Double Down

Double Down

Katie Porter

Samhain Publishing (2012)

Desire as reckless as a fighter jet in freefall...and just as dangerous.

Vegas Top Guns, Book 1

As part of the 64th Aggressor Squadron, Major Ryan "Fang" Haverty flies like the enemy to teach Allied pilots how not to die. The glittering excess of the Strip can't compare to the glowing jet engines of his F-16. But a sexy, redheaded waitress in seamed stockings? Now
she
gets his blood pumping.

Cassandra Whitman's good-girl ways haven't earned any slack from her manager ex-boyfriend, or prevented a bad case of frazzle from holding down two and a half jobs. She sure wouldn't mind letting the handsome Southern charmer shake up her routine.

Their wild weekend lives up to Sin City's reputation. Especially when they discover a matched passion for roleplaying. For Cass, it's an exciting departure from her normal, shy persona. But for Ryan, it triggers memories of a time when his fetish drove away the woman he loved--leaving him reluctant to risk a repeat performance.

Except Cass refuses to settle for ordinary ever again. She's about to show the man with hair-trigger hands that she's got a few surprise moves of her own.

Warning: This book contains dirty-hot roleplaying, featuring an all-alpha fighter pilot and an ambitious waitress with a fabulous imagination. Also: dressing-room sex, a plaid schoolgirl skirt, and a sprinkling of spankings.

Review

"The writing duo that is Katie Porter knows erotica. From the first sentence, you'll be drawn into the glamour of Las Vegas and the wonderful, yet sensitive, world of Ryan and Cassandra." ~
RT BookReviews
4 1/2 Star Top PIck

"Readers who are looking for handsome pilots and long, fun-filled nights will love this descriptive e-book. It is fun and sassy hotness--a quick read sure to get your jets off!" ~
Library Journal

"In the 'Vegas Top Gun' books, each couple indulges in extremely hot sex right at the beginning, and the tension comes from their emotional journeys, not from sexual anticipation." ~ Alpha Heroes

From the Author

The 64th Aggressor Squadron is an active United States Air Force unit assigned to the 57th Adversary Tactics Group, stationed at Nellis Air Force Base in Las Vegas, Nevada. The pilots' objectives are as we've described: to fly as adversaries against allied pilots from around the world, teaching them to better counter enemy tactics.

The 64th and other "bandits" from the 57th ATG regularly conduct dogfighting simulations in the United States, known as Red Flags, and Maple Flag exercises in conjunction with Canadian Forces. We enjoy assuming that at least one of these dedicated, highly skilled bandits appreciates seamed stockings.

PRINT VERSION: Release date June 4, 2013

Check out a free bonus scene on Smashwords! Smashwords.com/books/view/208086

Dedication

To JD & AA

Saving puppies

Acknowledgments

We deeply appreciate our families’ unflagging support. Credit for much of our sanity is owed to the Group That Shall Not Be Named. The feedback Rhianna Schoonover offered on an early draft was invaluable. Thank you for your time and input! In addition, we offer thanks to Sarah Frantz, Rowan Larke, Zoe Archer, Andrea Hodapp, Patti Ann Colt and Kelly Schaub for their friendship, and to Kevan Lyon and Sasha Knight for their amazing enthusiasm.

Chapter One

Seamed stockings. The waitress was wearing seamed stockings.

Major Ryan Haverty groped blindly for his glass since he couldn’t seem to drag his gaze away from those long, slender legs and the stockings clinging to every sleek inch. The cool wash of beer didn’t do much to clear his head. When the woman’s legs slipped out of view behind another table, he still pictured that sheer black and the darker line tracing up the back of each calf. Christ, maybe they were even silk.

She’d been cute as hell even before he realized the bonus she wore. Pixie-like features were topped with huge blue eyes and strawberry-blonde hair twisted along her nape. Something about the quirk of her mouth said she wasn’t as innocent as some might think.

