The Billionaire Alpha’s Dilemma

Chapter One

2012

Nantucket town USA

Isla Strand lingered in bed after her alarm went off even though she had to be at the bank early if she was to have any chance of seeing and talking to Mr O’Shea the bank manager, she still hadn’t told Ruth about the eviction notices the bookstore had been receiving.

They had started coming two months after Papa Strand died, so she would quickly go through the mail every Thursday so she could hide the letters that came in their conspicuous envelopes before Ruth came into the bookstore. At this point she had exhausted all possible avenues and unless she was able to convince the bank manager to give her more time she would have to vacate the premises two days after her twenty first birthday, she hated the thought of losing this place which felt like her only link to papa Strand but nothing short of a miracle could save the store and at this point she had run out of belief in magic dust and miracles, if she got kicked out she would have to leave Nantucket earlier than she had hoped, besides she didn’t want to leave without making proper arrangements for Ruth.

After doing up the buttons on the only skirt suit she owned she checked her reflection in the mirror as she wound her fair hair into a tight little bun, her striking blue eyes surveyed her appearance in the mirror as she squinted her at her reflection then she put on her glasses, came down the stairs, locked the bookstore behind her then drove out into the Main Street.

A couple of hours later Isla came back to an open sign at the window and an open door, barging in she yelled Ruth’s name and when she didn’t find her at the front desk of the book store she followed the sounds of cartons being shuffled towards the back of the book store.

Isla went between the aisles till she got to the shelves at the back and saw Ruth perched precariously atop a ladder and she grumbled inwardly, She had warned her against climbing the ladder due to her old age but it would be a cold day in hell when Ruth acted in consideration of her age, she was too stubborn and told anyone who cared to listen that she was as strong as she was twenty years ago.

“There’s the birthday girl” Ruth called out in her sing song voice.

“It’s not my birthday for another 6 days, why are you on that ladder?” Isla eyed the chubby but small woman going through book titles on the rows of shelves with a duster.

Without turning away from the books she was dusting Ruth replied, “don’t you dare sass me young lady, where have you been all morning?”

Isla rolled her eyes and crinkled the paper bag she held which contained her precious booty.

Ruth abruptly stopped her movements, sniffed the air and said, “is that I what I think it is?”

Isla smirked, knowing that she now had all of Ruth’s attention. “Only the freshest chocolate chip cookies in all of Nantucket”. She said.

Ruth whooped and hurriedly began her decent down the steps of the ladder, then like in a slow motion clip Isla watched horrified as she tripped while trying to climb down, her whoop of pleasure turned to a yelp of pain as she landed unnaturally on her left leg, Isla quickly ran over and after examining the bent ankle that was probably sprained and definitely in need of emergency care, she pulled her up and trying to ease any weight on the injured ankle carefully walked alongside an irritated Ruth who limped and treated the accident with a cavalier attitude.

“We are going to need to go to the hospital Ruth.” Isla declared.

“it is just a simple sprain, we don’t need to go anywhere, a sit down and some vaporub will do the trick, you don’t have to treat me like i am made of porcelain Isla” she protested and Isla ignored her and helped her to the door, made her sit down on the stairs and brought the car around, made her as comfortable as possible in the backseat and left her happily munching on the cookies. Isla spent the entire trip to the hospital feeling guilty, to think that she just had been considering leaving town after the futile conversation with Mr O’Shea, She had planned on speaking to Ruth on the state of their money affairs during work today but thanks to this injury she would have to bide her time again. She frowned as she remembered Mr O’Shea’s sneer when she had tried to talk to him,

“I might just get someone to hang seashells for sale to those yuppie tourists when crazy Brady’s bookstore is finally cleared out, such an eyesore. it has been a long time coming, with all his unnatural books and stories.” his gleeful comment still rang in her ears, months of delayed payments and excuses had drawn on his last nerve and his excitement to kick her out was galling and it seemed like the end of the road for her precious little bookstore.

