Hot Springs Werewolf Complete Series (BBW Werewolf Erotic Romance)

Title Page

Copyright Page

Chapter one

Chapter two

Chapter three

Chapter four

Chapter five

Also By Emily Cantore

About the Author

"O
h, c'mon Boris, you can make it!"

I'd driven across two states and was halfway into Arkansas and had spent most of the last day coaxing Great-aunt Millie's old truck (called Boris) up and down hills. But there was only so far he could go on prayer, frequent coolant top-ups and me beating my hands against the wheel. We crested the hill just as the motor coughed and expired with a whirr.

I turned Boris off and we glided down. As I neared the bottom, I hit the ignition and pumped the pedal but... nope. He was done. Not even a cough this time. Before I hit the next hill I braked and rolled to a stop.

I got out and opened the hood more for something to do than any chance of fixing whatever was wrong. There were bubbles of green liquid around the top of the radiator. I knew there was a leak and had been topping Boris up with oil and coolant the whole way but it seemed it hadn't been enough.

I should have known better. Boris was a truck used by a little old lady who only drove it to the supermarket once a week... for thirty years.

I looked around. The last house I'd seen was a good half-hour of driving behind me. Now, surrounded by green fields edging on to forests I was ten miles at least from the cabin I was moving to and the city of Hot Springs was ten miles on the other side of that.

It wasn't so much the walk that concerned me. Everything I owned was in the back of Boris and although I hadn't seen anyone in a while, I was worried someone would take it all while I was gone. Admittedly, when you can fit your entire life in the back of a truck it's not much but it was all I had. Including a laptop computer that would kill me to lose.

I slipped my laptop into a backpack and was getting ready to eat some trail dust when I heard the most beautiful sound in the world: gears changing. Someone was coming.

My sister Jem's warning came to mind: don't get taken as a sex slave by some country wildman. As I'd patiently explained to my sister: curvy girls don't get murdered or turned into hillbilly sex slaves. She had raised her eyebrows at me while I'd privately thought that meeting a country wildman wouldn't be so bad.

I checked my reflection in Boris' window. I was already rocking some decent cleavage but just in case it was a handsome man prone to helping girls, I undid my top button. Okay, sexy without being slutty. And if it were Ma and Pa Kettle on their way to church they could purse their lips at me all they wanted so long as they took me to town.

I pushed on what could be called a good day "a beautiful brunette tress" behind one ear (and on a bad day "a crazy bird nest") and made sure I didn't look too desperate. Cleavage, yes. But that's not an invitation. I adjusted my skirt and did the best I could to fix myself up after driving for a week straight.

A black 4WD truck crested the hill. There was a man behind the wheel and he was alone. I did my best to look both helpable but also able to punch him in the mouth if he got the wrong idea. As my ex-boyfriend (dick) once described me, I'm on the curvy side of curvy and while it sometimes had its disadvantages (a jiggle in my wiggle walk), I could throw a punch if I needed to.

He pulled up behind me and stepped out of his truck like he had all the time in the world. Printed on the side was Guile Constructions. He closed the door and then looked me up and down. I felt his gaze on me and I might have been annoyed but to tell you the truth, I was doing the same thing. He was dressed in blue jeans and a dark shirt, looking like he had just stepped out of a cowboy pin-up (complete with brown cowboy hat). He had on a pair of scuffed work-boots and between those, his muscular forearms and rough hands (and yes, the sign on the truck), he was one delicious farmer and/or builder.

"I know this truck. Boris. You must be Harper."

He stepped closer to me and I found myself staring into his hazel eyes. They had glints of gold in them. He took off his hat to reveal a head of jet-black hair shot through with a fine gray. The man was hot sex on two legs and had a twinkle in his eye and he knew my name! How did he know my name? How did he know Boris?

"Harper." My brain had temporarily seized up. I realized he was holding his hand out to me. I shook it, feeling the rough spots on his palm and fingertips. He definitely worked with his hands.

"I'm Red. You're renting the cabin next door to my place."

"Red."

My brain still wasn't cooperating. My dear deceased Great-aunt Millie had arranged the cabin rental in her will and her lawyer had told me to collect the keys from the neighbor, Red Guile, but for some reason I'd imagined him as some aging retiree, living far enough away from Hot Springs to feel like he was in the country but close enough to still drive in for a mint julep or whatever it was that old men drank.

I wasn't expecting Red to be young. And fit. And drop-dead gorgeous.

"So what seems to be the problem?"

He let go of my hand and walked around the front of Boris. I followed him, my eyes tracking down to his perfect ass and then away as I tried to pull myself together.

"Coolant leak. And oil maybe."

Well done Harper. An actual sentence.

Red reached into the engine and tapped the radiator.

"Overheated. I'll tow you in and then take a closer look."

He slammed the hood shut and then patted his hand on it. "I haven't seen Boris for twenty years."

He turned to me then and took my hand. Just having him so close was doing strange things to my body. I felt like I wanted to button up my top ... and unbutton it at the same time. He looked at me and I found myself lost in his beautiful eyes again.

"I'm sorry about Millie passing. She was one hell of a lady."

I nodded as he squeezed my hand and then stepped by me to go to his truck. I blinked away sudden tears and finally found my voice.

"Thank you."

