by K. C. Crowne
Neanderthal Next Door
Enemies to Lovers, Mountain Man Next-Door, Halloween Romance
K.C. Crowne
Contents
Also by K.C. Crowne
1. Mandy
2. Hunter
3. Mandy
4. Hunter
5. Mandy
6. Hunter
7. Mandy
8. Hunter
9. Mandy
10. Hunter
11. Mandy
12. Hunter
13. Mandy
14. Hunter
15. Mandy
16. Hunter
17. Mandy
18. Hunter
19. Mandy
20. Hunter
21. Mandy
22. Hunter
23. Mandy
24. Hunter
25. Mandy
26. Hunter
27. Mandy
28. Hunter
29. Mandy
30. Hunter
31. Mandy
32. Hunter
33. Mandy
34. Hunter
Epilogue
Baby for the Mountain Man (Preview)
About the Author
Also by K.C. Crowne
Mountain Men of Liberty Series (this series)
Baby for the Mountain Man| Junior for the Mountain Man| Knocked Up by the Mountain Man| Baby For Daddy's Friend | Triplets for the Mountain Man | Taboo Mountain Daddy| Mountain Man’s Secret Baby | Mountain Man’s Accidental Surprise | Quadruplets for the Mountain Man
Rainbow Canyons Cowboy Series
Untamed Cowboy |Taboo Cowboy |Cowboy’s Baby|Her Cowboy Daddies | Southern Charm| Cowboy’s Bride
Big Bad Daddies Series
Big Bad Doctor | Big Bad Daddy| Big Bad Taboo Daddy | Big Bad Prince|Big Bad Mountain Man| Big Bad SEAL| Big Bad Boss| Big Bad Sugar Daddy| Big Bad Mountain Brothers
Bearded Brothers Mountain Man Series
Her Mountain Daddy| Beauty and the Beard| Bride and the Beard| Built and Bearded |
Firemen of Manhattan Series
Big Bad Fireman’s Baby| Big Bad Firefighter| Big Bad Fire Daddy|
Spenser Sisters Reverse Harem Series
Men on a Mission| Christmas with Four Firemen| Dirty Cowboys
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Description
"This mountain isn't big enough for the two of us, Princess."
Hunter is a Neanderthal ✓
Mr. Crabby pants neighbor ✓✓
Totally NOT even close to my type. ✓✓✓
Okay, fine. That last one isn't entirely true.
The mountain man thinks he can scare me away.
But I don't scare easily.
I've got to protect my little boy from danger...And the demons of my past can't find us here.
So, if Hunter thinks he can intimate me with a grimace that would make a Halloween jack-o-lantern jealous - he has another thing coming.
Mandy
“Earth to Mamma!”
That pulled me out of my daydream.
I turned and glanced down, seeing my six-year-old son Parker standing next to me, an expression of concern on his face, like he knew something was wrong. And like the sweet little man he was, he’d often check in on me when I seemed to be having one of my episodes - staring off into the abyss
“Are you okay, Mom?” he asked.
Truthfully, I was nowhere near okay. We were hundreds of miles away from the place we’d called home since Parker’s birth, and all I could think about were the memories from the past. Maybe my mind was torturing me for my decision to pack us up and move to a strange new place. Or maybe it was my mind’s weird way of detoxing all the horrible memories and nightmares.
I wasn’t sure I wanted that, though. I wanted to hold on to every memory of Michael – even the soul crushing ones that tore me to shreds. I had loved that man with all my heart. Holding on to his memories was all I had now.
Without fail, however, the sight of Parker always managed to make me feel better. He was a reminder of why I was doing all this, why I’d moved us out to the middle of rural Washington to start over. All for him.
Parker was the spitting image of his father. Deep green eyes and auburn hair that defied the laws of gravity in the way it stood up in the morning.
I smiled, kneeling in front of him. Parker was dressed in an Iron Man costume, the mask hiding his adorable face. “I’m fine – just thinking about all the stuff we have to do today. You don’t need to worry.”
“Um, I think the waffles are burning.”
I sniffed the air, catching the scent of charred bread. “Shoot!”
My coffee mug in hand, I hurried into the kitchen and to the waffle-maker. Smoke was seeping out of the closed compartment.
“Holy mother trucker.” It wasn’t the word I wanted to say, of course. But it was as close as I could get without giving Parker any ideas on language that would be permissible under our new roof. I set down the mug and pried open the waffle-maker. The waffles were spattered with black singe marks, the scent of burnt food even more intense.
“That smells kinda gross,” Parker said, stepping up on the tippy toes of his sneakers to see with his little nose wrinkled in disgust.
“It’s, um, worse than it looks.” I picked up the waffle by the edge so Parker could get a good look.
“That one can be yours,” he decided.
