Saving Liberty (Kissing #6) Read online

  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Acknowledgments

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen

  Nineteen

  Twenty

  Twenty-One

  Twenty-Two

  Twenty-Three

  Twenty-Four

  Twenty-Five

  Twenty-Six

  Twenty-Seven

  Twenty-Eight

  Twenty-Nine

  Thirty

  Thirty-One

  Thirty-Two

  Thirty-Three

  Thirty-Four

  Thirty-Five

  Thirty-Six

  Thirty-Seven

  Thirty-Eight

  Thirty-Nine

  Forty

  Forty-One

  Forty-Two

  Forty-Three

  Forty-Four

  Forty-Five

  Forty-Six

  Forty-Seven

  Forty-Eight

  Forty-Nine

  Fifty

  Fifty-One

  Fifty-Two

  Fifty-Three

  Fifty-Four

  Fifty-Five

  Fifty-Six

  Fifty-Seven

  Fifty-Eight

  Epilogue

  Title Page

  Copyright

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen

  Nineteen

  Twenty

  Twenty-One

  Twenty-Two

  Twenty-Three

  Twenty-Four

  Twenty-Five

  Twenty-Six

  Twenty-Seven

  Twenty-Eight

  Twenty-Nine

  Thirty

  Thirty-One

  Thirty-Two

  Thirty-Three

  Thirty-Four

  Thirty-Five

  Thirty-Six

  Thirty-Seven

  Thirty-Eight

  Thirty-Nine

  Forty

  Forty-One

  Forty-Two

  Forty-Three

  Forty-Four

  Forty-Five

  Forty-Six

  Forty-Seven

  Forty-Eight

  Forty-Nine

  Fifty

  Fifty-One

  Fifty-Two

  Fifty-Three

  Fifty-Four

  Fifty-Five

  Fifty-Six

  Fifty-Seven

  Fifty-Eight

  Fifty-Nine

  Sixty

  Epilogue

  Following this book, you’ll find a free copy of my bestselling novel, Punching and Kissing. Both are full-length books.

  Saving Liberty ends at approximately 55%, according to your Kindle’s progress indicator.

  Join my newsletter and I’ll let you know when I release a new book so you can snap it up for 99c on launch day instead of paying full price. You’ll also get “Losing My Balance,” a free, exclusive novella from my Fenbrook Academy series.

  http://list.helenanewbury.com

  © Copyright Helena Newbury 2016

  The right of Helena Newbury to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Design and Patents Act 1988

  This book is entirely a work of fiction. All characters, companies, organizations, products and events in this book, other than those clearly in the public domain, are fictitious or are used fictitiously and any resemblance to any real persons, living or dead, events, companies, organizations or products is purely coincidental.

  This book contains adult scenes and is intended for readers 18+.

  Cover by Mayhem Cover Creations

  Main cover model photo image licensed from (and copyright remains with) NT Lady/Shutterstock

  Acknowledgments

  Thank you Liz - you went the extra mile on this one.

  Thank you Pearl for the beta read.

  And thank you to my readers, who let me do what I love.

  Emily

  Sometimes I think: five minutes earlier or five minutes later. That’s all it would have taken. If Kian hadn’t strolled towards me right when he did, we’d never have met... and I’d be dead.

  It was a gloriously warm September day. No one expected any trouble, so I only had the normal level of protection: five guys from the Secret Service plus a perimeter guarded by the Washington DC police. The park had been swept at dawn for bombs, there was a helicopter circling overhead, and two streets had been temporarily closed.

  You know: normal. When you’re the President’s daughter.

  Anacostia Park was a sprawling oasis of green in the heart of DC’s gray. The science fair’s organizers had made towering sculptures of DNA strands from red and yellow balloons, bright and glossy against the blue sky. The press photographers were going nuts, snapping picture after picture of me talking to the kids. I nodded enthusiastically as they told me about their solar-powered radios and battling robots. I wasn’t faking it, either. The exhibits blew me away: they made my own vinegar-and-soda volcano back in high school seem pretty lame. Choosing just one winner was going to be heartbreaking.

  I checked out the final entry, told the kids I had to consult with the other judges and stepped away to get some water. And that’s when I saw him for the very first time.

  I actually saw the guy he was with first: just another corporate sponsor in a suit, hurrying towards me to get a picture shaking my hand. He fitted the scene. Then I saw the guy following just behind him and my brain went wait, what? Because that guy didn’t fit the scene at all.

  Everything about him raged against the neat, safe, family-friendly atmosphere. He wasn’t wearing handmade Italian shoes like all the senators who’d stopped by; he was wearing lace-up leather boots that could have come straight from the Army. And not as some kind of fashion statement: these looked worn and battered, like they’d actually been to a warzone. His blue jeans had that perfect, lazy fit that you only get from a favorite pair that’s been worn a lot, when the fabric goes super-soft and barely seems to be there, the next best thing to being naked when it’s a warm day. The blue denim was stretched tight over muscled calves and hard thighs that could have graced a linebacker.

