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49

CONOR

While date nights with Star always ended with a bang, they were definitely outside of my comfort zone.

The ones that I didn’t plan, at any rate.

The first with her at the wheel was a soccer match, the second, a nightclub when I goddamn loathed techno music, and then there was tonight.

We were attending the opera.

The fucking opera.

My rock-loving self was going to watch Carmen at the Met when I’d prefer to stick pins in my eyes.

The woman had better know how much I goddamn loved her.

I wasn’t about to argue, not after surviving our first period together with my head intact, and especially not knowing how the date would end, but still, the fucking opera?

When I tugged on my bow tie for the twentieth time since she’d collected me from the Saturns’ stadium where my brothers and I had been talking strategy for the last few hours, she grabbed my hand, dragged it to my side, then quipped, “You’re worse than Kat on school picture day.”

My nose crinkled. “When was the last time I wore a tux, do you think?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Your communion?”

I grinned. “I’m not that bad. I think it was Eoghan’s wedding. Savannah might have been a bridezilla but she didn’t make me wear a bow tie for more than the photos.”

“And now she’s earned your undying loyalty?” The twinkle in her eye told me she wasn’t unhappy about that.

“I like her. She’s a freak so I’m comfortable with her. Plus, she makes Aidan happy.”

Her gloved fingers swiped across my jawline. Some men might have preferred the silk against their skin, but I preferred Star’s calluses. She wore her history in her hands, on her palms, and I preferred her at her most raw.

“You’re a sucker for family.”

The tender touch and the mocking words were discordant, but I smirked anyway. “And you like me so that means you’re a sucker too.”

She snorted. “The logic is far-reaching but I’ll accept it.”

When she shifted in her seat, I said nothing, well aware that in these moments leading up to our ‘dates,’ she turned inward. Becoming somber.

It made sense. The past and present were colliding for her, and that required some mental skulduggery on her part.

I’d have left her to her process, knowing full well that it was integral to her healing, but even seeing her in a fucking cocktail dress with killer heels wasn’t worth this torture.

I growled under my breath a final time as I dragged the ends of the bow tie and freed myself from its chokehold.

“I’ve felt more comfortable garrotes,” I grumbled.

“Do I want to know how you know how ‘comfortable’ a garrote is?”

“Da left things around the house that he shouldn’t have,” was my retort as I tugged on my collar. Which, now that I thought about it… “My shirt’s tighter.”

“And?”

“It’s not the bow tie. It’s the shirt!” Jerking my neck to the side, I heaved a sigh. “This is your fault.”

“How is it my fault?” she spluttered.

I stuck my hand in front of her face and started counting. “One, I’m happy.”

“And that’s a bad thing?”

I ignored her. “Two, I’m eating regularly.”

“I repeat, that’s a bad thing?”

“Three, Kat always wants to eat junk food after gym class. Ergo, all your fault.”

She sniffed and shoved my hand away. “You’re not gaining weight.”

“My shirt is too small.”

“No, it fits. You were skinny before. Now you have meat on top of the muscle.”

My brow puckered. “I wasn’t skinny.”

“You didn’t eat for hours,” she argued. “Then, you’d eat a steak and apple pie in ten minutes! That’s not healthy. That’s binge eating.”

“I take it back about liking Savannah. This is her fault, isn’t it?”

A soft laugh drifted from her. “No, it’s not actually, but she did make me realize you eat like a bougie college student. And when you’re hacking, you live off Coke and candy, Conor.”

“There’s nothing wrong with that. It’s not cocaine. Anyway, you live off candy too.”

“I do. But I eat green things as side dishes.”

“Only because of Kat. She’d never let you get away with making her eat green things if you didn’t too.”

“Exactly. That’s the compromise of being a parent.”

I blinked. “Negotiation?”

“Yup. You’re still new to the game so you’re rusty. But you’ll get used to it.”

As Craig, one of my crew, drove us toward Fifth Avenue, I asked, “Okay, so when she wants hot dogs?—”

“You make her drink water. Or milk. Or juice. No soda. And later, you make sure she eats something healthy.” She shrugged. “It’s not like you need to know this. I mean, I handle it.”

“No, I’m…” I coughed. “I mean, I want to know. I need to know. That’s what being a dad is, right? Being responsible?”

Her head tilted to the side and the lights from the traffic illuminated her expression. “She told me about your conversation.”

“Which one? We talk a lot.”

