid relationships”—he made quotation marks with his fingers—“like the plague?”

“Could it be we’re all badasses women know well to stay away from?”

“There is that, of course,” Caleb drawled. “The shrink I saw for a couple of months when I got back from Afghanistan the last time had a different theory. She said it’s because we lost our mother, the most important woman in our lives, at the age we should have been falling in love and getting married. Instead of which we all moved back together as a family and built an emotional barricade against the rest of the world.”

All the family were aware Caleb had been suffering from PTSD when he left the army. Not only had he been traumatized from being taken prisoner and tortured in Afghanistan for several weeks before managing to escape, but his injuries had been so bad, he hadn’t been well enough to fly back to England in time for their parents’ funeral. Pain and guilt: the perfect triggers for PTSD.

At the time, Ash had questioned whether Knight Security was the place for Caleb to be. Gabriel had been concerned too. Caleb had proved them both wrong. Working for Knight Security calmed and focused Caleb in a way he might otherwise not have been.

Ash gave a shake of his head. “We all moved back together as a family so there was always one of us available to take care of Lily.”

“Lily left home years ago, after which we all went our separate ways. Now Lily is married to the Big Guy over there and expecting his baby.” He nodded in Jonas’s direction. “And we’re all still living alone.”

“Sounds like you’re ready to change that?” Ash eyed Caleb curiously. “Someone specific in mind?”

“Nope. Just wanted you to know we have your lady’s back.”

“Lissa isn’t going anywhere she’s going to need us to have her back,” Ash stated firmly.

“Sure about that?” Caleb quirked an eyebrow as Lissa ended her call and crossed the lobby to talk to Gabriel.

Ash was never sure about anything where Lissa was concerned.

“You know, pouting isn’t an attractive look on a grown man.”

“I am not pouting.”

“Then why is your bottom lip sticking out?” Lissa challenged. “It makes you look like a sulky little boy.”

“God give me strength…”

Lissa bit her own bottom lip to stop herself from laughing in the face of Asher’s impatient frustration with her teasing.

Not that their current situation, going up in the private elevator to the penthouse floor, was a cause for humor. No, the amusing part was the efforts of all the other men crowded into the elevator with them to keep the smiles off their faces at Asher’s expense.

They were all tense and ready for battle.

Asher didn’t want her here. He had made that very clear once he joined her and Gabriel and heard their conversation.

Lissa told them Claudia had been surprised to receive her call so soon after their disagreement at the hospital. Lissa’s enquiry after Malcolm’s health had elicited the information he was currently lying down in his bedroom. Which probably explained why Claudia had grudgingly agreed to Lissa’s suggestion she come over so the two of them could have a chat. Claudia made it clear her half of the conversation was going to be her disapproval of Lissa’s involvement with Asher Knight.

Lissa had bit back what would have been her usual response to her mother being so opinionated on anything she chose to do with her life. Claudia had given up that right the day she abandoned Lissa to Jack’s care when she was only a baby, and then boarding school once she was old enough.

In spite of all that, Claudia was still her mother. If Malcolm was the monster responsible for Harvey’s death and the attacks over this past week, then Lissa had every intention of being there when Ash and his brothers took him down. If he was guilty of those crimes, then she’d like to put in a few kicks of her own.

What did it say about her that she wanted to kick an injured man?

If their suspicions were correct, then the stab wound to Malcolm’s shoulder was a self-inflicted injury, and he was responsible for killing or hurting people she loved.

Asher had protested vehemently when he heard her and Gabriel discussing the merits of Lissa being the one to knock on the door of Claudia’s apartment, even with her agreement to wear a bulletproof vest. A protest neither of them had listened to.

He glowered at her as they all stepped out of the elevator into the hallway leading to the door to Claudia’s penthouse apartment some twenty feet away. “You knock, stay in the hallway long enough to allow your mother to confirm that it’s you, either visually or verbally, and when she opens the door, you back off.” He reminded her of what had been his terms of agreement downstairs.

Lissa had no intention of
backing off
from anything. She had never backed down from a fight in her life, and she wasn’t about to do so with a wimp like Malcolm Arnold.

Not so much of a wimp if he had cold-bloodedly killed Harvey and shot Jack.

She straightened. “Let’s do this— Umph!” Her last words were muffled by the fact that Asher’s mouth had taken fierce possession of hers, his arms like steel bands about her waist as he pulled her in tight against the hardness of his body.

Lissa didn’t even attempt to fight that possessive kiss. All that existed at this moment was her and Asher and the passion that never seemed to be far away whenever the two of them were together. She twined her arms over his shoulders and gave herself to the kiss, heat and desire coursing through both of them.

