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  The Hermit

  There are some things you just can’t live without.

  Shayne McClendon

  When Dr. Ryan Wallace retreats to the Alaskan wilderness to find peace with his past, the last thing he expects is to stumble across a broken woman barely clinging to life.

  As he watches her fight her way back from hell, his own problems begin to pale in comparison. When she returns to her world, he finally understands...there are some things you just can't live without.

  Copyright © 2012 Shayne McClendon

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without written permission from the author and publisher. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  What readers are saying about “The Barter System”…

  “The way that Shayne McClendon writes her characters makes you emotionally invested in them. This is one of the best books I have read this year (and I have read many books this year). The Barter System is the book that I highly recommend on Facebook and to all of my friends. You care about all the men that come into Riya's life and I cried during one of the farewell scenes as if I had left the character. Aside from being a great book, the sex scenes in this story are sooo well written that you can totally imagine the scene in your mind.” Glorya

  “LOVE! LOVE! LOVE this book! I couldn't stop reading! I loved the story, you connect with each person, you feel their happiness, as well as their pain. I laughed, I cried, I cheered for Riya! Can't wait to read more books by Shayne!” Laurie

  “This book was great and I did not want to put it down! I always wanted to find out what was next. I read this book after reading 50 Shades of Grey and Bared to You and can honestly say that I fell in love with this book and all the characters. Shayne is brilliant and I cannot wait to read the next one.” Megan

  Also by Shayne McClendon

  Fiction:

  The Barter System

  In the Service of Women

  Revenge is Best Served Hot

  Ready to Rumble

  Somebody

  Fiction Coming Soon:

  To Everything

  The Playground

  Non-Fiction Coming Soon:

  Makeup and Blowjobs

  Dedication

  For every person who thinks it won’t get better. For every bad situation you think will never end. For every moment you feel pain or sadness. Stay strong. Keep fighting. You can make it. If you don’t fight, if you quit now…you will never know the good things coming.

  Much love,

  Shayne

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  About the Author

  Prologue

  Steven was always so gentle. Her best friend used to tell her about explosive orgasms and she didn’t think she’d ever had one, but he was good to her and she loved him. Daphne watched her husband above her, felt him inside her, and relished the feeling of snuggling him while he made love to her in a steady rocking motion that felt nice, if not explosive.

  “Steven, that feels really good, baby. I missed you today. I couldn’t stop thinking about getting you back in the tent,” she whispered with a smile as she nuzzled his ear.

  He stopped his rhythmic thrusts, lifting his face to look down at her with a frown, “Daphne, you know it breaks my concentration when you talk. I have to focus or I can’t go as long.” He had that little wrinkle between his eyes that told her he was truly annoyed with her. “I mean, if you want to talk after, or whatever, that’s fine. It’s weird to talk during. Normal people don’t do that.”

  Placing her hand on his cheek, she smiled, “Okay, Steven. I’ll be quiet.” She was a giver. Some would go so far as to call her a doormat. She lived to please the people in her life; it gave her purpose, made her feel like she had her little place in the world. She’d been that way her whole life and she wasn’t about to start regretting it now.

  Steven made love for much longer than her first boyfriend in high school that could only last about three minutes. Steven could go as long as ten before the sexual tension built to a point where he had to climax.

  Wanting to touch him, to feel a stronger connection, she reached beneath the sleeping bag they were cocooned in, put her hands on his ass, and pulled him harder into her. For one instant, she felt the beginning of something truly wonderful. The hint of a possibility she’d never felt before.

  “Daphne, I’m coming…oh damn, that feels so good. There it is, honey.” She felt his come coat her body a moment before he collapsed over her chest and she sighed silently. After a moment, he rolled off to lie at her side and put his hand over his eyes. His voice in the darkness startled her several minutes later. She thought he’d fallen asleep. “Did you do that on purpose, Daphne?”

  “Do what?” she asked him, honestly confused.

  “You pulled me…made me bump in harder…made me come too soon. I only lasted six minutes that time. You know I like to draw it out.” He rolled on his side, “Did you come?”

  She nodded, lying to him like she did so often to preserve his feelings, and rolled to face him. “I love when you make love to me, Steven, and it’s always very good. Why do you worry so much? Were you really timing yourself just now?”

  He closed his eyes, “I want it to be good for you. I know I wasn’t your first.” The tone of disapproval she heard wasn’t her imagination and she mentally gritted her teeth while outwardly maintaining her calm expression.

