Water's Edge (Alaskan Frontier Romance Book 1)

by Jennifer McArdle

  When Jake handed the phone back to her, Nora quietly put it away. “What now?” she asked, unsure of what else to say.

  “If you’re ready, we could start crabbing.”

  Nora wrinkled her nose at the thought of the crabs with their pincers, but then decided steamed crab would be worth the effort, especially if she could convince Jake to do most of the work.

  “Yeah, let’s do it,” she said with as much enthusiasm as she could muster. “Where should we go?”

  “Let’s go back to the edge of the cove,” Jake pointed.

  Nora reached for the throttle of the motor, still idling softly. When she turned the throttle, though, the motor stalled.

  “That’s alright. That happens sometimes. You remember how to start it, right?”

  Nora nodded her head and turned to restart it.

  “You’re going to flood it,” Jake told her after her fourth unsuccessful pull on the cord. Nora didn’t understand what he meant, so she tried it one more time. When the motor still didn’t start, she gave up and turned around. Jake was sitting there, patiently watching her, with an amused grin on his face. “Told you so.”

  They rocked gently on the waves and drifted with the current as Jake explained what she’d done wrong.

  “We’ll have to wait a few minutes before we try it again, unless you want to get your phone out and call for help.”

  It took a second for Nora to realize he was teasing. She actually almost reached into her pocket for her cell phone.

  “Very funny.”

  But it did get her thinking. She was completely isolated out there. There were no cell phone towers, so there was no way to call for help if she needed it. Aside from the boat, there was no way out. No roads. No nothing.

  Nora glanced up at the towering mountains. Just a few minutes earlier, they had seemed beautiful, but now Nora saw them for what they really were. An obstacle. A resolute force keeping her isolated from everything. The enormity of it all was almost overwhelming. Nora felt like she was in an enormous bowl. She was trapped and the only way to get out was to climb those impenetrable-looking peaks. The beauty of the inlet was intimidating, its remoteness intensely unnerving.

  She wondered what might lie beyond those peaks. Did they go on for miles and miles? Were there other communities tucked away back there, accessible only by air? Nora thought of the trail she’d seen leading away from town and into the back country.

  “Yesterday I saw a trail leading away from the parking lot at the ferry terminal. Where does it go?” Nora asked.

  Her question surprised Jake.

  “Oh, it cuts through between the mountains and leads back about 10 miles. People use it for hauling firewood and hunting, but other than that, there’s nothing back there,” Jake explained.

  Then he looked at Nora and saw the curiosity in her eyes. That look sent a surge of unease up his spine. Maybe there was some adventurous spirit in the woman after all. “If you get a bug up your butt and decide to do some exploring, don’t even think about it,” he said firmly. “You’d need a four-wheel-drive truck, and even then, the trail is pretty dangerous. Your car wouldn’t make it past the first bend.”

  Nora flinched at the commanding tone of his voice. She didn’t like the idea of having a man tell her what she could and couldn’t do. Wasn’t that why she’d left Conner? She hadn’t come all this way to be bossed around by another man.

  Truthfully, the idea of exploring some back country appealed to her. She’d never been confined to such a small space. Strange, to think Alaska was confining. It was the largest state in the U.S., but also the least accessible. Nora couldn’t venture inland. There were no roads and she didn’t know the first thing about surviving in the wilderness. With absolutely no boating experience, she couldn’t really explore the waters, either. She’d be stuck on the edge of a massive island, with nowhere to go. The idea of the trail, and the knowledge that it led somewhere, intrigued her.

  “I mean it,” Jake said, sensing Nora’s interest in the trail. The tone of his voice had grown more resolute. “It’s not safe for someone like you.”

  Nora bristled at the comment. Instantly, she forgot about finding out where the road led.

  “What do you mean, someone like me?” She had no right to be offended, but she was. Sure, she didn’t know the first thing about the Alaskan wilderness, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t drive down a road. It was a road, for God’s sake.

