Against the Wild (35 page)

“I don't care.”

He started smiling. “You should see it here when it snows. Big white flakes falling, weighing down the branches of the trees. The ice in the creek sparkles like diamonds. It's like living in one of those crystal snow globes.”

“You can show me. You can make me see it through your eyes.”

Something unfurled in his chest. “I love you. Will you marry me?”

Lane threw her arms around his neck. “I thought you'd never ask.”

Emily took off running for the house. “They're getting married!” she shouted, racing in to tell Caleb and Winnie. “Daddy and Lane are getting married!” Finn rushed after her, and the two disappeared into the lodge.

Dylan looked down at Lane. “I should have seen it. I should have realized you were the one. I should have figured it out when you fought down that bear.”

Lane laughed. She was crying when he kissed her. But they were happy tears.

His own joy came from a place he'd closed off a long time ago. Lane had opened the door to that dark, lonely place inside him.

He found himself smiling. He had given her the chance to go back. Now he'd never let her go.

Dylan bent his head and kissed her.

The Eagle Bay Lodge was officially open, with more than half the rooms filled with sportsmen, some with their wives. Dylan and Lane were officially engaged. They planned to marry next summer, when family and friends could join them. They were both excited, but not in a rush. For the moment, they were just happy to be enjoying their lives, and for Lane, the adventure of living in Alaska.

Dylan had been wrong about that. Lane loved it here.

“I might not have been born here,” she would say with a grin. “But I got here as quick as I could.”

Emily was talking a mile a minute now. Dylan smiled to think he couldn't seem to shut her up. She had blamed herself for her mother's death and kept her misplaced guilt locked inside.

She was free of that now.

Lane was painting. Every time she hung one of her landscapes in the great hall, one of the guests wanted to buy it. She was a terrific artist. But he had known that from the start.

“Dylan!” Waving a newspaper, she ran toward him down the grassy slope in front of the float dock, where he was working on the plane, making a few little adjustments to the engine.

Tossing down his wrench, he started up the gangway, caught her in his arms, and twirled her around, nuzzling his face in her hair.

“What is it, love?”

She shoved the newspaper in front of him. “I got an e-mail from the boys in Yeil, Alex and Jared? They did it, Dylan.”

“All right, I'll bite. What'd they do?”

“I printed the article they sent me. It was in the
San Francisco Chronicle
. Alex and Jared went down to San Francisco. Remember, that's where Artemus Carmack lived?”

“I remember.”

“Apparently his wife's family lived there, too. It's where he and Olivia met. When Artemus went broke, Olivia's parents bought his mansion in Pacific Heights. Descendants of the family still own the house. A few years back, one of them found his journal among some old papers in the library.”

“You mean the fool admitted to committing the murders?”

“Can you believe it? When Alex and Jared went to the house to talk to them, Olivia's family gave them the journal. The family had read them, but in those days reputation was more important than justice. Still, secretly they hated that the man who'd killed Olivia and little Mary had gotten away with murder. At last the day had come to see the truth exposed.”

Dylan looked down at the printed piece of paper. “That's what's in the article?”

She nodded. “The article is also about us, Dylan, and the Eagle Bay Lodge. How we urged the boys in Yeil to prove what really happened. The paper is going to do a series about Carmack, once one of San Francisco's most prominent citizens. They're going to tell the truth about what happened to Olivia and her little girl.”

He felt a trickle of unease. “They gonna say the lodge is full of ghosts?”

“According to Alex and Jared, since there never really were any ghosts, they're leaving that part out.”

“In that case, maybe it'll be good for business.”

“That's what I was thinking when I agreed to let them come up and do a photo shoot.”

He grinned. “Maybe it'll also be good for your budding career as an artist.”

She laughed. “Could be.” She looked past him out at the bay. “You know, I never told you this, but remember the day you flew me up here? That funny dream I had about the raven?”

“What about it?”

“We didn't fly over the cemetery that day.”

He glanced away, feeling a little guilty. “Yeah, I know. I just didn't want any more trouble.” He looked down at her. “I wonder why you had that dream.”

Lane turned and gazed back up the hill in the direction of the old cemetery, where the raven totem stood guard over the villagers who were buried there. “I don't know. I guess some things can never be explained.”

But Dylan figured the dream she'd had was just one more sign that Lane belonged there. As they walked back up the hill toward the lodge, he smiled.

I hope you enjoyed Dylan and Lane in
Against the Wild
. It's the first of three novels about the Brodie brothers of Alaska, romantic, high-action adventures I'm hoping will keep you entertained.

