by Ranae Rose
Lonely Alpha
Ranae Rose
EBooks are not transferable. This book may not be sold, copied or given away. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
This book is a work of fiction. All characters, names and events are products of the author’s imagination and are in no way real. Any resemblance to real events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Lonely Alpha
Smashwords edition
Copyright © 2012 Ranae Rose
Cover Design by Ranae Rose
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner without written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
Chapter 1
Mandy’s butt had fused to the driver’s seat of her Honda. She was sure of it.
She guided the car around what seemed like the millionth hair-pin turn of the day, sighing as she shifted, trying to work some feeling into her numbed cheeks. Only five more minutes to go. Or at least, that was her best guess. Her traitorous GPS had given up on the journey half an hour ago, leaving her to navigate the Tennessee wilderness on her own. Her road trip from Nashville to the Great Smoky Mountains had already proven to be even longer than the time quoted on the directions she’d printed out as back-up – the sun was creeping lower and lower, and would set before long. The drive had eaten up most of the first day of her vacation, but the evening should be salvageable…if she could find her cabin.
“Ah,” she sighed, cracking a window and letting the brisk spring air rush in. It had been too long since she’d breathed such unabashedly fresh air. She loved the outdoors and always had; there was just something about disappearing into the peaks and valleys of the mountains that made her feel alive. She didn’t get to do it often, so she fully intended to make the most of this week.
Tendrils of her blond hair escaped the loose knot she’d twisted them into, but who cared? She’d be alone with nature this week. Gloriously alone; free to let her hair go to crap if she felt like it. She had a brand new pair of hiking boots, a dozen unread books and a year’s supply of loose-leaf tea packed somewhere in her trunk. She didn’t need anything or anyone else. This vacation was a reward for her hard work, and she’d promised it to herself ages ago. She’d put it off for over a year, convinced she was too busy to escape city life for even a week, until one day she’d realized that she’d never take the trip unless she buckled down and forced herself to take a break. Now, here she was, lost in the seemingly endless Smoky Mountains. It felt good.
“Whoa!” A doe bounded across the road, her white tail held high.
Mandy hit the brakes, glancing reflexively at her rearview mirror. Fortunately, she seemed to be the only one traveling the desolate road. She started forward again, slower this time. It was a good thing too, because if she’d been going any faster, she might have missed the small cabin that was just barely visible through a thick screen of pines. “Finally.” She smiled, turning into the narrow dirt driveway.
The cabin looked about the same as it had in the pictures online. It was modestly sized and cute in a rustic sort of way – perfect for a vacationer seeking some time alone in the mountains – and even more secluded than she’d realized. As she pulled her keys from the ignition and exited her vehicle, it was like stepping into a new world; a quiet green one, lost deep in the foliage and namesake fog of the Smokies. Everything was perfect.
“What the hell?” The cabin’s screen door banged open, and a man stepped out, swearing loudly.
Mandy jumped, tripping backward into her car and rolling across the hood like a spy in an action movie, only not nearly as graceful. She barely managed to catch herself before she hit the ground and dirtied her new khaki hiking shorts.
“What the hell,” she muttered under her breath, echoing the stranger’s words as she braced herself with a hand against the bumper, narrowing her eyes at the man who’d nearly caused her to have a heart attack. He was tall with a shock of unruly, almost-black hair and a strong jaw shadowed by matching stubble. By the looks of him, he hadn’t shaved for days. It was as if he’d given in to the solitude of the mountains, foregoing things like razors...and shirts. The open flannel he wore hung loose at his sides, revealing a tight, toned torso striped with dark hair that formed a diamond in the center of his chest and narrowed to a thin trail that disappeared beneath the waistband of his well-worn jeans. He definitely didn’t look as if he’d been expecting anyone to drop by, and as Mandy stood staring, waiting for her adrenaline surge to ebb, he glared right back at her from the cabin’s front porch.
“This ain’t a turnaround,” he said, crossing his arms over his chest, “it’s private property.”
He was about as refined and charming as he looked. Mandy scowled. “I’ve rented this place from today ‘till next Thursday. What are you doing here?”
He mumbled something under his breath that sounded suspiciously like ‘the hell you did’, and shifted his stance, causing his shirt to gape even wider, shamelessly revealing a well-muscled hip. “I told you, this is private property.”
Mandy rolled her eyes. Maybe he was some sort of deranged mountain man squatting in her rented vacation home, hoping to scare her off with his bad manners. He seemed a little young for that – he looked about her age, and couldn’t have been older than thirty – but in any case, it wasn’t going to work. She straightened and marched right up to the porch, jutting her chin out to match his defiant expression. When she stopped within a couple feet of him, his scent hit her like a freight train. It was all fresh pine and masculine, woodsy musk. She took one deep, gluttonous breath before forcing herself to breathe shallowly, refusing to appreciate his smell. “Is this 113 Whippoorwill Road?”
His full lips curved slowly, showing her just a hint of a cocky smile. “Sure ain’t.”