  “I just meant someone who’s not familiar with the back country. That’s all,” Jake said apologetically. “I didn’t mean to offend you. Really. It’s just... we get these people who come in for a few days and think they’re going to hike the mountain or do some back country hiking and it seems like half the time we have to go in and rescue them. If you really want to explore the trail, I’ll take you back there sometime. But, please, don’t try it by yourself.”

  Nora didn’t notice the sincerity in his voice. All she heard were the words of an overbearing, domineering man telling her what to do. His comments annoyed her. “Okay,” she said, not bothering to hide the irritation in her voice. “You’ve made your point. I understand. I have no business being here. I might as well pack up my stuff and head back south.”

  “That’s not what I meant,” Jake said, thinking he ought to change the subject. Then he added cautiously, “Do you still want to learn how to catch crab?”

  “I think I’ve had enough bossing around for one day, don’t you?” she said, a little more crossly than she’d intended. Nora turned in her seat and yanked hard on the pull cord. That time, the motor roared to life.

  * * *

  Jake didn’t stick around long after they got back to the cabin. He offered to help her retrieve the rest of her things from her car, but she turned him down flat before not-so-kindly asking him to leave, her tone making it clear she didn’t want any more help from him. Not then, not ever.

  He’d obviously upset Nora out on the water more than he’d realized, even though it hadn’t been his intention. He had only wanted to impress upon her the necessity of playing it safe. The rules were different out there and the road was no exception. It was a dangerous trail even Jake didn’t like to use if he didn’t have to. He could only imagine Nora deciding to take a pleasure drive into the backwoods all alone. If she got into trouble, she couldn’t call AAA. He thought he’d gotten his point across, but he wanted to avoid angering her any further. So as soon as Jake showed her how to moor the boat and ensured she was safely back in her cabin, he left.

  At first, Nora was glad to see him go. But as the realization that she was all alone set back in, Nora’s irritation with Jake quickly dissipated and she wished she hadn’t ended their boating lesson early. Sure, Jake had been acting like a typical dominant male, telling her what she could and couldn’t do, but then again, maybe she had overreacted a tad. She had to remind herself, he wasn’t Conner. He was only trying to help, but Nora needed to learn how to do things on her own.

  She walked over to the table and sampled the casserole. It tasted good. Really good. Eating right out of the casserole dish, she took another bite and opened the box of supplies Lily had sent. There was a note on top.

  Heron doesn’t have an official welcome wagon, but I figured you could use some things to make the place feel a little more like home.

  - Lily

  Nora smiled when she saw the contents of the box. There were several scented candles, a jar of homemade jam, a well-worn paperback romance novel, and, of all things, a hand mirror. Nora picked up the mirror and looked at her reflection.

  “Ugh,” she groaned, wishing she’d had the mirror earlier. She looked a mess. Even with her hair pulled back in a ponytail, the damp ocean air had frizzed and curled a few tendrils that had gotten loose.

  She sat the mirror down on the table, picked up the casserole dish, and carried it over to the couch. As she picked at the casserole, Nora looked around the cabin, wondering if anyone would actually be interested in the place. She hop
ed someone would. In the meantime, she had no choice but to live there until a buyer came along, no matter how long it might take.

  She ate a few more bites and then lay down and closed her eyes. It was only mid-afternoon, but the exhaustion from the long trip caught up with her. She’d spent more than two full days on the ferry from Washington to Juneau, and then a good part of another day on the ferry to Heron, followed by a long trip out to the cabin and a sleepless night in her new surroundings. By the time the boating lesson had finished, she was exhausted, both physically and mentally.

  Chapter 4

  Jake didn’t like leaving Nora behind in Pete’s old cabin. He’d done it twice now, and each time he felt like he was leaving her to die out there in the wild.

  In his experience, people generally fell into one of two categories: those who could and those who couldn’t. One thing was certain, Nora couldn’t make it out there on her own. From the looks of her, she’d never had to chop and stack wood in her life. She probably didn’t know the first thing about hunting or fishing. Heck, she barely knew how to operate a boat.