I laughed. Even at a young age, Parker already had his father’s wry sense of humor.
“How about it’s no one’s,” I said with a smile, tossing it aside and preparing to ladle another heaping serving of batter.
“I like that idea,” he said, nodding.
I closed the lid, the batter popping and simmering in the maker.
“What are we going to do today, Mom?” Parker asked, taking a seat at the round, wooden kitchen table. “Can we go see the woods?”
“Trust me, kiddo,” I said. “We’re going to be seeing plenty of the woods. We live in them now. You’ll see so much you may start talking to the trees before too long.”
He laughed. “That’d be funny.”
“Seriously though, we’re going into town today to get you some stuff for school. And speaking of school, you’re going to need to get used to wearing something a little more appropriate than an Iron Man costume.”
He groaned as I took the mask off his face and set it on the counter. “I don’t want to go to school here,” he said, a sour expression on his face. “I miss San Diego. I miss my friends. And I have to wear my costume so I can get ready for Halloween.”
I turned, placing my palms on the edge of the counter. “I know this is different,” I said. “But we always have fun, you and me, right? I know it’s a major change, but also it’s an adventure, and adventures are always scary at first.”
“I don’t want an adventure,” he grumbled. “I want things back as they were.”
So do I kiddo.
We’d had this conversation many times before, and one I could sense we would have plenty more times in the future. But
I couldn’t blame him one bit. After all, I had decided to totally uproot our lives in San Diego and move all the way up to Washington, hundreds of miles from anything we’d known. We’d gone from sun and beaches to slate-gray skies and Douglas Firs.
I took my mug and sat down across from him. “We need to start over, to be someplace new. Especially when the old place has sad memories.”
“It’s cold here,” he complained.
“Cold’s good for you,” I told him. “It toughens you up – makes you strong.”
“Strong like Dad was?”
It’d been two years since we’d lost Michael, and one of the hardest parts was that it’d happened when Parker was so young that he barely had a chance to know his own father. But that didn’t stop him from viewing him as a legendary, larger-than-life figure, a brave military man who was a million feet tall and not scared of anything.
“That’s right,” I said with a smile. “That’s what your dad always said – you have to push yourself if you want to get strong.”
And he had. But I found myself wondering if moving wasn’t about pushing myself, if it was really about running away. Didn’t matter. I’d made the call, moved into my family’s old cabin in the woods. Silver Pines, the nearest dot of civilization on the map – not to mention my hometown – was thirty minutes away and with a population of twenty thousand. If I wanted to run, I’d picked the best damn place to run off to.
“I want to be tough like Dad,” he said, a flash of determination on his face. “And join the military.”
I smiled, happy he was happy. The waffle maker chimed, letting me know it was ready. I opened it, pried the non-burned waffles out, and dropped them onto a plate.
“Then eat up, champ,” I said, putting the plate in front of Parker. “You want to be tough like Dad, then you’re going to need a heck of a lot of waffles.”
He grinned as he reached for the syrup, dumping it all over his waffles and going to town. I mussed his hair, taking the mask and setting it in front of him before turning back to the window above the sink just in time to watch the branches of the trees on the edge of the property rustle. The grumble of an engine sounded, and my stomach tensed until I spotted the familiar shape of a mid-nineties Ford Explorer emerge from the trees, the two tones a deep orange and off-white.
“Who’s that?” Parker asked, already halfway through his breakfast.
“It’s Lizzie,” I said. “You eat – I’ll say hi.”
With another muss of Parker’s hair, I grabbed my mug of coffee and headed to the front door just in time to watch Lizzie pull the car to a stop, kill the engine, and hop out.
“Goo-oood morning!” she sang, waving her hand as she sauntered toward me.
Lizzie McMillian was my best friend since the two of us were kids going to school at Tillman Elementary in town. But our lives had taken very different directions over the years. While I’d gone off to LA to go to school, getting hitched and moving to San Diego soon after, she’d stayed in town, putting down some serious roots, opening her own boutique, and playing the field when it came to men.
And with one look at her, it was easy to see why she never had any trouble catching the eye of whatever guy tickled her fancy – and even ones that didn’t. She was tall and blonde, with long legs that stretched for miles out of the bottoms of her jean shorts. Her smile was sunny, her eyes a watery blue, and her figure like something out of a pin-up magazine.
“Morning!” I chimed, noting how thick the air was with moisture from the latest drizzle.
“How’s life in the middle of nowhere?” she asked, coming over to me, her boots plopping in the soft earth.
“Quiet,” I said, leaning against the door frame. “That’s for damn sure.”
“You know,” she said, putting her hands on her hips. “When I told you to come back to Silver Pines, I meant, like, actually coming back to Silver Pines – not living in the woods like a dang hermit.”
