My husband is the love of my life-gorgeous, powerful, and full of secrets. We had one perfect year of marriage before everything fell apart. Now, he reeks of cheap perfume and beautiful lies. But giving up on us, after all we've been through, is unthinkable. So, when I hear about a mechanic who fixes broken relationships, I waste no time tracking him down. The only issue? Doc doesn't meet with wives. But I'm desperate, and I'm willing to break the rules. I need to convince him to make an exception, or I might lose my husband forever. Will Doc take me on before my husband destroys our marriage completely? And even if he does, will his methods work on a relationship this damaged? I still believe in love, even though it's torn me apart. My husband is the love of my life, but I'm not sure he'll ever change. Can Doc repair a marriage this broken?
I GRAB my husband's mistress by the hair. Feel my nails scrape against her lily-white scalp. Wrench her extensions the way I discard tufts of dandelions from my rose garden.
She shrieks like a banshee. Like some otherworldly monster, clawing out of the grave. Out of hell. A devil wrapped in my robe, sipping from my wine glass. In my freaking house.
I throw my weight and my words around. Cohesive sentences broken by expletives. Dark obscenities. Vicious threats.
The woman manages to slip out of my grasp like the worm that she is.
Big brown eyes blink in my direction, filled with shock and pain.
I give her a once-over. Make side-by-side comparisons in the space of three seconds.
Jerrison really lowered his standards with this one.
She's young. The kind of young that believes her opinions matter even though she lacks experience. The kind with shelves of participation trophies and awkward photos of herself in lingerie, celebrating the years before gravity sags everything and the sun carves lines into her face.
Blonde. From the bottle. Her roots are showing. Black. Darkness creeping on light.
Her body's lanky–if I'm being harsh. Willowy if I'm being kind. But her tits are like watermelons. She must have back problems. There's no way her scrawny frame was built to support that.
Fake hair. Fake eyes. Fake tits. Airhead Barbie. As plastic as the dolls I used to play with in childhood.
Jerrison lurches to his feet, his thick blonde eyebrows slashing over startling blue eyes. "Harriet? I thought you were going on a business trip?"
There's an edge to my smile. I feel the rage building and building, galvanized by his ridiculous question.
He wants to know why I'm here. Like this isn't my house.
Like my name's not on the mortgage.
Like he wasn't sipping wine beside another woman, giggling and cuddling her five seconds before I busted in.
I ball my fingers into fists. Fight the lump that forms in the back of my throat, a lump that always precedes my tears.
Beyond the anger, frustration and disappointment is a secret hope.
Please let this be a dream.
Nightmare. Reality.
I never thought it would come to this. That I would fake a business trip just so I could catch my husband in the act.
I wanted evidence. Proof beyond whispered phone calls in the night. Socked feet tiptoeing out when he thought I was asleep. Empty sides of the bed. Strange credit card purchases. Hotels. Lingerie. Flowers that never came to me.
My marriage fell on the rocks and capsized, but I stubbornly believed it hadn't come to this point. It took effort to ignore the signs when I was bombarded with fragments of the truth. Nudges from my intuition. Whispers from my co-workers, friends, and family-those who loved me enough, who were brave enough, to bring their concerns to me.
"I noticed your husband with someone last week..."
"I thought you should know..."
"Is Jerrison seeing someone...?"
I didn't want to believe it. Even if I knew I was no longer his priority, even if the nights he reached for me, slid inside me, moved over me had dried up to nothing. Even if we never said 'I love you' or went on dates or exchanged more than the necessary conversations about bills, politics, and schedules, I believed in our marriage vows. To love and to hold. To honor. To respect.
I was there when Jerrison made those promises in front of everyone. Love shining in his eyes. Chest puffing out in a double-breasted suit with a flower clipped to the lapel.
He held my hand. Squeezed my fingers. Repeated after the priest in a giant cathedral that echoed with prestige and old money. The kind of religion people fought wars over.
'I will always love you, Harriet'.
Except Jerrison didn't warn me that his love came with strings. With business suits carrying the subtle scent of perfume. With lipstick stains on wrinkled napkins. With callers that go silent and then hang up when I answer the phone instead of him.
Today, I summoned the courage to see for myself, but there was no preparation for this moment. No motive beyond an urgent desire to prove I wasn't crazy.
I wanted my husband to face me. To see me.
To watch me watching him.