If I sounded proud, so be it. Much like her mother, Kat was a tough nut to crack, but I’d cracked that shell which meant I knew too much about Camden and the ins and outs of floor work in gymnastics.

“About wanting to call me Mom and, once we’re hitched, you Dad.”

“She hasn’t called you that yet, has she?”

“No.” She peeped at me. “Thank you for letting her open up with you.”

“You don’t have to thank me for that,” I grumbled, unfastening my top button for good measure.

“I think you’ll find that I do. I never talked to you about being her father figure, just kind of threw you into the ring, and you’ve shown up more than I could have anticipated."

“I already told you that I knew you came as a package, Star, and I never wanted anything else.” I cleared my throat. “I couldn’t imagine myself having kids, so I feel pretty blessed, to be honest.”

“Why not?”

“They’re a lot of responsibility, they’re fragile and easy to break, and the psychoses you can impart on them…” I whistled under my breath.

“So, it was less about you and more about them?”

I shrugged.

“Even before we met in person, I knew you had it in you to be a great father.”

“Why?”

“Because of how important family is to you. Your main goal in life is to keep your siblings alive?—”

“That just means I’m a neurotic wreck,” I dismissed.

“If you were a regular Joe whose brothers worked in white-collar jobs, sure. But they’re not. So you’re not. You’re appropriately and adequately anxious about their welfare.”

I snorted. “Thanks, I think?”

She chuckled. “No ‘I think’ about it. It’s the truth. But that was before we met, and now, just seeing you with her has confirmed it.”

She stunned me by reaching forward and pressing her lips to mine in a soft kiss.

In fact, it was softer than soft. It was loving and loaded with (entirely unnecessary) gratitude. It was gentle and warm and everything my abrasively abrupt Star usually wasn’t.

“In the future—” I whispered against her mouth as she began to pull back. “—you can thank me like that every time.”

When she chuckled, we settled in for the ride. Her hand knotted with mine.

Ten minutes later, and knowing we were approaching Midtown, I asked, “Truth time?”

She swallowed. “I’d tried to run off the week before. I was beaten black and blue and he made me attend with no makeup.”

My eyes flashed at that. “Are you being serious? Did nobody say anything?”

“It was a power move on his part. That’s how rich I am. ” She huffed out a laugh. “I was grateful for the money once he was dead. Do you want to know why he bought me?”

Fuck, what a question.

I cleared my throat. “Hit me with it.”

“I sprained his dick.”

“You, what?” I couldn’t stop myself from laughing. “You go, girl.”

“He was into that.” My laughter faded as she continued, “He’d anger me until I reacted. He’d starve me if I wouldn’t obey. Then, when I grew too compliant or if I was just so fucking lost that I didn’t care if I never ate or slept again, he’d give me a whisper of a chance at hope.”

“He let you think you could escape?”

“I fell for it. Every. Fucking. Time.”

“You were desperate.”

“I was.” Her fingers separated from mine and they drifted along my chin. “I’m desperate for other things now.”

I arched a brow. "Orgasms?"

She smirked. "What can I say? You've made a believer out of me."

Sensing the change in her, and needing to taste that cocky smirk, I slipped my hand behind her nape and dragged her into me.

Her lips parted again in a silent request for a deeper kiss, which I was eager to give, eager to free her from the taint of that fucker, eager to help her take back control over this part of her past.

She groaned as I thrust my tongue against hers, taking everything she had to give and returning it threefold, needing her to understand that I was more than just ‘all in.’

She goddamn owned me.

As much as she was mine, I was fucking hers.

When she groaned, deep and low in her throat, I felt it inside my bones.

With a tender trail of my finger, one that was in sharp relief to the hunger of my kiss, I traced the sweetheart neckline of her dress and followed it to its natural end. Soft goosebumps on the tops of her breasts made an appearance as she reacted viscerally to my touch.

In a flurry of activity, she surprised me by dragging her skirts to the side, swooping them over her arm so she had more freedom of movement.

As she straddled me, her mouth retreated so she could mutter against my lips, “This was supposed to happen in the opera box, but fuck that. I want you. Now .”

That in itself was proof of healing, but I didn’t say that, didn’t even have a chance to think it because she was pulling down the neckline of her dress and her tits were spilling out.

I studied her delicious curves in the twinkling street lamps that provided us with a faint illumination through the tinted back windows.

“You are so fucking beautiful,” I rumbled, dropping kisses along the soft swells before nipping here and there in the run-up to the main event.