  As far as Jake could tell, Nora was the kind of woman who needed to be taken care of. She needed a man to do the heavy lifting and to protect her on those cold, dark nights. With summer coming on, the days were getting longer. But winter would roll back around soon enough and the nights would turn long and dark. Darker than Nora could understand, at least until she experienced it for herself. And when those dark nights enveloped the cabin and shrouded everything in blackness, who would be there to wrap his arms around Nora and keep her safe?

  On the other hand, maybe she’d be gone by then. A woman like Nora had no business in the wilds of Alaska, and he expected she’d realize it quickly enough. As soon as she got a taste of life in the last frontier, he was betting she’d come to her senses. Already, she was realizing she didn’t belong out there. Hadn’t she said as much on the boat? She’d end up high tailing it out of there the first chance she got, which would be in another two weeks when the ferry was scheduled to come back to town. Yeah, if she had any common sense, she’d leave. And therein was Jake’s dilemma, because the last thing he wanted to see was her boarding a ship and leaving Heron for good. For the life of him, he couldn’t figure out why, but he hoped she would stay.

  For now, all he could do was make sure she survived out there all by herself. At least he left her with enough supplies to keep her alive and a little knowledge to help her navigate her new surroundings, Jake thought as he turned his skiff toward town. But he still didn’t feel right about leaving her alone in the drafty old cabin to fend for herself.

  Jake was only a mile from Nora’s cabin, still another nine miles from town, when he turned the boat toward the shore. He needed some peace of mind. Short of setting up camp next to Nora’s cabin, there was only one other way to make sure she would be safe in that ramshackle cabin.

  There were no tidal flats there, so Jake pulled up as close as he could to the rocky shore and carefully climbed out of the boat, tying it off on the rocks. With sure steps, he followed a narrow footpath through the lush forest leading to Willie’s doorstep.

  The house sat out of view of the inlet, exactly the way Willie wanted it. All of his life, he’d dreamed of living in the Alaskan wilderness, far enough from everybody so no one would come knocking on his door. When he retired from his job at the factory at the age of 50, he packed up his belongings, left Ohio, and headed north. He didn’t have a plan, just an idea of where he wanted to be. He wandered around for a while and somehow ended up on a fishing boat based out of Sitka. It was hard work, especially for a man of his age, but he stuck with it for as long as he could. When he heard about a piece of land for sale near Heron, he bought it without even seeing it and left the rest of the world behind for good. It took Willie less than a month to build a small cabin to live in, tucked away from the inlet and the curious eyes of passersby. Only those who knew where to look could find the path he’d made from the shore of the inlet, through the thick forest, to his house.

  Jake had walked the path many times. He knew every twist and turn of the trail, every blasted root jutting up out of the ground attempting to trip him. He could probably walk it blindfolded.

  At the end of the trail there was a large clearing and right in the middle sat a beautifully crafted log home. After he’d built a small cabin to live in, Willie had spent years designing and building the house he’d always dreamed of. Everything had been done with his own two hands and a very well-worn set of tools. Even though he had a generator right from the start, he’d chosen not to use any power tools. He had wanted to feel the wood in his hands as he cut and shaped the logs. It had been a labor of love, and it was the only thing in Willie’s life of which he was truly proud.

  An old, rusty saw blade hung on the door of the home, the serrated edge sticking out to catch the paws of any animal large enough and hungry enough to try and break in. As long as Willie had lived there, no bear had tried to push down his door, but he believed in taking precautions, and he had come up with various methods of questionable effectiveness in an attempt to keep the bears away.

  Jake raised his hand to knock on the door, but before his knuckles rapped on the wood, he heard the old man call to him from somewhere in the woods. Jake couldn’t see him, but obviously Willie had spotted Jake. Somehow, Willie always knew when someone came to call on him. A second later, Willie stepped out from behind his workshop, a small shack that housed Willie’s not-so-secret distillery.

