Werewolves of the Mountain: Werewolves of St. Neuri, #1

By Abigail Raines

Millie has her eyes on the prize: taking her blossoming fashion line and turning it into an empire. Life has other plans, however, and a phone call informing her that her father has passed away brings her back to her hometown of St. Neuri.

 

St. Neuri has changed, with a fog that settles across the town every night, people vanishing and turning up dead, and rumors of wolves hunting in the surrounding woods. Millie doesn't recognize her hometown anymore – nor the men that reside in it.

 

A chance encounter leads to her to meet Liam, a dashing bad boy with a smile that shatters her heart neatly in half. She cannot deny the pull she feels for this mysterious stranger. But as the secrets of St. Neuri pull her in deeper, towards legends of werewolves that could very well be real, Millie realizes that not everything is as it seems, including Liam?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Abigail Raines
• Release date: Sep 10, 2022
• ISBN: 9798215249321

Book preview

Prologue

Millie was so focused on composing her e-mail that at first she didn’t even hear the vibration of her cell phone. Her fingernails drummed against the desk and she chewed on her bottom lip; a bad habit she still couldn’t break. Currently frustrated by the fact that her fabric delivery was late, the last thing on her mind was her phone, shoved in the drawer of her desk. She was avoiding it, not wanting to deal with Albert.

They had broken up a week ago, but he apparently watched one too many romantic movies. He thought calling her non-stop would win her over and to take him back. But Millie wasn’t interested in any man that thought her fashion line was taking a backseat to anything.

No, her fashion line, Artemis Blossom, was her baby and it would be treated as such. It came first, above anything else. Which meant dealing with suppliers not meeting deadlines or missing things from her orders just made Millie angry.

Per my last e-mail, She mumbled aloud as her fingers struck the keys, trying to keep her cool.

The phone went silent in the drawer as Millie typed rapidly, the frustration brimming just underneath the surface of her skin. Between her recent break-up and putting the spring/summer line together, she felt like pure nerves. A giant iced coffee sat next to her, with her planner opened to the current date, filled with her tiny handwriting, trying to keep everything organized. Outside her office, her assistant tried to keep only the most critical issues filtered to her, and beyond that were her team, working long hours trying to get the line ready.

She could feel a headache coming on and took a sip of her coffee before belatedly wondering if too much caffeine is why her head hurt. Finishing the e-mail, Millie proofread it before hitting send and leaning back in her chair, exhaling.

So much to do and it felt like no time to do it. That was how her life had felt the last five years since moving to the city with her fashion degree and attempting to launch her own fashion line. Everyone around her was trying to reach the pinnacle of success, to be hailed as a creative genius and bring something new to the table.

But Millie had actually garnered interest in her clothing from her fall/winter line and to drop the ball now would kill the momentum she had so carefully been building up. A lot weighed on this. Nothing could pull her away from it.

A soft knock on the door broke her thoughts and she looked up, What is it?

Her assistant, Melissa, poked her head in, looking funny. Her skin was pale and she was shifting uncomfortably. Millie wondered if she was falling ill. It would make sense. Everyone had been putting in long hours and pushing themselves. With a stab of pity for overworking Melissa, she prepared to send her home for the weekend.

There is a call for you, Her tone, distant and stiff, raised the hair on the back of Millie’s neck, I think you should take it. It is pretty important.

What is it about?

It’s your aunt, Melissa said, fiddling with a ring on one of her fingers, not meeting her gaze.

My aunt? She asked incredulously, not having spoken to her aunt in almost ten years.

Her assistant nodded and that was when Millie knew something dreadful must have happened. It was a slow feeling, starting in her feet then sweeping over her, engulfing her completely. With dread, she watched as Melissa slinked from the room, closing the door softly behind her. Alone, Millie stared at the blinking light indicating someone was on hold for her.

Even though her brain protested and told her to ignore it, to go on with her day, her body operated separately. Her hand reached out and picked up the phone, holding the receiver to her ear.