“Well, I don’t currently have a job, so a free cabin my mom left me sounded pretty good.”
She looked around, gazing at the little cabin Parker and I now called home. “Just as long as you’re not going too kooky out here.”
“So far, so good.”
“Well, it’s only been a few days. Let’s see how you fare when it’s been a month and you and Parker are starting to have conversations with the elks.” She grinned, and I laughed. “So!” she said, clapping her hands. “You going to invite me in for coffee or what?”
I stepped aside. “Come on in. You might be here in time for waffles, too.”
“You know just how to win a girl over,” she said with a wink as she walked into the house. Once inside, she stopped and looked around. “Wow,” she said. “You know, for a cabin in the middle of the woods, this is actually a pretty nice little pad.”
I smiled at her observation. The cabin wasn’t huge – two bedrooms, two bathrooms, a living room and combined kitchen and dining area – but it was pretty spacious for two people. It was small and cozy, filled with furniture my father had hand-carved out of wood and thick blankets my mom had made herself draped over the backs of the chairs and couches. There was a fireplace and plenty of bookshelves just waiting to be packed with new books. Solar panels on the roof gave us all the electricity we’d need.
“It’s great,” I said, leading her to the kitchen. “And most importantly, it’s quiet.”
She smirked. “Have you been to Silver Pines before? It’s not exactly Tribeca.”
“Silver Pines is regular small-town quiet. I need monk-quiet.”
“Well, you’ve got it.”
We stepped into the kitchen. Parker’s plate was already clean, only a few small pools of syrup remaining. He looked up and said, “Mom, can I have some more?”
“And hello to you too, big man,” Lizzie said with a smile.
“Parker, say hi,” I said, stepping over to the coffee pot to pour Lizzie a mug.
“Hi, Aunt Lizzie,” he said, clearly more interested in his next serving of waffles.
“You gonna share those waffles with me?” Lizzie asked. Parker looked shocked, as if the idea of sharing the next serving was totally unimaginable. “I’m kidding, I’m kidding,” she said. “As if I’d make a handsome little dude like you wait for more waffles.” She picked up the mostly burnt one from the counter and took a bite. “Perfect,” she said between chews. “Charred to perfection.”
Parker laughed, and I poured another ladle of batter into the machine before passing Lizzie her mug.
“Anyway,” she said. “I stopped by for two reasons. First was to see if you wanted some help shopping this afternoon.”
“I’d love it,” I said. “And we can get some lunch in town.”
“Perfect. I would say you could pick up some Halloween candy for trick-or-treaters, but something tells me you’re not going to have too many up here,” Lizzie joked, chuckling at herself.
“The other thing?”
She sipped her mug, her face going blank as if trying to figure out how to say what was on her mind. “So, you came up here for quiet, right?”
“Right.”
“Well…you’ve got a new neighbor.”
I looked around at her, unhappy about the prospect. “Wait, what?”
“You know the place down the road? A quarter mile or so west and up in the hills? Some guy bought it.”
I sighed, hoping this person was of the same mind as me: solitude. “Are you serious? When did you hear about this?”
“I was at Marley’s last night.” Marley’s was one of the local watering holes. “And this…guy came in.” She said the word as if guy wasn’t sufficient. “He was tall, big shoulders, looked like a cross between a lumberjack and a Navy SEAL. He sat down by himself, ordered a beer and drank in silence.”
“And let me guess, you started hitting on him.”
“If you saw him, you wouldn’t blame me a bit.”
“Why would you hit a stranger?” Parker asked.
Lizzie and I shared a look and giggled. “It’s not like hitting. It means when adults talk to someone they like,” I said, trying to find the best way to describe it.
“I won’t be hitting any girls. They’re annoying.”
Lizzie and I both laughed before she continued. “Anyway, he’s kinda-sorta hot, in that rugged way. But when I tried to get him into conversation, he was not having it. I got his name – Hunter – and that he just bought a cabin near town. And on my way here I spotted a truck driving up the road toward the place.”
“So I have a new neighbor,” I said, not thrilled.
“A very, very attractive new neighbor,” she said, raising a finger.
“I don’t care if he’s the hottest guy on the planet – that’s the last thing I’m thinking about right now.”
“Wait until you see him,” she said with a glint in her eye. “And that’s not all. I stopped for coffee at the Red Roast and people were already talking about him.”
“Are you serious?” I asked. “Guy’s in town for less than a day and the gossip mills are already going?”
“It’s Silver Pines!” she exclaimed. “People have to pass the time somehow.”
“I’ll bite then,” I said. “What were they saying?”
“They’re not a fan so far. He’s pretty gruff.”
“Pretty gruff?”
“He’s not exactly a people person, for one. And I can attest to that – he did more grunting than talking when I tried to start a conversation with him.”