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Appalachian Prey
Debbie Herbert
Star-crossed lovers…Danger awaits them bothUnfortunate circumstances force pregnant Lilah Tedder to face deputy Harlan Sampson, her child’s secret father, who left her heartbroken. But when a killer targets Lilah, Harlan becomes more than her protector. They must uncover old secrets or pay the ultimate price…
Star-crossed lovers on Lavender Mountain... Danger awaits them both.
After her father’s murder, pregnant Lilah Tedder dreads facing deputy Harlan Sampson, her child’s secret father, who left her heartbroken. Though she still wants him, Lilah knows his professional ambition won’t let him associate with a moonshiner’s daughter. But when a killer targets Lilah, Harlan becomes more than her protector. Now they must uncover old family secrets or pay the ultimate price.
DEBBIE HERBERT writes paranormal romance novels reflecting her belief that love, like magic, casts its own spell of enchantment. She’s always been fascinated by magic, romance and gothic stories. Married and living in Alabama, she roots for the Crimson Tide football team. Her eldest son, like many of her characters, has autism. Her youngest son is in the US Army. A past Maggie Award finalist in both young adult and paranormal romance, she’s a member of the Georgia Romance Writers of America.
Also available by Debbie Herbert
Bayou Shadow Hunter
Bayou Shadow Protector
Bayou Wolf
Siren’s Secret
Siren’s Treasure
Siren’s Call
Visit millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk) for more information
Appalachian Prey
Debbie Herbert
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
ISBN: 978-1-474-07855-9
APPALACHIAN PREY
© 2018 Debbie Herbert
Published in Great Britain 2018
by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF
All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.
By payment of the required fees, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right and licence to download and install this e-book on your personal computer, tablet computer, smart phone or other electronic reading device only (each a “Licensed Device”) and to access, display and read the text of this e-book on-screen on your Licensed Device. Except to the extent any of these acts shall be permitted pursuant to any mandatory provision of applicable law but no further, no part of this e-book or its text or images may be reproduced, transmitted, distributed, translated, converted or adapted for use on another file format, communicated to the public, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher.
® and ™ are trademarks owned and used by the trademark owner and/or its licensee. Trademarks marked with ® are registered with the United Kingdom Patent Office and/or the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market and in other countries.
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
This book is dedicated to Maxine Brooks,
one of the best readers ever!
And, as always, to my husband, Tim; my dad,
J. W. Gainey; and my sons, Byron and Jacob.
Contents
Cover (#u90bd7757-5e8f-55a7-a33c-04449de483a9)
Back Cover Text (#ufa6a91a9-ee46-551a-a82c-e09feed8db56)
Author Bio (#u54b36544-16cc-57b7-bfc2-6754e9a309c7)
Booklist (#ufdc22dd2-00fb-55b3-8c61-6db11a5ac7e8)
Title Page (#u8be982cf-3884-515e-aa83-46b69c2c671e)
Copyright (#ua03ed227-fbbb-58ed-a2b9-d05434701b75)
Dedication (#uf6b503a4-74e1-5707-8097-4f823074b223)
Chapter One (#u35ba7049-af73-5244-88f8-71ce22f296d7)
Chapter Two (#ua3b3a624-06ad-587a-b0ea-c32fc625803a)
Chapter Three (#u795b53c5-e0ff-5d80-ba68-c7ad7b6fe629)
Chapter Four (#u08161122-421e-5f2c-8f88-488726e3ceb1)
Chapter Five (#uee7cfc6a-0bb3-520f-86a0-60a353abe4ec)
Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Sixteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seventeen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eighteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nineteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter One (#u072b5b70-9af4-50a1-9d9e-d6ec7fafadd7)
Moonshine again...seriously?
Hidden caches had turned up everywhere in her father’s cabin. No surprise there. Lilah snatched two plastic jugs from the back utility room and marched to the kitchen, intent on pouring the illegal hooch down the drain. Corn liquor had destroyed her parents’ marriage and her dad’s liver. Would have killed him, too, if he hadn’t been murdered a week ago.
Unexpected tears blurred her vision as she unscrewed the lid on one of the jugs and poured the liquid poison into the chipped enamel sink. Not that she and Dad had been all that close in recent years, but still, the man had been her father. Lilah tipped the jug. Glug, glug, glug...a hundred dollars’ worth gone. Could have bought a used college textbook with that money.
She blinked and gazed out the open window. The cabin was nestled in the foothills, with rolling mountains standing sentinel in all directions like a green fortress. A deceptive beauty, as though the price for living in such a visual feast meant being taxed with rampant poverty and violence. Dad’s death was the latest evidence of that.
Whoever said you can’t go home again was dead wrong. After a mere week, Lilah felt like she’d never left Lavender Mountain. Memories washed over her, most of them unpleasant—her parents’ screaming matches, brutally cold nights where they’d all huddled in front of the fireplace. But it hadn’t been all bad. Some days, wandering the woods with her older siblings, Jimmy and Darla, had been magical.
