Defying Asher (Knight Security 1) by Carole Mortimer Read Free Book Online Page A

the fucking question!”
    Lissa took in Asher’s clenched fists, the ready-to-spring tension in his body, the furious expression in his eyes, and the accusation in his tone, and decided that caution would be the wisest course of action. “It seems to have escaped your notice that Ethan was standing outside my apartment not inside.”
    Nothing about seeing Lissa and Ethan talking together had escaped Ash’s notice. Nor the way Lissa was dressed. Or rather undressed. Or the admiration in his brother’s eyes as he looked at her.
    Or the fact that Ash had a throbbing erection and his vision had turned red the moment he saw the two of them chatting so cozily together. Like friends. Or lovers… “Maybe that’s because he just left it?”
    “Or maybe because he was never in my apartment to begin with. I was offering to get him a cup of coffee, Asher,” she added exasperatedly.
    “Just coffee?”
    “Your suspicion and accusations are not only insulting to me but also to your brother’s professionalism,” she accused. “Or do you all make a habit of sleeping with the people you’re protecting?”
    Ash wanted to kiss the sneer off her lips. To put his hands on her bare bottom and lift her up so that she had no choice but to wrap her legs about his waist, the heat of her core pressing against his erection as his mouth claimed hers in a punishing kiss.
    God, this situation was fucked up. Ash was fucked up. Because of Lissa. He hadn’t so much as thought about her for months—
    Why was he lying to himself? He hadn’t been able to stop thinking about Lissa since seeing her again at Alexandre and Stazzi’s wedding six months ago. Wondering what she was doing. Who she was doing it with.
    In the circumstances, Ash had thought it best to keep himself occupied last night and had taken over the whole of the night shift at Claudia Reynolds’s apartment building. Neither she nor Jack had left the apartment during the evening or the night that followed. Curiously, neither had Malcolm Arnold. Which must have been a cozy little threesome: Claudia, her past lover, and her present one. Ash was sure if it came to a showdown that Jack would easily have won the battle to share Claudia’s bed.
    Ash’s cousin Ian had taken over from him an hour ago, and the impulse for Ash to visit Lissa’s apartment on his way home had been purely that, an impulse. One he might have been wiser not to have acted on, considering he had behaved like a Neanderthal once he saw Lissa chatting to Ethan, dressed in her nightclothes.
    His mouth twisted self-derisively. “Have you spoken to your mother recently?”
    Lissa’s eyes widened in alarm. “Has something else happened?”
    “Depends what you mean by happened.”
    “Asher—”
    “Your father arrived yesterday and spent the night at Claudia’s apartment.”
    Lissa drew her breath in sharply. She had thought she was over knowing she came way down her parents’ list of priorities, and for the most part, she was. But that didn’t mean she couldn’t still be hurt by their utter lack of consideration for her or her feelings. Or feel humiliated at Asher knowing of their complete disregard for her as their daughter.
    As far as Lissa was concerned she had been an accident that neither Claudia nor Jack were willing to change or adapt their lives to accommodate. Hence the nanny when she was young and boarding school once she was old enough. Hell, half the time, she had ended up staying with Stazzi’s family over the Christmas break and other holidays, because both Claudia and Jack were busy. Those holidays and Christmases with the warm and loving Carmichael family had been the ones Lissa enjoyed the best.
    They had also shown her own family wasn’t just dysfunctional, it was nonexistent.
    It would have been better for all of them if twenty-eight years ago, Claudia had chosen not to have her baby. Lissa had often wondered why she hadn’t.
    The tension left Lissa’s body as she slumped back against