  Willie zipped up his pants as he trotted toward Jake. “I was just markin’ the perimeter with my scent,” said Willie when he got closer. He was short and stocky, firm with the muscle that only comes from years of working outdoors. “Thought I heard somethin’ scratchin’ around out here last night and I want to make sure it doesn’t come back.”

  “You know that doesn’t work.”

  Willie shrugged and walked past Jake, into the house. “Worth a try,” he said.

  Inside, Willie went straight into the kitchen and pulled a hot meatloaf out of the oven. Over the past 15 years since Willie spent his first winter in the tiny cabin, the home had grown considerably. The original cabin, a space barely larger than 10-foot square, now served as the entryway to a comfortable, two-story home. The house was a bit larger than Willie needed, but once he’d started building, he couldn’t seem to stop. It had taken a great deal of restraint for him to call it quits when he’d reached 1,200 square feet and to focus his efforts instead on the finishing touches.

  Even though it was off the grid, Willie didn’t go without at least the basic modern luxuries. He had running water and electricity, both installed entirely on his own. An outbuilding served as the powerhouse and held battery units for a combination of solar and hydro power, and he always had the gas-powered generator as back-up. Willie hadn’t gone as far as installing a satellite and wasn’t sure if he ever would. He didn’t want to be connected to the world, but he still enjoyed the comforts of modern life. Just that past summer, he had installed new floors with built-in radiant heat, a luxury he really enjoyed because it meant he no longer had to spend hours of back-breaking work, chopping and hauling wood to burn. Other than a slight limp, Willie was in good shape for a 67-year-old man, but after a life of hard labor, he was looking forward to settling in and enjoying his golden years.

  “You’re just in time for supper,” Willie said, grabbing a gallon of goat’s milk out of the fridge and pouring two glasses. To his own glass, he added a bit of coffee and a shot of Irish Cream liqueur. “You want a nip?”

  “No, thanks.”

  In spite of all the measures he took to ensure people couldn’t find him, Willie was actually a rather friendly man. He welcomed his friends and helped his neighbors whenever they were in need. For a hermit, he was remarkably genial. Without even asking, Willie already had two plates out and was cutting into the meatloaf. He slapped a slice of meatloaf onto a plate and slid it across the table to Jake.

  “
This is from the bear I shot last season. The one that broke into the goat house."

  Jake sat down at the table. He wasn’t hungry, but he also wasn’t going to insult Willie by not eating. He picked up his fork, ate a bite, and then grinned up at Willie.

  “You know, for an old coot, you’re cooking isn’t half bad,” Jake joked.

  Willie smiled, ready to get down to business.

  “So what brings you here? It ain’t that new girl down at Pete’s, is it?”

  “How do you know about her already?”

  Willie shrugged. “I may live in the middle of nowhere, but I still have eyes. Saw you and her headin’ down that way yesterday.”

  “I suppose you’ve already been down there checking things out.”

  “Can’t say I didn’t take a little walk last night.”

  Jake smiled and took another bite of the meatloaf. “Then you must know everything about her, right?”

  Willie chuckled. “I know enough. I can tell by the looks of her she ain’t used to this kind of livin’. I also figure she didn’t find what she was expectin’.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “A woman like that wouldn’t have come all this way if she knew Pete’s place was just a shack. I figure she was expectin’ somethin’ a little more...” He hesitated, trying to think up the best word to describe it. “...up-to-date, I suppose you could say.”

  “You may be right,” said Jake. “That’s actually why I’m here.”

  Willie chuckled again. “I think I know exactly why you’re here. You want me to check in on her every once in a while, am I right? You want me to make sure she’s okay out here all by herself.”

  “Maybe,” said Jake, shoving a forkful of meatloaf into his mouth. He had the distinct feeling Willie understood all too well Jake’s interest in Nora and it made him feel a little uncomfortable.