Read Creed of Pleasure; the Space Miner's Concubine (The LodeStar Series) for Free Online

khaki utility pants had been spared, so he cleaned his hands with gel and walked barefoot back out into the foyer.  
    While he waited for his mystery visitor, he linked the man who could illuminate the situation. His big brother, Logan Stark. Self-made man, owner of his own space cruise fleet and numerous other businesses including a share in Creed’s irridium mine. Space magnate, head of LodeStar Enterprises, and master manipulator.
    As long as he could recall, Creed had watched with admiration, increasingly mingled with exasperation, as Logan played beings like chess pieces. The man had a genius for getting events to turn out the way he wanted, because he had a genius for getting the beings involved to do what he wanted them to do. Logan didn’t know much about his ancestry, but Creed wouldn’t be surprised to learn his adopted brother had some Indigon blood.
    He was not above playing his own brothers, either. For their own good, of course. Usually Creed was merely irritated. If what he now suspected was true, he was ready to shoot straight back into the same anger that had sent him storming out of the mine today instead of methodically loading droids and supplies. Except that it might land him in another mess.
    Stark’s face appeared before him in holovid. Handsome, urbane, relaxed, lamplight gleaming on his short brown hair. In a rustic lodge, so probably still at the Masterson place in New Haven.
    “Creed,” Stark said. “How are you?”
    “Puzzled,” Creed said dryly. “Any idea why one of your pilots thought she was supposed to deliver a female here to LodeStone?”
    Stark merely smiled. “She’s there. Good. She’s a gift.”
    Creed’s eyes narrowed, his brows shot up. “Come again?”
    His older brother took a sip of his drink and fingered the glass, watching Creed. “For you. A courtesan.”
    Creed’s head went back, his body tightened. “You sent me a whore ?”
    It was then that he saw movement from the edge of his vision. His gaze snapped right. The blonde was watching him from the hallway. She had one hand braced on the corner of the wall, her gaze fastened on him. She was still, but he’d seen her flinch of distress. She’d heard him, hadn’t liked what she’d heard. Hadn’t liked it at all.
    “Taara’s not a whore,” Stark corrected him. “She’s a very high-class courtesan. There’s a galaxy of difference, Creed.”
    Creed heard him, but he didn’t look away from the blonde. Couldn’t look away.  
    “Not really,” he muttered.
    She was beautiful. Even with her face pale, hair tousled, expression closed and wary, she was female sensuality personified. Under her curtain of pale blonde hair, her face was heart-shaped, with big, tilted green eyes, short straight nose and a mouth that was sweetly curved, even when she was biting it, sucking one side of her lower lip between her teeth. Maybe especially then.  
    The little motion was a tell. She might not expect warmth from him—that was good, because he was not ready to give it—but she definitely had emotions of her own. She was real.
    “Of course there’s a difference. She’s trained in the sensual arts, but she’s also a lady. And, don’t worry, she knows better than to expect any emotional involvement,” Stark went on relentlessly. “You’re a man in your prime, yet you live in a world populated by mine techs. You’ve no females around, except a few employees—whom I’ve seen and who are not enticing—and another man’s wife. You won’t come to the city to meet any women, so I’ve sent one to you.”
    Creed’s gaze drifted down, over a slender frame clad only in a strappy little red dress that revealed the curves beneath. High, round breasts, a small waist and those round, lush hips tapering into slender legs that went on forever. Small feet in red sandals that revealed manicured toes.  
    Toes that were currently curling, digging into her sandals so hard they were white with pressure. Another tell.
    His gaze