She scrutinized his face, trying to determine whether he was telling the truth. It was a challenge not to take a step backward when she met his eyes. They were hazel – the brightest hazel she’d ever seen. Almost gold. His stare was…penetrating. And irksome, when paired with that condescending half-smile. “Then just where might I be,” she asked, managing to keep her voice mostly steady, “if this isn’t 113 Whippoorwill Road?”
“Pine Ridge,” he said, drawing out each syllable with his thick Southern accent like she was too stupid to understand if he spoke at a normal pace.
What a smug ass. And yet… “Pine Ridge Road…” It did sound vaguely familiar. “Hold on. I’m getting my map.”
He stood motionlessly as she turned on her heel and marched for her car. His stare burnt into her back, making her want to shrug. She resisted the urge, retrieving the map and directions she’d printed and striding to the porch with them in hand. Her stomach tied itself into a series of uneasy knots as she scanned the papers. “Pine Ridge isn’t anywhere near Whippoorwill.”
He shrugged. “Might not seem close to a city girl like you, but it’s only a few miles away. Just around the other side of the mountain.”
City girl? Was he serious? She barely managed to suppress a snort as she met those strange almost-golden eyes again. “So you’re not just trying to get rid of me – I really am in the wrong place?”
He nodded, and a little heat crept into her cheeks. She’d been so sure…this cabin was the only building she’d seen for miles. Who actually lived out here, so cut off from civilization? But as she glanced around, she noticed things she’d overlooked in her excitement, such as the old pick-up truck parked around the side of the cabin. With its rust-eaten body, it blended almost seamlessly with the forest behind it. Its wheels were sunken into well-established ruts in the ground, and it looked as if it probably hadn’t been driven in ages. People didn
’t leave crappy old trucks in the yards of vacation cabins. This was a home. She swallowed. “I thought for sure that this was my rental cabin.”
He arched an eyebrow at her, clearly nonplussed.
“My GPS crapped out on me and…” She trailed off. He obviously didn’t care what had led her to make the mistake. She made a conscious effort to smooth her features as a wave of irritation rolled over her. “Do you think you could give me directions to Whippoorwill?”
He rattled off a string of directions, as if he knew the mountain like the back of his own hand. For being ‘just around the other side of the mountain’, the journey there was pretty damn complicated. She jotted down his instructions on the back of her useless internet directions. “Thanks,” she said when he finished. “I appreciate you directing me, and uh…”
God, apologizing to him rankled. There was just something about his arrogant expression that made saying the words feel more like swallowing acid. “I’m sorry about the misunderstanding. It was my mistake.” She finished anyway. Maybe he’d take a hint and get some manners of his own.
He tilted his head ever so slightly in her direction. “Enjoy your vacation.”
She chose to ignore what might have been a hint of sarcasm in his voice as she turned and headed for her car. A minute later, she was back on the road, breathing freely again now that she wasn’t within sniffing range of his rich scent. She left the windows cracked and inhaled the fresh air, hoping it would help her forget about the stranger and his odd eyes. So far, it hadn’t exactly been the solitary, hassle-free escape she’d imagined. But there was still plenty of time for that. All she had to do was make it to her cabin, her own little retreat nestled deep in the wilderness…
“Crap!” She pounded a fist on the dashboard as she hit the brakes, squealing to a stop in the middle of the mountain road. It wasn’t a deer that had stopped her this time, but a tree. A gigantic one that looked as if it had been growing for decades…and had chosen this very day to fall squarely over the road, blocking it completely.
There had to be another way. Mandy put on her hazard lights, on the off chance that someone would pull up behind her, and picked up her map. She studied it for a good ten minutes, searching for any possible route that would lead her to Whippoorwill. As time stretched on, she became more and more exasperated. Apparently, there was no other way. At least, not on the map. An idea struck her, and she shied away from it, balling up the map in her fist as her stomach lurched. No way did she want to go back to Mr. Mountain Man and beg for directions again. She crossed her arms over her chest and stared defiantly at her reflection in the window.
A bird called out – not a whippoorwill, but something with an annoying chirp that sounded almost like laughter. Mandy sighed, tossing the crumpled map aside and putting the car into reverse. Unless she wanted to drive all the way back to the nearest town and bunker down in a motel room, it didn’t look like she had much of a choice – she’d just have to bite the bullet and ask the hazel-eyed stranger for alternative directions.
Her second foray onto ‘private property’ went much like her first. She pulled into his driveway, and as soon as her boots touched dirt, the screen door banged open. He didn’t swear this time, just stood there glaring with his shirt hanging wide open, affording a vista of smooth muscle and dark hair. She kept her spine rigid as she marched forward. “I’m back.”
He was silent, but the look in his eyes said ‘obviously’.
“I used the directions you gave me, but there was a tree that had fallen across the road. Is there another route I can take to get to my cabin?”
He shook his head. “That road’s the only one that’ll take you to Whippoorwill. You won’t be able to get there, unless you wanna go on foot.”
Now it was her turn to look at him like he was being stupid. “On foot? Over an entire mountain?”
He shrugged. “I was just sayin’.” A glimmer of amusement flashed through his eyes as he lowered his gaze to her pristine hiking boots. “I didn’t really think you’d be interested in taking that route.”
