Lara and the City of Angels (10 page)

Kristian walked back into the living room carrying two glasses of wine and an open bottle he set on a coaster on the table. He quickly pulled out coasters for their wine glasses before he handed her one. “I hope you love Pinot Grigio. It’s my favorite summer wine and the only white wine I drink.”

“I adore it or haven’t you noticed yet?” Lara questioned in a light-hearted manner. “I hate some men think just because I am a woman, I must love those sugary sweet shit wines like White Zinfandel or Muscato. This is definitely the life: enjoying a glass of wine with a very sexy man well past my bedtime in such a gothic environment. I still can’t believe this is now my life.”

He sat next to her so they could cuddle together while they both sat up on the sofa. He slipped her lean legs over his thighs as he began to massage her feet. “I never thought I would ever have you here. I mean, in my house and on the sofa the way you are now. I knew you were sad—don’t get me wrong—but so many marriages are unhappy so that meant nothing.”

“True but it means something to me because despite all the hardships my parents have gone through, they truly love one another. There is mutual respect and they care about the other the way Sean can’t possibly fathom. He’s always been selfish. Everything revolves around him and his career. Well, I am sick of the bullshit.”

Kristian gazed in her direction with those seductive blue eyes of his that contained more gray than blue at that moment. “This is the most relaxed I have seen you since you have been here. So, tell me about this husband of yours and why you are divorcing him. I don’t want to hear all the superlatives about how talented and amazing he is, rather I want to hear why he can’t seem to make you happy.”

Lara downed her glass of Pinot Grigio as if it had been a cheap glass of wine and she studied her empty glass before she set it on the coaster in front of her on the magazine table. “Well our sex life is a huge issue. I don’t mean to sound like a raging nymphomaniac but I do believe four years is too long of a time to go without sex.”

His priceless expression said it all. “Four
years
? You haven’t made love to your husband in that length of time? How are you still sane?”

“I do believe you mentioned something earlier about swinger’s parties for the rich and famous? Meet one of the members of that ultra-secret club. That’s why I didn’t want to discuss it when you brought it up today—well, technically, yesterday as we are already on a new day.”

“So it’s true.” Kristian finished his wine before he poured the remainder of what was in the bottle by dividing it between the two of them.

“Excuse me? You mean you already knew?”

“Dominic mentioned Sean was part of it but I couldn’t believe it and thought he was joking. I mean, everyone in the industry knows your husband likes to play for both teams but I assumed he was a bit more…discrete.”

“What do you mean when you say everyone in the industry?” Lara’s heart began to pound so hard, she heard it thundering in her ears. She suddenly felt like she was in a wind tunnel she could never escape.

Would this information get back to her parents and what would they say? Sure they did it but they wouldn’t exactly want to know about what their daughter was up to in such a sordid, sleazy manner. No matter how cut and dried the situation seemed, it wasn’t a controversy they had any wish to handle.

“Calm down,” Kristian said as he reached out and touched her crimson-colored face. “I don’t mean everyone, I merely meant the people in our circle. They would never tell, not if they want to keep their careers. I certainly didn’t mean the old fogies in the industry or the vapid youth who are so-called actors with little to no talent, barely attractive and are nothing but drunks and drug addicts. The ‘Lindsay Lohan crowd’—as I refer to them—are firmly in the ‘not knowing’ camp.”

“Uh oh, don’t let Ms. Lohan hear that or she might sue you the way she did Pitbull,” Lara responded before she laughed out loud. “In all seriousness, it was Sean’s idea and I was so sex-starved at the time, I was willing to do anything to at least ensure I got laid every now and then. It’s a small group of us and we are now intimately familiar with one another but it still felt like empty sex. I suppose the other couples have active, healthy relationships with their spouses so it was a bit of fun on the side for them.

“I mean, let’s face it. Forever is a long time with one person but what if you love that person and you don’t want to divorce? It was the perfect way to have your cake and eat it too. Unfortunately for me, it was the only time I ever really experienced intimacy but it wasn’t very fulfilling. I didn’t want anyone but Sean’s touch and he denied me because he could. He knew there was nothing I could do. My parents love him and think he is the best thing since the invention of pre-sliced hamburger buns. He can be highly manipulative but that just comes from his upbringing. You don’t survive a place like Charlestown without becoming highly cunning and manipulative.”

Kristian sat up and slipped his arms around her. “I am here for you and I don’t judge you. It’s hard being married to someone who demands so much out of you but doesn’t bother to give anything back in return. I am so very sorry to hear you suffered through this experience and if I could kiss the pain away, I would.”

Lara smiled and pressed her lips against his. It was a bold move on her part but the Pinot Grigio had given her nerves of steel. She only hoped he didn’t reject her outright as that would have been terrible.

He didn’t, he surrendered to her kiss and his delicious tongue with notes of citrus from the Pinot Grigio caressed hers. She felt heady and like a teenager as he wrapped his arms around hers and pulled her closer to him.

This is what she had been missing: genuine intimacy with another person. There was nothing remotely rehearsed in his actions and better yet, he made her feel like a real woman who was beautiful, desirable and
wanted
.

