Valley Girl Wars

Book 2: Southwest of Homer

by Cherime MacFarlane

Genres: Small Town & Rural; Contemporary Romance; Small-town Romance

Synopsis

What happens to her when he takes over again?
Southwest of Homer Book 2
The poacher is an ever-present threat to Ally as captain of Tore Olson's boat, Valley Girl. She doesn't understand why he refuses to go to the Alaska State Troopers. She agreed to help him by taking over the captain's chair when Tore broke his leg. She didn't sign on to evade a poacher, scramble to catch enough fish to make the balloon payment and dodge the big Swede.
Fishing on Lower Cook Inlet southwest of Homer is stressful enough without the added tension of wondering how Rurik will react to her wanting to return as captain of the family fishing boat. Her younger brother is doing fine without her. Marriage has settled the man down and Ally fears it isn't fair to ask him to give up his new position as captain of the Arina. When she does turn the Valley Girl back to Tore, what is she going to do with herself?

Release date: June 26, 2018

Publisher: Paper Gold Publishing

Print pages: 285

Content advisory: Steamy

Sample

 

"You damn idiot! Why the fuckin’ hell didn't you get the fuckin’ bait out of the fuckin’ damn cooler before. How the hell do you figure you're going to get anything fuckin’ done if the bait is fuckin’ frozen solid?"

Ally cringed at the helm. If she didn't need to hear the radio, she'd put earplugs in. All the man did was yell, scream and curse. The F-bomb was the worst of it. For all her brother Rurik cursed, he didn’t drop the friggin’ F-bomb like Tore Olson did. Almost every other word out of his mouth fucked something or other.

The man shouldn't be out on deck or stomping around on the cast. If he didn't let the damn leg heal… Ally sighed. He was corrupting her with the constant cursing. If she got in the habit, Mom and Auntie would give her what for.

And what was she going to do when this whole temporary captain gig finished? She turned the Arina over to Rurik. She couldn't just waltz right back in and snag the captaincy away from him. That would be unfair.

Rurik would probably take it with good grace, but their mother and aunt would see it as a mean-spirited power grab. It was different when she first took over the captain's chair of the Arina when her father died. Rurik was nothing but a randy kid out for a good time back then.

Because of the age difference, she had more time with the old man than Rurik had. Yes, they both lived on the boat and worked alongside her father, but somehow she picked up more. It might have been because she was a girl and quickly realized most girls didn't get to take the helm at fourteen. Ally settled in and ate, slept, and breathed fishing.

With their father died, Rurik calmed a little. He confined his drunken binges to times in port and worked hard while out fishing. Except for the time he grabbed the cash for the repairs and went on a whirlwind tour of a bunch of beaches in the Lower 48, he buckled down.

Rurik seemed a changed man after marrying Lynn. So far, the Arina hauled in fish, made money, and no one had a complaint about Rurik. But where did that leave her? Ally didn't have enough money to buy the permits and a boat of her own.

A crash sounded behind her. When she turned her head, the young woman groaned. She put the Valley Girl on auto and ran down the companionway. Tore stood rooted to the spot as he clung to the doorframe.

Teeth clenched, his face had lost all color.

"What the hell happened?" Ally tucked her shoulder under his and the man sagged on her.

"Wait!" he hissed out. "Need to lie down."

Olson had to weigh over 200 pounds and all of them settled on her shoulders. Ally wondered if she could get him into the captain's cabin without breaking one of her bones.

"I told you not to go out there with that damn cast on still. The doctor said if you broke the thing again, you might have permanent damage."

No curt response met that statement. Ally realized Tore's injury had to be bad and prayed he hadn't knocked the original break out of alignment. "When we get you back in bed, I need to get one of the guys in to take over the helm. Let's not make the day worse by hitting something or running over someone's net."

"Call the Willow Billy in. Dorset is a garden variety idiot."

"I thought you didn't like Dent?" They navigated the turn into the small cubby that served as the captain's cabin and Tore used both hands to ease his body down on the bed.

"I don't like greenhorns, any of them."

Ally decided he looked well enough to wait a few minutes while she got Jackson inside and manning the Valley Girl. Southwest of Homer, they were in close quarters and she didn't need any problems. The Valley Girl and Olson already had enough.

Until her brother took Devlin on the Arina to make up for Ally's loss, the Valley Girl's crew were known as the three Ds--Dark, Dumb and Dented. Devlin's dark stemmed from his Mexican-Indian heritage. She never learned the reason for Dorset's nickname of Dumb, but Dent's last name made sense.

The kid from Willow hurried inside and listened to her instructions before he jumped in and flipped off the autopilot. Ally hurried back down to see to Tore.

With both legs off the edge of the mattress, Olson lay on his back with his eyes closed. "How are you feeling? The pain ease off any?"