First Touch_My Best Friend's Little Sister

by Lauren Wood

“Me. You got the east and I get the west. I think they are trying to play matchmaker from their graves. Sounds about right. Mom never forgot about you and she told me all of the time that I’d messed up losing you. She always was right.”

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  MOUNTAIN MAN’S SECRET BABY - SNEAK PEAK

  PREVIEWS

  BLURB:

  Denise

  Things were getting boring in Nome. It was always the same old faces.

  I wanted something new.

  I wanted fresh faces and new adventures.

  I want some new men in the dating pool because it was getting stale.

  So when I heard about the new construction at the harbor.

  I was excited.

  I hoped for something and it came in the form of Ethan.

  He was tall, muscled and he had the boyish looks that were hard to turn away from.

  Once he got his hands on me and our lips met, I knew that there was going to be so much more between us.

  Ethan

  She had a smart mouth that she only used when she needed to.

  Denise may have looked innocent at first, but it didn’t take long for her true self to come out.

  The little redhead liked to tease and she had me wrapped around her finger before I knew it.

  The only way to tame her was to get my hands on her.

  Then she wouldn’t be able to deny what was between us.

  Denise was going to be mine.

  I was going to be the first man in Nome to get a taste of her.

  ***

  Chapter 1

  Denise

  “I can’t believe it Molly. What do you think of all of this?”

  My boss wasn’t too sure and I kind of felt the same way. There was too much going on and when I heard that they had sold the Western harbor, I had been speechless. It was one of the biggest landmarks in the town and now it was going to be converted into a port big enough to take cruise ships.

  “It’s kind of sad. All of that time I was trying to keep the land for Nome, it didn’t matter, someone else sold out anyways.”

  “Isn’t there something that we can do?”

  She shrugged and I could tell that she didn’t think so. Molly was a fighter and if she thought it was too late; I was going to think the same as well. If there was a way to figure it all out, she would know about it and would certainly be trying to do something about it. I wasn’t sure how it was going to change this tiny town, but I knew that it was going to bring in more people.

  I was so sick of the same old faces that I didn’t know if that was going to be a bad thing or not. I liked the small town feel, but the fact that I knew everyone here and still wasn’t dating anyone said that I needed a bigger pool to go off of. The men around here just didn’t suit me for some reason and seeing Molly in love, as well as several others that had tied the knot this year, the missing piece was becoming more and more noticeable when I went home at night.

  “Well at least there will be new people running around. New faces to meet and learn.”

  Molly didn’t seem too happy about that little tid-bit, but I found it hard to show too much enthusiasm for it. She wouldn’t have taken it well. She had went through a lot to keep the cruise lines out of here and it hadn’t seemed to work all that much.

  “I don’t know if that is going to be a good thing. We’ve got enough business as it is. We don’t need anymore.”

  I wasn’t going to argue with her. I was in need of some fresh faces here in Nome, or I was going to have to do something drastic. I’d even thought about leaving to find a husband. I wasn’t as attached to the place as Molly. I liked it here. It was beautiful, but as I was starting to see the beginning side of thirty soon, I didn’t think I had that much more time to waste. It was time to find ‘the one’ and settle down.

  “Well if you think it’s done, I guess it’s done now. There’s nothing that we can do about it.”

  “There isn’t, but I’m not going to be happy about it. We’ve always done okay. What use would we have to add more people to this town?”

  “Well a few people will get some good jobs and I wouldn’t mind some more men added to the dating pool. There are nearly all men here, but they are all kind of the same.”

  She stopped and sized me up. “What happened with you and Larry?”

  I tried not to make too much of a face because it was Molly that had set us up, but it was hard not to. I went out with Larry a couple of times and it actually got worse the second time, so much so that I had to basically tell him that he wasn’t my type and that I wouldn’t be calling him again. I’d had to be rude, which I hate to do because he literally just wouldn’t get it.

  “It didn’t work out. He was a nice guy and all, at first anyways, but it all went downhill pretty quickly.”

  “I’m starting to think that you’re just too picky Denise. There are hundreds of guys here. No one has made your fancy? You are turning down good men because I hear them asking you out all the time.”

  “Picky? Says the woman that had to wait how many years till an old flame came back to Nome since no one else would do?”

  Her face got red and I felt bad about saying anything at all. I knew that Molly was still sensitive about it. It was true though. She was determined to have her love and she hadn’t dated almost anyone. I’d never known she was waiting for one man in particular until much later. Now I knew and I had to say that the gossip couldn’t have made it any better than the truth did.

  “Okay, but that’s different. I don’t know how, but it is.”

  I laughed at her answer. She wasn’t sure what she was saying and the more I tried to hear her, the harder it was. Molly was just as picky as me, though I didn’t have an old flame that I was holding onto. I’d been here too long and no one here was really my type. I didn’t know what it was that was missing, but I was sure when I met the one I was supposed to be with, I would know it. It was one of those blind faith things and I was sure that it was going to happen. I put a lot of faith into it happening the way that it did in my head.

