Star of Wonder (The Kinky Truth)

by Angel Payne

  The Kinky Truth 3:

  STAR OF WONDER

  Angel Payne

  www.loose-id.com

  The Kinky Truth 3: Star of Wonder

  Copyright © December 2012 by Angel Payne

  All rights reserved. This copy is intended for the original purchaser of this e-book ONLY. No part of this e-book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without prior written permission from Loose Id LLC. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author's rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  eISBN 978-1-62300-071-4

  Editor: Rory Olsen

  Cover Artist: Marci Gass

  Published in the United States of America

  Published by

  Loose Id LLC

  PO Box 809

  San Francisco CA 94104-0809

  www.loose-id.com

  This e-book is a work of fiction. While reference might be made to actual historical events or existing locations, the names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Warning

  This e-book contains sexually explicit scenes and adult language and may be considered offensive to some readers. Loose Id LLC’s e-books are for sale to adults ONLY, as defined by the laws of the country in which you made your purchase. Please store your files wisely, where they cannot be accessed by under-aged readers.

  * * * *

  DISCLAIMER: Please do not try any new sexual practice, especially those that might be found in our BDSM/fetish titles without the guidance of an experienced practitioner. Neither Loose Id LLC nor its authors will be responsible for any loss, harm, injury or death resulting from use of the information contained in any of its titles.

  Dedication

  Dedicated…as always…every time, all the time, to my wonderful man, my Master, my Sir. Your support and belief in me has made so many of my dreams come true. Thank you. I love you so much!

  Special, unending gratitude from the bottom of my heart to my friend Angela Barrett. You know the bazillion reasons why. Heart, devil, kissy.

  Chapter One

  “Can stars really collide?”

  The question came from the lips, coated with dark red lipstick, of Dante Tieri’s date for the evening. Her name was Meredith Collins—Meredith, not Merry, she was sure to tell him—and the question was actually refreshing. It was the first thing she’d said all night that didn’t involve his clothes, his business, or his new condo at The Elysian, as well as the tour she clearly expected at the end of the night. In short, she was one of his usual date selections. Blonde, beautiful, young, vivacious, but close enough to his forty-three that nobody cocked a brow. The checklist went on from there, and nearly all the boxes were filled. To all who cared, he’d made an ideal selection for one of the most important Chicago events he bankrolled each year.

  Which made his yawn, concealed as he reached for more champagne, not an encouraging thing.

  “I’m not sure Elton John was thinking about cosmic physics when he wrote the song, darling.” He smiled, amused at gazing into her kohl-caked eyes and facing the cloudy effects of the alcohol. Maybe she’d be more interesting after he got a few more flutes into her. “It’s a great lyric, though. One of my—”

  Meredith stole the last word off his lips by smashing hers to them. It was a kiss of determination, enforced by her hand at his nape, gripping him hard. Instinct compelled him to hold her waist as she went for tongue play, though he guessed the Taittinger had dulled his blood. His body reacted with a mild surge of warmth, nothing more. He opened a little wider, letting her explore him, groaning as she dived for his tonsils with nearly professional confidence.

  He did a mental pullback. Shit. She really did kiss like a pro.

  He yanked back physically too.

  “Thank you,” he managed to murmur. “But, umm, appearances, darling.” He gazed across the room, through the forest of military dress attire, knowing damn well that none of these people cared who the hell he was or whether he humped an ostrich in front of them. “I’m sure you understand.”

  “Certainly.” Meredith’s reply matched the smooth line she ran down his sleeve with a dark red fingernail. “Just wanted you to have a preview for later.”

  He started running a list of I’ve-gotta-call-it-an-early-night excuses.

  His effort was interrupted by a whoop from the dance floor that sliced the air as the ballad ended. The outburst was so loud, it visibly shook the banner overhead reading THANK YOU, CHICAGO VETERANS, ACTIVE DUTY, AND FAMILIES. As the disc jockey hit the Play button on a bass-heavy dance tune, Dante joined the rest of the crowd to observe his best friend, Mark Moore, sweeping a curvy brunette off her feet. The man’s grin was brilliant against his well-trimmed beard as he twirled her a couple of times, then set her down and grabbed her hand, setting a path back to where Dante sat with Meredith.

