3311 Book(s) Related to 7 reasons not to fall in love

Isabella Monte is distraught when her family loses everything. Determined not to lose her parents, she swore on her father's hospital bed to get back all they had lost.
However her father told her that it was futile as their suffering was caused by Angelo Flores, the wealthiest bachelor in Panama.
Angelo would stop at nothing to completely get rid of the Monte's as he blames them for the death of his parents and sister. While at the hospital with her father, Isabella is visited by none other than Angelo and a deal is placed before her.
"Marry me and I will let your family go." Against her father's will, Isabella agrees to Angelo's demands. Her hatred for him is stronger than ever as she vows to make him pay for her family's suffering.
But, what happens when Isabella finds herself falling for the enemy?
WARNING: MATURE CONTENT

After being murdered in an arson attack, I was reborn to the moment right after marrying Charles.
This time, all I want is to fight for my daughter's future and my career.
But just when the divorce papers are ready, the always cold and distant Charles suddenly begs me to stay.
——
I hesitated...

"You'll regret this," he said, certain I was only bluffing.
I still signed the divorce papers—without asking for a single extra dollar.
For three years, I was the wife who left a light on for him, who knew exactly how warm he liked his water, how strong his coffee should be, even what his silence meant. He never once asked what I wanted.
"I can't live without you," he now begs, kneeling in the rain outside my building.
Some men only learn to bow their heads after they've already lost everything worth keeping.

Sophie Ashford's perfect life shattered at her husband Ethan’s 35th birthday party. In front of everyone, he announced their divorce, accused her of being the reason for their childlessness, and revealed his engagement to her best friend, Veronica who is already pregnant for him. Humiliated and heartbroken, Sophie fled, vowing never to look back.

A chance encounter with Lucas Ashford, a mysterious stranger at a bar who she didn't know his name at that time, led to a one-night escape that changed everything. Weeks later, Sophie discovered she is pregnant, giving her the strength to rebuild her life at least for the sake of her child.

Four years later, Sophie had finally found peace until Ethan reappeared, claiming her son was his and begging for forgiveness. But Ethan wasn’t the only one determined to claim Sophie’s heart. Lucas, the man from the one-night stand, returned and learned the truth, that the child was his. To complicate matters further, Lucas turned out to be Ethan’s estranged cousin.

As Sophie became caught in a fierce love triangle with two brothers, Will Sophie forgive Ethan’s betrayal for her sake? Can Lucas prove his love is genuine? Or will Sophie choose herself and carve out a new path free of these men?

I was three months pregnant when I found out my husband had been cheating with the cousin I had kindly taken in.

My son said he wanted her to be his mom, then shoved me down the stairs and caused me to miscarry.

The day I lost the baby, my husband sat beside my bed. His voice was gentle, soft enough to lull someone to sleep.

“Relax,” he said. “You’ll forget all this pain.”

I closed my eyes and let him plant layer after layer of hypnotic commands in my ear.

“When you wake up, you’ll be an obedient wife.”

Now I watch them living happily ever after as a family of three.

They think I’m nothing but an empty shell.

They have no idea that I’ve already posted this plea for help online:

[HELP] My cousin is wearing my sexy nightgown to seduce my husband, I caught them cheating, and my son calls her “Mom.” But I just feel numb. What am I supposed to do?

Farryn once had a normal life, as normal as one could have in a world where werewolves were hunted down for sport because they were different. In the matter of a year, Farryn’s life has been turned upside down, losing all her family members and living without her wolf. Until she met Alpha Chandler, she could not believe she might be able to come close to who she once was. However, the Moon Goddess isn’t the only one who has abandoned Farryn in a world where being defenseless means a death sentence….

Leaning back, he studied me. "Do you know what I think? You should have a quick, dirty revenge sex, then."
"I should?" My voice turned breathless after his slow perusal, eagerly anticipating his plea for me to forget everything.
"And I think I should be the one you do it with."
My cheeks heated, and he was already seemed aroused, envisioning pressing his lips against my skin. "Wh-Why with you?" I stammered.
He tilted his head, catching a hint of my scent. "Because I can guarantee I'll make it good for you. Because we both need to get out of our heads tonight."
"Well," I said, eyeing his forearms. This man had captured my attention like few did. After today's ordeal, the temptation to lose myself in his body was irresistible. "I'm saying, yes, let's have a quick, dirty revenge sex."


Zephyra thought she had it all: a loving boyfriend, a promising career, and a bright future.
But when Jovan dumps her over her reluctance to sleep with him, she seeks comfort in the arms of a mysterious stranger. Little does she know that the stranger is Lirael, the billionaire client she's trying to impress.
Her life turns upside down when she reconciles with Jovan and faces Lirael in a professional setting.
Caught in a web of lies, lust, and betrayal, Zephyra must choose between her heart and her future.
Will she find true love with Lirael, the man who ignited her passion and broke her trust? Or will she settle for a safe and comfortable life with Jovan, the man who cheated on her and took her for granted?

