Match Made In Paradise by Barbara Dunlop (black female authors TXT) 📕

*   *   *

Silas had been gone now for more than two days.

Mia tried to convince herself it was a good thing. She didn’t want to miss him. He didn’t deserve to be missed.

He’d pretended to respect her, but he was just like all the rest—humoring her without having any real faith in her abilities.

“You sure you don’t want to drop me off today and keep the truck?” Raven asked as she laced up her work boots.

Mia was sipping a strong pick-me-up coffee at the breakfast table. The sky was blue, the sun already high, and the robins were twittering happily in the trees outside. The world seemed to be fighting back against her sullen mood.

She wasn’t going to buy into the world’s cheerful outlook, but she would force herself into event-planning mode. “Breena finished the graphics on our information page. I promised her I’d put together the text today.”

“You sure you want to keep working so hard on this? I hate to see you waste your effort.”

“It won’t be a waste.” Mia lifted her chin, determination kicking in along with the caffeine.

“I can talk to him again,” Raven said. “But you know Brodie’s not a mind-changing kind of guy.”

“Maybe you could lead with a kiss this time.” It was clearer than ever that Brodie was vulnerable to his attraction to Raven.

But Raven gave her a stern frown. “The kiss was irrelevant. And he’s not bribable.”

Mia wasn’t convinced the kiss was irrelevant, but she wasn’t about to push. “If it has to be glamping, we’ll make it glamping. I found a service that’ll set up super-nice wall tents with wood floors.”

“Expensive?” Raven polished off her coffee, set her mug in the sink and moved toward the door.

“Stop worrying about the money. My expenses this month have been negligible. I barely even pay for groceries.”

“There’s the wine.”

“The most expensive bottle in town is thirty-eight dollars.”

Raven shook her head and smiled as she stepped outside. “You’re spoiling me.”

“I have not yet begun to spoil,” Mia said in a dramatic voice as Raven closed the door behind her.

The sun abruptly disappeared, dimming the sky and finally matching Mia’s mood.

She topped up her coffee cup and moved to the screened porch with Breena’s laptop. The birds were still gamely singing, while the air was warm and fragrant from the pine trees.

As she settled into a chair, raindrops began clattering on the corrugated plastic roof. The sound was calming, and the ozone combined with the fresh scent of the forest.

Still determined to distract herself from memories of Silas, she opened the draft web page, gazing at the clean graphics and the beautiful scenery and Paradise photos Breena had put together. Impressed, Mia turned her mind to the questionnaire. They were looking for women with an adventurous spirit, possibly at a pivot point in their lives, open to a relationship, and with job skills or at least an aptitude they could use in Paradise. She didn’t want anyone to end up with a repeat of her experience trying to work here.

She began typing then, framing, revising, moving text around. The rain gradually slowed and stopped, and the atmosphere brightened again.

Suddenly, a giant groaning roaring crash reverberated through the air. It jolted her upright as the earth vibrated beneath her. Her first thought was an earthquake, but she’d experienced plenty of those in LA.

But it was too loud for an earthquake. Plus, the vibrations felt wrong. Her next thought was more horrible—a plane crash. She leapt from her chair, dropping the laptop to rush outside.

She scanned the sky and the surrounding hills but didn’t see any smoke rising up.

She went back inside and put on her shoes, trotting out to the road to look up and down. The clouds against the distant mountains were dark purple and black. She could see lightning flashing through them, but she couldn’t hear the thunder. It wasn’t thunder that shook the ground like that. But something had happened, and it was something big.

She had a choice. She could go south to town or north to the airstrip. The airstrip was a lot closer, and her phone would work on their Wi-Fi. Plus, Silas was due back today. If there’d been a plane crash, it could have happened at the airstrip while someone was trying to land a plane. It could have been Silas.

Trying desperately not to consider that scenario, she ran back to the cabin for proper shoes and a few essentials then took off at a fast jog toward the airstrip. She hoped someone would drive up on the road. They’d likely have news and could give her a ride the rest of the way.

The creek beside the road was roaring high. She’d never seen it so high. In a few places, it lapped onto the roadbed and she had to detour around.

It hit her then. The bridge. A flash flood could have taken out the bridge. That would explain the strikingly high creek and the noise. She paused and considered turning back. Had Raven’s cabin been cut off from town? What if someone had been on the bridge when it washed out? Did they need help?

The airstrip was less than a mile away. The bridge nearly four miles back. And Silas. She couldn’t help thinking about Silas. Going toward the airstrip felt like she was going toward him.

She went with her instinct and started running again. The air was seeped with moisture. Rain trickled down on her, mingling with her sweat. The creek disappeared from the roadside and wound back into the bush, leaving only a puddle-strewn road.

She thought she spotted movement ahead, something just beyond the bend. Her heart lifted and her pace increased, looking for a pickup truck or an ATV to come zipping around the corner.

She swiped the dampness from her eyes and stared harder. Then her heart tripped, and panic flooded her system.

It was the bear. The bears. All three of them were staring straight at her.

She stopped, and they started toward her. Her instinct was