Stark Pleasure; the Space Magnate's Mistress (The LodeStar Series) (24 page)

“Wonderful, although next time you tell me you don’t have the credit and we’ll work something out, understood?”

Kiri nodded, her heart swelling. “Understood.”

Illyria nodded. “So dish—what’s Stark like? Is he as, um, hot as he appears? I’ve seen him at city business functions.”

Kiri just smiled. She was not talking about Stark and sex in the same conversation.
 

But her expression was evidently enough. The blonde sighed, one hand to her bosom.
 

“Fabulous. So many men are all show and no substance. Like a decaffeinated bean, you know?” Her arching brows lowered, indicating she might be thinking of one man in particular.
 

Then she tossed her hair back again. “I suppose we’d better get back to business. How can I help you?”

With great satisfaction, Kiri placed an order for a supply of Pangaean coffee, both light and dark. Illyria nearly burbled with joy at Kiri’s interest in the more expensive products, and when she invoked Stark’s name for the bill, the woman promised a delivery that very afternoon of a better grade of beans, along with a top-grade variety Kiri simply had to try.

Kiri hesitated, and then interrupted the woman’s effusive plans. “Thanks, Illyria, but I don’t think it’d be very wise for me to go top grade. My customers can’t afford that.”

“Sweetie,” the other woman breathed. “With Stark behind you, you can afford to
move
. Rent space in the newest, best area of the space port. Give those MoonPenny bastards a run for their credit.”

Kiri raised her brows. The woman was practically bristling, her brown eyes as hot as the brew she sipped as she waited for Kiri to answer.

“I take it the owner wasn’t interested in your product,” Kiri guessed.

Illyria snorted, taking another drink of coffee. “Marc Moon? Smooth bastard. Not only did he refuse to talk business, he then proceeded to
proposition
me.”

“For sex?” He’d put the moves on during a sales call? No way.

“Whaddya think?”

“Wow. That’s low,” Kiri murmured. But also easy to believe. Illyria was very pretty, and she had a great figure, much more voluptuous than Kiri’s own. “So what did you say to him?”

The blonde’s eyes narrowed with satisfaction over her cup. “I shoved my large sample bag of top-grade fresh-roasted Pangaean dark coffee beans in his sculpted abs and told him to fuck that, because he’d never have me.”

“Oh, wow,” Kiri breathed. “Wish I could’ve seen that.”

“I was pretty good,” Illyria agreed. “But, I not only didn’t get the contract, I pissed off the owner of the largest chain of coffee stands in New Seattle, so all in all …” She waggled her hand as if balancing scales. “My father is not going to be happy.”

“Totally worth it,” Kiri assured her. “Your reply will reign in the annals of womankind forever.”

Illyria smiled crookedly. “Thanks. I needed that. And on the upside, when you open your huge chain of competing stands, you’ll buy all your beans from me, right?”

“Absolutely. Illyrian Bean is my supplier, no matter what.”

“Excellent. I’ll have your product to you in a few hours. Where shall I have them delivered?”

Kiri gave her Stark’s address. They said goodbye. Next, Kiri spent a little time perusing advertisements for several other upscale coffee purveyors, including the wildly successful MoonPenny chain.
 

Illyria was right, if she wanted to upgrade seriously, she’d have to move. She allowed herself to daydream a bit about keeping her small shop open for the discount travelers and those who needed an occasional free coffee, and opening a large, glossy, upscale stand in the newer section of space port near the LodeStar commercial docks.
 

Lot of wealthy travelers on and off Stark’s ships. Heck, maybe they could even subsidize a coffee and soup kitchen in the poor end of the port.

Her new comlink was programmed with Logan’s link as well as Jasmine, Maitresse, and a few others she didn’t recognize. Should have known—the man had a mind like a computer, ranging far and fast, taking care of things she hadn’t had time to realize she might want.
 

She took great pleasure in erasing the link to Maitresse. She wouldn’t be shopping at that spiteful bitch’s store any more.
 

Then she looked at the second link waiting in her virtual mail. She rose from her chair, and paced restlessly to the windows to look out at the dark, foggy day, leaning her forearms on the window glass. The cold seeped through the lace covering her arms. She’d need more credit for that one and she wasn’t sure how much Stark would let her borrow.

But Stark had family, brothers anyway. He’d understand why she needed the credit, wouldn’t he? She hated asking him for it. They’d agreed on the loan for her business, but this was another matter entirely. And if she waited until she had the credit herself, it might be too late.
 

It might already be too late, hissed an all too familiar voice inside her. She felt the brush of wings beginning to unfurl inside her, and shoved away from the window, turning to pace back and forth the length of the big room. Quark, if she were really the cat Stark liked to call her, she’d pounce on the fear and rip its head off with her teeth and claws.

She couldn’t do that, but she would
not
let fear win. Kai was out there, somewhere. And she was going to find him.

She flung herself back into her chair, and concentrated fiercely on the work at hand. This she could do right now, concrete and definite. She’d deal with the rest later.

Bringing up the holodisplay of the employment agency, she stared at the soothing, professional smiles of the reps. Logan Stark thought of everything. And he wanted to control everything. If she accepted an employee from the agency he’d directed her toward, how did she know that person wouldn’t really be working for Stark, instead of her? She didn’t.

She curled her legs up into the chair, and wrapped her arms around her knees. Logan Stark had powerful charisma, and he knew it. He’d compelled her from the sec she met him. She couldn’t walk away from him now—she craved him and his outrageous sexual play, even more than she wanted his credit.
 

But she had to keep her guard up. He knew too much about her as it was, even her association with Tal. Not that Kiri wanted to continue to associate with the ganger, especially after last night, but she chose her own friends.