When my lips found her nipple, I tugged the tip between my teeth, rolling it over the edges, then I lashed it with my tongue.

A shaky sigh rushed from her as her nails dragged over my scalp. She hauled me deeper into her, snapping, “Don’t tease me, Conor!”

Smugly, I tested the resilience of her nipples with a soft bite. Meanwhile, my hands were busy. I slipped one along the inner length of her thigh until I found the outer edge of the crotch of her panties.

As she hissed in response to my bite, I nipped harder, enjoying how her hiss morphed into a long, low moan when my fingers stroked the fabric that shielded her.

Sliding my thumb over her clit, rubbing it back and forth, her knees tightened around my thighs and she wriggled farther down my lap.

“Now, Conor, now,” she rasped with no small amount of urgency.

I plucked at the crotch of her panties, pulling it away from her pussy and stroking my thumb down the line of her slit.

As her slippery juices coated the digit, I groaned around her nipple, biting down when I thrust it inside her and felt her inner muscles clench down hungrily in response.

Her nails dug into my scalp one final time before they were between us, sliding over my tuxedo jacket, over the starched front of my studded shirt, and down to the fly.

When she went straight for the zipper, not even bothering to cup me, I grinned in delight as she freed me from the cage of my pants.

After gracing me with a single stroke of my cock, she decided that enough was enough because, before I had the chance to savor her touch, she was bucking onto her knees, dislodging my mouth from her tit, and moving ever nearer so that when she seated herself on my lap again, my dick fell against her slit.

That was my cue to take control.

With one hand holding her panties to the side, I rubbed the tip of my dick over her clit, rasping, “Rock your hips, my Star.” With a soft cry, she obeyed, and I whispered, “You have no idea how gorgeous you are. You light up my fucking life and you don’t even know it, my beautiful, beautiful girl.”

The rocking of her hips increased in its pace until she was breathing heavily. Her arms settled on my shoulders for better traction, and I felt her working her way up, and up, and up.

She was close.

I knew she was.

It was getting easier for her to come, more proof of her healing.

“I am so goddamn proud of you,” I whispered as I tilted her chin down so I could kiss her again.

As I swallowed her moan, I let my dick trace down her slit and encouraged her to pause as I fed the tip into her. When she took me, slowly, inch by inch, we groaned into each other’s mouths.

Gravity helped settle her around me, as did the natural rocking of the car as we drove over a pothole. Thanking fuck for how goddamn slow traffic was in Manhattan, I gripped her outer thighs and encouraged her to ride me.

She was frantic—all jerky, rocky movements as she tried to find her release. Then, I ran the outer edge of my thumb over her clit and she bucked on top of me, stilling, freezing, imploding around me.

The suddenness stunned me, but I urged her on, not for myself, just so that she could ride out the pleasure, wanting it to flood her, needing it to overwhelm her. Needing to give that to her when she gave me so fucking much, more than she even knew.

When her pussy stopped clutching at me, that was when I moved faster. Bucking from underneath, taking my own pleasure now that hers was complete.

As I exploded into her, she cupped my face and started kissing me. Her hunger for me as powerful as ever.

Coming down was painful but only because the high was so sharp, so fucking sweet.

When she sagged into me and started dotting kisses on my forehead, at the corners of my mouth, and on my chin, I whispered, “What are you doing?”

“Showing you.”

My brows lifted. “What are you showing me?”

But even as I asked the question, I already knew the answer.

“How much I love you.”

Slipping my arms around her waist, I hugged her hard, burying my face into her chest, loving her and needing her and feeling so fucking happy that I didn’t even care about the tux or Carmen or two hours of opera torture anymore.

With her tits smothering me, I mumbled, “I’ll wear the bow tie.”

Her laughter was soft, tinkling. So unlike Star that it was as if I had another woman on my lap. But it wasn’t. It was her.

Mine.

Always fucking mine.

“How do you manage to make everything better?” she whispered, her fingers stroking over my hair.

Another woman and I’d have retreated. Cringed . Instead, I burrowed into her touch. “I don’t.”

“Lies.”

“Do you have a game plan for the aftermath of this?”

“I’m wearing panties, plus my skirt is long and black and lined.”

“I don’t want to ruin the dress. I haven’t even seen you in it. Plus, it’ll be my pants that are ruined, not your skirts.”

“Not ruined. Maybe it’ll make it better.”