Kristian’s kisses lead down her neck and she threw herself back onto the sofa as he settled between her legs and slowly began to slip the baby doll top down. Underneath, she wore a black lace bra and his fingers teased her nipples through the material with aching and slow pressure as he continue to devour her mouth with his own.

Lara threw her head back and his mouth dipped down to her exposed throat. She felt every part of his mouth, so warm and inviting at the pulse point of her neck as he licked the spot and she burst into giggles.

“Did you forget I only play a vampire on television?” Kristian inquired.

She stared at him with lustful green eyes before she shook her head. “I know you are flesh and blood, and completely human. I look forward to you devouring every inch of me.”

His expression changed from cheerful to weary. “Then I should tell you I am a true gentleman and I won’t take you on the sofa like a horny teenager. Let’s go upstairs where there is a real bed and we can really enjoy ourselves.”

He stood and held his right hand out to reach one of hers.

She grabbed his hand and he hoisted her off the firm sofa with enough force to pull her into his inviting embrace.

Kristian’s steel blue eyes studied hers. “I want you to know that once we go up those stairs it is going to be very hard for me to let you go. If you are unsure about this then please let me know now because I have never forced myself on any woman and I don’t plan to set the precedence tonight.”

Lara didn’t even have to think despite the heady feeling the expensive Pinot Grigio had caused in her head. “No, I want this…I haven’t wanted something so much in my entire life.”

He nodded his head and they walked up the stairs.

Chapter Ten

L
ara took the steps one at a time but before she could make the second set, Kristian turned her toward him and lifted her baby doll top. He kissed her stomach as his hands worked on the button of her jeans. Once he’d undid it and unzipped, his fingers worked into her panties and gently caressed the swollen nub of her clit with ease.

She moaned out loud as he withdrew his hand and shed her baby doll top there and tossed it over the railing before his fingers caressed her confined breasts again through expensive lace. He slipped the straps down and kissed the gentle peaks of her lightly tanned skin before he revealed her dark rosy nipples.

As she felt his mouth on her right breast while his expert fingers lightly pinched the left, the ecstasy of his caress completely unnerved her.

Lara had no wish for this to be just a clandestine affair on the set of a television show she just happened to guest star on. She desperately wanted and needed this to be real.

Most of her life had been fake for so long, she needed something she could finally hold on to and never let go.

Despite her highly turned on state, she stopped his movements, albeit reluctantly, and glared into his eyes as she held his face in her hands.

“Do you really want to do this with me? I mean…this isn’t some kind of conquest for you is it? I know what a coup it would be to screw Sean Buchanan’s wife but I’m me and I can honestly admit I have fallen hard for you. If this is just some dare my husband set up to have me running back to him then—”

“Lara, don’t be ridiculous.” He caressed her left cheek with his hand as he murmured in a language she assumed was either Danish or Swedish underneath his breath. “I don’t even know Sean, your soon to be ex-husband. I mean, yeah, I have met him at gatherings when I go to Introspect parties but he isn’t a close acquaintance. Dominic is pretty close to him but you should know I am nothing like my
second
cousin. I find his behavior deplorable and believe it is some sort of sexual addition he has and I’ve told him as such.

“Yes, the Stenfeldts’ are my family but I am a decent guy. I have been in one long term relationship and that was Julie. I am a one-woman type of guy and I get nothing out of affairs or conquests. I have wanted you from the moment I saw you struggle with your keys at your rented house. This has nothing to do with what goes on back in Hollywood and everything to do between you and I. A man and a woman who want to get to know one another. I can only hope you mean it when you say you have every intention of divorcing the cheating bastard. I would hate for you to change your mind and leave me on my own.”

Lara shook her head. “That is never going to happen, Kristian, because I am sick of Sean’s bullshit. I can’t live my life that way for a moment longer. I want to be with someone like you. I just hope tonight doesn’t make you feel any less respect for me. Please know my petition for a divorce should be coming through very soon and I already have the whole situation worked out. We were married in Las Vegas at my brother-in-law’s opulent hotel so I filed in the state of Nevada as is my legal right. The divorces there go through much quicker than California—”

Kristian silenced her words with a passionate kiss on her lips. She’d been unaware he’d been inching closer and closer to her as she prattled on about nothing.

He lifted her into his arms and walked them both to his bedroom where he proceeded to flip a switch and bright light immediately illuminated the space.

It was a large suite filled with masculine colors and scents. He sat her down on the bed before he stripped out of his tee shirt. There were several candles all about, all large and three pronged. She immediately noticed they’d never been used before. He walked around lighting them before he slipped off the bright lights that came from a chandelier directly above his bed.

Lara watched him with genuine lust as she struggled to take her jeans off though she left her matching lace thong on; it was quite a turn on to think about him removing it from her dripping sex.

“These candles smell heavenly. You’ll have to take me to the store tomorrow so I can get some for my rented place. They definitely aid in the wholeness of the ambient and romantic environment you’ve created.”

Kristian strode to her like a cunning panther. “These aren’t Bath & Body Works candles, my dear. They were a gift from my sister, Janne, and she bought them in bulk the last time she visited me in California…from Neiman Marcus.”

He silenced any more words from her as his mouth descended upon hers again and their tongues touched in an elicit dance that felt so perfect and right. They were like that, passionately kissing, necking and fondling one another like two horny teenagers before he stopped and sat up.