The Alaskan Catch

  Where life’s currents take you…

  Dana Raynott just traveled 3,600 miles to reunite with the brother who changed his name and fled to Alaska nineteen years ago. It’s impossible not to be moved by this wild, breathtaking state, even if Dana’s no closer to finding the answers she came here for.

  Her brother’s best friend, Anchorage engineer Sam MacKettrick, might be able to help her. He’s strong and kind—a six-foot, irresistible blend of diverse cultures. He’s also haunted by a tragic family history with a startling connection to Dana’s past...

  Sam met her eyes. “I’ve never brought anyone here before.”

  Dana reached for his hand. “I’m honored.”

  He held her gaze for a long moment before he stepped closer and slowly lowered his head. Her lips parted in a tiny gasp just before he pressed his mouth against hers. She closed her eyes and let her entire focus shift to the sensation of their lips meeting. His hands settled on her waist; her arms reached up around his neck. She pushed her fingers into his thick hair and pulled him closer. He responded, tilting his head and deepening the kiss.

  He didn’t rush, simply kissed her as though it was the one and only purpose of his life. Dana had dated a few other men, and yet somehow she’d never truly been kissed.

  Not like this.

  Dear Reader,

  Welcome to Anchorage. I’m thrilled to be able to share my hometown with you in my very first Harlequin, The Alaskan Catch. It’s the first story in my Northern Lights series, all about life and love in Alaska.

  Anchorage is the kind of city where you can dine on grilled king salmon with béarnaise sauce prepared by a master chef or catch your own salmon in one of the creeks that run through the city—maybe on the same day. This mix of wild and refined is one of the reasons people fall in love with the place. A story I’ve heard over and over is “I came to Alaska for a summer and I never left.” They found home.

  I wanted to capture that feeling in this story. Dana, the heroine, has been the glue holding her family together, especially since her brother’s unexplained departure nineteen years ago. After her father’s death, she heads to Alaska to find her brother and get some answers.

  But pinning her brother down is more complicated than she anticipated. While she’s waiting, his roommate, Sam, shows up and takes charge. When Sam shares his favorite wild Alaskan places with her, Dana discovers an adventurous streak she never knew she had. And with Sam, she feels confident enough to let it out, knowing she’ll treasure these memories once she returns home. Only her heart isn’t sure where home is anymore.

  If you enjoy The Alaskan Catch, keep an eye out for the next Northern Lights novel, coming this Christmas.

  Happy reading!

  Beth Carpenter

  The Alaskan Catch

  Beth Carpenter

  Beth Carpenter is thankful for good books, a good dog, a good man and a dream job creating happily-ever-afters. She and her husband now split their time between Alaska and Arizona, where she occasionally encounters a moose in the yard or a scorpion in the basement. She prefers the moose.

  Join Harlequin My Rewards today and earn a FREE ebook!

  Click here to Join Harlequin My Rewards

  http://www.harlequin.com/myrewards.html?mt=loyalty&cmpid=EBOOBPBPA201602010002

  To my mother. For all those Scholastic books you let me order, all the trips to the library, all the years of unwavering support and so much more...thank you.

  Contents

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  EXCERPT FROM NEW YEAR'S WEDDING BY MURIEL JENSEN

  CHAPTER ONE

  NOT AN IGLOO in sight. Dana wasn’t sure whether to be relieved or disappointed. Somehow she’d expected...maybe not an igloo, but something more exotic than the sage-green split-level at the end of a cul-de-sac. Only the dense spruce forest behind the house and towering mountains in the background hinted she wasn’t in Kansas anymore. That and the salmon-shaped mailbox across the street.

  The house number matched the address the private investigator employed by the estate had given her. This was it. She paid the taxi driver, collected her suitcase, climbed the three steps to the porch and stood there, staring at the doorbell. Nineteen years. Fifty-four percent of her life. A lot could change in nineteen years, although apparently not her brother’s taste in vehicles. The battered blue pickup in the driveway wasn’t too different from the one he’d been in the last time she saw him, through the crack in her bedroom curtains. She could still picture Dad scowling in the driveway, his arms folded across his chest, while Chris burned rubber and burned bridges, roaring out of their lives.

  How would Chris react after all this time? Clearly, he had no overwhelming desire to see her. He could have gotten in touch with her anytime, right where he left her all those years ago. She wasn’t the one who ran away to Alaska, who changed her name. Who obviously didn’t want to be found.

  But, after a long and expensive search, she had found him. Letters from the lawyer had garnered no response, so she came in person. Would she even know him after all this time? What if he slammed the door in her face? But she hadn’t flown thirty-six hundred miles to chicken out now. Maybe he still felt something for the home where they’d been raised. After all, it was only forty-seven percent of Chris’s life since he left. Less than half.

  As always, the mental calculation calmed her. She set down her suitcase and reached for the bell, but before she could push the button, the door flew open and a big brown dog rushed out. Dana stepped back and might have fallen down the steps if the man hadn’t grabbed her arm.