And I wanted remorse. Knees hitting the hardwood floors. Tears gushing from his incredible blue eyes. Hands up, rasping together in pleas for understanding.
But my husband did not receive my script because he's not following the lines.
It's been five minutes since I burst into the house, caught him with Blondie and grabbed her hair.
Five minutes.
I have yet to receive an apology.
"J-Jerry!" Barbie whispers, reaching for Jerrison. Bracelets dance up scrawny arms, clanking loudly against her elbows.
My gaze drags back to her. The way my voice carries through the room sounds like a gun without its safety. "Touch him and die."
She snatches her hands back. Looks at me with fear and trembling. I am her end.
And she knows it.
Jerrison does too. He moves in front of her. "Did you lie to me about the business trip?" He has the audacity to look annoyed as he pieces everything together. "You set me up. There wasn't any emergency at HQ, was there?"
Something ugly knots inside my chest. A twisted, ravenous evil. The side that society beats out of us. That school and eight-hour jobs in hot cubicles told us was wrong.
Conform. Restrain. Hold it in.
Do not let them see you explode.
Jail time. Police escorts. Assault charges.
Choose peace over violence. Choose conversation over fists. My dad taught me that when he taught me how to box. 'You have power and now you have a responsibility to use that power wisely.'
Whoever made those arbitrary rules has never been cheated on. Never walked in on their husband with another woman. Never had to choke down the acidic bile that starts in the stomach and rises to the throat.
I feel like a soda bottle shaken to within an inch of its life. A volcano spitting ash, a precursor to the lava.
Our breaths hit the air and damages the silence. No one moves.
It's like we're stuck in time. Each of us a cast member in a ridiculous set piece, moved around by a Higher Being that we don't understand. That couldn't possibly be benevolent.
"Harriet..." Jerrison says my name like an adult would to a misbehaving child in the middle of aisle four. 'No, you can't have that cereal, baby. It's too expensive'.
"Shut up."
"You need to calm down."
"And you need to move." It's all I can say through clenched teeth. Every muscle in my body coils. Flames lick at my skin and neck. Sweat beads on my upper lip.
"No," Jerrison says. "Let's talk about this like rational adults."
The Blonde begins to smile. She's got painfully thin lips that threaten to disappear completely from her face. The kind of lips that will probably land her in a plastic surgeon's office, asking for fillers and holding up a picture of a woman who looks like me.
I hate her.
Every inch of her. I want her to die.
Jerrison's eyebrows jerk a little closer together. He takes a step toward me. Hands outstretched. Eyes narrowed. Animal control approaching a rabid raccoon. Here, kitty kitty.
I can't look at him. Can't breathe from the pain that snaps at me like a shark out for blood.
There's no remorse in my husband's face.
No shame.
He's still tense, still acting as if he's got the upper hand. As if I should be ashamed for interrupting him.
I get the sense that I'm messing up his day. That I'm moving away from his script. That I should fold myself into a little box while he plays with his tramp. Make way until he's finished. Because isn't that what a good wife does? Step aside while her husband screws his girlfriend?
Bastard.
The betrayal barrels into me. A boulder on my back. Shackles on my feet.
I refuse to cry. She's still here. The other woman. I'm going to burn that robe. With her still in it.
"Fine." I whirl around and stomp to the mud room. Grabbing the bat we store on our shelf of prized junk, I stalk back to the main hall.
Barbie shrieks when she sees the bat. "Jerrison, she's going to kill me!" My husband stares at me with wide eyes.
I swing the bat over my shoulder and give him a cold smirk. "Excuse me a minute."
"Harriet..."
I throw the front door open. Her cherry convertible is pretty. Svelte. Just like Barbie. Not a scratch on its red paint. She takes good care of this thing.
Good.
The first swing of my bat smashes against a rearview mirror. Glass shatters into a million pieces and feeds my rage. I bash the hood like a madwoman. Jump on the trunk and beat the roof. Gorilla stomps. Blown tail lights. Cracked windshield.
Jerrison yells at me. Barbie wails.
I don't stop and neither of them come close enough to grab me. Smart idiots. They know I'll exchange metal and glass for sinew and flesh.
When I'm done, my straight hair sticks to my cheek and my hands hurt from gripping the bat so tightly. Something sharp stings my hand. I think some glass shards might have sailed through the air and scratched me.
My boots thump the concrete driveway. The bat rolls from my fingers and clanks to the ground, sliding back and forth before coming to a stop at one of my rose bushes.
