Dead End Beach: Life and Love in Alaska

by Cherime MacFarlane

Genres: Clean & Wholesome Romance; Short Stories; Contemporary Romance

Synopsis

It's the end of the road, the last town on the road and the very last beach at the end of the road. And it's the end of the season. Fall is on its way, and the party is shaping up to be the biggest one in a long time. Alaskans will party at the drop of a hat, and the termination dust party is about to go into party til you drop mode. Irene's employer knows better than to let the bunch who have been living in the campground on the beach in the bar for this one. The Old Salt Bar closed for the Labor Day weekend. The biker from Louisiana, Fawke has been waiting for this opportunity to get Irene out of the bar and into a situation where he can get to know her better.
He isn't sure what he plans to do. The job he lined up gives him enough to buy gas for the motorcycle and eat. Living in a tent on the beach was his only option. But another possibility has come up, he might have a line on a spot on a fishing boat. Everything depends on the little blonde, Irene “Ornery” Maddox. Fawke would stay in Alaska if he had a real good reason. But he has to decide soon. There are only a few weeks between fall and winter.

Release date: February 1, 2018

Publisher: Paper Gold Publishing

Print pages: 42

Content advisory: some cursing

Sample

 

What a strange summer it had been. On one hand, productive money wise, on the other screwed all to hell and gone. And she couldn’t even discuss the whole pile of fish guts over a bottle of tequila with her best friend.

That got lumped in with the screwed part. Ally Petrov, her best bud, and captain of the FV/Arina had gone off on a whirlwind tour of God knew where trying to find Rurik. Her jerk off of a brother had taken off with most of the money Ally set aside for repairs and upgrades on the Arina.

Rurik would enjoy his stay in the hospital when Ally caught up with him. Why he did that when the fishing vessel was his only source of income was a mystery to everyone.

Not a metropolis at around five thousand people, almost everyone in the community knew Rurik had hauled his sorry butt up to Anchorage and boarded the first flight he could get going anywhere.

Ally didn’t bother informing the police or the State Troopers. She hustled on out after the creep. Only half a day behind, Ally wasn’t able to catch up with him. Ornery got a text saying her best friend wasn’t coming back until she had Rurik in tow.

Irene thought she lived up to her nickname of ‘Ornery’ all of May and if she was honest, most of the summer. The hits just kept on coming. Ally left, and then she and Smitty got into it over his planned occupation for the coming winter.

Losing Smitty to fishing on Prince William Sound was bad enough. When he hinted that he was signing on with a crabber for the season, the fight started. It got hideous when he came clean and admitted to having signed on without discussing it with her.

Irene kicked him out. With most of the reasonable rentals snapped up, Smitty wound up camping out across the bay in Seldovia. It got back to her that he was telling all their friends she would soften up, and everything would be okay when she got a look at his paycheck at the end of the crabbing season.

She didn’t bother to have it out with him and explain what.'I’m done with your sorry ass’ meant. In retrospect, Irene realized she should have had another talk with the man. Instead, she took all her aggression out on the job.

As the only female bouncer in Homer, she gained a reputation over the summer as being very hard-nosed. The owner of the Old Salt Bar, Hal said nothing about her being too overbearing. Irene thought he had encouraged her because it brought in customers.

Having a blond, blue eyed female for a bouncer was a big enough draw all in its self. When the woman was only four feet, five inches tall, it shook a few people up. One or two smart boys from out of town attempted to see if they could be the man to shut her down. The local boys all made money on side bets when that happened.

Everyone in town knew her Daddy trained her right. Ex-military, Drew Maddox ran the local martial arts school until he retired. With her mother working a nine-to-five job for the city, Irene spent a lot of time at the school and got an excellent education while waiting for her Mother.