A house burns in the dead of night. A boy screams from inside. Another is arrested on the spot. But neither of them set that fire.

Weeks earlier, Nathan Rourke, a worn-out defense attorney from the city, returned to Hollow Creek—his haunted Southern hometown—after his brother’s sudden death. What was supposed to be a temporary visit becomes permanent when he uncovers chilling truths about the town he left behind.

Nathan takes on two high-profile cases: Elijah Moore, a wealthy teen accused of murdering his father, and Jace Carter, a poor foster kid charged with arson. But in a town where no one is ever found guilty, Nathan finds himself caught between lies passed off as justice, buried family secrets, and a decades-old system built on silence.

As Nathan digs deeper, the lines between his past and present blur. The deeper he searches, the more dangerous it becomes—not just for him, but for the boys whose lives depend on him.

A substitute, huh?

She met him out of luck, and out of the blue, he proposed something to her that she couldn't possibly refuse.

To become his wife.

But unknown to her, she was just a substitute to him, all because she resembled his beloved ex.

And when his ex returned, she was something he could easily discard.

Heartbroken, betrayed, and called a golddigger, she left with her little brother and her mother, who was recovering from a dangerous illness.

Only to return 7 years later as a completely different person with pride.

What happens when they cross paths with each other? Especially when he saw a young child beside her who looked just like his childhood pictures? But most especially, what would happen when he discovered just how much he was hated by the child, since his mother had filled his mind with something beyond saying.

She saved her husband with scorched flesh, raised her son with dying breath, yet was abandoned, insulted, and left to freeze in the snow. When she vanished into the deep sea, all the liars finally got their cruel karma.

Revenge brought her back. His unwavering love made her stay.

Paisley Hughes opens her eyes three years in the past, at the start of her gilded cage marriage to tycoon Clive Harrington. Haunted by the memory of her tragic end, she is a storm of vengeance, ready to expose the betrayal that awaits. Yet she swiftly uncovers a stunning truth: her powerful, enigmatic husband has loved her silently but fiercely all along.

Thrust into the heart of his family's ruthless succession war, Paisley discovers that Clive's devotion is her greatest weapon. Together, they battle hidden enemies and poisonous alliances. This time, she fights not just to settle scores, but to claim the powerful love and the true family that were always her destiny.

My woozy brain managed to register my body being laid on a soft bed... I held on tightly to his neck, grinning stupidly, "you're so handsome. I like to kiss handsome men."
A soft chuckle, "darling, you..." I raised my head to jam my lips with his, cutting him off.


The accident that was meant to end her, put Roxanne in coma for a year. When she woke up, her memory was a blank. Then she finds herself in a contract marriage with Josh Caldwell, her CEO husband, who's betrothed to marry the true heiress of the powerful Gilmore Empire.
Five years later, her husband's woman is back. Vanessa Gilmore — the beautiful, manipulative heiress of Gilmore Empire. Roxanne is tossed aside.
The boy she'd taken care of since he was a baby was snatched from her. She has lost...and she knows it. Then comes Kylian Caldwell, the half brother of her ex-husband, a well known playboy and black sheep of the Caldwell, to the rescue.
With him by her side, she's about to discover that the past isn't dead...and that her memory holds the key to unlocking secrets, including her stolen identity and the child she didn't know she'd given birth to.
But when the truth finally comes spilling and two brothers fight for her heart, will she be able to stand against the enemies who will stop at nothing to keep what is rightfully hers, even if it means driving a wedge between her and the man who's ready to rain down hell just to protect her?

Five years ago, Emma Holloway made the cruelest choice of her life—breaking the heart of the only man who ever truly loved her. She let him walk away without knowing the truth. Now? She’s broke, desperate, and hiding behind a fake name just to land a job.

Only it’s not just any job. It’s at Harrington Enterprises.

And her new boss?
Cole Harrington. The man she pushed away. The man who built an empire… and never forgot the woman who betrayed him.

Cole is colder now. Powerful, unreadable, and engaged to someone else. But when he sees her again—“Emily Grace,” as she now calls herself—he plays along. Smiling in public. Testing her in private. Pushing boundaries she’s too vulnerable to defend.

She needs the paycheck. He wants answers.
But neither of them are prepared for what happens when secrets start unraveling, and emotions long buried come roaring back.

Because Cole isn’t just back for business.

He’s back for closure.
Or revenge.
And maybe... her heart.

My sister’s TikTok Shop was on the verge of being shut down. As a top livestream creator with three million followers, I stepped in and turned a warehouse full of dead inventory into bestsellers.

That night, my sister shipped the wrong items for three hundred orders. I apologized on camera, then paid ten thousand dollars out of my own pocket to issue refunds and send replacements.

After the livestream, I went to the warehouse to pick up samples for tomorrow. The second I grabbed two insulated tumblers, my sister snatched them out of my hands.

“I knew it! You’ve been stealing from me again!”

I told her they were samples and that every item had been logged.