I laughed. “Depends on what your idea of fashion is, I guess.”

“You could set a trend.” Her nose nuzzled into mine. “Do you care if people know what we’ve been doing?”

“Not really.”

“Then, what’s the problem?”

“No problem,” I said with a sigh as she snagged my white handkerchief from my top pocket and quickly shimmied me out of her then pressed the folded fabric between her legs, tucking her panties back into place.

“There, no stains,” she crowed as she zipped me up.

When she didn’t shuffle off my lap, I settled my hands tighter around her waist and asked, “How do you feel?”

“Like I had an orgasm.”

“You know what I mean,” I chided softly, tracing soft kisses along the sinews of her throat.

“You don’t normally ask.”

“You don’t normally jump on me before you hit the scene of the crime.”

“Fair,” she mumbled, arching her throat to the side to give me better access.

“It always surprises me how you were mistreated in public.”

“Because I didn’t act out? Didn’t rebel to liberate myself?”

“Partially that, but partially the fact that no one helped you.”

“I didn’t have a label on my forehead that said ‘sex slave,’” she countered. “And it wasn’t like that.”

“What was it like?” I questioned gently.

“Do we have to talk about this?”

“I think it’d be good for you. Good for me too. Katina is starting to see a shrink, but we never bothered to find ourselves one. Maybe we can be that for each other.” Oddly nervous, I hitched a shoulder. “Just an idea.”

“You won’t like what you hear.”

“Do you think you’ll enjoy hearing why I disliked having my hair pulled before you?”

She tensed. “No.”

“We both have parts of our pasts that will be painful to share, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t talk about them if we need to talk about them.”

“I’m sorry I keep stroking your hair.”

I clucked my tongue. “I didn’t say that to make you self-conscious. I meant it when I said before you.”

“Why am I different? And don’t say because I’m your penguin.”

“Because you’re my person, Star. The one I’ll always let in when I lock everyone else out.”

She took her sweet time before saying anything, as if weighing the meaning of what I had just told her.

Eventually, she mumbled, “When I was with Hans, among other passive-aggressive moves, he’d control me through food.”

I stilled. “What? He starved you?”

“Gave me food for good behavior. Denied me food for bad. I was so accustomed to having my appetite controlled that it was a miracle he managed to get me pregnant in the first place.

"For the first year or so, I was always underweight. To the point where I was skin and bones.”

Hatred for her fucker of an ex-husband filled me. “If I could electrocute him to death, I would.”

“But then, you’d have denied me the fun of stringing him up,” she said lightly, her fingers automatically moving toward my head where I knew she was going to play with my hair. She paused, though, as if she remembered…

I snagged her hand in mine and plunked it on my head. “ You can play with my hair. No one else. Only you.”

She swallowed. “Are you sure?”

“Of course.”

“Did he force you to…”

“Blow him? Yeah. Used to pull on my hair until I did as I was told.” My tone was free from bitterness, mostly because I’d come to terms with what had happened a long time ago. Well, as much as a person could. “You’ve never triggered me,” I told her candidly.

“I’m glad,” she whispered, hugging me to her.

“Me too,” I said, leaning up to kiss her. “What happened at the opera?”

“He used to like offering me freedom.”

My brow furrowed as I thought about the dates we’d been on. “What does that mean?” I asked when I couldn’t make sense of what she said.

“It means when we were in public, he’d fuck me over or beside balconies so that I could throw myself over if I wanted.”

“That was his idea of freedom?” I rumbled.

Death.

That had been how he'd told her that was her only way out.

“Trust me, some days, it felt like it could be.”

“What stopped you?”

“I wish I knew. Sometimes, it was sheer obstinacy. Killing myself felt too much like letting him win.”

“Thank Christ for your obstinate self.”

She chuckled.

“We didn’t fuck in the opera box,” I pointed out.

“We didn’t, but I didn’t need to either. I wanted you here, now . That felt liberating too.”

“I’m glad.”

“Me too.” Star cleared her throat. “Who’d have thought the O’Donnellys had a box at the opera?”

“You can thank Declan for that.” I cupped her chin and angled her head down. As I brushed my lips over hers, I whispered, “Thank you for sharing that with me.”

She swallowed. “Thank you for listening.”

So long as she was the one doing the talking, I’d always listen. But only time would prove that to someone who’d gone through what she had, and in my mind, we had forever.

Somehow, not even that felt long enough.