Barbie's crying and so am I. The tears leak out of my eyes without permission.
I face the other woman. "You have ten seconds to get the hell out of here. If you ever come back to this house again, I promise you I won't show the restraint that I have today."
Her heels clack on the ground as she limps off. I'm surprised when her car starts. I'm surprised when it speeds out of the gate, the muffler scraping pavement and the side mirrors swinging in the breeze.
My attentions shifts to the man standing in the doorway of our home. The love of my life.
The man I pledged my world to. My cheating husband.
Imogen is a lady on the brink. Due to her mother's therapeutic condition, she's been constrained to live out of her car, in her workplace's car carport, no less. She can scarcely make closes meet, and her as it were center is how to survive fair one more day. Tobias and Theo are her bosses, and it doesn't take them long to find her mystery, but unbeknownst to her, they have a mystery of their possess, one that may alter everything.She's their mate, and they'll do anything they have to in arrange to keep her for themselves, indeed if that implies breaking her to begin with. Imogen knows she will never be free of them, and being human against a Lycan and vampire, she might as well donate up; As it were presently, she was not as it were battling to elude her mates who captured her but battling for her humankind. Constrained into a world she never knew existed, one thing gets to be clear. No people permitted! Imogen before long finds the most secure put for her may really be with her mates, but at what taken a toll? Will Imogen truly fair let them take anything they need, or will she battle back?
TamI'll provide Hallie Wynter thirty days.Thirty days of living with me some time recently I'll wed her.Thirty days for her to tell me no, so I can shoot her running back to my family's greatest match – her father.She might act intense, but I do n't misdoubt my capability to break her.She's so guiltless. So naive.The young lady will be requesting to go domestic by the time I'm done with her. HallieTam Cornell is as well ancient for me; as well difficult, as well cold, as well everything.It was noway assumed to be him.I know he's pushing me, attempting to shoot me back to a father who's fair as merciless as he is.He considers he can stun me with his unprintable words and rough touch, but nothing he can uncover me to will make me take off. My father has continuously guided me family is everything.And in thirty days Tam Cornell will come my family, as well, whether he likes it or not. Find the heart- dashing world of the Mafia Delegated. Leo Cornell is a reasonable- haired demon with an ice-blue aspect that cuts right through me.Thinking he'll get his retribution on my father, he's stolen me from one imprisonment and landed me straight in another. But he's not the as it were controller around. I'll turn his outrage to work for my possess devices.He considers he'll destroy me, but he's guarding me from somebody worse.He fair does n't know it yet.I trapped Kaja from her bed in the center of night like a creature in a puck- tale.My arrange to corrupt her will make her dangerous father feel my pain.But as I get to know her, she stirs product interior me I allowed was long dead.I know it's off-base, but her slim body and sleek dull hair interest me.I call her my Raven Will I set her free some time recently I devastate her?
I was never meant to be discovered. After my father's death, my mother severed ties with the Jacksonville Pack and retreated into the swamps to hide a secret-me. Raised in this dangerous, isolated wilderness filled with ogres, panthers, and bog hags, I've never had contact with anyone except my mother. That is, until the Alpha of the Jacksonville Pack shows up, claiming that we share the rare and fated bond of True Mates. Unfortunately, my awkwardness and lack of social experience make me an unsuitable match, and he quickly breaks our bond, sending me back to the swamps. Just when I've given up hope, a mysterious man rescues me and brings me to his home, where I meet his two rough, biker brothers. Cast out from the pack for defying its Alpha, these triplets are also lone wolves. Unlike others, they don't mock me for my lack of social skills-they take care of me, heal my wounds, and show me the world I've been kept from. But dark forces are closing in, and they're determined to claim my life just as they did my father's. Can these three protectors save me from the same fate? "True Mate Rejected " is the first book in a trilogy of steamy, near-future paranormal romances featuring an innocent, sheltered heroine and her multiple, tough, protective mates who share her love. There's no choosing between them. The book contains mature scenes for readers over 18, with mild kink and an age gap. All intimate moments are consensual.