She refused to listen and smacked the shelf with her palm.

“My inventory has been off for months because you’ve been stealing from me! Pay me twenty thousand dollars, or I’m calling the cops!”

For three months, I hadn’t charged a flat fee or taken a dime in commission. I had even covered the customer service costs myself.

And now she was calling me a thief.

Our parents rushed in when they heard the shouting. Mom wrapped an arm around my sister and glared at me.

“You’re her older sister. You’re supposed to help her. But stealing says everything about what kind of person you are.”

Dad looked at me with disappointment. “Do you have any idea how hard your sister has worked to build this business? How could you take advantage of her?”

I looked at the three of them, each one convinced they were in the right, and laughed.

Fine. If they thought anyone could sell this stuff, they could go live and sell it themselves.

I was in love with Ethan Black, a brilliant man with big dreams. I gave him my twenties, my body, my loyalty. I worked three jobs while he chased his startup dreams. And when he finally made it, he became a stranger.
Then I found out he got another woman pregnant, the same woman who dumped him in college when his family lost everything. That nearly destroyed me. But I stayed. I told myself love was worth it.
But nothing could prepare me for the day he left our four-year-old daughter home alone… to go see her. And our little girl died.
I buried my child and with her, the woman I used to be.
Now, I live for one thing only: Revenge.
He took everything from me. Now I’ll take everything from him.
He doesn’t know it yet… but I’m not the same woman he left behind. And by the time I’m done, he’ll wish he never met me.

I’m Molly Johnson. At my own engagement party, I witnessed my fiancé’s betrayal with my stepsister right before my eyes. Devastated, I turned around and married Edward Howard—a wealthy heir rumored to be terminally ill, with not much time left to live.
Everyone laughed, saying I was in a hurry to become a widow. But little did they know, I leaned close to his ear, my breath warm and teasing: “Since you don’t have much time left, why not play a little game with me?”
I flirted with him, tempted him, watched as his indifference slowly melted into a blush at the tips of his ears.
Until one day, he cornered me against the wall, his eyes burning with longing. “Molly… tease me again. Please.”

Blurb:

“Did the condom really break all those years back or did you just want to baby trap me, Varian?”

He looked at me, eyes freezing over, “I just did what time you would make sure you would never leave my side,”

•••••••••••••

Varian and Thalia had been childhood sweethearts ever since they were little. He was the alpha son and she came from the Beta line, there's seemed like a perfect love story just waiting for its happy ending. That was until Thalia got a scholarship to go to Crescent University and pursue her dream of becoming a professional healer, it was supposed to mark the end of their relationship until another curveball was thrown at them–Thalia’s pregnancy.

Her dream was eventually flushed down the toilet, exchanged for being an underappreciated glorified housewife with the title of Luna slapped across it. Varian had become distant over the years then the straw that broke the camel's back was when she found out that he had been cheating with her best friend, devastation claimed her. She demanded for a divorce and as if to punish her he made sure she was left with nothing more than the clothes on her back.

One night she disappeared with her twins, and years passed. Varian came face-to-face with her again. The only woman who could cure a plague unlike any seen in a hundred years. He tried to win her back but now saw that their twins was calling another man ‘Daddy’

He bought her company to own every inch of her. She plans to shatter his empire. Falling in love was never part of the plan.
Kael Knox is the most secretive billionaire in New York – ruthless, dominant, brooding. He has never been seen with a woman in public.
Until her.
Aria Vale.
When he purchases her firm, she becomes the one thing he can’t control. And the only woman he’s ever risked his legacy and reputation for.
Their first meeting ends in a boardroom explosion, and the second, in a deal with too many strings. And their third? That’s when she realizes that the man who signs her checks might just want to ruin her.
Or worship her.
Maybe both.
And now, the world is watching.

He was supposed to be my way out, but he was the one who pushed me into the pit all along.
I used to think Carter was the one good thing in this hellhole of a high school. He'd stand up for me when the whole class mocked my stutter. He'd hand me a clean jacket when my locker got stuffed with dead rats.
For him, I gave up my Ivy League dreams, willingly settling for some mediocre state university.
Until that Friday outside the locker room, when I heard him brag to his teammates and the head cheerleader—the same girl who'd led the charge in tormenting me—about his "conquest" in the most casual tone imaginable.
Turns out, I was just the prize in their sick bet.
In that moment, everything I'd believed in shattered.
I didn't cry. I didn't scream. I just quietly changed my college application, and then, at the height of their triumph, I watched with cold eyes as they destroyed themselves.

In my previous life, I married the old-money aristocrat Charles for the sake of so-called love, only to exhaust my heart and soul enduring his mother's torment and his own spineless cowardice.

I eventually left that marriage with nothing but scars.
 
Meanwhile, my gentle and kind-hearted sister, Chloe, married the self-made shipping magnate Alexander.

Yet, she was relentlessly tormented by the so-called "comrade's sister" he kept in his mansion, ultimately slitting her wrists in a bathtub in utter despair.
 