“Yo, Fang.” Captain Jonathan Carlisle waved a hand in front of Ryan’s eyes. “You with us?”

Ryan blinked at the use of his call sign. He’d unconsciously shifted forward in his seat, the better to watch the waitress walk away. He stretched an arm across the leather bench, trying to focus on his friends.

Jon smirked at him before flicking a glance in the direction the woman had gone. “Really, man? A waitress? Hasn’t anyone told you they’re practically paid to flirt with the customers? Tips and all.”

Jon’s words came out rounded in some places and clipped in others—the high-class affect of Massachusetts. No surprise since the guy came from money. Buckets of it. He didn’t play up the fact, but he was the reason they were sitting in Blakely’s Steakhouse, a tiny family-owned joint. If not for Jon, neither Ryan nor their third friend, Captain Leah Girardi, would have ever heard of it.

The dining area was barely bigger than Ryan’s small apartment, but it was lux. Light shone from frosted-glass wall sconces, and every table was blanketed by white linen. Were it not for formal Air Force events, he wouldn’t have known what to do with the multiple heavy silver forks at each setting. The atmosphere had a softened white-noise effect, muting conversations from the other diners.

The meal itself had been amazing, as evidenced by the scatter of plates between them, which had been all but licked clean of food. Hell, there’d been a time in his childhood when Ryan wouldn’t have hesitated to swipe up the last bits of rib-eye juices with his bare fingers. He hadn’t eaten a steak that tender and flavorful until his twenty-fourth birthday, home from his first deployment and living large in New York.

“Wait, the waitress? Fang has a thing for her?” Leah twisted around in her seat. “Where’d she go?”

Ryan quirked his brows. “What are you going to do? Pass her a note that says I like her?”

Leah flipped around and flashed a manic smile. Her hair was pulled straight back in a slick ponytail. “So you
do
like her.”

He couldn’t help but roll his eyes, but just a minute amount. Any more and he might have to give up his balls. “Princess,” he said, using her call sign, “sometimes you sound more like a ninth grader than a fighter pilot.”

She stuck her tongue out at him.

Jon laughed. “Careful, little girl, or someone’ll put that tongue where you aren’t expecting.”

Leah slugged him in the shoulder. Despite being scrappy and wiry, the other pilot didn’t even budge, and Ryan knew from experience that Leah could hit hard when she wanted. “Ryan and I have already been there, done that. Wasn’t worth T-shirts.”

“Never say,” Jon mocked, turning his pretty-boy features into a caricature of surprise. “Our waitress is going to be disappointed?”

“The problem wasn’t the sex,” Leah said. The woman had barely even a promise of tact. “We were too wound tight for each other. Two type-A’s in a relationship is a very bad thing.”

“Anyway, she’s no one’s waitress anyhow.” Ryan stretched his legs to the side as cover for searching her out again. The booth really was too small for him—one of the perils of being a couple inches over six feet tall.

There she was, near the swinging wooden doors to the kitchen. Though clad in the same charcoal-gray skirt as the other waitress, she wore it with entirely more grace over her sleek curves. The plain white blouse did him a huge favor and clung to her small breasts.

Some short, rat-faced man had taken her by the elbow, and neither of them looked too happy. Red flushed across her rounded cheeks. Her pretty pink mouth twisted.

Ryan’s hands fisted below the table. Those lips were meant for much more fun tasks than spitting words at a pinched asshole.

When she walked back toward Ryan’s table, she smoothed her features into the genial friendliness required of servers. The skin around her eyes remained tight.

A hard swallow contorted her graceful throat as she set the leather check-holder on the table. Somehow she still managed to dredge up a smile. “Here you go.”

Ryan grabbed the rectangular folder and flipped it open. His eyes bulged. For God’s sake, the bill was almost a third what he spent on rent, and more than the monthly mortgage his mom had paid for their trailer when he was growing up.

With a fast display of dimples, Jon snagged it from Ryan’s grip. “My choice. My treat. Go back to chatting her up.”