  “Steven, why do you dwell on the three boyfriends I had before you? I wasn’t your first time either.” She could feel the bubble of annoyance in her heart that wanted to tell him off about his double standards and insecurity. “You had several lovers before you met me.” Idly, she wondered if they had enjoyed having sex with Steven before tamping down the disloyal thought.

  Her husband of a year rolled his eyes, “It’s not the same, and you know it. It’s different for guys, Daphne.” She hid her aggravation by pulling her clothes back on. It was too cold in Alaska to sleep naked. She was fully dressed except for her hiking boots.

  He watched her silently until she laid back down beside him, pulling the sleeping bag up her body. He got dressed and rejoined her. He was on his side again, watching her pretend to sleep. “You seem upset. Are you upset?”

  Schooling her features carefully, Daphne replied calmly, “Of course not, Steven. I love you and I know that means we accept one another for who we are now, not who we were before we met.”

  She hoped that maybe this time her gentle message would get through to him. She’d been shocked the first time he’d brought up her lack of virginity. This wasn’t the middle ages or even the 1950s. It was a hang-up of his she hadn’t expected and had frustrated her from the beginning. It wasn’t like she could do anything about it. They had held this same conversation half a dozen times since the first time they’d slept together. It was getting old.

  “I love you, too, Daphne. I really do. I’ll make it up to you in the morning. Make it all about you. Okay?” His face was so hopeful she couldn’t help but smile and he smiled back. In his mind, the problem was solved and there was no need to discuss it any further.
“Good. You should get some sleep, we’re hiking the other side of the mountain tomorrow, and you aren’t in the same shape you were in college, baby.”

  Nice little passive-aggressive thrust and parry there, she thought with an unusual burst of anger. “I resent that, Steven. I’m in perfect health. You’re just mad because I don’t hang out at the gym like you and don’t have to watch what I eat.”

  He laughed and straightened his clothing, tugging her against him beneath the warm sleeping bag. “I hate that you never have to work out. If I don’t, I end up with a beer belly…and I don’t even drink beer. It sucks.” He kissed the top of her head and hugged her close. “Love you, Daphne.”

  “I love you, Steven. And I’d love you even if you had a beer belly.”

  They would be the last words she ever spoke to her young photographer husband. Daphne would think about that later, that she’d been kind to him when she’d wanted nothing more than to fight. His last memory of her was being told he was loved. Not the sweet but ultimately bad sex, not who she’d been with before him, not one of a thousand petty irritations she’d apparently caused him over the two years they’d been together.

  That she’d love him, no matter what.

  The sun was higher than it should have been when Daphne opened her eyes. Steven was already up and moving around outside. With a heavy sigh, she sat up and pulled on her boots, pulled her hair into a snug ponytail and grabbed her jacket.

  Rubbing her face free of the annoyance of him not keeping his promise, she unzipped the tent and crawled out, zipping the tent behind her.

  Someone grabbed her by the hair in the same moment she registered her husband’s bleeding and unconscious body a few yards away. He was naked from the waist down and there was blood on the back of his thighs.

  She knew in that instant neither of them was going to survive whatever was happening.

  As she was dragged screaming back into the tent, she suddenly wished she’d been honest with Steven when he’d asked her to marry him. Told him she loved him but wasn’t in love with him and let him go on his way.

  Then she wouldn’t have found herself fifteen miles from the nearest small town in the Alaskan wilderness with what looked like three men who had no concept of right and wrong. Maybe she wouldn’t have taken a leave of absence from the hospice center and would even now be comforting a patient and their family, helping them prepare for the end of a loved one’s life.

  Then there was no ability to think at all as her clothes were ripped away and she was brutalized for the first time of the many that awaited her. God at last had mercy and allowed her to pass out.

  Chapter One

  Ryan Wallace hiked up the mountain, lost in thought as he always was. Some days he was lost in memory and those days were harder on him. He’d toyed with the idea of taking his life but somehow, it felt like the coward’s way out. He’d made his choices and it was only right that he deal with the consequences.

  If he’d been walking just two steps to the left, he’d have missed her completely. Walked right past her and she would have died of exposure within hours. If he hadn’t stumbled across what he at first thought was a child in the deepest wilderness of Alaska’s Wrangell Mountains, Ryan’s life would have gone on as it had for so long.

  He didn’t miss her. He didn’t pass her. He tripped over her still form and barely caught himself, scrambling back to stare at her in shock and confusion.

  He lived twenty miles from his closest neighbors, there were no roads, and the nearby river was packed with snow and ice this time of year. That meant she’d traveled overland on foot. How she’d survived at all puzzled him. There was a time when puzzles had meant everything to him. Ryan felt the familiar itch between his shoulder blades. The itch that told him he couldn’t rest until he knew how she’d come to be here.