Now, I was back to the exact moment we were about to sign our prenuptial agreements.
 
The second our eyes met, Chloe and I recognized the shared, unspoken resolve in each other's gaze—we had both been reborn.

When Carol Bennett caught her long-time boyfriend cheating, she didn't cry or beg. Instead, she exposed the scandal online, turning him into a viral disgrace overnight. Then, without looking back, she agreed to a marriage of convenience with Ethan Mitchell, a powerful billionaire suffering from a terminal illness—her estranged father's carefully arranged match.
On their wedding night, Ethan handed her a cold-hearted prenup and warned her not to expect love, money, or a future. Fine by Carol. She played her role perfectly, calling him "husband" with a sweet smile while keeping her heart locked away.
But the aloof CEO who once wanted nothing to do with her is now the one chasing her. One kiss, one glance, and suddenly he's breaking his own rules.
"Carol, kiss me."
She smirks, her fingers trailing along his collarbone. "Falling for me already, Mr. CEO? Looks like you're the one breaking the contract."
Who would've thought the dying billionaire would end up begging for a second chance?

Lorraine never expected to lose her virginity to her cold, unreadable CEO Tristan—let alone five times in one night. Even more shocking? He keeps showing up to save her, stepping in not once, but twice, to protect her from a toxic ex. After several heartfelt proposals, she finally agrees to a contract marriage—thinking it's a practical solution to a messy life.

Tristan has had his eyes on Lorraine for years—the brilliant top designer working quietly under his nose. The contract is just the beginning of his plan to claim her completely. He's ready to offer her everything: protection, devotion, and a love she's never dared to hope for.

But when jealous exes and relentless suitors re-enter the picture, threatening to tear them apart, their fragile arrangement is put to the test. Can a marriage built on strategy survive long enough to become something real?

Eight years ago, I left him bleeding in a hospital bed and disappeared without a trace.
It was the hardest thing I had ever done.
It was also the only way to protect the secret growing inside me.
For eight years, I built a quiet life for myself and my daughter, far away from the Trevanti name and the dangerous family that nearly destroyed us. I had one rule.
Never let them find me.
Then I made a mistake.
One bad decision landed me in debt to the wrong people, and before I knew it, I was being sold to the highest bidder.
I expected a stranger.
Instead, Fabian Trevanti walked through the door.
The boy I abandoned.
The man I never forgot.
The only man I’ve ever loved.
Eight years should have been enough to forget him.
It wasn’t.
Not his smile.
Not the way he looked at me.
Not the way my heart still betrayed me whenever I heard his name.
The worst part wasn’t that Fabian found me.
The worst part was realizing I still wanted him.
Because Fabian isn’t the sweet boy I left behind anymore.
He’s powerful.
Dangerous.
Possessive.
And after spending eight years searching for me, he’s no longer willing to accept my excuses or my distance.
He’s never letting us go again.
But Fabian finding me is only the beginning.
A ghost from our past has returned.
A man we thought was dead.
A monster who stole years of our lives and left scars neither of us ever truly escaped.
And this time, he wants more than revenge.
Caught between old secrets, deadly enemies, and a love neither of us managed to bury, Fabian and I are forced back into each other’s lives just as the past comes crashing through the door.
The problem?
The more danger closes in around us, the harder it becomes to remember why I ran in the first place.
And when the truth finally comes out, I might lose far more than my secret.
I might lose my heart all over again.

"We should be doing this," I mumbled, yet I bent my neck for him, giving him better access to it.
"Yes we shouldn't," he answered, but his hands were sliding under my skirt and pulling my panties down.
"If we get caught," I muttered, moaning as his fingers found my slick entrance and he rubbed. My knees shook but he held me against himself with his other hand.
"If we get caught," he repeated. It was as if this had become some sort of game between him and I. Repeating each other's words like this.
"I could be expelled and your job would be taken from you," I completed.
"Yes, that could happen," he answered with a nod of his head. He moved away from me and stared into my eyes. "But it won't happen. We won't get caught. I won't tell, if won't tell."
"I'd be crazy to tell someone," I answered, my eyes searching his.


Vampire x Human. Professor x Student. Steamy x Forbidden love
When your one night stand turns out to be your professor, there's only one thing to do- continue to sleep with him. And that was exactly what Sophia is going to do.
She's faced with a forbidden attraction that's hard to resist until she finds out his dark secret; he's a vampire.
Will her passion overcome the secrets he had been hiding from her or will the shadows tear them apart?

The craziest thing I've ever done? Agreeing to Mason's idea—sex in the middle of nowhere.
But then his first love called, and he left me stranded out there. Alone. In the dead of night.

In her past life, Arabella Oberon was the lowest-ranking member of the Oberon family.

She genuinely took in Regina, the butler's daughter, only to be constantly manipulated by this cunning and manipulative woman.

Regina gradually stole the love from her three brothers.

Arabella was forced to give Regina blood transfusions time and again, her weight plummeting to a mere eighty-eight pounds.