A faint scrape of boots on leaves and pine straw jarred her senses. Someone approached.
Lilah stilled, picturing in her mind’s eye the open front door and windows. Had the murderer returned? She fought the instinct to flee to the back bedroom and lock herself in. Probably just one of Dad’s old customers who hadn’t gotten the word yet.
Quickly, she raced across the rugged pine floorboards to the den. Through the battered screen door emerged the silhouette of a tall bearded man dressed in denim overalls. What mountain had he just climbed down from? Lilah sprinted to the door and latched the rusty lock into place. A joke of a defense. She reached for the weapon always propped by the door frame, and her right hand curled around the barrel of the twelve-gauge shotgun, its metal smooth, familiar and comfortable.
And loaded.
“What you want?” she called out in her fiercest voice.
The man didn’t appear the least bit intimidated as he shuffled forward, his foot on the first porch step. “I got bizness with Chauncey Tedder.”
“Guess you could say my dad’s out of business,” she said, sliding the shotgun next to her hip.
He climbed the second step. One more and he would be within six feet of where she stood. He swayed and squinted, peering into the room. Lilah was painfully aware he could see straight into the little kitchenette.
“Looks to me like you got some ’shine in there,” he boomed. “Go git me a jug afore I get really riled.”
She didn’t aim to find out what the stranger was like “really riled.” This place was well out of range for anyone to hear if she screamed, and Dad was shot not far from the cabin. Lilah unhitched the lock and kicked open the screen door. She drew the shotgun up to shoulder level, finger twitching at the trigger. “I repeat—this place is closed for business. I’d appreciate you spreading the word.”
“Whoa, little missy.” He threw up his hands and backed away. “Don’t mean ya no harm.”
He tripped on the step and took a tumble. Oomph.
Chagrined, Lilah bit her lip and lowered the shotgun. “You okay there?”
He rose, brushing dirt off his overalls. “I reckon. You sure are a touchy thing. Best be gettin’ on my way.” With one last sorrowful glance at the jugs on the kitchen counter, he ambled away, gingerly limping on his right foot.
What the hell.
She returned inside, retrieved the full jug she hadn’t yet dumped out, and stepped out onto the porch. “Hey,” she yelled. “Come on back, you can have a jug.”
He shot her a wary look, clearly suspicious of her change of heart. But in the end, the pull of the moonshine outweighed his reservation, and he returned.
Lilah set the jug down at the bottom of the stairs and scampered back to the door.
“Same price as always?” the man asked, carefully pulling out a wad of dollar bills from his side pocket.
“It’s on the house. Just don’t come back, ya hear? This is the last of it.” Unless she found more while cleaning out the cabin. No telling how many bottles were tucked away in nooks and crannies.
A grin split his weathered face as he tucked the money away. “Thank you kindly, ma’am.”
He picked up the jug and gave a quick nod before walking across the yard. A sheriff’s cruiser rounded the bend in the road and turned into her dirt driveway. The man momentarily froze at the sight, and then took off running to the nearby tree line—more like hobbling with his injured foot—but almost quick enough to get out of sight. Couldn’t have hurt too bad, she mused.
The cruiser came to an abrupt halt, and a man started to climb out.
Lilah’s heart skittered, even faster than when the stranger had suddenly appeared at her door minutes ago. Could it be...
Oh, yes, it most definitely was.
Harlan Sampson. The man who’d quickly won her heart three months ago and then had dumped her twice as fast after a week of fun and games. Her left hand involuntarily fluttered over her stomach, and Lilah hastily jerked it away.
“Well, looky here,” Harlan drawled, eyeing the man carting his haul off into the woods. He faced her and pushed the dark sunshades up on his head, revealing the startling beryl-blue eyes that had enthralled her on her last ill-fated visit, which—damn it—still sent her heart pounding into overdrive. He walked toward her. “Looks like I finally caught a Tedder point-blank in the act of distributing illegal whiskey.”
“Wrong. I wasn’t selling. I was giving. Ain’t no money exchanged hands here.” Inwardly, Lilah winced at the slip into the local vernacular. It had been twelve years since she’d called Lavender Mountain home, but in times of high emotion—and now definitely counted—she lapsed back into the lingo.
“So you say.”
She pinched her lips together. “What brings you here?”
“Came to pay my respects, see how you’re getting on.”
Weeks ago, she would have flung herself on Harlan at those words. But not now. “I’m jim-dandy,” she replied, lifting her chin a fraction. “I saw you at Dad’s funeral. No need to come over.”
“I believe I owe you an apology.”
“Forget it.” There was no way she’d admit how much his silence had hurt.
His eyes smoldered, and he slowly climbed the porch steps, close enough now to make her breath hitch. “I can’t forget it. And I can’t forget you.”
* * *