  “Is your love life that bad that you’re willing to put it in the hands of some outsiders that you’ve never met before?”

  That was the gist of it and I was glad that I hadn’t had to spell it out for her. But that’s how desperate I was. I knew that I was taking a chance with an outsider, but it had to be a better option than what I had now. If it didn’t work out with someone from somewhere else, at least I wouldn’t have to deal with them when they went back home.

  “Larry wasn’t even from here and look how that turned out? I need to start thinking about it sometime soon. I’m turning thirty in a few weeks. That should be like some kind of sign. I don’t want to have to leave to find someone, but I will if it’s what I have to do. Nome’s winters are too long to do them alone forever.”

  Molly had this look on her face and I knew that I had said too much. It was lonely here without someone. Until recently she was single too, so I had a good feeling that she knew what I was talking about.

  “You just got to have faith Denise. When it is supposed to happen, it will happen. Sometimes it’s all about timing with these kinds of things. I know that it’s going to happen for you soon. I can just feel it.”

  “I wish I was as positive as you were.”

  Because I was starting to wonder if there was a man out there for me, at all. If he was out there, I wish he would come soon, because I was sick of waiting. More men could be a good thing because the man of my dreams may be coming soon.

  Chapter 2

  Denise

  It had been almost a month since they’d first announced the new harbor and what it was going to be used for. The talk in town was not so nice and many people were not inclined to want change. Humans never did and I h
ad to keep my opinions to myself about it not being so bad. No one wanted to hear about the good side of it and what could come from it. They were far too into finding all of the bad that was going to come from it, whether it was true or not.

  “Hey Denise, I haven’t heard you say a word about the new cruise line coming in.”

  I was pouring some coffee into a cup of one of the regulars and I just shrugged at the question. I knew when it was time to shut up and I usually did, but Carl had asked several times before.

  “I don’t have anything to say about it. It’s happening, so you might as well stop fussing about it like some two year olds. All you’re doing is riling yourselves up.”

  That got a round of laughter and I turned around to go back to the counter and stopped in my tracks when I saw the new arrival that had just came through the door. It was not someone that I’d seen before and it felt just like the reason that I wanted the plans to go through. He was a fresh face and I was already smiling before I realized what I was doing. The man was gorgeous and I felt like my options were already getting better by the minute.

  “Take a seat wherever you like Sir. You want coffee?”

  The blonde man smiled at me and agreed that he did. He had a grin that ran from one side of his face to another and I liked the way it looked. It looked like he had a secret and I wanted to know it. He was tall, very tall and just as broad as everyone else here. He even dressed like the mountain men of the area, but there was something that made him stand out besides the obvious of not being from here.

  His face was smooth and his blue eyes made him look a little boyish, even though it was clear that he wasn’t a boy at all. The new arrival was a man in every aspect of the word and I wanted to know who he was, but with present conversation, I didn’t think that it would be a good idea to start in. I didn’t want to put a bigger target than there already was on his back.

  I came back with the coffee and the man had chosen to sit on the bar counter on the end. Now he could watch me and when I looked over twice, that was exactly what he was doing. It made me very self-conscious and I tried my best not to let it bother me, but his attention was nerve wracking.

  “Cream? Sugar?”

  “Please.”

  The sound of the word on his lips was somehow erotic or I was just taking it that way. The way I was feeling, there really wasn’t any telling. My mind had gone immediately to the gutter and I had to pick it up out of there before I said something I wasn’t supposed to.

  When I came back with some of both, he thanked me and our hands touched momentarily as he went for one of the creams.

  “Hungry?”

  “Starving.”

  “Breakfast?”

  “Not right now.”

  I don’t know why, but the last bit had me trembling a little inside. I leaned back up and stood, trying to figure out when I had leaned in to begin with for.

  “Denise?”

  I was turning around to go help another customer, but my name uttered from his lips was enough to get my attention away.

  “Yeah.”

  “I’m Ethan by the way.”

  “Nice to meet you Ethan. Let me know if you need anything else.”

  “Will do.”

  I walked away with flames and red streaks on my face. Of all the time I had lived in Nome, I’d never been so turned on and embarrassed at the same time. I had to continue to waitress, knowing the man was right there, watching me and a glance his way every now and then confirmed it.

  Molly came in a little while later and asked about the man at the counter. He hadn’t said much of anything besides to thank me for the coffee that I kept refilling in his cup. The locals around him railed about the new plans and the new harbor that was going to start being built soon. I don’t know why, but I had a feeling that he was taking it all in. He was one of those newcomers.

  I told her that I didn’t know much and she decided that she wasn’t going to wait around to find out. There was a new face in her restaurant and she wanted to know who it was.