  I blinked and stared at those strong legs as he strolled towards me. His walk didn’t fit, either. All the guys in DC walk like they’re trying to prove something, whether they’re a senator or a lowly aide. It’s all the testosterone in the air and the constant eyes of the press. But this guy strolled through the scene as if oblivious to the cameras. As if he was experiencing life instead of acting it out. He looked... real.

  I blinked as the sun glinted off his belt buckle. That didn’t fit either: big and brash and definitely not picked out by some overpaid personal stylist. And then the breeze lifted the bottom of his t-shirt a few inches and my eyes were drawn inexorably up….

  His abs looked hard as rock: smooth, warm, rock, tanned from the sun and so very strokable—God, I could see the deep crease of his Adonis belt leading diagonally down towards—

 
; The t-shirt dropped back into place but my eyes kept following the line—

  No, I’m not going to look at his—

  But my eyes were already on the heavy bulge between those strong thighs. Heavy and... hard. I could feel my face heating up.

  Everyone else in Washington is oddly sexless. Oh, sure, power is an aphrodisiac and senators will bend their naive young assistants over the desks just to prove how goddamn awesome they are, but it’s all done in a polite, carefully-choreographed ballet. This is a city where husbands and wives only argue over their affairs when one of them is indiscreet and threatens the other’s chances for re-election.

  This guy was the polar opposite of that. Raw and wild, untamed. He didn’t hide his sexuality behind double-talk and mind games. He wasn’t hiding the fact he was getting hard, under that tight denim. Whichever woman he was checking out would know, when she looked down and saw that bulge, that he was thinking about—

  Wait, who was he checking out? He seemed to be looking my way. I twisted around, frowning, but I couldn’t see anyone behind me.....

  My eyes widened. He was looking at me... and he was still approaching.

  I snapped back to front and hauled my eyes desperately up. The breeze was plastering the soft cotton of his t-shirt against his torso, now, a vertical cliff as solid and unyielding as granite. I could see the shallow depression where the fabric blew into his navel: an inny, same as me. We’d match. Wait, why am I even thinking that?

  I found my eyes being drawn up, hypnotized by the swing of his pecs under that tight black cotton. Wide shoulders and broad, huge pecs that didn’t make me think of DC gym bunnies who get up at 5am to pump iron. It put me in mind of a soldier, a warrior: muscles that weren’t just for show. And, yep, I could see ink on those thick biceps, tattoos that looked like they could be military.

  The guy was big, bigger than any of the suits around me, bigger than any of my Secret Service detail. And a lot bigger than my own small frame. In fact: if I stood up against him, like right up against him with my front pressed to his front, and someone looked at him from behind, I’d disappear, completely hidden by that big body. I reeled a little, imagining it. My nose would be near the tops of his pecs, my lips perfectly positioned to kiss across that warm expanse of flesh, my breasts would be brushing that hard torso and, further down, his groin would be—

  What the hell is going on? I didn’t normally react to guys like this. Or stare at them like this. I dragged my eyes away from his body and looked at something safer, like his face.

  Big. Mistake.

  I looked up just as he reached me. Even his jaw didn’t fit the scene. Strong and gorgeous and sporting a thick layer of black stubble, gleaming in the sunlight. None of the other guys around me were unshaven. I wondered if it would be scratchy, when he—

  Get it together, Emily!

  But I couldn’t get it together. Because set right into that beautiful jaw were the most perfect set of male lips ever. Just the right combination of hard, strong upper and soft, sensuous lower. I unconsciously licked my lips, then realized what I’d done and blushed.

  He was wearing sunglasses so I couldn’t see his eyes, but he had soft, tousled hair, the blackest I’d ever seen. The wind was playing with the strands in exactly the way I wanted to.

  “Miss Matthews,” said a voice. It was weird, because he’d said it without moving his lips. And the voice didn’t match his face at all. It was a refined, Boston accent, slightly nasal. It would fit better with—

  Realization hit me. I twisted around to look at the guy in the suit—mystery man’s companion. I’d completely forgotten about him and, immediately, I felt awful. What’s the matter with me? “Hi! Yes!” I said enthusiastically. The breeze blew a lock of hair across my face and I scrambled to push it back.

  The suit told me that he worked for one of the chemical companies sponsoring the science fair and we both agreed that, yes, the kids were wonderful and it’s so important to get them interested in science at an early age and meanwhile a photographer to my left was snapping picture after picture of us shaking hands... and my mind, however hard I tried, kept drifting a few feet to my right, where mystery man was lurking.

  I forced myself to focus on the suit, to nod sympathetically about how the new clean air bill was going to affect his company and reassure him that, yes, my dad totally understood the needs of industry and he was working very hard to make sure the right balance was met (after a whole day of saying it, the words rolled off my tongue like song lyrics).

