Table of Contents
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BONUS BOOKS
Forsaken Riders MC
Lost Creek Shifters
Dystopian Romance
Victorian Mystery
Stepbrother Romance
MC Romance
Billionaire Romance
Highlander Time Travel Romance
Time Travel Romance
Mountain Daddy’s Nanny
Samantha Leal
Copyright ©2018 by Samantha Leal. All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic of mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
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Introduction
Thank you so much for purchasing my Novella. All of my stories also contain bonus stories, so please take a look at the other stories I offer here. Don’t forget to sign up for my newsletter for updates and free books!
Also by Samantha…
The Forsaken Riders series is a collection of novelette length standalone Bad boy romances that fit together to tell the longer tale of the Forsaken Riders – and the woman they love - as they fight to dominate the town of Slate Springs.
The Forsaken Riders
Tanner (Book 0 Prequel)
Available HERE
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King (Book 1)
Lynx (Book 2)
Steel (Book 3)
Gunner (Book 4)
Hawk (Book 5)
Bull (Book 6)
Stag (Book 7)
Stick (Book 8)
Decker (Book 9)
Ax (Book 10)
Hunter (Book 11)
Rocket (Book 12)
Diesel (Book 13)
Breaker (Book 14)
Flash (Book 15)
Hammer (Book 16)
Brick (Book 17)
Chains (Book 18)
Ranger (Book 19)
Snake (Book 20)
The Lost Creek Shifters
The Lost Creek Shifters series is a collection of novelette length standalone Bad boy romances that fit together to tell the longer story of the ancient tale of the bear and wolf shifters in a small mountain town. Enjoy!
ARLO (Book 1)
SCAR (Book 2)
BLU (Book 3)
BODHI (Book 4)
KODHI (Book 5)
ZEKE (Book 6)
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Table of Contents
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
BONUS BOOKS
Forsaken Riders MC
Lost Creek Shifters
Dystopian Romance
Victorian Mystery
Stepbrother Romance
MC Romance
Billionaire Romance
Highlander Time Travel Romance
Time Travel Romance
1.
He looked down at the little girl sleeping beside him and smiled. She was curled up like a cat, wearing her pink and white spot pajamas, and breathing softly as he pulled the blanket up around her shoulders to make sure she was warm.
It had been a long night full of uncertainty, but he had finally come to a decision. He knew he couldn’t stay there any longer. It was time to put her, his only family, first, and to ensure that their future was bright, not scattered with the darkness that seemed to keep on coming.
He rose to his feet and crossed the room to the window, where he peeled back the curtain slightly and looked out across the parking lot. The motel had been closed for months, but it had finally reopened. And he had decided that if he was going to skip town, he would do it from there, rather than the home they had shared with her all those years before.
He sighed as he looked down the highway. Trucks and bikes thundered past them through the night with their headlights and engines blaring. He couldn’t help but smile. He knew he would miss this life, but he had so much more important things to give his attenti0n to.
His adorable daughter for one.
He had to make sure he gave her the best possible life.
And staying in a place like Slate Springs, where the whole town was falling to hell, wasn’t exactly going in the right direction.
Over the past year, things had changed in his hometown. Stores had closed, fights had broken out, businesses had shut down, and people had gone missing. News had filtered through about the battle between a bike gang he knew well and a group of outsiders that were trying to muscle in on the action and take the bikers’ businesses.
Everything felt unsettled.
No one seemed to know what was coming next.
He had sat by and watched a lot of it happen, and he had seen some of the shady characters that had come to town in the meantime. He had heard their Russian accents, and he had sensed the impending carnage.
He may not have been a biker, but he was friends with a lot of them, and he had heard whispers of what was going on.
He knew a shit storm was coming.
And Trent wasn’t prepared to get caught up in it. And he certainly wasn’t going to let his beloved Emma suffer either.
He let the curtain drop closed and turned back to look at her, sleeping soundly in the bed. She looked so innocent and so like her mother when she slept. However, the bitch that had given birth to her, was no innocent angel. He shuddered with anger when he remembered how she had been so irresponsible throughout her pregnancy, and how she had up and left as soon as she had the chance.
He had been Emma’s only family.
Her sole provider.
He had no idea how the woman he had once thought he loved could have left them both behind without a second thought, but she had. And now he had to admit that they had been better off without her.
They were close as father and daughter. They were best friends. And Trent would do anything to make sure she had everything in life.
And that was why he had to leave.
He couldn’t risk staying in Slate Springs when such uncertainty surrounded the town. He had to get out of there and go back to his roots.
