Bound to the Bad Boy Read Free

Her whole body trembled and a hot flush spread
from her ruby red toenails to the roots of her auburn hair. How could he have
such an effect on her after all this time? She felt like a teenager again. Confused. Aroused. Exhilarated. Terrified.
    She had to get out. Make a quick
escape. She couldn’t go on pretending she could see him and not be affected by
him anymore.
    She had been consumed by her love
for Matt King once.
    She couldn’t let it happen all
over again.
    ****
    Megan took a wide arc around the
gym, keeping to the edges. She smiled and nodded at people as she went, trying
to avoid arousing suspicions about why she was leaving so soon. She kept her
head down, grateful for her long, thick hair, which created a red curtain
around her face.
    She picked off the sticky label bearing
her name, then folded it and tucked it into her bag, swallowing a sigh at the
sticky rectangular residue it had left behind on her new dress.
    Damn.
    No time to worry now, though.
She’d have to see if she could get the drycleaner to remove it.
    Not that it mattered. None of it
really mattered. It was all just futile and irrelevant in the grander scheme of
things. It didn’t even feature on the horizon of the pain she’d suffered giving
up the man she loved, and all because she couldn’t face loving him so much any
longer. Was it possible to love someone too much? Megan knew it was.
    Stop it.
    She was almost at the doors when
a hand landed on her shoulder. She froze and swallowed a scream. Her mouth
dried up and the pink punch swirled in her stomach, threatening to re-emerge at
any moment.
    No. Please, no. This was a mistake. I can’t do it.
    “Well, well . . . if it isn’t
Megan Agnelli.”
    She cringed at the high-pitched
voice that reminded her of fingernails being raked down a blackboard. There was
only one person it could belong to. She turned on her heel and plastered on a
fake smile.
    “Hannah Pinter… How nice to see you, and you look…” Megan glanced quickly up and down the
woman in front of her. She assumed her best poker face. “You look just amazing .”
    And she did. Amazing
for a woman who had once been svelte enough to wear a cheerleader’s short skirt
and tight top as she somersaulted across the field. Megan realized that
if Hannah tried that now, she might well injure herself or at least be hindered
by the fifty or so pounds she had gained.
    “Hmmm.” Hannah narrowed her eyes. “You look pretty good yourself. Life in the city
seems to suit you. Married?” She peered at Megan’s left hand. “ Dating anyone?” She raised her penciled-in
eyebrows.
    “I’d like to hear the answer to
that one too.”
    Megan gasped as the mouth so
close to her ear moved a ringlet against her face. His breath was hot on her
neck as he gently moved her hair and swept it over her shoulder. Tiny shivers
ran up and down her spine as images from their joint past flooded into her
mind.
    Matt.
    The familiar scent of leather and
pine washed over her, filling her senses and making her heart leap like a
spring foal. It set her skin on fire and stoked the yearning between her legs
that only he had ever been able to fully satisfy. Matt always ‘got’ her. He had
understood what she needed and craved as no other man ever had. But their love had
been dangerous, her passion for him overpowering. It had consumed her like a
bushfire, sweeping throughout her body, heart and mind and she had needed to
get out in order to survive . She never wanted to feel
like she was teetering at the edge of that chasm of vulnerability again, even
though the alternative was just so dull. So lonely. So empty.
    It would be easy to turn now and
kiss him the way she remembered. To press her lips against his and breathe him
in until she found the high she craved. She was consumed by the longing to be swept
up in his muscular arms, held against his rock hard chest and loved until the
sun rose in the Minnesota sky.
    Yet, that would be inappropriate
and out of