My name is Scarlet Jones, and I'm a witch... sort of. At least, that's what I've come to believe. Growing up, everyone saw me as the spoiled brat nobody wanted around. Sure, I broke things on purpose, stole a few items, and maybe set half my school ablaze, but can you blame me? They were too hard on me! In a family of powerful Blood witches, my peculiar magic always felt out of place. I thought I was the only one like me-an undeniable freak of nature-and I relished the uniqueness. I lived independently, hunting mindless creatures that drained my magic whenever they got the chance. I even threw a party for them, hoping to teach them some manners. But my plans unraveled when four strangers crashed the party-people who were just like me. Suddenly, I didn't feel so special anymore. With four unconscious bodies at my feet and no clue about what had just happened, I figured things couldn't get worse. I was dead wrong. Now, my journey is just beginning, and it looks like it's going to be anything but smooth.
Janice, the long-forgotten legitimate heiress, made her way back to her family, pouring her heart into winning their hearts. Yet, she had to relinquish her very identity, her academic credentials, and her creative works to her foster sister. In return for her sacrifices, she found no warmth, only deeper neglect. Resolute, Janice vowed to cut off all emotional bonds. Transformed, she now stood as a master of martial arts, adept in eight languages, an esteemed medical expert, and a celebrated designer. With newfound resolve, she declared, "From this day forward, no one in this family shall cross me."
Catherine swallowed with her eyes closed and her lips slightly open, a moan escaped her lips when Lucas slid two fingers under her panties, "Lucas..." She moaned, lost in the sinful desire as her ex-boyfriend's dad moved his fingers against her rosy flesh... *************** Catherine, a young mother of two who came to the city with the hope of finding her twin's father only to be denied and deserted by him, found herself entangled in a forbidden web of craving. As the flame of passion ignites between her and the CEO, Lucas Leonard—her ex-boyfriend's father—their affair takes them on a journey of temptation and sinful desires.Struggling with society's judgment and their own inner desire, Catherine and Lucas must steer the treacherous judgemental waters of the society and either fight for their love or let it crumble especially when her ex-lover came back to claim her and the twins. Will their love withstand the dishonorable whispers, or will it crumble under the weight of societal expectations and her ex-lover's conspiracies to win her back?
Three years ago, the Moore family opposed Charles Moore's choice to marry his beloved woman and selected Scarlett Riley as his bride. Charles didn't love her. In fact, he hated her. Not long after they got married, Scarlett received an offer from her dream university and jumped on it. Three years later, Charles's beloved woman fell terribly ill. In order to fulfill her last wish, he called Scarlett back and presented her with a divorce agreement. Scarlett was deeply hurt by Charles's abrupt decision, but she chose to let him go and agreed to sign the divorce papers. However, Charles seemed to delay the process deliberately, leaving Scarlett confused and frustrated. Now, Scarlett was trapped between the consequences of Charles's indecision. Would she be able to break free from him? Would Charles eventually come to his senses and face his true feelings?
BOOK 1- BILLIONAIRE ROMANCE BOOK. MATURE THEMES 18+ The book may contain s!xual scenes, sudden instances of possessiveness, mild violence. Sydney Morgan and Gavin Reed, high school sweethearts, had been married for over a decade. Five years of their relationship were filled with unconditional love; however, in the next six years, this changes drastically between them when Sydney takes advice from her best friend, Gavin's first love. When Sydney loses her baby, Gavin is left broken and vulnerable in the hands of his first love. She convinces him to divorce Sydney, and when he does, Sydney loses it and nearly gets hit by a car, but then the talk of the town, Gavin's rival, and CEO's son, hiding behind a facà de, comes to her rescue.
**This book contains a trigger warning. Mention about rape and torture in this book. Please read with caution** "Our marriage is nothing but a deal," he said looking at the girl, her green eyes met his cold silver eye, and both of them glared at each other. "For any rules you break, I will claim any part of your body," his gaze grew dangerously darker at his word. Ashley Harlow was at the top of the world, living the perfect and luxurious lifestyle as the legitimate daughter of the well-known Daniel Harlow. But sadly, a one-night stand put an end to that and brought her life upside down and that of her family's name to the ground. To restore his family's reputation, she was forced into marrying Damien Albrecht, a young, ruthless, obnoxious, brutal billionaire and the head of a mafia gang in exchange for her father's company.
Sophia Drake braced herself for the worst when she was forced to move across the country in the middle of her junior year. Desperate to escape her shattered home as soon as she turns eighteen, her plans are disrupted by the enigmatic and captivating Ashford twins. Sophia can't fathom the intense attraction she feels for the twins and tries to avoid them at every turn. As she's thrust into an unfamiliar world, her past demons resurface, making her question her true identity. Will Sophia flee from her past's secrets, or will she embrace her destiny and take control of her future?