Ultimately, under the relentless pressure from her brothers, she jumped out of a window in despair and died. Her last words were,

"What about Regina's blood transfusions?"

When she opened her eyes again, Arabella found herself reborn three years earlier—the very day Regina appeared at her doorstep crying, begging for help.

Looking at the pitiful, tearful girl before her, Arabella smiled.

No more soft-heartedness.

No more groveling.

Instead, she "kindly" arranged for Regina to move into the servants' quarters, to earn her own living through honest labor.

Faced with her brothers who sided with her, she no longer bothered to please them.

And towards her former fiancé, Theodore, whom she had once fawned over, she remained cold, distant, and indifferent.

Moreover, in this life, they would discover that her identity was far more than just the eldest daughter of the Oberon family.

"Bite me." Chase Sterling's whisper was a blade against my skin.

I should pull away.
I should hate him.
But my wolf is howling yes while my heart screams no.

"Say stop," he breathes against my pulse, "and I'll stop."

Liar.

We both know he can't stop.
The bond won't let him.

And neither can I.


Ten years ago, they found my father with his throat torn out
on Silvermoon land.

The Sterlings called it "trespassing."
I called it murder.

They gave us hush money and a warning:
Keep quiet, or the Beta's daughter is next.

So I learned to be invisible.
To swallow my rage.
To survive.

Until someone slipped a note into my locker:
They lied about how your father died.


Chase Sterling.

Future Alpha. Golden boy. Untouchable.

The moment our eyes met, the bond snapped into place—
a collar I never asked for, a chain I can't break.

He says he didn't know.
He says his father is innocent.
He says he'll help me find the truth.

But every time he touches me,
I feel my father's blood on his hands.


Now I'm trapped between two impossible choices:

Accept the bond and betray everything I am.
Or break it—and lose the partner who can prove
my father's killer walks free.

The worst part?

When Chase whispers "mine" against my skin—
I want to believe him.

Mature Contents Ahead. Please this book is highly rated 18+
'You'll pay for this Amelia, mark my words, you get married to me through deception, you'll suffer the consequences. And now, you'll face your first punishment, you want to be my wife huh, you'll face what happens to them on their wedding night.' He chuckled, but it was one filled with bitterness. 'You're not that beautiful. But that doesn't mean I won't have your body.'
Amelia Harper, a young lady with virtue, finds herself in a family and vicinity where she isn't acceptable.
Her family borrowed money from Dylan Blackwood the billionaire and couldn't pay their debt.
Dylan Blackwood decided to take the Harper's most beautiful daughter as a wife in place of the debt but she fled leaving her elder sister, the not so pretty one, Amelia Harper to suffer the consequences.

BLURB

Ravenna Damon was banished for existing.

Darius Pike crossed the border anyway.

They built something in the wilderness. A home from nothing, a child on the way, something almost close to peace. The Moon Goddess let them have three months before she took it back.

Now Darius is dead. Her child is gone. And the man responsible for both is apparently her second fated mate.

The bond does not care what Caleb Nightshade did. It does not care that Ravenna has nothing left to lose, or that the war outside the dungeon walls is burning everything she ever loved to the ground. It simply exists, pulling at her like a tide, patient and merciless and completely indifferent to her feelings about it.

She has a choice. Survive Caleb or die rejecting him.

Ravenna Damon has never been good at dying.

Mated to the Enemy is the second book in the Blood and Ice series. It contains mature themes, grief, and emotional intensity.

"I married you only to destroy you."

That was the only reason FBI agent Sophia Carter accepted a new identity as Evelyn Russo and married Lorenzo Moretti, the most dangerous mafia boss in Italy.

Her mission was to infiltrate, gather evidence, drag Lorenzo to prison, and save the children and women that Lorenzo Moretti had kidnapped for trafficking.

But life as a Don's wife was never as simple as she had imagined. Behind the luxurious mansion, the armed men, and the secrets of the Moretti family, Sophia found herself trapped in a game she did not understand.
The closer she got to Lorenzo, the harder it became to distinguish lies from reality.
But one thing never changed. If her identity as an FBI agent was exposed, then at that very moment, she would die at her own husband's hands.

I promised her father I would protect her.

Lizzie Foster was never meant to be mine.
She was the spoiled mafia princess I was ordered to guard… the daughter of my dying best friend… and the young woman already promised to another man.

My duty was simple: keep her safe until her wedding day.

Then her fiancé betrayed her.
And the only way to protect her was to do the unthinkable—

marry her myself.

Now Lizzie is living under my roof, wearing my ring, carrying my name… and testing every last ounce of the control I’ve built my life on.

She wants a real marriage.
Not a cold arrangement. Not a contract signed out of necessity.
She wants affection, devotion, a husband who will look at her like she’s the only woman in the world.

And the more time she spends in my bed, in my house, in my life… the harder it becomes to remember this marriage was never supposed to happen.

She was my best friend’s daughter.
Too young. Too forbidden. Too innocent for a man like me.