  Talking to the suit wouldn’t normally have bothered me at all. It’s part of being the President’s daughter. But right then, all that small talk seemed so... stupid. False and meaningless. It was because he was standing there, just out of my eye line, his presence rolling off him in waves and slapping up against every inch of my body. Talking to him... that wouldn’t be meaningless at all. It was suddenly all I wanted to be doing.

  But I’m not someone who can be rude to anyone. So I took my time with the suit, listened to his concerns and promised I’d pass them on. And only when I’d finished did I flick my eyes in the direction of mystery man and raise my eyebrows to ask….

  “Oh!” said the suit. “That’s my protection.”

  As if he wasn’t even worthy of a name. I hate people who do that. I felt a deep, hot rush of anger on mystery man’s behalf. I turned to him and stuck out my hand. “Emily Matthews,” I said.

  He seemed surprised. I couldn’t see behind the sunglasses but I imagined him blinking at me. Then he took my hand in his much bigger one and it was so much better than the suit’s handshake: warm and strong and comforting. “Kian O’Harra,” he said. “Ma’am.”

  That voice fitted. It was strong whiskey poured over slabs of rough-hewn rock, American but edged with something else, something beautiful and silvery I couldn’t place. It burrowed deep into my brain and throbbed straight down to my groin. I’d never heard anything so good in my life.

  “Emily,” I said in a don’t be silly tone.

  “Ma’am,” he rumbled stubbornly. And for some reason that sent a hot rush through me. I think it was the combination of old-fashioned politeness and the feeling that he really, really wanted to rip all my clothes off.

  I swallowed. “You don’t look like a bodyguard,” I thought. And then realized I’d blurted it out loud.

  He grinned as if he was very proud of that fact and took off his sunglasses. I found myself looking up into the clearest, bluest eyes I’d ever seen. A blue that put me in mind of frozen lakes of pure, glacial water... and yet his gaze wasn’t cool at all. I could feel it heating up my skin, like I’d just opened an oven door. He didn’t gawp, didn’t glance down at my body. And yet I swore I felt that heat slide right down me.

  “You don’t look like other bodyguards,” I said. He must have some sort of security clearance: there was a huge pistol holstered on his belt and you don’t carry a weapon anywhere near the President’s family without some very thorough checks. “Are you with a security company?”

  He shook his head, not taking his eyes off me for a moment. “Private,” he said. “Just me.” He gave me a wry grin, showing white teeth. “I don’t play well with others.”

  “Well,” said the suit a little hotly, “we should let you talk to someone else.” And he walked away, jerking his head to indicate that Kian should follow him. As if Kian wasn’t worth wasting words on.

  Kian and I both tensed in reaction. He scowled at the guy’s retreating back, those glorious pecs lifting and his biceps swelling. I could see the anger building in those pure blue eyes and for a second I thought he was going to thump one big fist down on the suit’s head, knocking him into the ground like a tent peg. But then he glanced back at me and we exchanged a look: asshole! And the anger seemed to drain from him. He sighed, gave me one last grin and ambled after the suit. I could hear the suit muttering something about not paying you to flirt.

  That made me flush... but I grinned a little, too, turning away
so that the cameras couldn’t see. Guys don’t flirt with me. Guys barely speak to me: they’re too intimidated by my dad. And I spend twenty-four hours a day in a bubble of security, everyone I interact with carefully screened and vetted and every conversation watched. The idea of even meeting someone is far-fetched; dating would be absurd. Especially since I finished college and moved into a room at the White House. I mean, sure, it’s The White House, but it’s still living with my parents. I was looking forward to starting my new job in a few months and getting a place of my own.

  What kind of name was Kian anyway? I was sure it was spelled that way, too: he’d said it Key-an, not Kane. It sounded hundreds of years old, maybe something from England or Scotland. The sort of name you’d give to some ancient warrior, standing on a windswept clifftop about to lead the charge against his foes. It suited him: there was something old-fashioned about Kian.

  I sighed and turned back to the science fair. Time to get back to my duties. And stop thinking about rough, gorgeous, totally unsuitable men. Especially ones I’d never see again.

  I took a step towards the other judges. The press moved in and I heard a flurry of shutter clicks.

  And that’s when the first gunshot rang out.

  Kian

  Asshole.

  Businessmen annoy me at the best of times—which is a problem, because they’re the ones who hire me, these days. But now he’d dragged me away from her and that made me royally pissed.

  “I’m not paying you to flirt,” bleated the guy. “I’m paying you for protection. She’s right, you don’t even look like the other bodyguards. Couldn’t you have worn a suit?”

  I ignored him. He didn’t need protection. He’d only hired me because he’d wanted to feel big and important. What he really wanted was a guy in a suit with a bulge under his jacket to stand by his side and say yes sir, no sir, the limo’s here, sir. He didn’t notice—or care—about the actual protection stuff I did, like checking the sightlines and watching the crowd, sweeping under his limo for devices or planning escape routes.

  I was tempted to tell him where to shove it but I was painfully aware I needed the job. So I walked silently beside him, soaking up his bitching and moaning, and keeping myself calm by thinking about Emily.