God, how she loved this man.

With every fiber of her being.

“Might I suggest the two of you wait until this is over to finish this?”

Lissa had totally forgotten they had an audience. Although how she could forget all those highly muscular and attractive, dangerous men, all wearing different degrees of body armor, she had no idea! Gabriel, for one, felt no qualms about reminding the two of them of his presence.

Ash kept his arms firmly about Lissa’s waist as she broke the kiss and attempted to step back, her cheeks hot with embarrassed color. “You’ll stay put, okay—”

“Is that the reason you kissed me?” Her eyes glittered. “In the hope of turning my brain to mush and ensuring I do as I’m told?”

“I kissed you because I wanted to, damn it. Why do you always— My kisses turn your brain to mush…?” he prompted curiously.

“Don’t tell me they don’t have the same effect on you, because I won’t believe you,” she scoffed.

“Our kisses turn my brain to mush,” he acknowledged gruffly.

Her eyes widened at his admission. “They do?”

“They do. Which is why I want you to be careful.” He frowned. “Arnold is our man, I’m sure of it. He obviously has a gun, and he’s already shown he isn’t afraid to use it.”

“Jack ensured I knew how to fire a gun when I lived with him in LA. I’ve had a gun permit ever since—”

“That permit isn’t accepted in the UK. And the firearm laws are different here. Even we aren’t allowed to carry guns. Besides.” Ash’s voice gentled. “Knowing how to shoot a pistol and actually firing it at a human being are two different things.”

She gave a firm shake of her head. “If Malcolm really did these things, then I can’t think of him as human. And it could just as easily be you who gets shot, you know.”

“Goes with my job description.”

A frown appeared between those gorgeous yellow-topaz eyes. “Then maybe you should think of changing your career?”

He grinned at her. “Catching the bad guys is what I do best.”

She snorted. “Someone save me from macho men!”

Ash pulled her in close again, his lips almost touching her ear as he spoke. “Nothing and no one is going to save you from this macho man once this is over.”

She pulled back, eyes wide. “Is that another threat to spank me?”

“I—”

“Ash, I really don’t think everyone here needs to know about your sex life!” Gabriel snapped, his patience obviously at an end.

“Don’t know about you guys, but I was finding it very enlightening,” Ethan drawled.

“I was looking forward to hearing about the paddles and whips next,” Caleb added.

“Fuck off, the lot of you.” Ash couldn’t help chuckling at his two brothers’ teasing and the total look of disgust on Gabriel’s face. “Are you ready to do this?” he prompted softly as he released Lissa and she stepped away.

She gave a jerky nod. “Ready.”
 

Ash turned to the other men. “Okay, guys, it’s time to end this. Without bloodshed.”

“And if Arnold starts shooting?”

“Use only as much force as necessary to disarm him,” Ash answered. “I want the bastard to pay for what he’s done.”

Chapter 14

Lissa’s legs felt as if they were made of rubber as she walked the length of the hallway to stand outside the door to her mother’s apartment. Ethan had already telephoned when they were all still downstairs to tell Claudia her daughter had arrived and was on her way up in the elevator.

All perfectly normal.

Apart from the fact Asher was flattened against the wall to Lissa’s left, Gabriel to her right, both ready to enter the apartment once Claudia had checked through the peephole and confirmed it really was Lissa and, hopefully, opened the door.

Jonas stood beside Gabriel, ready to grab Claudia and remove her from the apartment and get her out of harm’s way. Jacob, injured but determined to be here, had been instructed to remain in the hallway and protect Lissa. The rest of the men were ready to follow Asher and Gabriel inside.

Lissa’s heart felt as if it was about to pound right out of her chest as she waited for Claudia to answer her ring on the doorbell. Her palms were damp too—probably just as well she didn’t have a gun, or it might have slipped right out of her hand.

What on earth was taking Claudia so long?

She rang the doorbell a second time.

What if, despite all their efforts, Malcolm had realized something was wrong and already taken her mother hostage? What if— The apartment door opened so suddenly, Lissa flinched back.

“Patience was never one of your virt—” Claudia’s sharp reprimand was cut off in a muted scream as Jonas moved far more stealthily than Lissa had believed a man of his size could. He placed one hand over Claudia’s mouth, the other about her waist before lifting her out into the hallway, leaving the way clear for the other men to enter the apartment. Liam stepped just inside the doorway, no doubt to ensure Malcolm didn’t escape that way.

Claudia had now recovered from her initial shock and was kicking and resisting Jonas’s hold on her as he carried her down to the end of the hallway where the elevator was situated, Lissa and Jacob trailing behind.