  He stood staring down at her for a long time before he approached. She could already be dead. She wore boots with no socks and clothes so thin there were places they were transparent.

  It had been four years since he’d seen another person. He’d packed in ten years of supplies when he’d sold everything he owned and walked away from what was left of his life. Fresh goods were air-dropped in a meadow not far from his cabin and charged to his credit card without the annoying chatter other customers might require.

  Solitude was a choice he’d made. Having it disturbed was…unexpected.

  Sighing deep in his chest, he crouched beside her and removed a glove, immediately noting the jagged scar along her jaw that spoke of a serious injury and likely great pain. As Ryan reached out to take her pulse, his hand trembled.

  He had no choice; he had to touch her to help her. He was many things but a cold-blooded murderer of innocents would never be one of them. He clenched his hand in a fist and sent a message through his body and mind to step the fuck up already. When he opened his hand again, his fingers were steady as a rock. Placing them on her neck, he felt a pulse so shallow he almost missed it. She was in danger of freezing if he didn’t get her to shelter immediately.

  Tugging his backpack off his shoulders, he removed a thermal blanket and wrapped it around her body. He pulled the bed roll blanket out and added that, placing his pack beneath her head. Standing, he set about making a litter from branches and twine to transport her back to his cabin.

  He moved quickly, knowing he had only two hours before he lost the light and would be forced to make camp. Alone, this wouldn’t bother him but allowing her to remain at the mercy of the elements for another twelve hours would kill her. Of this, he was certain.

  She was his responsibility now. It was his job to keep her safe and make her well so she could go back where she belonged and leave him alone again. Alone but not at peace. Never at peace.

  He used his bedroll to shield her from the rough twine, lifting and moving her to lie on it, shocked at how little she weighed. He carefully tucked the blankets around her and used more twine to secure her to the litter.

  Pack over his shoulders again, he stood staring out at the Kennecott Glacier in the distance with his hands on his narrow hips.

  “I don’t know why you’ve sent this person to me. I won’t pretend to understand. I’ll help her and send her away. Is this going to become a regular thing? Sending me underfed strays to patch up?” When there was no answer, he pinched the bridge of his nose between his finger and thumb, squeezing to relieve the tension building there. “Okay, let’s get this over with.” He turned back and lifted the litter, hauling it behind him as he retraced his steps.

  Ryan moved quickly down the mountain and the roof of his cabin came into view as the sun began to disappear behind the lowest range. He breathed a sigh of relief and pulled her up on the porch, untying the twine, lifting her from the floor, and carrying her inside the warmth of his compact home. First things first, he couldn’t afford an infestation of bugs. He had to clean and examine her. He spread an old blanket over his long farmer’s table and laid her on it.

  Retrieving his medical bag and supplies from the pantry as well as a warm flannel shirt and thick socks, he returned to her. He pulled the blankets back and began a series of tests on her vitals. The corneas of her eyes were yellowed, the pupils dingy. They dilated when he flashed his light in them.

  He started removing the tattered shirt and men’s pants she wore, held on her malnourished frame with a piece of dirty rope. She had no undergarments. Everything went into an enormous Ziploc bag he would save for the authorities. Gradually he bared her body to his eyes and his heart felt a wave of compassion he hadn’t experienced in too many years to count.

  The obvious malnourishment and dehydration were the least of what this woman had been through. Her bones showed clearly under her lax grayish skin. The scarring was so much worse. Everything from lash marks to what looked like slices from a knife were scattered over her torso, arms, and legs. Someone’s desire for her to remove her body hair with either an old blade or the edge of a knife had left her armpits, legs, and pelvic a
rea dotted with infected razor burn and likely agonizing tiny cuts.

  He filled a small tub with warm soapy water and began to wipe her body down with a soft cloth after he stoked the fire to prevent her from becoming chilled. His mind was detached as he’d been trained, seeing her as a patient and not a person of specific gender.

  When her body was as clean as he could get it, the scars and bruises were so much clearer against her pale flesh. He applied antibacterial ointment over every cut and sore he could find, covering the worst with gauze and medical tape. The bruised outlines of hands on her upper arms and inner thighs infuriated him on her behalf. Her genitals were raw and he knew she likely had vaginal and anal tearing. For someone to treat a human being this way, they deserved nothing less than death.

  After a moment of consideration, he removed an ACE bandage with a Velcro closure. Lifting her upper body he worked to bind her breasts. Evidence of severe and repeated sexual assault would make her feel vulnerable under any condition. He wanted her to feel as secure as possible under several layers of clothing if and when she ever woke.