But Lizzie is mine now.

And I’m not sure if I’m protecting her from the brutality of our world…
or from the darkness inside me.

Insatiable Desire is the first book in the A Marriage to the Mafia Princess Trilogy, a steamy dark mafia romance series where each book follows a different couple and their own dangerous love story.

He's the golden boy of Kansas City hockey. He has the trophies, fortune, women, and a life where he always gets what he wants.

She's the Special Agent who has spent ten years hunting the monster that murdered her father, waiting for the day its signature appears again.

Zane Chandler's perfect life shatters when he comes home to find his younger sister brutally murdered, her eyes gouged out and a five-pointed star carved between them.

For Island Meyers, that star isn't just a killer's signature. It's the ghost that has haunted her for a decade.

Determined to solve the case that destroyed her, Island takes charge of the investigation, only to face the victim's furious brother.

Zane dismisses her as a rookie, demands she's removed from the case, and insists she isn't capable of finding his sister's killer.

What he doesn't know is that Island isn't a stranger. Their families are connected by a betrayal neither of them has forgotten, and a secret buried for ten years.

Island refuses to walk away. This investigation is her only chance to uncover the truth she's spent a decade chasing, and no grieving hockey superstar is going to stop her.

But when another body appears and the killer's twisted game grows deadlier, Zane and Island are forced into an uneasy partnership where every clue exposes another lie, every discovery brings them closer to the monster, and every argument makes their attraction harder to ignore.

Because Zane's sister wasn't chosen by chance…She was a message.

Now Zane and Island must trust the one person they swore they'd never need before the next victim wears the star.

Because whatever murdered the people they loved isn't finished.

And this time, it's watching them fall for each other.

I'm screwed.

If I want to keep my dream job, my new (and way-too-attractive-for-his-own-good) boss says I have to score an interview with one of the legendary Fontaine brothers of Hollywood.

I know three things about the Fontaine brothers:

that they're Hollywood royalty,
that all four of them are ridiculously, mind-numbingly sexy,
and
that they never, ever give interviews.

My only chance is to seduce one of them. The only problem? Historically speaking, I'm way more likely to put my foot in my mouth (or generally make a fool of myself) than charm the pants off anyone.

That's where my way-too-sexy boss comes in. He might hold the fate of my job in his hands, but he's also totally willing to teach me the art of seduction. I only hope I can survive his lessons. . .

Due to explicit scenes, this steamy romantic comedy is rated 18+.

The Secret to Seduction is created by Ember Casey, an eGlobal Creative Publishing signed author.

“A dynamic story line that grips from the first chapter and doesn't let go.” --Midwest Book Review, Diane Donovan (regarding Once Gone) From #1 bestselling author Blake Pierce comes a new masterpiece of psychological suspense—the AVERY BLACK SERIES—which continues here with CAUSE TO DREAD (Book #6), also a standalone novel. The series begins with CAUSE TO KILL (Book #1)—a free download with over 200 five star reviews!A woman turns up dead in her own apartment, locked in her closet, her body crawling with poisonous spiders, and the Boston police are stumped. As all of their leads collapse, they are dreading the killer will strike again. Desperate, the police have no choice but to turn to Boston’s most brilliant and controversial homicide detective—Avery Black. Now retired, Avery, in a low point in her own life, reluctantly agrees to help with the case. But when other bodies start turning up, murdered in grotesque and unusual ways, Avery can’t help but wonder: is there a serial killer on the loose?With the intense media pressure and the stress of having a new, inexperienced partner, Avery is pushed to her limit as she struggles to crack the bizarre cases—and to keep herself from falling into the abyss. Avery finds herself falling deeper and deeper into the twisted mind of the killer, who holds more secrets than Avery could imagine.The most riveting and shocking book of the series, a psychological thriller with heart-pounding suspense, CAUSE TO DREAD will leave you turning pages late into the night. “A masterpiece of thriller and mystery. Pierce did a magnificent job developing characters with a psychological side, so well described that we feel inside their minds, follow their fears and cheer for their success. The plot is very intelligent and will keep you entertained throughout the book. Full of twists, this book will keep you awake until the turn of the last page.” --Books and Movie Reviews, Roberto Mattos (re Once Gone)

Kaitlyn Randall wakes up late and the first thing she does is leave her place, almost throwing her cold coffee on a cop car nearby with a handsome officer inside.

To say the least, her day isn't going very well except for the eye candy. Especially when she shows up to work extremely late and has to clear out her desk.

When she finds out later that her estranged father left her millions of dollars, she decides to go to Europe and take a well-earned vacation after quickly buying a house.

Once she is there, she realizes that it was all an elaborate scheme

and now she is stuck in Europe by herself, without a single dollar to her name.

Will a tall, dark and handsome stranger come to her rescue?

Or more importantly, what will he want in exchange?

See what this rich stranger has in store for her in A Day To Remember.