This is Millie, She said, her voice wavering slightly.

It turned out there was something that could pull her away from Artemis Blossom.

Chapter One

Millie’s key slipped into the lock and it turned without protest. Even after all these years, her father hadn’t changed the locks. Of course he wouldn’t. He always knew Millie would return at some point. Holding her breath, she stepped inside.  

The house was still. Once it had brimmed with life. Her father, Greg, loved visitors and enjoyed hosting small parties with his friends. The topics of discussion were always art and literature. Millie used to be out of her depth with the conversations as a young child but still would hover, soaking in how adult everything seemed. It was during these parties that she discovered fashion, discovered how fabric could move and elicit emotion, from listening to some of the attendees she discovered designers.

But now, the house was mute, as if there had never been any life in here at all. For a second, Millie’s head swam and she thought she might faint. She had spoken to her dad last week. How could he be gone now?

Taking a step forward, she closed the door behind her. The house from her childhood, the house in which she had grown up, suddenly felt alien. Greg, having redecorated, made everything feel new and different as if Millie no longer belonged.

She recalled her aunt’s thin voice on the phone, explaining that her father had suffered a cardiac arrest at home alone one night after going to the movies with friends. After missing a lunch with him, her aunt had gone over and found him in the living room. Her aunt began to cry at the end, her voice hitching, deep sobs coming out of the other end of the phone.

But Millie had only felt frozen. In fact, she felt frozen ever since. Surely, the entire thing was a nightmare she would wake from. Gliding from her office, she bought a one-way ticket to her hometown of St. Neuri. Artemis Blossom, her break-up, dealing with the spring/summer line felt so very far away and pointless.

The foyer spilt off towards the living room and the kitchen. Skirting the living room where her father had collapsed, Millie walked into the kitchen. It had been remodeled. When had that occurred? She couldn’t remember and a stab of guilt ate at her for not being able to recall if Greg had mentioned it. It felt like something she should know; her childhood home being changed should be something she held onto.

Millie opened the fridge almost out of instinct. Food her father would never touch lay inside. Her breath sucked out of her lungs and for a split second, she was worried that she was going to vomit. Her stomach twisted and she shut the fridge door.

Into the hallway and up the stairs she went. As a teenager, she had always been grateful for the layout of the home. Her dad’s bedroom was on the bottom floor and Millie enjoyed having the upstairs basically to herself. It had her room, a bathroom and a guest room that was rarely used.

The pictures on the wall showed a timeline of her life through Greg’s eyes, starting with Millie’s birth. Her as a baby, grabbing her mother’s finger and staring at the camera, wide-eyed. As a toddler wearing a stuffy dress she hated, but her mother wanted her in it for the photo. The last photo of Millie and her mother Bethany together, were of them outside a water park. She was wearing a frilly bathing suit and Bethany was holding her. Both waved at the camera.

A week after the water park, her mother had died in a car accident.

The rest of the pictures showed accomplishments from her childhood, as well as pictures with Greg. After she moved away for college, the photos changed to include his friends and special occasions. Millie stared at the pictures for a long time, lost in the memories of her parents. Both were gone now. She thought she had had more time with her father.

Her bedroom remained untouched. Greg, always sentimental, wanted her to have a safe place to land. Her posters on the wall showed a version of herself that felt so very long ago. Everything in here belonged to a different Millie, one that was still figuring herself out and what she wanted to do. She stopped by her desk, which still had a stack of old fashion magazines on it. Flipping through them, Millie found herself lost in the old images of what she used to soak up as a sponge.

How could so much change and yet still remain the same? Unmoored, Millie found solace in going through her old things. Diaries detailing her boring days in high school, crushes that led to nothing, notes with her friends. All of it made her realize just how far she had come – and what she lost in the process. Her mother. Her father. Friends that had once meant the world. Daily routines gone with the passing years.

Millie lost track of time. By the