Kiri scowled at the computer. It wasn’t that she didn’t trust Stark on a personal level, because she did. But give him a chance, and he’d take her over like a business, managing her life as was most convenient for him, until he tired of her. Stark reality—simply arrange everything the way he wanted it.

Who could she trust who was unconnected with him? She had friends, but they all worked, some of them off planet for much of the time. She could think of one person who was always around and who could use a comfortable post.

She made the call. Kiri smiled at the familiar face on her hololink. “Maury, I’ll be opening my stand this afternoon. Would you come and have a coffee with me?”

***

Rak picked her up in the slider. Kiri sat beside him, wondering if she’d have a chance for the newness of sliding about in a small private craft to wear off. She watched Rak manipulate the controls with calm expertise.

“I really would love to learn to fly one of these,” she commented.

He cornered them around an industrial block, following another craft, and avoiding an airbus lumbering along in the lane just below. “Have to talk to Mr. Stark about that.”

Kiri shrugged, accepting that. She was in Stark’s world, everything flowed through him.
 

It was fun now diving down to the private docks at the space port. Kiri watched the dock with the big star glimmering above it grow clearer through the dirty fog. “There’s Stark’s dock,” she realized. She’d been flown in and out of here before in his cruiser.
 

“Yup. LodeStar,” Rak said.

She watched with fascination as they hovered over the platform, and then landed lightly, and taxied in under the graceful awning. Rak stopped the slider right at the end of the podway, and the hatch slid open, revealing the walkway.
 

“Got something for you,” he said, reaching into a cubby on the dash.
 

Kiri took the small device. It looked like a silver-toned tube of lip gloss but heavier.
 

“What is it?”

“A shocker. Keep it with you at all times. Anyone gets too close that you don’t like the look of, you pretend you’re gonna pretty up. But for the Great God’s sake, don’t touch this round end to your own skin. You touch them with it, and I promise you, they’re going down.”

“Starry.” She examined it. “Press this part here?”

“No, twist it. That way it can’t be zapping you by accident in your pocket. You got pockets, don’t you?” He eyed her soft black knit leggings and gold fitted top with misgivings.

Kiri grinned. So much for sex appeal—he just wanted to know if she could hide weapons.
 

“I do.” She examined the shocker and then tucked it into the pocket hidden in the seam of her top.
 

“Okay. Let’s go,” he said. “I got your beans. I’ll bring them and then go take care of some other business. I won’t be too far away. You link me when you’re ready to go.”

Kiri walked onto the concourse with nerves pinging. Her lessons in self-defense and carrying the shocker reminded her sharply that danger could come from any direction.
 

She half expected to find news cameras or crowds dawdling. Instead, there were only the usual throngs of passengers passing to and fro. The bar across the way was open, although the gambling kiosk was still shuttered.
 

Rak stowed her bags of coffee beans and then stood by as she powered up her coffee machine. She ground some of her new coffee beans and poured them in to brew.

Illyria had included a gift of new disposable mugs with Illyrian Bean’s logo emblazoned on one side, Kiri’s Kaffe on the other. Kiri set them proudly in the racks, ready to grab when customers ordered.
 

Rak stood on the other side of her counter, legs spread, arms crossed as she worked.

“You don’t go anywhere else without me,” he reminded her gruffly.
 

“Hey, I’ve had this place for over a year. And today the area’s crawling with heroes.” Kiri waved her hand airily at the open bar across the concourse, where a trio of InterGalactic Space Forces pilots sat with mugs of ale. One of them smiled at Kiri, and his companions turned to look. She smiled back, because the pilots might come over and buy a coffee after they were finished drinking. She wished Rak would stop the lecturing. He was creeping her out, and she had a business to run.

Rak was not finished. “There are no nice areas on this damn planet, ‘specially not in this old area of the port. And with all the rioting, you never know. Slavers have been sniffing around, too.”

“I know they have, believe me. I’ll be fine here.” Kiri opened her refrigerator unit to check on her supply of soy creamer. Good, she had some vanilla, some sweetnut, and even gremel fruit. She didn’t understand how anyone could put fruit flavor in their coffee, but it sold, so she kept it on hand.

Straightening, Kiri waved a cheerful hand around her stand, showing that she had her coffee machine running, and she was ready to work. “You want a coffee?” she asked. “My new stuff is pretty good. Bet you like sweetnut creamer.”

“Drink my coffee black.”

“Got it.” She poured him a large cup, snapped cover on and handed it over.

“Thanks. How much?”

She gave him a look. “No charge for my fight instructor.”

He didn’t smile, but she was sure she saw a slight softening in his weathered face. “Thanks. Stay put.”

Coffee in hand, he stepped on a lift and zipped up to the hoverway. As soon as his gray-clad figure was out of sight, Kiri walked back out onto the concourse with her own coffee and stood out of the way of traffic, under the hoverway.

She sipped her coffee, which was very good, rich and dark, mellowed by the soy creamer. So good, in fact, that for a moment she worried Illyria had somehow mixed up her order and shipped top-grade beans. Then she shook her head. The supplier was too good a businesswoman to make that mistake.
 

She studied her kiosk, imagining the improvements she was going to make. Not too much, but definitely a new holovid sign, larger than the one she had now and with some rich, bright colors. And maybe a new rack for snacks and baked goods, so customers got an eyeful of irresistible confections.

To the left of her kiosk ran a solid wall, with port infrastructure behind it. On the right an empty shop, larger than hers, was closed and barred. If only the space had a business in it that would attract more customers to stop, shop and then have a coffee.

Perhaps if her upgrade was successful, another business would be attracted to the area. She caught a glimpse of movement in the shadowed depths of the space and paused to watch. Starry, maybe someone was looking it over now. Weird they didn’t have the lights on, though.