My father said an honest man can't run a farm. My brother called me nothing but a burden. My ex-girlfriend dropped her engagement ring into a glass of champagne and handed it back to me. They all thought I was worthless. None of them knew I'd been reborn, and had stockpiled five years' worth of supplies in the cold storage. When the blizzard hit, the walkie-talkie crackled to life. I heard their cries and the unspoken thoughts swirling inside their heads. Really? You're still trying to scheme against me right now?

In my past life, they drained my blood, kicked me off the rooftop, and said, "Waste doesn't deserve to live."

Reborn into the apocalypse, I opened my palm, and seven beams of primal energy pierced the sky. The woman who cried out "the best in the world" to me just ten minutes ago couldn't even produce a spark now. The brother who wore the boots I sewed and called me trash was being chased and bitten by mutants like a stray dog, his leg broken.

They came to me with memories of their past lives, demanding, "Why did you steal our special abilities?"

In front of thousands of people, I unleashed a net of lightning, scorching those who came to block my way. They knelt in the mud, their heads bleeding from kowtowing; Elena covered her mouth, which had been slapped clean, and David trembled on his single leg, leaning on a rusty steel pipe—yet they couldn't even climb over the iron thorns surrounding my tower.

Later, they rotted into a pile of mud in the arena and among the hordes of corpses, and I didn't even look back.

Until a horde of millions of zombies besieged the city, I went out alone with my sword and shattered the zombie king with a single strike.

The entire ruins knelt down.

They thought I had stolen the light.
No. I was just a fire that burned away what should have been garbage.

I am the chief architect of a quantum computing system valued at hundreds of billions in the real world.
For an AI test subject that I wrote myself, I was willing to conceal my identity as the creator and become her unseen, low-level assistant, even at the cost of taking a fatal blow for her.
Just as she was about to go public and reach the top of the conglomerate pyramid, she unhesitatingly pushed an "Organ Donation Agreement" in front of me, forcing me to remove a kidney to save the newly spawned "old money" NPC new love.
She thought that as long as I died on the operating table, she could kick me aside, this useless stepping stone, without any moral burden, and embrace the perfect capitalist marriage.
But she didn't know—
The entire world she exists in is just a sandbox test server on my desk.

I was the undefeated queen of the underground octagon—a body held together by broken bones and spilled blood, all to build Dorian's fighting empire from the ground up.
But when he'd made it to the top in his tailored suits and polished shoes, suddenly my scars made me too crude, too ugly to stand beside him.
He ordered me to throw my title defense—told me to take a dive for some rich girl whose daddy bought her a spot in the cage. And when that woman shattered both my legs with an illegal knee strike, he just stood there and watched.
I clawed my way out of that wreckage—barely breathing. Left him a blood-stained divorce decree and vanished.
While he mourned over what he thought were my ashes, I was already training alongside the legendary king of the octagon, rebuilding myself from the ground up.
Now I'm back—stronger than ever.
This time, I'm going to break that princess's pretty face and crush his pathetic ego underfoot.

They told me the baby was gone, but they didn't tell me my heart was being carved out, too.

I woke up on the operating table, paralyzed. Through my blurred vision, I saw my beloved husband, Marco, trembling with excitement as he held my medical chart.

"Her blood is perfect," he whispered. "It is a perfect match for Isabella. We can proceed with the transplant now."

"Finally. It wasn't in vain that I brought her back." My revered father let out a sigh of relief. "If it weren't for this day, how would someone who wandered outside for so many years be qualified to step into this house again?"

When my husband said "I love you," he actually meant "Your heart is perfect for the woman I truly love."

I couldn't scream; I couldn't move.

I could only watch helplessly as the silver scalpel pierced toward my chest, while my sister, Isabella, lay on the operating table next to me, smiling in her sleep.

I was never a long-lost daughter, nor was I a beloved wife.

I was just a mobile blood bank waiting to be slaughtered.

In my previous life, on the very day of our marking ceremony, my Alpha fiancé met his fated mate at the banquet.
He didn’t break off our engagement. Instead, he chose silence and completed the ceremony with me. He chose to trap me with a twenty-year mate bond.
For twenty years, I fought wars for the Pack, bore him an heir, and ruled the main hall alone as Luna.
Meanwhile, in another Pack’s territory, he spent his entire life with that woman.
Before I died, he told me he was sorry.
But he also blamed me—saying that if I hadn’t insisted on taking the Luna seat, he could have left more completely.
Only then did I realize something cruel. Not only was I never the one he loved, I was also the obstacle to his freedom.
When I opened my eyes again, I had returned to the day of the marking ceremony.
This time, the mate bond had not yet formed, and the mate mark had not yet been sealed.
Whether he would abandon me for his fated mate no longer mattered.
Because this time—
I would never step aside for any Alpha again.

I once loved Ryan deeply and helped him become the Alpha, only to be rewarded with chains in a dungeon and the mocking laughter of him and his mistress.

Fate gave me a second chance—I woke up reborn on the morning of the mate selection ceremony. There he was, still ordering me around in front of everyone, expecting me to play the obedient servant.

