Teri Wilson - Alaskan Hero

Melting His Heart

Never stay in one place too long. These are the words Brock Parker lives by. Roaming the world to save avalanche victims keeps the search-and-rescue patrolman from getting too close to anyone. The resort ski town of Aurora is no different. Until Brock meets Anya Petrova. The Alaska native needs someone to train her dog. Who better than the man who works wonders with his canine rescue team? Haunted by a family tragedy, Brock doesn’t think he’s anyone’s hero. But Anya refuses to believe that. And when she shows her true mettle in the face of breathtaking danger, Brock realizes what he’ll risk for the woman whose love has healed his heart.

Brock grinned and Anya gasped in delight as the dog scooted alongside

her leg and began eating from her hand.

Anya beamed at him. “Thank you.”

“This is your doing. Not mine.” Brock swallowed with great difficulty. “So let me get this straight. When you’re not making the best coffee in Aurora, you’re helping me with the ski patrol, knitting hats for poor people and rescuing frightened dogs?”

She laughed. “It’s only the one.”

He handed her a few more treats. “One what?”

“One hat and one dog.” She shrugged. “I’m kind of new at this…faith and making a difference.”

“It suits you,” he said in a voice almost too quiet for her to hear.

Who was he kidding? This was more than just business.

He hadn’t asked for it, but Anya had crawled under his skin. His reluctance to admit it didn’t change the fact that they were becoming friends.

Close friends.

TERI WILSON

grew up as an only child and could often be found with her head in a book, lost in a world of heroes, heroines and exotic places. As an adult, her love of books has led her to her dream career—writing. Now an award-winning author of inspirational romance, Teri spends as much time as she can seeing exotic places for herself, then coming home and writing about them, of course. When she isn’t traveling or spending quality time with her laptop, she enjoys baking cupcakes, going to movies and hanging out with her family, friends and five dogs. Teri lives in San Antonio, Texas, and loves to hear from readers. She can be contacted via her website at www.teriwilson.net.

Alaskan Hero

Teri Wilson

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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Though the mountains be shaken

and the hills be removed, yet my unfailing love

for you will not be shaken.

—Isaiah 54:10

In loving memory of Robert K. Wilson, Sr.,

my grandpa and a real-life hero.

This book is also dedicated to

the men, women and dogs involved with

search and rescue all over the world.

Acknowledgments

Special thanks to Beckie Ugolini, for her support, friendship and the idea for Brock’s bear suit.

Also, thanks to Meg Benjamin, my writing friend, RWA roommate and awesome critique partner.

As always, I owe a debt of gratitude to my fantastic agent, Elizabeth Winick. And I’m blessed

with the best editors in the world,

Rachel Burkot and Melissa Endlich.

Thank you to my loving and supportive family.

Thank you to the people of Alaska

and the Iditarod Trail Dog Sled Race for a bottomless well of inspiration: Emil Churchin,

Hugh Neff, Deby Trosper, Kate Swift and

especially Zoya DeNure, for giving me the

“the odds are good, but the goods are odd” line.

And Silvia Furtwaengler for giving me the ride

of my life at Iditarod 2012.

Thank you to Elizabeth Chambers and everyone

at Bird Bakery, for giving me a fun place to write and for the many, many cupcakes.

And last but not least, thank you

Wendy Pohlhammer for creating the pattern

for Brock’s hat and for doing the impossible—teaching me how to knit.

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

Epilogue

Dear Reader

Questions for Discussion

Excerpt

Chapter One

Anya Petrova shoved her mittened hands in the pockets of her parka as she stood on Brock Parker’s threshold and tried not to react. The man had answered the door dressed in a furry bear costume. It wasn’t every day that she knocked on a stranger’s door and found a grizzly bear, albeit a fake one, on the other side. Even in Alaska.

She pasted on a smile. “Hi, I’m Anya Petrova. I emailed you about my dog. You’re Brock, right?”

He nodded, but made no move to take off the bear head.

Super. Anya had to stop herself from exhaling a frustrated sigh.

She’d expected someone normal, especially considering Brock Parker’s reputation. He was new in town, an avalanche search and rescue expert and alleged dog genius, at least according to what Anya’s friend Clementine had told her. Anya had been trying in vain to reach him for the past two days, but he appeared to be a mystery. He didn’t even have a locally listed phone number, and he’d yet to make an appearance in town. And she’d been looking—hard—because a dog genius is exactly what she needed at the moment.

Fortunately, Clementine had managed to procure Brock’s email address. Anya had fired off a message and was thrilled when he agreed to meet with her. Clementine had predicted he would turn out to be the answer to Anya’s prayers. What she’d failed to predict was that Brock Parker would be dressed head to toe in a grizzly bear costume when he answered his front door.

The odds are good, but the goods are odd.

Some considered it Alaska’s best kept secret.

The rest of the free world seemed all too aware of the fact that men outnumbered women in the Land of the Midnight Sun. So much so that sometimes the statistics Anya Petrova saw on the subject made her shake her head in disbelief, if not snort with laughter. Fifteen to one? Did people in the Lower 48 really believe that?

Anya had lived in Aurora, Alaska, since the day she was born. She even had a dash of Inuit blood in her veins, and she knew as well as every other Alaskan woman that such statistics were exaggerated at best. At worst, they were baloney. In any event, the exact ratio didn’t make a bit of difference. Because the men of Alaska weren’t like other men. The majority of them, anyway. Like anything else, there were exceptions.

A few.

A very few.

The odds are good, but the goods are odd. Or, to put it nicely, Alaskan men could be eccentric. And it wasn’t just the locals. Sometimes the transplants could be even worse. There seemed to be something about Alaska that attracted independent spirits, adventurers...and oddballs. Case in point—the man standing in front of her in a bear costume.

Not that she cared a whit about Aurora’s bachelor population, strange or otherwise. She’d learned a long time ago that men were trouble. In her infancy, actually. Being abandoned by her father at three months of age didn’t exactly set her up for success in the man department. Neither did being unceremoniously dumped on top of the highest mountain in Aurora for the entire town to witness. More than the town’s population, actually, because television cameras had been involved.