  Dante greeted the couple with a smirk he had to paste to his lips. Their giddy delight in each other was so palpable, it made his embrace with Meredith seem a cartoon. His chest went taut. Fuck. Just admit it, you asshole. You envy him. More than a little. It’s ugly as hell, but it’s the truth.

  “Well, Rose.” He managed to fake his way through an easy drawl at least, addressing the gorgeous woman nestled against his friend’s chest. “Marker Man doesn’t raise the roof like that unless there’s a damn good reason. And I have a feeling his ‘damn good reason’ means I’m about to lose a tremendous employee.” He arched his brows at Mark. “You talked her into it after all, eh? You put a ring on her finger just two months ago, and now you want her around on a full-time basis? This is the thanks I get for footing the bill on your annual love child of a pet project?”

  “Bite me, Tieri.” Mark chuckled. “The marines were half my life. And didn’t you just sign the contract to bankroll the Memorial Day cruise on the lake too? I think somebody just likes ogling women in uniform.”

  Meredith grabbed his elbow. “I could get a uniform.”

  He was able to ignore her, thanks to Rose Fabian-Moore’s musical laugh. “Mr. Tieri, you could turn that gift for flattery into a new business. I’m not that huge of a loss. You have some amazing consultants on the Baghdad project.”

  He grunted. “None who’ve cared more about getting that school rebuilt, Rose.”

  The classic angles of her face crunched with emotion. “Yes. I’ll really miss those kids.” She glanced up at Mark. “Maybe we could take just one more quick trip there, to say good—”

  “No.” His friend nearly snarled the word. Dante furrowed the brows he’d just hiked at the man. He knew about Mark’s intensity; hell, he shared the trait to many degrees. But he’d never seen Marker Man this ferocious. “No,” Mark repeated. “And that’s final. Baghdad is no place for a pregnant woman.”

  Shock froze him for a second. Then he surged off the stool. “What. The. Fuck? You spunky dog!” He yanked his friend into a hug. “No wonder you hollered like a goddamn teenager. Congrats, man.”

  “Thanks.” Mark said it with heavy meaning. “That means a lot, Inferno Boy.”

  Though he chuckled at the nickname, Dante had to turn his gaze away again, lest Mark see what was going on in his soul. The self-honesty that had propelled him to millionaire status now turned traitor, forcing him to recognize that his envy had mutated to jealousy.

  Goddamn it, there was no denying it. He craved what Mark had found. The connection. The need. Yeah, even the protective snarls. He longed for the magic his friend had been brave enoug
h to go after with all emotional guns blasting, despite the silly social whispers that had followed. Mark and Rose shared something that drowned it all out anyhow. Their love played a symphony of its own, blasting away those small minds and their meaningless squeals of disapproval. The two of them were certainly none the worse for wear in getting deleted from half the social invitation lists in the city. To be frank, they seemed happier for it.

  Hell. He could really get used to a calendar like that.

  “Umm…Mr. Tieri? Are you busy?”

  The shy greeting, coming from just out of his periphery forced Dante to turn back. A female navy officer now stood there, a lieutenant if he read the stripes on her shoulder accurately, who looked ready to bolt from nervousness. He smiled out of sheer sympathy for the petite redhead. She was bracketed by two friends. A blonde, equally tiny, joined her in the squirming act. The last member of the trio, a taller brunette, stood off to the side and rolled her eyes in the universal code for get me out of here right now. His gaze was pulled to her. He got this reaction from a lot of people, and prided himself in easing it by turning on the old-world Italian charm he’d learned so well from the source of the stuff: his grandfather. He tilted a big grin and—

  It froze. He froze.