She frowned, resisting the urge to cross her arms. “Even if I felt like taking an epic hike, I’ve got a whole car full of stuff I need to get to the cabin, not to mention the car itself.”
He shrugged again. “Looks like you’re out of luck. Nearest town is about twenty minutes from here.”
“I know that,” she said, more snappishly than she’d intended. “I drove through it on my way here.”
“Well, then, you know exactly where to go.” He turned without so much as a goodbye, and the screen door swung shut behind him, squeaking on its hinges.
Mandy made her way back to her Honda with as much dignity as she could muster. Why the heck had she even bothered to come back? He was about as friendly as a grizzly bear with a toothache. She climbed into her car and backed quickly out of the driveway, heading down the mountain for the tiny one-street town that passed for civilization at the bottom.
“Impossible.” She said it, but it wasn’t true. When she climbed out of her car and strode up to the gigantic tree that lay across the road, giving it a good kick, it proved to be very real and very solid. She winced as her toes throbbed inside her now-scuffed hiking boot. “Ugh.”
She was trapped. Trapped. What were the odds that two huge trees would just so happen to fall across the road at the same time, blocking the passage at either end, a mile or so before the junctures that joined it with other routes? The hair on the back of her neck stood up. This was no random act of nature. It couldn’t be. Backing away from the tree quietly, she slipped back into her car, rolled up the windows and locked the doors.
Her heart fluttered as she tried to keep a cool head despite the fact that alarm was zinging through her veins. One evening in Nashville, a strange man had followed her as she’d walked a few blocks from a convenience store to her apartment. This felt like that – unnerving, with an air of impending danger that sharpened her senses. Pressing her nose against the window, she glared at the fallen tree. Its trunk-end still lay in the forest, hidden by trees and mid-evening shadows that prevented her from seeing where it had broken. Was the wood jagged and splintered, or cut smoothly by a saw? Or maybe even ax-bitten. A chill raced down her spine, and she shuddered as the vague memory of some cheesy ax-murderer film flashed through her memory. Someone had probably cut down those trees, blocking the road on purpose, which meant that she might be trapped on the mountain with a psycho.
She immediately thought of the only man she’d met on the mountain, and his bright hazel eyes assaulted her memory. Could they be the eyes of a crazy man? A killer?
No. She was getting ahead of herself, her sudden suspicion fueled by one too many murder mystery novels and the occasional horror film. It was true that something wasn’t right, but she wasn’t doing herself any favors by jumping to the worst possible conclusions. Taking a deep breath, she reached into her purse and pulled out her cellphone. She’d call the police and they’d send out someone to clear the road and give her a ride back to civilization.
Or not. Her fear returned as she flipped on her phone and stared down at a screen that boasted no reception. She glanced around at the thick forest surrounding her on both sides. Of course her phone didn’t have reception – the asymmetrical mountaintops and thick forests were more than enough to block fickle electronic signals. She put it away and wiped her sweaty palms on her shorts, mentally corralling her options. By the time several stressful minutes had passed, she’d come up with two options. The first was to walk down the mountain to town. The second was to stay put, spending the night in her car, hoping for rescue in the morning.
Dusk had truly settled over the wilderness, quelling Mandy’s enthusiasm for her first idea. Town was miles away, and that distance would seem very long indeed if she had to make the trip in the dark. The woods were thick, and the idea of walking alongside the tree line without being able to see anything or anyone lurking nearby made the hair on the back of her neck stand up
again. Besides the possibility of a lurking criminal, there were wild animals. These mountains were known for their abundant bear populations. Maybe it would be safer to wait out the night. Someone was sure to discover and report the blocked road by morning. Maybe she wouldn’t even have to wait that long. Surely the sheriff’s department sent cruisers over the mountain roads occasionally, checking for trouble. With that thought brightening her outlook just a little, she made a one-eighty, heading for a little gravel turn-around spot she’d seen a little ways back up the mountain.
With her car pulled safely off the road and nestled in the half-moon shape that had been cut into the edge of the woods, she committed herself to the idea of spending the night there. It wouldn’t be that bad. She had snacks she’d picked up at a convenience store along the interstate, and heck, her little Honda was a lot sturdier than a flimsy canvas tent, and she’d camped in one of those before. Even if a hungry bear or a murderous madman did emerge from among the pines, she could drive faster than they could walk. And if that didn’t work…
She opened her glove box, groping inside until her fingers touched cold steel. Gripping the handle of the .22 she’d packed there in preparation for the trip, her fear ebbed a little. One of her co-workers had cautioned her not to embark on a journey into the mountains alone without some sort of protection, and she was glad she’d listened. The gun would be a last resort, but if it came down to it, she wasn’t a bad shot.
****
Mandy awoke to a sharp pain spiking through her chest. As she stiffened against the driver’s seat, she realized that it was alarm, pure and simple. Her pulse raced as she reflexively tightened her grip on the gun she held in her lap. There had been a sound, and it had jarred her out of her uneasy, nightmare-ridden sleep.
Knock. Knock. It came again, and she flung her weapon toward the driver’s side window, leaning as far away from it as possible as she took blind aim at whoever had rapped on the glass.