  “Hey, careful there.” The bean pole she remembered had filled out, with a wide chest and shoulders that looked as though he could carry a moose. In spite of the two inches she’d grown after he left, Chris was still a foot taller than her, his rust-colored hair wild and curly with a beard to match. His blue eyes held an expression of puzzlement as he looked at her.

  She studied his face, waiting for a spark of recognition. “Hello, Chris.”

  After a moment, a grin spread across his face and laugh lines formed around his eyes. “Dana!” He dropped the duffel bag he was carrying and crushed her into a bear hug, lifting her from the ground, just as he always had when he came home from college and she would run to greet him. The years melted away as she hugged her big brother.

  Finally, he set her back on her feet. His eyes skimmed over her. “You grew up.”

  “That happens.”

  “I guess so.” He shook his head in wonder. “I can’t believe it’s you. How did you get here?”

  “The usual. Airplane. Taxi.” She glanced at the duffel at his feet. “I see you were on your way out.”

  “Yeah, actually.” His face grew more pensive. “But I have a few minutes. Come in. Do you want something to drink? Coffee, maybe?”

  “Okay. Thanks.”

  He picked up her suitcase and led her up the sh
ort flight of stairs. A brown leather couch and two recliners faced a giant television. Snowshoes decorated the wall above a rough stone fireplace in the corner. Behind them, a butcher-block island with four barstools divided the living room from the kitchen. “Have a seat. Is instant okay?”

  “That’s fine.” She perched on the edge of the couch. The dog picked a rubber bone from the floor and dropped it into her lap, then sat and tilted his head, looking up at her.

  “That’s Kimmik.”

  “Hi, Kimmik.” Dana stroked the dog’s head, and his tail thumped against the floor. Yellow eyes met hers. “What kind of dog is he?”

  “A chocolate-brown Lab. At least that’s the general consensus. He was a stray.” Chris poured boiling water into two mugs, stirred and set them on the slate coffee table. “I hope black is okay. I don’t have any milk.”

  “Black is fine.” She really didn’t want coffee, but since he offered, she didn’t want to refuse.

  He sat down on the chair next to her. “So—” his mouth quirked “—did you ever get your driver’s license?”

  She laughed. Thanks to his inexpert coaching on driving a stick, she’d failed the driving test the first time. “I did, finally. What have you been up to all this time?” She looked around the room but saw no signs of a feminine influence. “Married? Kids?”

  “Nope. Near miss once. How about you?”

  She shook her head. “Not even close. I went to college and then went to work for Dad.” She’d planned to teach math, but Dad insisted he wanted her there, in the business. Sometimes she wondered why.

  Chris raised his eyebrows. “The old man know you’re here?”

  She pulled a piece of paper from her pocket. “Actually, that’s what I came to tell you.” She licked her lips. “He died about three months ago.” She handed Chris the obituary.

  He didn’t take it. Instead, his face went blank, his eyes staring into the distance. She set the clipping on the coffee table. After a moment, he blinked and turned to look at her. “Three months, huh?” He picked up the scrap of paper and read it over, his face impassive, but his jaw grew tighter as he read. Dana had helped write the article, all about her father’s success in tool rentals, his contributions to the community and his surviving wife and two children. It, of course, didn’t mention Chris’s absence from the family. When Chris was done, he let the paper flutter to the table, saying nothing.

  After a moment, Dana spoke. “The lawyers tried to contact you, but you didn’t answer their letters.”

  He frowned. “I remember some sort of letters with a return address for a law office, but I assumed they were some sort of scam and threw them away. What did they want with me?”

  “You’re his son.”

  “I’m not.” He shook his head firmly. “We dissolved that relationship a long time ago.”

  “Is that something you can dissolve?”

  He shrugged. “He did.”

  Dana leaned forward. Maybe she was finally going to get some answers. “What was that all about, anyway? The big fight.”

  Chris looked away. “He didn’t want me to come to Alaska.”

  “That’s it?”

  “In a nutshell. He said if I stepped foot in Alaska, I was no longer his son. I came, anyway.”

  There had to be more to it than that. Yeah, Dad could be a little dictatorial, but he’d overlooked much more blatant disobedience from Chris than an unauthorized destination. Like when he was thirteen and drove Mom’s car three towns over to visit a girl he’d met at a basketball game. Or the secret party he’d thrown at the warehouse his senior year of high school that turned out not to be so secret. She was tempted to point that out, but confronting Chris directly had never been the way to get him to talk. She tried another tack. “You’re in his will.”

  His eyebrows rose. “What did he leave me, a cyanide pill?”

  “Same as he left me—fifty thousand dollars.”

  He stared at her. “No way.”

  “I have the papers you need to sign. They say the estate—”

  “What about Mom?”

  “She got the house, the business and all the investments. In trust.”