He may have classed Slate Springs as his hometown now because he had been there for so long, but there was another place just as close to his heart. Somewhere where he had spent most of his youth, and where his grandfather had settled and kept their family house for a long, long time.
“Wakestone Pines,” he whispered nostalgically as he twisted the top off a bottle of beer and held it to his lips.
It had been years since he had been back, but he knew where the house stood empty, and he had the keys to access it. His grandfather had died, and he had left it to him in his will, and Trent had been waiting for the right time to go back there.
“This is that time,” he whispered as he took a swig of his beer and looked down at the suitcases scattered across the floor.
He didn’t want to bail on Slate Springs in the middle of the night. But he had left home and taken Emma to the motel
so they could be right on the highway and ready to leave if anything crazy happened. He had had such a bad feeling all day, and now he was on high alert. He had heard that the Russians were on the brink of invading and causing an almighty gang war, and there was no chance he was going to risk being caught up in it.
Emma rolled over in the bed and sighed. She looked like she was dreaming, and her eyelids twitched ever so slightly as she continued to breath softly and kept herself cuddled up beneath the blankets.
“I’ll do anything to keep you safe,” he said as he looked over at her and rubbed his temples.
He had to get out of that town. He had to get out of that life. Emma was going to be raised right, and he didn’t want her to witness any of the violence and criminal activity that went hand in hand with being a resident of Slate Springs.
Trent could no longer turn a blind eye.
He knew what the bikers were up to, and even though they were good, kind hearted guys, who protected the town, he was also very much aware that there was trouble coming to their door.
And he didn’t want to get caught in the crossfire.
He’d told Emma about the house in the mountains many times before, and it had become a sort of myth to her. He had told her all about Wakestone Pines, and about how the forests and rivers that surrounded it would be like nothing she had ever seen before.
She had asked him if he could teach her to fish, and he had never felt a greater sense of pride.
For a single dad, it was little things like that that let him know he was doing alright.
He would teach her to fish, and he would teach her how to build a fire. He would teach her how to live off the land and get back to her roots. Trent was a mountain man through and through, and he had been sucked into life in the desert almost by accident, but now he was more than ready to return.
He could already smell the fresh, clean air. And he could feel the breeze on his face. He closed his eyes and imaged the sight of the lush greens of the forest, and could already hear the rippling waves of the streams that ran down by the back of the house. A city was no place to raise a daughter, and with all that was going on within it with the gangs, it just made Trent even more determined to get out.
He drained his bottle of beer and placed it down on the desk in the corner before he stood and looked at himself in the mirror.
A man on his own.
He was almost forty, tanned and muscular, but suddenly, he saw the age to him. He wasn’t twenty anymore, but did it matter? He was the guardian of a six-and-a-half-year-old, and he was a dad first and foremost.
He had sworn off women for life after Emma’s mother had done what she did. When she had left, she had taken part of his heart with her. But only because he was destroyed that she wasn’t interested in raising their child. The thought of having her in his life now was abhorrent, but he did feel bad for his daughter that she didn’t have a mother figure. All little girls need a mom, and Emma was certainly missing out on that.
Trent did his best. He tried to be both. And that was why he had made the decision to leave Slate Springs.
He leaned over and turned out the light on the corner of the desk, before he kicked off his boots and swung his legs up onto the couch as he lay down. The sounds of the trucks thundering past were a lot more calming than he would have expected, and he knew it wouldn’t take much for him to get to sleep.
He looked across at Emma again as she slept silently in the bed. Within twenty-four hours he would have rescued her from all the uncertainty that a future in the desert was going to bring for them. And he would have settled them both somewhere new, somewhere fresh and clean, where there was no crime, and where people’s values were still non-corrupt and genuine.
Trent and Emma were going to start again, they were going to get back to their roots, they were going to live off the land, and they were going to thrive in a new environment that would bring them nothing but promise.
He felt warm inside when he thought about it, and he knew he was doing the right thing.
Being a father was the most important job a man could do, and he was determined he would excel.
Emma deserved the best, and he was going to give it to her.
It was time for them to start a new life in Wakestone Pines.
It was time for Trent to head back to his mountain.
2.
Six Months Later
Morgan rolled over and stretched as the bright sunlight streamed in through the crack in the curtains. She raised her arms high above her head and felt her whole body slowly awaken, as she worked up the courage to open her eyes.
She felt so warm and snug, she couldn’t believe she had to drag her ass out of bed and start the day.
“Dammit,” she whispered as she buried her face back into her pillow. “Just one more hour…”
She peeked through her eyelids and looked at the time on her alarm clock. It was almost seven thirty and she knew she had to get up, shower, and dress, and out to work within the hour.