  Molly walked over to him and asked if he needed anything.

  “No Ma’am, thank you.”

  Molly hated to be called that, but she just smiled.

  “So where are you coming from friend?”

  “Kalachee.”

  She whistled. “That’s even further out of the way than Nome.”

  He agreed and I was left in the dark because I had no idea where that was. Molly seemed to know and apparently it was worse than being at the end of the world. It left me wondering and if I hadn’t had so much to do; I would have done an internet search to have answered that question by now.

  “It is.”

  “Then what are you doing here?”

  He grinned. “Working on the harbor. I made the plans, so I’m here to make sure it’s done as it is supposed to be done. I’m a couple of days early and was hoping to get a feel for the locals before I started.”

  Molly laughed. “Well I bet you’ve gotten a feel for them now.”

  She was talking about how vocal they all were about the plans and he just kind of smiled back at her. “I see that.”

  “Well don’t take it personally honey. We like to bitch a lot round here, but it will be a good thing in the end. Either way, it’s happening.”

  Molly was once again not too happy about it, but I can’t say that I wasn’t. It looked like good things were already coming to Nome.

  Chapter 3

  Ethan

  “So what is there to do around here?”

  Molly waved her hands around. “You see it. There are plenty of wildernesses to hunt and fish in, hiking. I don’t really know what the men do around here except drink coffee and complain, but there is a lot to do if you like the outdoors.”

  I told her that I liked to hunt and she went through a few places that were available, including one sight that I hadn’t expected.

  “Hey Denise. You still have that track behind your house, don’t you?”

  She told her that she did and Molly offered that up as well. That got my attention because I wanted to see more of the quiet little redhead that was serving me coffee all morning. She was not at all like the blonde I was talking to now and that was a good thing. The redhead was quiet right now, but her eyes and walked I walked into when I first got here told me that the truth was otherwise.

  Denise hadn’t said much, but I had her attention and her soulful green eyes told me that she was interested in me. I believed that more than I believed anything else. I smiled at her several times and she had this almost innocent reaction to my attention that made me curious. They didn’t have women like her where I was from and I was even happier to be in Nome. Maybe something good was going to come out of it, more than I had thought anyways. This trip was going to be more than a little money in my pocket.

  “You don’t mind?”

  Denise nodded her head that she didn’t. “Not at all. Its good hunting ground, but I don’t personally like to hunt it too much. I just talk other people in to killing for me if I need something. I haven’t hunted out there in a long while.”

  “Well I wouldn’t mind going out one evening soon if you are going to be home and wouldn’t mind. I don’t want to find myself on the wrong track and someone get territorial. They do a lot where I come from.”

  “I don’t have to be there if you want to go. I will give you the address and you can come by if you feel up to it whenever. I’m here a lot, so you don’t have to wait for me to be home, or you would be hunting by flashlight.”

  Molly waved her off and told her that she had some time coming up to be off. All she had to do was tell her when. Denise didn’t like the add-on by her friend, but she smiled nonetheless and didn’t answer back.

  Denise was put on the spot and she relented because she was not given another choice. Molly pushed for a time; even though I would have left it open.

  “Tomorrow?”

  Denise agreed, but once again I wasn’t sure if that was
something she wanted to do or felt compelled to do to be polite. It didn’t matter to me all that much why, as long as I got to see her again in a different context than here. There were too many people in everyone’s business to try anything here with. I would have better luck at her place and less people watching our every move. Denise hadn’t been with anyone in the town and that had made her a legend in some eyes and I even got a few dirty looks for even talking to her.

  I got up from the counter and thanked her again for the coffee. I’d had enough and I had a couple of men that I had to meet about the job that was already starting to get going full steam. It was my vision, but I had to make sure that everyone else could see it as well. It was going to be an attraction, as well as a functional harbor, so I had to make sure everything was just right. This was my first big project like this so close to home and I wanted to make sure that everything went right. There was more pressure because it was my home state and I knew how the locals loved change around here.

  The air was much colder than the inside and it took my body a minute to acclimate to the change. It was a little warmer here in Nome then where I was from, but there was dampness in the air that I wasn’t used to. It somehow seemed to make it colder than home.

  My mind went to Denise and I could see that I was going to be spending more time there. There were a couple other restaurants in the small, seaside town, but it was Molly’s that had the staff to take care of all of my needs.

  Pushing those thoughts from my brain, I couldn’t help but find it straying there time and time again while I took the short walk to the harbor. It wasn’t that far from the restaurant and it gave me some time to appreciate the views. I loved Alaska and travelling to all parts of it had always been a fun pastime for me. I wanted to see what was out there and the more I tried to see it all, the more I realized that there was just so much more to see and I wanted someone to share it with. Travelling alone became old after a while. I wanted someone to see the sights with me.