Free Kyle’s Bargain by Katherine Kingston

you going to marry Mr.
Harrison?”
    “ Marry ?” Meg almost dropped the spatula into the pan
of half-cooked scrambled eggs. “Good heavens, hon, I don’t know him nearly well
enough for that.” Really ? She asked herself. “Last night was the first
time I even went out with him. We would have to learn a lot more about each
other before we could think about something like that.”
    Did last night even qualify as a date? It was…mind-boggling,
amazing, thrilling and exciting, and yes, it probably could be called a date.
    “You like him, though, don’t you?”
    Did she? Some aspects of him, certainly. “Yes, I do. But it
takes more than that to get married to someone.”
    “I know. You have to fall in love. He’s handsome. It should
be easy to fall in love with him.”
    Meg scraped the cooked eggs onto plates and carried them to
the table Laurie had set with placemats and silverware. “He’s handsome, but a
man has to have more than just looks. He has to be intelligent and honest and
kind and responsible and…well, it helps if he’s fun to be with.”
    “You had fun with him last night.” Laurie gave her a very
serious look. “I like him. I hope you’ll marry him.”
    Meg almost hoped so too. And that thought scared her right
down to her toes. She was still totally blown away by what had happened the
previous night and suspected he might be the most sexually compatible man she
was ever likely to meet. But there were so many other things working against
them. The ruthlessness and shades of arrogance lurking behind his amiable
exterior worried her. She wasn’t at all sure she could trust him to keep his
word. And there was something else deep inside him. Something had happened with
his late wife, something she suspected still colored his approach to any new
relationships.
    And she had her own issues. Laurie—David had broken their
engagement rather than be saddled with the lifelong burden of her care and the
knowledge that Meg would always have to divide her attention between her sister
and the man in her life. Maybe it was David or maybe the deaths of their
parents, but Meg couldn’t give her trust lightly or easily anymore. Certainly
not to Kyle Harrison, who had too much going on behind the pleasant exterior.
    She finally managed to steer Laurie away from marrying her
off as they prepared to leave the apartment. The rest of the day was
uneventful. Every time Meg moved, a few stiff muscles and some soreness gave
treasured reminders of how much fun she’d had the night before. Her only
disappointment was the discovery that the spanking itself hadn’t left a hint of
a mark, not even a pink shadow. And why did she want to have a bruise or
something, anyway? How un-PC, antifeminist, even plain ridiculous was that? How
perverse was it to want to be marked? But she did.
    The rest of the day dragged as she found herself absurdly
hoping he’d call or come by. Of course he did neither.
    The next day she and Laurie did the normal Sunday chores of
cleaning the house, washing clothes, paying bills and taking out the trash. And
Meg spent way too much time still thinking about Kyle Harrison, still hoping he
would call.
    On weekday mornings, Meg usually got in a couple of hours of
database work after dropping Laurie at school and before she opened the store
at ten. That Monday morning, though, she’d just turned on the coffeemaker,
booted up the laptop and settled in to work when an odd rumbling noise pulled
her to the door to find its source.
    Not far down the street, a line of trucks with flatbed
trailers poured into the crumbling parking lot of the now-empty strip of shops
that mirrored theirs from the other side of the street. Each truck carried a
backhoe or tractor or other piece of heavy equipment she couldn’t name. The
convoy crossed the broken pavement and headed up a slight incline to the field
behind it where a couple of rickety old abandoned houses stood. The vehicles
parked. Drivers got out and began to