She grumbled as she pulled the blankets up over her head and wrapped them tightly around herself.
She didn’t want to move, and she felt incredibly resentful at the fact that morning had come around so soon, when it only felt like mere seconds since she had closed her eyes and drifted off to sleep.
With a big sigh and a heave of the duvet, she sat up and swung her legs around to the side and let her feet touch down gently on the floor. She cricked her neck and rolled out her shoulders, before she rose to stand and crossed over to the window.
She peeled back the curtain and looked outside and at the wonderful view she would never, ever tire of.
Wakestone Mountain was sprawled out ahead of her, and she could see a fresh smattering of snow up toward the top as its peak disappeared into the clouds. She smiled and pressed her nose against the cold glass as she cast her eyes around the forest before her.
She had lived in the idyllic mountain town her entire life, and yet it still surprised her when she really stopped and took stock of its beauty. It was such a stunning place to live, and yet it was almost as if she was so used to it, she took it for granted. So, she tried to appreciate what she had around her every once in a while, and this particular morning, she was becoming fully sucked in to her incredible surroundings.
“If only I didn’t have to work,” she pouted as she looked up toward the mountain. “I’d be out there climbing and exploring.”
She pulled the curtains open fully so the sunlight streamed in, and then turned and headed toward her adjoining bathroom. She turned on the shower and let the water heat up, and when the steam was rising throughout the entire room, she slipped off her nightdress and jumped in.
As the water washed over her, she felt herself becoming more invigorated and awake, and she finally felt as if she were ready to take on the day.
She stepped out of the shower and wrapped herself up in a big, fluffy towel, before she headed back into her bedroom and started to get ready.
She had been working in the store for the past couple of months, but it had done nothing but drain her spirit and was starting to make her wish she had skipped town after she had finished high school. Morgan had always loved her hometown, and she had always been a home bird, but there had never been too many opportunities for a girl like her there. Most of her friends had left and started lives in the city far, far away. But Morgan had stayed close to what she held dear, and had settled well into small town life.
The store sold pretty much everything, and it was well known in the community. She didn’t like her boss, and she didn’t really enjoy the work, but the main thing was that it gave Morgan time to work on her art. She was a creative soul, who loved expressing herself through her craft, and so when she managed to bag herself a job at the general store, she had decided it was much better for her in the long run. It may not have been a career job, and she wasn’t short of smarts and intelligence, but she knew what she wanted to do. And studying to become something t
hat wasn’t in her heart and soul was only going to be a waste of time.
She still remembered the way her mother had looked at her when she had told her she wouldn’t be going off to college. It had been the look of fear, followed by immense disappointment.
But Morgan had been determined.
“I don’t want to waste all of that money. I know I have talent and I want to explore that, it’s what I’m passionate about,” she had said.
Her mother’s face dropped, almost like she had been slapped right across it.
“You can’t bank on that working out,” her mother had told her. “You need to go to college, so you have something to fall back on at least.”
“It isn’t me, mom,” she had protested. “I know my own mind, and I know what I want to do. College isn’t going to be for me. I want to create, I want to stay close to home, and I want to take my time. I don’t want to be forced into something unnecessarily which will only waste all of our energy.”
She had watched her friends being sent off to college, and she had seen some of them return after a year or two, completely disheartened and broke. She wasn’t going to be that person.
Morgan was mature, she was determined, and she knew her own mind. It may not have been everyone’s ideal scenario, staying close to home and living in the log cabin right at the bottom of their parents’ garden, but she knew if she wanted to make a living with her creativity, this was something that was going to have to happen.
“Temporary sacrifices for long-term gain,” she had told her mother. “I know I’m making the right choice.”
“I hope you’re right, Morgan,” her mother had sighed. “You are far too intelligent to waste your brain.”
“I’m not wasting it if I’m doing something I’m passionate about,” she said with a raised brow.
Her mother had held her hands up in defeat and agreed to let her follow her heart. After all, who knew Morgan better than Morgan?
Three years later, and she was still working on becoming the best version of herself, but she was happy, and her portfolio of work was expanding all the time. She had moved from job to job around town, and now she was working in the general store, she knew it wasn’t forever, but it would do for the time being, and she also knew she wasn’t far off from having enough pieces to try and run her own exhibition.
She swept her hair over her shoulder and looked at herself in the mirror. Her nailbeds were still pitted with paint from the previous evening and she couldn’t help but smile. She had a calling, and she was determined to follow it. No matter what anyone else said.
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