Viking King (The MacLomain Series: Viking Ancestors, Book 1) Read Online Free Page B

nodded at the boat. “Or am I going to find you sleeping in that tomorrow morning?”
    Megan shot it a contemplative look. “Not such a bad idea.” Then she winked at him. “Kidding. I’ll be in soon. Go on.”
    Sean eyed what she suspected were her bloodshot eyes for another long moment before he nodded and turned away, saying over his shoulder, “I’ll be back out in ten if you haven’t turned in.”
    “Yeah, yeah,” she muttered under her breath and tucked the metal box back into the drawer. Leaning against the workbench, she continued to eye the boat. Though Sean had certainly helped, she had put in most of the work building it. Regardless, it would always be theirs . And though he said it’d make the local paper if she went down in a storm, Megan knew it’d make the paper no matter what. It was a work of art. With clean, smooth lines it was built historically accurate.
    Made of oak, they’d fastened the boards with authentic iron nails to a single sturdy keel and then to each other so that one plank overlapped the next. The Viking’s had called it the ‘clinker’ technique rather than the more conventional method of first building an inner skeleton for the hull. Then they’d affixed evenly spaced floor timbers to the keel and not to the hull. This insured resilience and flexibility. After that, they added crossbeams to provide a deck and a few rowing benches, and secured a beam along the keel to support the mast.
    Yes, it was all done on a much smaller scale but she was proud.
    Though she’d dabbled in making model ships, this offered a whole new sense of accomplishment. It provided more fulfillment than those cut-throat real estate deals in her past. Sure, she’d felt a certain amount of pride back then but it always had more to do with her competitive nature rather than anything else.
    But perhaps age and her relationship status had something to do with that. After all, half the reason she pursued real estate like she did was because Nathan had. Right out of college, they’d made a contest out of it. They were young and ambitious…and talented.
    Megan ground her jaw and flicked off the lights. About the last thing she wanted to do was think about her ex-husband. She wanted thoughts of him nowhere near this beautiful boat and all the love she’d put into it.
    While she had no trouble pushing thoughts of Nathan aside, Naðr Véurr continued to haunt her through the night. It was too damn uncanny that his name was in that manuscript. And though she’d gone along with Sean’s theory that his name might’ve been mentioned before, she’d spent a great deal of time researching it. When she had no luck on the internet beyond the actual meaning of the name, she’d hit the local libraries. Nothing. But there had to be something out there. So not for the first time, Megan tossed and turned restlessly through the night until the sun cracked over the horizon.
    A few loud woofs made her sit up in bed. Uh oh. She flung the blanket over herself moments before a Husky/Shepard mix burst into the room and jumped on the bed. With a hearty laugh, she flung her arms around the excited pooch. “Hello my sweet girl.” Burying her face in the thick fur, she smiled. “Welcome home, Guardian.”
    She’d only been in Winter Harbor a few months when a local suggested she keep a dog around for protection. Though relatively crime free, it was rather isolated. Absolutely not had been her initial response. Megan didn’t do dogs. Then she relented…okay, maybe a small one that wouldn’t get in the way too much. Instead, she ended up with a light tan little mutt with a gray racer stripe down her back. As it turned out, the pup grew into a great beauty that currently weighed ninety pounds.
    Amber sauntered in and flung herself down on the bed beside them, laughing as Guardian smothered her in kisses. Around heavy licks, she said, “Sean picked her up from the groomers before he went to work.”
    “I figured.” Megan