You've met Dylan's brother, Nick Brodie, a former police detective with a serious case of burnout. In
Against the Sky
, you'll meet Samantha Hollis, owner of the Perfect Pup dog-grooming salon, a woman from California who is definitely in for trouble with both Nick and Alaska.

Trouble that involves solving a murder and puts both their lives in danger.

I hope you'll watch for
Against the Sky
, then Rafe Brodie's story,
Against the Tide
. Till then, very best wishes and happy reading.

 

Kat

Read on for a preview of
Against the Sky
, coming next February.

Nick helped Samantha into his black Ford Explorer for the drive down the hill to his house. It had started to rain. This late in September, rainy days were a given.

“What do you think really happened to Jimmy?” she asked. “A fistfight with a schoolmate wouldn't explain why he didn't come home all day.”

“Maybe he was afraid of what his aunt would say when she saw his battered face, but it's hard to believe. Jimmy's usually the kind of kid who tackles trouble head-on.”

“Then what else could it be?”

Nick shook his head. “Worrying his aunt that way was really out of character.” He ran a hand over the late-night beard along his jaw. “I don't know, it seemed like he was trying to brazen it out, putting up a tough front, but I got a feeling he was scared.”

“Of his aunt?”

Nick shook his head. “No.” He sighed. “Hell, he's a kid. Maybe I was reading the whole thing wrong. I'll talk to him in the morning, see if I can get him to open up.” He looked over at Samantha as he pulled into the driveway. “I've got a microwave. How about we heat up some of that chicken you cooked before we had to go looking for a runaway kid?”

“Good idea. I'm really hungry.”

“Me, too.” But the kind of hunger he was feeling had nothing to do with food and everything to do with Samantha Hollis. He tried not to remember the last time they had been together, the softness of her lips, her small, feminine curves, her sweet cries of passion as she'd moved beneath him.

He tried to prevent it, but by the time he pulled the car into the garage, turned off the engine, and helped Samantha down from the SUV, he was hard as a frigging stone.

Samantha smiled as he led her into the kitchen. “I imagine after all the excitement, we'll both get a good night's sleep.”

He cast her a thunderous look. “You really think so? Because I'll be lying there half the night aching for you, wishing you were in my bed instead of your own.”

Her eyes widened. “But you said—”

“I know what I said. I said you'd be safe if you came to Alaska, and I won't break my word. Doesn't mean I don't want you.” He leaned over and very softly kissed her, felt his arousal stirring beneath his jeans. Samantha returned the kiss, making him harder still. Then she pulled away.

“I-I'd better get the chicken out of the fridge and into the microwave.” She started walking toward the refrigerator, stopped, and turned back. “I'm glad your friend Jimmy is safe.”

“Yeah, at least for now.” It took superhuman effort to force his mind off sex and onto the conversation he needed to have with the boy in the morning. The kid was important to him. The boy's father had just died, and Jimmy was convinced it was murder. It was crazy, but after what had happened tonight, it was clear that something was wrong. Nick needed to find out what the hell was going on.

Samantha couldn't sleep. Nick had said he'd be lying in bed aching for her, wishing she were there beside him. She hadn't thought she would be the one aching, unable to sleep.

How could she have forgotten the magnetic pull of the man? The aura of masculinity that had so effortlessly seduced her before?

Just looking at that lean-muscled body as he walked around the house made her want him, those long, purposeful strides that had attracted her from the moment she had seen him in the hotel. And those amazing eyes, the most arresting shade of blue she had ever seen. Eyes that should have been cool, but instead seemed to burn with an inner heat.

Nick was the kind of man who touched easily and without conscious thought, the kind who made a woman feel protected and desired. She remembered the feel of his hard body pressing her down in the mattress, his muscles flexing as he took her, the pleasure he had given her. She remembered every moment she had spent with Nick.

She wanted Nick Brodie, had from the moment he had rescued her from a stranger's unwanted advances.

But now there was more at stake. So much more. She needed to know him, trust him. She needed time to be certain he was the kind of man he seemed.

She heard movement in the bedroom next to hers. Nick was awake, just as he'd said. How long could she resist the urge to go to him, to offer him her body as she had done before?

With a sigh, Samantha plumped her pillow, put it over her head, and tried not to wish Nick would storm through the door and demand a place in her bed.

ZEBRA BOOKS are published by

 

Kensington Publishing Corp.
119 West 40th Street
New York, NY 10018

 

Copyright © 2014 by Kat Martin

 

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the Publisher, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.

 

If you purchased this book without a cover you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the Publisher and neither the Author nor the Publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”

 

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ISBN: 978-1-4201-3382-0

 

First Electronic Edition: June 2014
eISBN-13: 978-1-4201-3383-7
eISBN-10: 1-4201-3383-7