Werewolf in Alaska: A Wild About You Novel Read Free

he’d suspected that his impulse buy might come back to haunt him, especially after he’d walked up to the counter and she’d turned to look into his eyes.
    Leaning against the mantel, he gazed across Polecat Lake toward her property. It was nearly nine in the evening, but it might as well have been midday. Sunlight continued to play on the water, and the metallic whine of her power saw drifted in through his open window. She must be starting another large project, one that required the saw and the extra space provided by the workshop she’d had built about ten yards from her cabin.
    Now that she was bringing in the big bucks, he kept expecting her to tear down that cabin and build a McMansion in its place. So far she hadn’t, and he respected her for keeping her operation low-key. Understatement was a Polecat tradition, one of the reasons he loved it here.
    She’d bought a new truck, but he couldn’t blame her for replacing the unreliable bucket of bolts she’d inherited from her grandfather. She’d also hired a local kid named Lionel, who was part Native American, to clean her workshop and wrestle the bigger pieces onto her truck. A new truck, a roomy workshop, and a part-time assistant seemed to be the only concessions she’d made to her success, and Ted Haggerty claimed that she was the same down-to-earth person she’d always been.
    If so, then props to her, because she’d created quite a stir, the kind that could turn a person’s head. No telling what this hunk of driftwood was worth now that she had commissions coming in from wealthy collectors all over the world. He should probably have it insured and protected in a climate-controlled safe.
    Rachel Miller’s first wolf carving, if it surfaced, would bring a pretty penny on the auction block. To her credit, she’d never identified him as the buyer of her initial effort, and neither had Ted. Apparently no one except the three of them knew this work existed.
    She’d sent him a note a couple months after he’d made his purchase, though. He knew that note by heart.
    Dear Mr. Hunter,
    You bought my wolf carving from the Polecat General Store on July 14. You were my first sale. There have been others since then, but yours was the most significant. It inspired me to leave my veterinarian internship and try my luck as a full-time carver. I was in the store that day and we met, but I didn’t have the nerve to identify myself and thank you for making the purchase. I want to thank you now. You literally changed my life.
    With gratitude,
    Rachel Miller
    He hadn’t needed the note to tell him that he’d met her that day. His acute hearing had picked up snatches of her conversation with Ted, and he’d pegged her as the granddaughter who’d inherited Ike’s cabin. Ike had been a carver, although not nearly as talented as Rachel.
    Then Jake had met her gaze, and her nervous excitement had given her away. Although he wasn’t an artist, he could imagine that putting your stuff in front of the public would be scary, and having someone buy it might take some getting used to.
    He’d debated for days whether to respond to that note, which was still tucked under the carving on his mantel. In the end he’d decided not to. If he’d replied, she might have thought they could be friends. But he’d known from the moment they’d met that friendship wasn’t going to cut it. He wanted her, and he couldn’t have her.
    That made living across the lake from her cabin a difficult proposition. Closing his eyes, he pictured how she’d looked three years ago, her hair falling to her shoulders in shades ranging from dark walnut to warm cherry. Her gaze had locked with his for one electric moment, making him think of summer storms and silvery rain.
    She’d worn jeans and a faded T-shirt, an unremarkable outfit intended simply to cover her tall, lithe body. She hadn’t tried to entice anyone with those clothes. Yet she’d enticed him without trying. He couldn’t explain why