After taking a protesting Ruth to her house from the hospital and ordering her to stay off her feet, Isla came back to the store and flipped the closed sign open out of habit considering there was no chance of anyone coming in today anyway. walking past the back where Ruth’s accident had happened she saw the end of the dust cloth Ruth had been cleaning with and as she bent to pick it she caught sight of the feather duster further away, going on her knees and reaching far under the shelves to retrieve it she watched startled as a pair of well polished men’s shoes soundlessly came into her line of vision from the directon of the entrance, she followed the progress of the owner of the shoes and before she could pick the items and stand up they came to rest right beside her. Looking all the way up into a face obscured by the golden wash of the late afternoon sun hitting against the back of his head and forming a halo she wondered how someone so big got past the creaky boards without alerting her with his footsteps, she silently cursed the fates that made it that the day she was alone a man that looked like he had stepped right off the front cover of one of those historical romances that Ruth preferred would appear mysteriously and seemingly out of the blue.

She scrambled up to her full height and tried and failed to affect an intimidating stance considering that the man towered over her, maybe he was lost she thought, that would explain it. he probably meant to go to Nantucket Bookworks and ended up here because this store’s clientele comprised only of the old ladies that belonged to Ruth’s book club plus a few scholarly type gentlemen, there were very few visitors and even fewer male visitors and the ones that came in looked nothing like this man who looked like he had stepped out of the pages of a GQ magazine, maybe he was a tourist, even though it wasn’t even tourist season and he sure did not fit the profile in his well tailored navy blue pinstriped suit, the snug fit of his pants molded athletic looking muscular thighs.

she momentarily wished she could have a peek of the back, blushing at her own mischievous thoughts she mentally chastised herself and looked properly at his face which struck her breathless, she itched to rub the brush of a well groomed beard on his strong looking square jaw, his perfect full lips, his full eyebrows furrowed in a quizzical look as his roamed her face as if searching for something, she looked skeptically at him and wondered if she had a smudge on her face. As she eyed the bulging pectorals that seemed to flex with any movements he made she mused that a man that looked like he did was probably used to women throwing themselves at his feet and ogling him and she was probably staring and should stop, she pursed her lips as she wondered why he was here.

Remi watched as the woman with the school marm glasses hanging From a rope on her neck looked at him with suspicion, as she rose from the ground where she had been crouched in a funny position, she seemed to have retrieved her lost objects which she now held in her hands and he clamped down the urge to smooth the soft tendrils of light hair that had escaped from her bun and were plastered down the nape of her long smooth neck, he yearned to lean in to bask in the tantalizing sweetness of her scent.

He had been struck by it on his drive here, it felt like coup de foudre, His wolf instincts had stirred and he had suddenly been seized with a need to be beside the source of the beguiling scent, and he was teased by the light notes of citrus and cinnamon, the scent grew stronger as he was directed by the car’s gps system through light traffic till he came to at a standstill in front of a dreary looking building with Strand’s written in bold lettering on a tattered looking board hammered above a door, the scent had been strongest then and propelled by his senses and the need to be with that scent he had gone up the short stairs and into the building and as he looked down at the source of the almost overwhelming scent he pushed his hands down his pockets to stop from reaching out and bit his tongue to resist saying the word, her wary eyes warned him that she would bolt if he made any sudden moves.

As he took in the delicate features in the small heart shaped face Adrien quietly scolded himself for letting his mind wander away from the mission that had brought him here all the way from Normandy, it was bad enough that he was distracted during such serious times but to be distracted by a human woman? he knew better than that, he would ignore the urging his wolf was giving him, there had to be a mistake somehow.

“Good day” his voice rang out, “I’m looking for Brady Strand”

Isla was surprised, no one ever came looking for papa Strand, what did this mysterious looking stranger want with her father she wondered.

“He is dead” she answered flatly then turned away and pushed the ladder that was still propped against the wall to the very end of the shelf.

“I am Isla Strand his daughter, Brady Strand has been dead for months, what do you need him for maybe I can be of some help?”

“Merde!” He muttered under his breath looking extremely disturbed, if he was the type that was given to fits he would have thrown a tantrum, instead his mind whirled and calculated, dead? Their very last lead had led him here and this book keeper was telling him the person who probably had answers to his Pack’s survival was dead. Had he come all this way for nothing? He thought of his Beta Lucien amongst the other werewolves that had to be locked up in enchanted chains in the underground dungeon at the pack house to keep their uncontrollable shifting at a minimum to avoid any risk to the humans that lived nearest to the commune, he remembered the snarling unrecognizable vicious monsters some of the usually docile werewolves had become which according to the seers was an advanced stage of the curse, in time they would all look like that unless he could find the key. He straightened his back and stood resolutely, The fate of his brothers and sisters rested solely on his shoulders and he had not come all this way to be deterred by death.