Touched by Starlight

Kiernan O’Shay, one of the most powerful and richest people in the solar system, dreams of building a light-speed spaceship. She can achieve this goal if she owns all of Stellardyne, a space freighter manufacturing company founded by her late grandmother. To accomplish this, she must meet stipulations in her grandmother’s will that require her to marry and have an heir by her fortieth birthday. Time is running out. Kiernan has a reputation as a ruthless business tycoon letting nothing and no one stand in the way of getting what she wants. And she wants the beautiful and intelligent Ariel Thorsen as her wife and the mother of her child.

Ariel Thorsen is content with her family life and her profession as a college physics professor. She meets Kiernan O’Shay at a dinner celebrating her mother’s promotion to a junior executive in Stellardyne. Ariel is impressed by Kiernan’s interest in physics and spaceships. She also finds Kiernan attractive. One week after the dinner, Kiernan offers monetary wealth to Ariel if she enters into a marriage agreement and bears Kiernan an heir. Ariel is appalled by the offer. She’s not for sale, believing love should bind two people together—not the promise of wealth.

But when Kiernan accuses Ariel’s mother of corporate espionage, Ariel feels she has no choice but to accept Kiernan’s marriage proposal on the condition that no charges are brought against her mother.

Can love grow when trust isn’t in the equation?

Edited and previously published as The Dreamer, Her Angel, and the Stars.