Chapter Five

Oren

When I first called the Realtor, saying I was interested in selling the new cabin, they told me it was best if I came to look through it first. At the time, I was frustrated. Why couldn’t I just sell it? Why did I have to drive all day to look at a place I didn’t care about.

But once I got here, I understood. This place was filled with memories—not necessarily my memories but memories from my uncle, which included memories of my father. Memories I was just discovering.

It was also in disrepair. So much disrepair. In the condition it was in, I’d be lucky to get someone who wanted it for the land. It wouldn’t take much to fix it enough for market, but most people wouldn’t see that. I only did because my father was a fixer-upper kind of guy and taught me everything he could. I barely used the skills in my daily life, not with a super who was in charge of all that, but here? Here, I could put it to use and build myself a nice little nest egg out of the profits.

What started as “I’ll be there for a couple of days” turned into me calling work and letting them know that I needed to be remote for a while. Or at least, I would be working once the internet was installed.

The longer I stayed in this cabin, the more photos I saw of my father as a child, the more I uncovered wooden trinkets carved by my uncle, the more I discovered about the family I never knew. I needed to do this right for him. No slapping on a coat of paint and hoping no one would look past it. These repairs needed to be as solid as this unintentional time capsule he’d created for me.

When the lawyer had called him an uncle, I had assumed he meant my grandfather’s brother or something along those lines—something more removed. My dad had never told me he had a brother. It was just him as far as I knew.

I fell back into the recliner, overwhelmed by the task in front of me and feeling a little bit antsy. I was used to being surrounded by people and noise, and sure, there were noises in the woods—like birds chirping or animals running—but nothing quite as calming as the sound of cars going below your window or even horns honking in the distance. It was very lonely here.

Closing my eyes, I made a mental list of all I needed to buy until the list became too long to not be on paper. It would have to wait until tomorrow. I needed air.

I stepped outside onto the back porch and decided to shift. Maybe stretching my legs would help. Only, when I scented the air, I scented a bear—and not a shifter bear and potential new friend. No, it was a wild bear and I wasn’t sure, but I had a feeling this place had grizzlies. I was fine not coming toe to toe with them. If I was going to stay here, I was going to have to mark the territory. Wait, what? Stay here? No, I wasn’t going to do that. What was getting into me?

“You know, bear, if you just left this place, I could get my antlers on.” Even if they were there, they wouldn’t have understood my words. Still, I repeated myself, this time louder.

I took out my phone and wandered until I got a decent signal—my service provider wasn’t the greatest for the area—and pulled up the internet to look for things to do locally. It was going to be a lot easier once the internet got connected tomorrow, but for now, this would do. There was a bar, a national park, and an art gallery. That pretty much summed it up.

The bar could be fun, I suppose, but was that the kind of fun I wanted to have? Going there alone, not knowing a soul, and definitely not looking like I fit in? Would they all stare? Probably. Would they be social? Probably not. Ugg.

A pop-up filled my screen. Normally I hated them, but this time, it was a hookup app and I couldn’t be mad at it. Maybe that was what I needed— a night in the sack with a hot omega or alpha even. I wasn’t picky.

I put all my information in and hit enter. “Try expanding your search field.” I growled at the phone, and I wasn’t even a growly kind of beast. “It’s fifty miles. I hardly was asking for someone within walking distance.”

I tried another one with the same result. And then, because I was now determined, yet another one. This one didn’t even let me get past the zip code. And after three more attempts, when I was finally ready to tap out, a pop-up for a male-order app filled my screen. The odds of that person being local given their premise? Nonexistent. But since I wasn’t having any success anywhere else, I decided I might as well try it. Maybe people from here were looking to get out of here because there were no hookups around. Not really, but the thought amused me. At least this poorly formed plan of mine was fending off boredom and keeping me out of my head. That was something.

Wouldn’t you know it. This time was different. When I typed in all my information, it connected me with not one but two people. And both of them seemed like people I might want to get to know.

Before I thought too hard on it, I shot them both a message. Maybe I could stave off the loneliness after all. It was worth a shot.