  The halt to his gut, his chest, and his rational thinking happened sometime just after the rest of his senses fell ass over elbows into the magic of looking at her. Her sable hair was pulled back into a typical naval bun, now seeming more a goddess’s knot on her head. Her dramatic brows swept over forest-deep eyes. Her mouth was a generous sweep of dark cherry, the bottom a bit fuller than the top. Her nose wasn’t perfect, thank God, with a slight rounded tip that seemed made for kissing. Her strong chin perfectly finished the heart shape of her face.

  His gaze dipped, taking in the rest of her. God save him, he couldn’t help it. She was slim yet curved in all the right places. Her breasts looked gentle and plush, decent handfuls that were matched by the soft swell of her ass, and legs that made her government pumps look erotic as pole-dancer stilts. Damn it, when had naval skirt suits gotten so sexy?

  He told himself to shake it off. To crack some lame one-liner that would set her at ease and make her want to stay here, in his direct universe, nearly close enough to touch. Shit, just thinking of touching her—well, now he knew what creative visualization meant, didn’t he? As well as sweet torture.

  As well as complete irony.

  Three minutes ago, he’d tossed a symbolic coin into the fountain of fate. He’d waved his goddamn melodramatic mental flag, declaring cravings for connection and need, possessiveness to the point of going feral about it, a lover and not just a date.

  Something a lot like this.

  In the back of his mind, he heard fate giggling at him. Hysterically.

  Chapter Two

  She’d been at this “Yay for the Troops” dance party thing for an hour and a half. In Celina Kouris’s mind, that was sixty minutes too long. How she let Eve and Reiley talk her in to this was still a mystery, but finally her friends were ready to head out. They were just a dozen steps from the doors when both Eve and Rei stopped and hyperventilated like a discount shoe rack had been dropped in the middle of the Hilton’s ballroom. Only this was worse.

  The reason for their change in course was a man. Not just any man, she learned as they dragged her to the massive bottom-lit bar in the middle of the room, but the bazillionaire whose credit line had made this spectacle possible. For some reason, Eve thought that required her to approach the guy as if he were the Pope. And to nearly genuflect when he turned, his black designer suit moving easily with him, his megawatt smile a direct contrast to his black, close-trimmed beard.

  “Holy shit.” Reiley leaned close to Celina as she whispered it. “He’s more gorgeous in person! Look at his hair. Holy God, it’s doing that curling-around-the-ears thing. You think he’d kill me if I touched it? It’s like…like black satin!”

  Celina arched both brows. “Girl, you are a commissioned officer of the US Navy Judge Advocate General’s Corps. Do not tell me you just compared a man’s hair to something they make into bad prom dresses.”

  “Sure did.” Reiley giggled. “Deal with it, girl.”

  The man now kicked his grin at Eve. “Please call me Dante.” All too quickly, his gaze swung and locked on her. “And no, I’m not busy.”

  “Dante?” She poured more derision into her tone, using it to counter his unnerving stare. She dared a fast glare back, but regretted it at once. She’d relent on one aspect of the man. His eyes were haunting. Did they have any color? Did he ever blink? She looked closer, drawn by the need to find out. “Is he serious?” she finally managed to quip.

  “Completely.” Rei kept up her eager whisper. “The name’s been in his family for centuries.”

  “You don’t say.” Her snort seemed to register on Pope-Man Tieri’s radar, but she wasn’t surprised. He still didn’t stop examining her. Self-consciousness dug in, especially because his date now noticed the same thing. Of course, she looked like a magazine ad too, coiffed and cultured, a walking version of the society page. The observation was oddly unnerving.

  She shook her head. The loud music had obviously popped a bunch of her mental screws loose. Every time she went to court, she faced men more confident and swaggering than him. And she put them all right back in their place, too. She just had to find her game face. Where’d the damn thing gone?

  “So what can I do for you ladies?” Tieri asked. “Is there a problem with anything?”