Ryan resisted the urge to tell him to shove it. “Fine, but I’ll get the tip.”

“I hope you were happy with your meal,” the waitress said.

“Everything was wonderful.” The smile he flashed was the same one that had talked his seventh-grade gym teacher, Miss Pavers, into ignoring the fact he hadn’t dressed out for a week. It was difficult to find clean gym clothes when his mom hadn’t gotten off the couch in almost a month. He ignored the kick Leah aimed at his shins beneath the tablecloth. “Especially the service.”

The woman’s eyebrows went up. “Does that line work for you often?”

“See now, there’s no way I can answer that,” he said with a laugh. “If I tell you no, it’ll just confirm what you think. If I tell you the truth, that I’ve never tried it before, you’ll never believe me.”

She gave a mock pout and shook her head. “That certainly is a difficult dilemma. I’m not sure you can recover at this point.”

“Be careful,” Jon said as he took the check and slipped a credit card inside. “At this rate you’re going to make yourself a challenge. There’s nothing Ryan here likes more than a challenge.”

Leah smothered a laugh, making it Ryan’s turn to kick at her.

“Ryan? That’s your name?”

“Ryan Haverty.” He stuck his hand out and nodded to her name tag. “And you’re Cassandra, right?”

She put her hand in his with a curt nod. An electric tingle worked its way up to his shoulder. Her fingers were slender and graceful and so smooth that he could imagine them wrapped around his cock. He practically twitched in his slacks.

Cassandra nibbled at her bottom lip. The blue of her eyes shifted darker. “Any relationship to Joseph Patrick Haverty?”

“Not a clue who that is.”

She pulled her hand back as she chuckled. “It was a joke. Mostly. He was a painter.” She gave an abbreviated wave, as if to brush away her words. She picked up the check. “It’s no big deal.”

“Cass,” said a voice with a distinct whine. The man Cassandra had been talking with near the kitchen doors approached the table. He wore a suit coat that did nothing to conceal his narrow shoulders. His eyes were amazingly beady. Ryan was surprised he could see at all. “Excuse me, gentlemen,” he said to Ryan and patted Jon on the shoulder.

Ryan was surprised he didn’t draw back a stump. Jon, call sign Tin Tin, might be something of a pretty boy—especially with his goddamn dimples and faux-innocent smirk. The guy had a ruthless side that was only more intimidating for its coldly mechanical streak. Ryan was willing to have him on his wing anywhere, anytime.

After a quick glance over Leah that spent entirely too long on her rack, the man tagged on a, “Miss.”

Leah only raised her eyebrows, thank God. She could be a bit reckless at times.

The guy Ryan presumed was the manager returned his attention to Cassandra and tugged her to the back of the room. There was no mistaking their antagonistic body language. The guy hovered over Cassandra while she kept her face averted. Ryan probably shouldn’t have been able to listen in, but he’d always had excellent hearing. And he was very interested in the conversation’s outcome.

“Why are we out of napkins, Cass?”

“I don’t know, Tommy.” She rolled her eyes before facing her menace. “Probably because it’s not my job to order them.”

“You’ve been taking care of it for the last six months.”

Her smile only got bigger, but it took on a brittle edge. “Let’s not do this in the front of the diners.”

“I tried, but you’re the one who leaves the prep area every time I walk in.”

“Fine,” Cassandra said in a saccharine tone. “I stopped ordering the napkins when you dumped me and took up with Cynthia. How about you ask her to take on that duty?”

After gesturing to the dishwater blonde taking an order at the other end of the room, she stalked back to Ryan. Her eyes sparkled with an amusement that invited him to join in. She wiggled the black leather case with Jon’s credit card inside. “I’ll be back in a minute with this.”

The dickweed followed her to the back of the restaurant, unfortunately obscuring Ryan’s view of both her sweet ass and those sexy stockings.

Jon laughed and shook his head. “It’s my card in there, but she tells you that she’ll be back. Maybe you’ve got a shot after all.”