Red pulled his truck up in front of Boris and then hooked a tow cable somewhere underneath him. I watched all this with my mind still spinning. It was one thing to run into a gorgeous man but it was entirely another to discover he was your new neighbor and knew your favorite relative too (and her truck!).

"You'll have to steer. On the down slopes brake when I brake. On the up slopes just keep it straight. You'll do fine."

Then he winked and smiled at me.

I smiled back before I realized what I was doing. Then embarrassment kicked into high gear and I swear I blushed like some Southern Belle. Red got into his truck and I pirouetted on the spot like the world's curviest ballerina before bolting back to Boris.

I got in and put Boris in neutral. A moment later Red waved out the window and then we slowly took off.

I was still having a hard time processing that he had known Great-aunt Millie. Her name was Mildred but she'd been Millie to me my whole life. She'd died three months ago and had been by far the most awesome relative I'd had.

In her will she'd left me a cabin rented for the entire year, her truck (Boris), and somehow, a job offer from Greasy Manna. I also got a stern but loving letter telling me to take this opportunity or she'd come back from the dead to haunt me. Given that I was single (again) after my most recent ex had dumped me (dick) and my terrible job writing ad copy had replaced me with a bunch of unpaid college students, it didn't take much for me to decide to pack it all up and move. The final hairy and squeaking straws were a family of rats I discovered living in my apartment wall and then my hairy landlord dragging his ugly feet to do anything about it.

A few days after the will-reading (in which Millie left Jem a book on leech farming and techniques for blood-letting - the old girl had style) I received a call from a woman named Sarah. She was the owner Greasy Manna and told me the job offer was open for as long as I wanted. All she would say when I asked was that she promised Millie.

Now here I was, behind Boris' wheel being towed to the cabin by Red Guile. Neighbor. Hot neighbor.

I got a sudden image of his perfect ass as he walked back to his truck. What was wrong with me? I needed to slow down. Cool off. I was here for a year.

But my god, the man was hot.

*

S
oon we were pulling up a long gravel drive that led to a wood cabin. There were trees on two sides and a large open-air gazebo to the left of it. I'd only seen one image dragged up from the depths of the internet before deciding to come here. In real life it was so much better.

There was a matching black truck with Guile Constructions printed on the side parked next to the cabin. As we approached, two men stepped out. One was lean and tall, dressed in blue jeans and a white t-shirt. The other was shorter but muscular with a torso as solid as a tree trunk.

"What the hell..." I said to myself as we pulled up. Did this place have an excess of hot men? Red got out of the truck and went over to talk to them.

Okay Harper. Use your words. Remember how to language.

I got out of Boris and approached the three men.

"Harper, this is Fen and Jake. They work for me. Called them to help unload the truck."

I let out a squeak that could have possibly been hello at the ultrasonic spectrum.

Well done girl.

Fen was the tall one and Jake the strong one. They both nodded to me and then went to the back of Boris, peeled back the canvas cover and started lugging my boxes inside after Red unlocked the door.

I joined them and managed to take in two boxes but in no time at all there was only a single box in the back of Boris and Fen and Jake left before I could even say goodbye.

I walked into the cabin to have a proper look. It was a two-bedroom fully furnished log cabin that had been somewhat modernized.

"Where do you want this?"

I turned around to see Red holding the final box. The one with BEDROOM written on the side in black. The only box he has to ask about and it's
that
one? It had some ... things ... in it that were a little bit private.

"Just there on the sofa is fine," I said and then came the terrifying noise of sticky tape creaking before the bottom of the box let go.

Red made a valiant attempt to catch the contents but when a box full of sexy underwear, a few sex toys and a few books decides to go - it goes quickly.

Like it was happening in slow motion I saw something slip out of the box, bounce off his thigh and ricochet onto the floor, coming to rest between us.

A vibrator.

A
red
vibrator.

Red got one arm under the box to hold it shut. The instant he looked away, I leapt forward and grabbed the vibrator. I didn't have any pockets so I settled for hiding it behind my back. There was no way he didn't see it.

With his leg under the box he managed to keep it shut before placing it on the sofa.

"That was a close one. If it's okay with you I'll take the truck to my place and see if I can get him running. I'm up there on the hill. Follow the path."

"That would be amazing. Thank you so much."

What was I meant to say? No? I'll ... hire a mechanic from the town to come out?

He looked at me and smiled again but I was too focused on the red vibrator I held in my hand. It had a bad habit of turning itself on and had drained many a battery while I was away at work. I couldn't remember whether I'd removed the batteries and if it switched on now I thought I'd die right there on the spot.

He dropped the house key on the table and headed for the door.

"There's a spare key out there in the gazebo. On top of the third pole in case you get locked out. I have another one too. I'm having some dinner at seven-thirty if you'd like."

I followed him to the door with the vibrator still behind me. With my hands together behind my back my normally pretty awesome cleavage was verging on epic. He looked back at me and I swear for an instant his eyes flickered down. Or maybe over my shoulder. It could have been my imagination.

I finally found my voice.

"Thank you so much. Hope to see you again!"

Red nodded to me and then off he went, slowly towing Boris behind him towards the house that stood up on the hill.

I closed the door and collapsed back against it. My face was so red and hot that you could have cooked bacon on it. I got a jolt of adrenaline a moment later when the vibrator buzzed to life in my hands.