  Eve and Reiley laughed with manic energy she’d never seen from them before. “No, nothing at all!” Eve blurted. “We just saw you here and…wanted to say thank you for the party.” She bit her lip like an awkward teen. “I’m—errrmmm—oh shit, who am I?”

  Tieri turned a little more, his black suit jacket opening to reveal a physique that really could’ve come from the same beautiful-people magazine as his date. The guy literally bulged in all the right places, which got highlighted even more as he rose from his bar stool with the fluid grace of a dancer. With a slight smirk, he leaned and read Eve’s name badge. “Does Pascal ring a bell?”

  “Oh yeah! Th-thank you. Pascal, that’s it. Lieutenant Eve Pascal, sir. And these are my friends, Lieutenants Reiley Young and Celina Kouris. We’re with the Midwest JAG office.”

  “Hmmm. Gorgeous and smart. Thank you for your service to our country, counselors. This is the least I can do to signify the gratitude.”

  “The least?” Eve giggled again. “Are you kidding? This party is—well—wow. Seriously. I’ve been coming since you started it.”

  “Me too!” Reiley arced her hand in a fast wave.

  The man tilted his head, looking to Celina again. His smile hitched at one side. “And you three?”

  “No.”

  She couldn’t get it out fast enough. As she shifted her weight, a rush of heat tormented her. His gaze was like a damn spotlight, and she had nowhere to hide. She drew in a breath against the panic that followed. Maybe this was how it started. Maybe this was the opening tactic with men like him. Men who thought their black Amex and their practiced stare could get a woman to drop everything in her life, everyone in her life, to float away with them into the sunset on a fifty-foot yacht. Playing to women like her own mother and sister-in-law, who proved them completely right.

  “No,” she repeated, more firmly this time. “I don’t do dances.” Especially ones backed by players like you, Mr. Tieri.

  “Cel!” Rei gave her a playful swat on the arm, but her eyes were wide with threat. “Be. Nice!”

  She flashed a grin of false sweetness. Reiley’s reaction ensured she’d gone for exactly the right tone and achieved it.

  But her private celebration was destroyed by Tieri’s smooth interjection. “It’s okay. I don’t usually do dances either. I’m just the guy with the checkbook.” He nodded to a man who sat nearby, whom Cel only now recognized. It was Mark Moore, former Indiana senator and new Chi-town transpla
nt, looking relaxed and happy as he cuddled with a mahogany-haired woman who looked a lot more normal than Ms. Society Page. “My best friend Mark,” he said in introduction. “And the bastard you have to officially thank for this thing. He’s just found out he’s going to be a daddy. And since his first offspring is currently blowing up the net with her single being downloaded, we need to make sure the next gets a decent round of celebration. Would you ladies care to join us in some more champagne? And of course, one glass of cider for Rose over there.”

  Again, the man’s words included Eve and Rei, but his stare twined only around her. She risked looking directly back this time. And regretted it. He gazed with more determination than ever, as if she were a knot he longed to untangle. And she felt his energy too, pulling at the tight ends of her composure, a relentless tug at her blood, her bones, her nerves…

  No. No.

  The resolve was easy to maintain. All she had to do was remember the house, heavy with Dad’s agony, the morning after Mom left them for the president of her bank. And Dylan, the rock of their family, crumbling to emotional dust when Natalie divorced him for an international commodities czar.

  She wasn’t biting into the same poisoned apple. Or drinking a drop of the champagne that precluded it either.

  “Cel?” It was Eve this time with the big bug eyes, only hers were filled with desperation. “C’mon. You wanna?”

  She gave her friend a rueful glance, then steeled her jaw. “I’m sorry. I don’t do bubbles either.”

  “Cel-eeeee-naaaa…”

  Now she actually laughed. “God, you’re persistent. Listen, you two stay and have fun.” She found a spot on the wall that was suddenly interesting. She wouldn’t look at him again. She couldn’t. “I just need to get out of here. I’ll be around the corner, at the Blue Sax Grill. It’s safe. See you in a bit.”

  Chapter Three