I shouldn’t resent Ashlyn. She hadn’t asked to be pulled into our world. She couldn’t help that she’d led a charmed life. And why shouldn’t she have everything she could possibly want? She’d done nothing to deserve what I’d done to her, stealing her away from her safe, easy life.
I shrugged off my budding sense of guilt.
I wasn’t sorry for taking her. Joseph needed her, and I needed Joseph. He was the only family I had in the world. My father might still be alive, but that didn’t make him family, not in the ways that counted. Even once I’d dragged Joseph back to New York, he was like a ghost without Ashlyn. He’d never really been happy in his life, but this was on a whole other level. He’d been miserable without her.
So, I’d fixed that.
I’d promised Joseph that Ashlyn would come around and forgive him.
I hoped to hell I hadn’t been lying through my teeth.
“What do you think you’re doing?” I asked, leaning against the doorframe with my arms crossed over my chest. I’d swung the bedroom door open a full thirty seconds ago, and Ashlyn had yet to notice me.
She yelped and jumped away from the drawer she’d been rummaging through. Several more were open, their contents in disarray. I didn’t like seeing my neatly-organized possessions being rifled through, but her blush and guilty expression were cute enough that I could forgive her.
I took a step into the room. She took a step back and bumped into the desk behind her.
She held up her hands, as though to reassure me that she wasn’t a threat. I almost laughed at the very idea of the curvy little brunette causing me any trouble. She wasn’t particularly short, but I still towered over her, and she was much smaller than my bulky frame. I worked hard to stay fit. Intimidating people was in my line of work, so being the scariest motherfucker in the room had proven useful on many occasions.
I’d promised Joseph that I wouldn’t scare Ashlyn. That didn’t mean I wasn’t going to indulge in toying with her. The first night I’d met her, when I’d cornered her in the bar where Joseph worked, she’d looked up at me with those wide, blue eyes. She’d quivered in my shadow, and a twisted part of me liked her trepidation. I didn’t want to truly frighten her, but I couldn’t deny that I liked making her nervous. The effect I had on her was delicious. She might soften and sigh for Joseph, but she’d tremble for me.
She belonged to Joseph, but I could indulge myself a little while he was away. Even if he were here, I didn’t think he’d mind. He might be possessive of Ashlyn, but we shared everything. Even women, from time to time.
And while I was certain Ashlyn was far too innocent to contemplate that kind of play, that didn’t mean I couldn’t toy with her. Just a little.
“I asked you a question,” I said as I slowly advanced on her. “What do you think you’re doing, tearing my room apart? It’s very rude. Are you being a little brat again?”
Her wide eyes
narrowed, her full lips twisting in a frown. She lifted her delicate chin in defiance. “Stop saying I’m a brat. You make it sound like I’m a petulant child or something. You freaking kidnapped me. I have every right to be angry.”
“So, you’re tearing through my things because you’re angry?” I asked coolly.
I didn’t stop advancing on her until mere inches separated our bodies. I didn’t initiate any physical contact with her, but I let her feel my presence, encroaching on her space enough to make her squirm.
She tried to ease back again, but the desk behind her stopped her. I pressed my hands to the wood on either side of her hips, trapping her in case she got any wild ideas about bolting for the door. I had a good idea what she’d been up to in my absence, but I wanted to make her admit her transgressions.
“Tell me what you were doing, Ashlyn,” I commanded.
She let out an angry little huff, but her wide eyes watched me warily. “I was looking for a way to contact Jayme, okay?” she said in a rush. “I figured you had to have a spare tablet or something in here.”
My brows rose. “Did you really think I’d just leave something like that lying around where you could get your hands on it?”
She licked her lips nervously, and my gaze fixed on her lush mouth. I wondered what she tasted like. Probably like fucking heaven. After all, Joseph did keep calling her his angel.
“I expect an answer when I ask you a question,” I prompted in my darkest tone.
There it was: the little tremor I’d been waiting for. Her skin pebbled, and her fingers shook. Her pupils dilated, and her head tipped back slightly.
Fuck. I was understanding Joseph’s obsession more with every minute I spent with her.
“I…” she took a breath. “I thought it was rhetorical.”
“It wasn’t.”
I stared down at her, waiting for her response, imposing my will on her.
She didn’t lower her lashes in a show of submission. Her gaze remained transfixed on mine, as though she couldn’t look away.