Page 84 of Her Noble Protector

The word whirled and twirled in her head until she was dizzy. How could Raiden’s mom possibly be thinking something like that? She and Raiden had only gone out on one date. One! And they hadn’t even made it to second base.

Lisa sighed. Akari must be desperate for grandchildren, that had to be it.

“You know, if you sigh like that again, I’m going to be forced to ask you what’s wrong,” Ezio said.

Lisa swiveled around on the kitchen counter stool and looked over the relaxed man on the couch who was watching her so intently.

“It’s just the whole Maria thing,” she lied.

“You’re lying.” Ezio set his laptop down on the coffee table and sat up straight on the couch. “What’s really wrong?”

Lisa frowned. “Isn’t that enough?”

“Normally yes, but that sigh was an I-have-man-troubles sigh.”

“Excuse me?” She didn’t know what else to say. Then Ezio smiled. Holy hell, he had a pretty amazing smile. Then there was that lock of hair that fell over his forehead. The man was hot.

“Did you know I have younger sisters and had to live with them all through their teenage years?”

“No,” she said slowly.

“Yep. You have all the signs of man trouble. So that’d be Raiden, right?”

“Actually, it’s his mom, she freaked me out.”

Ezio’s eyebrows shot up. “Mrs. Sato? She’s so cool, how is that even possible?”

“She said Raiden is in love with me.”

Ezio barked out a laugh.

“That’s not funny.”

“The man gave me a whole lot of shit about Samantha, so it’s really pretty funny from where I’m sitting.”

“Well, it’s not.” Lisa couldn’t believe she was having this conversation. She never had personal conversations. Never, ever. But since Raiden came into her life, with all of his friends and family, she was having loads and loads of personal conversations. How was that even possible?

The buzzer on the alarm system rang. Ezio stood up grinning. “Hold that thought, let me buzz Cami up.”

He went over to the panel near the door and depressed a button. “Cami?”

“Yep. I have your boring coffee.”

“Great, come on up.” Ezio pressed a button, then turned back to look at Lisa. “Lisa, everything is going to be all right. Have you and Raiden talked, or is this just what his mother is thinking?”

“Ezio, we’ve only been out on one date.”

Ezio barked out another laugh. “Woman, he sat outside your house in Arizona for days. He moved you to Virginia Beach to live with his parents. Don’t make this out to be that you’re not in a relationship with him.”

When the condominium doorbell rang, Lisa almost sagged with relief. “You need to get the door,” she told Ezio.

He was still shaking his head in disbelief as he checked the peephole. He started to open the door when it slammed open. Cami was shoved into Ezio’s arms as hot coffee flew everywhere. A huge man stabbed a gun into the top of Cami’s head as Ezio’s gun came upwards.

“Put the gun down, or I put a bullet in her brain,” the behemoth hissed.

Two more men pushed into the condo, then they shut the door. Cami was whimpering and Ezio looked calm. Lisa had seen that look before on Raiden’s face; Ezio was trying to figure out a way to get them out of this situation alive.

The man who shut the door stalked across the room toward Lisa, the other one went toward Ezio.