  He sat very still, as though he was taking it all in. Kimmik whined and laid his head in Chris’s lap. He rubbed the dog’s ears. Dana picked up the mug and took a sip of coffee. After a moment, Chris turned to her. “It was good of you to go to all this trouble to find me, but I don’t want anything from him.”

  “But—”

  “No. Thanks for the offer, but I’m doing fine on my own.”

  This wasn’t how it was supposed to go. This inheritance was supposed to bring them together, to reunite the family. To show Chris his father cared enough to leave him money. At least that’s the picture Dana had imagined when she had decided to make the trip.

  “Come on, Chris. He wanted you to have it.”

  Chris stared into the empty fireplace, working his jaw. Dana sat very still and watched him. Her hand trembled, threatening to spill the coffee. She set the mug on the table.

  Chris turned toward her. “When did he make this will?”

  Dana couldn’t meet his eyes. “The year I was born.” She looked up. “But that doesn’t mean he didn’t want you to have the money. He had plenty of time to change it if he’d wanted to.”

  “What happens if I decline my share?”

  Dana shrugged. “It goes to me. But I don’t want that. He’s your father as much as he is mine.”

  He tilted his head. “You came all the way up to Alaska to convince me to take the money, when it’s in your best interest if I don’t?”

  “I came to find you.” And to find out what happened between him and Dad nineteen years ago, but she wouldn’t push. Yet. “Also, I wanted to look into some letters the lawyers found in Dad’s safe.”

  Chris tightened his hand into a ball. “What kind of letters?”

  “From some woman named Ruth. No last name. She claimed Dad owed money. The lawyers aren’t worried. They posted a notice, and if no one has filed a claim within four months, it’s too late. But there was something—I don’t know—desperate in that letter. It sounded sincere to me. Anyway, I thought I’d look into it. I just have to find the son of someone called Roy Petrov.”

  He jerked his head toward her. “Who?”

  “Roy Petrov. From Fairbanks. Why? Do you recognize the name?”

  Chris rose abruptly, pushing the dog away, and walked into the kitchen to set his mug on the counter. “Sorry, but I’m not going to be able to help you. I don’t want anything to do with that money.”

  She stood and followed him. “Think it over before you decide.”

  “I’m not changing my mind, and I have to go.” He slung his duffel over his shoulder. “Look, Dana, thanks, but no thanks. I appreciate that you came all the way here, and I wish I could spend some time with you, but you should have called first or something. I have people waiting for me. I’m sorry you wasted a trip.”

  He started for the door, but after two steps he turned back and looked at her, indecision written on his face. “Where are you staying?”

  She shrugged. “I don’t know yet.”

  “No reservations? You won’t find anything last minute at a reasonable price this time of year.” He sighed and pulled out a key ring from the kitchen drawer. “I’ll tell you what. You came all the way to Alaska—you might as well have a little vacation.” He tossed her the keys. “You can stay here and use my car until you’re ready to go home. It’s in the garage. Take the first bedroom on the left down that hallway. You’ll find clean sheets in the hall closet.” He whistled. The dog jumped up and followed him out the door.

  What just happened? Dana ran to the porch and watched Kimmik jump into the truck. Chris climbed in after. She’d found her brother after ni
neteen years and he was walking out on her? “Where are you going?”

  He leaned out the open window as he backed out of the driveway. “Fishing.”

  She stood on the porch until his truck turned the corner and disappeared, all her hopes disappearing along with him. Fishing? Really? She thought she’d prepared for all possible outcomes, but this wasn’t one of them. Not for Chris to ignore her like this.

  They’d been close once. Chris was the golden boy, honor student, gifted athlete. Their father didn’t spend a lot of time with them, but she used to hear him brag to their neighbors and friends about Chris’s accomplishments. The fact that her GPA was actually higher than Chris’s didn’t seem to register on Dad’s radar. But Chris noticed. He encouraged her to take honors classes, to compete in Math Olympics, to enter the science fair.

  She was sixteen when it all fell apart, the summer between Chris’s junior and senior years of college. On Saturday, Chris was his usual cheerful self, putting some things in the attic at Mom’s request. Dana went to a movie with friends that night. On Sunday morning, after some muffled yelling behind the closed doors of Dad’s study, Chris left without saying goodbye. From that day forward, her dad refused to talk about him. It was as though she’d never had a brother.

  She wandered into the house and collapsed onto the sofa. What now? Tuck her tail between her legs and go home? She probably should be there, making sure her mother wasn’t in negotiations for the Taj Mahal, but she’d come all the way to Alaska for answers, and she wasn’t going to leave without them.

  She would just have to wait for Chris to come back from his fishing trip and try again. Surely, once they sat down and really talked, Chris would understand why she needed to know what happened. He could accept the inheritance, and they could make up and be a family once again.

  Her cell phone vibrated in her pocket. She checked the screen and braced herself. “Hi, Mom.”

  “I got a bill for that new étagère I’m having made. Should I send a check?”