Punishing Petra [Locks and Chains 3] by Sara Kingston

brother couldn’t look like Kyle.

Chapter Eleven
     
    Petra’s fingers flew over the keyboard, another story pouring from her fingertips. As with most of her books, she liked to write the beginning and the ending at the start. The book ended once again with the knight in shining armor, though with modern clothing and modern technology, riding into the sunset with his princess. If only that could be true in real life, but then again she couldn’t live her life being anybody’s prized princess. No, her darker side needed to feel the burn of the lash, and that was definitely not the act of a princess. Her cell phone buzzed, announcing a text message, and she picked up the phone to read the display.
    “Are you free for dinner tonight?” Cursing at the on-screen keyboard, she struggled to type her response.
    “Yes.”
    “Great, I’ll pick you up at eight.” Her phone buzzed in reply.
    Well, it was a bit presumptuous of Kyle, but what the hell, she may as well go out with him. They’d had a great night the night before, and he was good-looking and delicious in bed. What on earth was she going to wear? She looked again at her cell, expecting it to suddenly give the answers to the questions roaming around inside her head. Like where was he taking her? Was it formal, casual, or fetish wear? Would she need a jacket? What was he going to wear? She cursed Kyle for not giving her more of an explanation and then considered calling him and asking. But she didn’t want to look like a fool, although wouldn’t it be worse turning up dressed incorrectly? Hell, she didn’t know what to do, so she let her fingers decide for her. She quickly typed a text and pressed send before she could second-guess herself.
    “What’s the dress code?” She held her phone like it was going to bite her while she waited for the reply. Finally after what felt like an eon, it buzzed.
    “Dinner dress, no panties.”
    Typical Dom. At least she now knew what to wear. What woman in her thirties didn’t have a little black dress? Hell, she had four of them. Granted, one was nearly a decade old, but it still fit, kind of. So what if she had to suck in her stomach and wiggle a whole lot to get into it and then crossing her arms in front of her might not be possible. The zipper did up, and that’s all that counted. She really needed to consider giving it to Goodwill, but it was her favorite, and it made her look pretty goddamn hot, she thought. She hadn’t worn it in at least two years, okay, maybe four.
    Shit! Where had the time gone? She shook her head and looked back at the story she was working on. Okay, the sexy, handsome alpha male looked like? Umm…She ran all the good-looking men she knew through her head and matched them to the characters of her books, but came up short. Now she began to catalog the hunks from her favorite TV shows. Damn, why the hell was this always the hardest part? Well, actually the names were always the biggest fly in the ointment and coming a short-priced second was hair and eye color. Okay, so she’d used black too many times, and well, red, how many redheaded men were attractive without the Scottish thing? Okay, hero, blond, heroine—damn why did that always remind her of drugs? Women had gotten such a bad rap in history. Well, if Dan Brown wanted to write another conspiracy theory, he should work on that one.
    Hours later she saved all her work and a backup, and it was time to start the chore of getting dressed. Time to shave, pluck, wax, scrub, buff, preen, and then start the war paint. “God, it sucks to be a woman.” After an hour and a half she was ready. Bubbling with an equal amount of nerves and excitement, she patiently waited for the clock to strike eight. At the knock on the door, she jumped off the couch, nearly tripping over her own feet. She felt as silly as a school girl. She took a deep breath before she opened the front door. Kyle stood there in black dress pants, a matching black jacket, and a blue