The Bad Boy Bargain (Suttonville Sentinels #1)(12)

“Kid, one of these days,” he’d said, his voice deep and commanding, “you’ll have a chance to knock them off their high horses. When it comes, do it, and don’t look back.”

With Faith’s offer, it looked his best chance had come. He just needed to take it. Still, the memory left a bitter taste in his mouth. To this day, he hated himself for not fighting sooner, harder.

Kyle slammed the spade into the ground, ripping up the roots of the hedge. The only way to forget would be to work so hard his hands blistered and his brain went dark. And that’s exactly what he did. He disappeared into a world of green, of aching muscles, of earth. And he didn’t want to come back.



Sometime later, hours by the slant of the sun, Mrs. Gladwell called, “Kyle?”

He jumped, dropping the spade, and pulled his earbuds out of his ears. Judging by her amused smile, she’d been calling to him for a while. “Um, sorry. Yes?”

“Honey, it’s almost six. You’ve been at this a while. Maybe you should take a break and come back tomorrow?”

Almost six? He looked down and winced. His legs, arms, and chest were caked with dirt and he had a half dozen new scratches. It looked like he’d been mud wrestling a tiger. And the backyard was a disaster.

“Oh, um, I should clean up everything first.”

Mrs. Gladwell chuckled. She had a nice laugh—kind, not mocking. A total mom-amused-by-a-kid laugh. “As long as you promise to come back tomorrow, I think we can leave it. I must say, I’m impressed by the level of, uh, destruction.”

He flushed. At least she wasn’t pissed about all the holes, mounds of dirt, and stacks of branches. “Don’t worry—it’ll look brand-new by the time I finish with it.”

“I trust you.” She handed him his T-shirt. “Now run along home. I’m sure your folks are wondering where you are.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he said meekly, his cheeks going hot. I’m such an idiot. “I’ll be back by eight tomorrow, if that’s okay. I’ll let myself into the backyard.”

“That sounds great. Thanks, Kyle.”

As soon as she went back inside, he pulled the shirt over his head and collected all his tools, marveling at the mess he’d made. He’d lost all track of time, going into a zone he normally reserved for games, but instead thinking about his deal with Faith.

Apprehension prickled down his back. A sure sign that he might’ve made a mistake saying yes. How long could he make her—and everyone else—believe he wasn’t a complete dork around girls? He wanted to pull this off, to show up Cameron, but it could blow up in his face instead.

Suddenly, he felt like he was being watched, and he glanced up at the second-story windows. The blinds on the right-hand window shifted against the glass.

Had Faith been watching him all this time? Huh.

He stared up at the window, waiting. A minute passed, then the blinds fluttered. He smirked when Faith noticed he saw her. Her eyes popped open wide, and the blinds crashed back into place. Feeling a little better about everything, he went to the Toyota.

Who knew—this might be fun after all.



“Kyle? That you?” Grandpa yelled from the kitchen. The spicy scent of King Ranch casserole hung in the air.

His stomach growled loud enough to answer before he made it out of the mudroom. “Yeah. I’m beat, but dinner smells good.”

“You also have enough dirt on your hands to plant petunias. Go clean up,” Grandpa said, shaking his head. He wore a red apron over his jeans and Rangers T-shirt, like he actually prepared the meal, even though all he’d done was put dinner in the over to warm up.

“I’m going, I’m going.” He yawned his way toward the stairs. “Dad home?”

“In his office. It’s tax season.”

“Oh, right.” Although Dad would be working on Saturday even if it wasn’t. Managing his—and other people’s—money took a lot of effort. Kyle figured he’d stick to planting trees and mowing lawns. “Be down in a sec.”

A shower sounded great, until he actually stood under the hot water. Every scrape and blister he’d earned in Faith’s backyard stung at once, making him hiss with pain. He needed to keep his shirt on tomorrow. How would Faith like it if he covered up the scenery, though? He laughed, the sound echoing off the hard walls of the shower. In the course of one afternoon, he’d turned into Faith’s boy toy. In more ways than one.

And funny how he kept calling it “Faith’s backyard” when she wasn’t the one paying him for the job.

After drying off and putting on clean shorts and a T-shirt, he went downstairs to help Grandpa set the table.

“You’re awful cheerful for a kid who looks like he got into a fight with a Weed Eater,” Grandpa said, giving the scratches on his legs a look. “I guess you won the fight, then?”

Kyle bit back a grin. “Yeah, except I was doing battle with a holly bush.”

“Who’s the client?”

“You know those commercials for the Gladwell Foundation?”

Grandpa scratched the side of his head with a potholder. “The pretty lady asking for donations to help with juvenile cancer? I think I wrote them a big check last year.”

“So did Dad. Mrs. Gladwell is the one who hired me,” he said. “She wants me to redo her backyard. It was a freaking mess. Some hotshot landscaper overdid it, and I have to rip out a ton of worthless crap before I can fix it. All their photinias had fungus, and I saw some on the hollies. So they had to go before they ruined the good stuff.”