Everyone tried to convince me that Ryan, the man who killed me, is the "right choice."

Yet I chose Connor—the man feared by the entire clan, the one who will bring ruin to the clan for the sake of his one true love.

This time, I refuse to be the stepping stone on Ryan's climb to power.

I'm going to make everyone see who truly holds the reins.

Forty-eight hours before my wedding, I was kidnapped and gang-raped, surviving by only a thread in the depths of despair.   When my mafia boss fiancé and my police detective best friend stood guard by my hospital bed with bloodshot eyes, I heard him suddenly switch to Navajo and ask her, "The death row inmates from the dark web—were they dealt with cleanly?"   My best friend chuckled, replying in the same language. "Don't worry. The guys who put their hands on Maya have been wiped out. Dead men tell no tales."   "Sacrificing Maya alone gave you the perfect excuse to wipe out the rival family and swallow the southern smuggling network, while earning me a high-level promotion. It was a damn good deal."   Amidst tearing, agonizing pain, it felt as if I had been plunged into an ice cliff.   They thought I could never understand this obscure tribal language, so they brazenly feasted on the spoils of victory built upon my very flesh and blood. But what they didn't know was that, to surprise my fiancé during our wedding vows... I had been secretly studying Navajo for an entire year.

My boyfriend entered our village shrine to ask for a blessing before our wedding.

Ten minutes later, he came out, wrapped his hands around my throat, and promised my father he would kill me himself.

He wasn't the first.

Every man who offered to take me away went into that shrine and came back disgusted, violent, or both.

My father called it a curse. Then he beat me for bringing it upon myself.

When my grandmother saw my bruises, she came with my uncles to take me home.

I thought she was the one person my father could never turn against me.

Then my uncles entered the shrine.

The apocalyptic deluge came, and I rescued the entire village onto a cruise ship.

The villagers were deeply grateful to us.

But somehow a rumor spread—that I had a warehouse full of food and was refusing to feed them properly.

The villagers turned on me, hurling accusations left and right.

Helpless, I opened the warehouse to show them. There was barely anything left. But they still refused to believe me.

"Yu Lei! You must have hidden the food somewhere else!"

"That's right! He never really wanted to save us!"

They beat me with fists and feet, cursing me with every foul word they knew.

Then a gang of thugs stormed the ship.

Under their brutal rule, the entire village was enslaved. Young women became playthings. The children—their fate was even worse.

I tried to rally the villagers to fight back. But someone sold me out to the thugs, trading that information for a single full meal.

In the end, they beat me to death and tossed my body into the sea for the fish.

When I opened my eyes again, time had rewound to three days before the apocalypse. I immediately started packing, ready to get as far away from these ungrateful bastards as possible.

But the villagers were already crowded at my door, demanding I hand over the keys to the cruise ship.

It turned out I wasn't the only one who'd been reborn. The entire village had come back too.

I handed over the keys without a fuss.

After all, the System told me this time it would be a zombie apocalypse. What good was a ship?

I woke up on the same morning I was about to send another payment for my daughter's education.
In my last life, I paid for everything. Every year, without missing a payment.
Tuition. AP tutoring. Summer program deposits. Medical bills. Birthday gifts. The education fund.
Not one payment late. Not one skipped.
I only found out the truth after I died. My daughter wore a blazer that hung off her like a hand-me-down. She glued her shoes back together instead of throwing them out. She got mocked in front of her whole class for owing a two-thousand-dollar activity fee she should never have had to worry about.
She hated me for it.
She said, "You say you love me. So why was there never any money for me?"
I understood the truth only when it was too late to matter. It was never that I hadn't given enough.
It was that my husband had been siphoning it out from under me the whole time, spending it on another woman's family.
This time, I didn't wait to find out.

My younger sister, Freya, was preparing for her advanced training in New York the following week, so she dragged me to the dance studio to help her correct her movements. I put on my dance shoes as usual and stood in the center of the floor, ready to demonstrate a turn.

The moment my foot slipped, I didn't even have time to react.

My body hit the ground hard, and the sharp pain from the back of my head nearly made me lose consciousness. I lay on the cold floor, my throat tight, unable to even cry out for help.

When Mother rushed in, she didn't spare me a glance.

She immediately helped Freya up and took her to the hospital. I missed the critical window for treatment and died on the way to the hospital.

I'm sixty years old. My husband Marcus just whipped me with his belt — for burning an egg. My face is bruised, my hair is gray, and I gave up a full ride to Stanford for this man over forty years ago.
Then the phone rings.
The voice on the other end is mine — my eighteen-year-old self, calling on her birthday, gushing about how Marcus is out buying her a cake, how they're running away to Nashville together tomorrow.
She asks if I'm happy.
I tell her the truth: her boyfriend is in a cheap motel right now, in bed with her best friend. And those pretty promises about Nashville? He's planning to use her up and throw her away.
She doesn't believe me. Of course she doesn't.
But I know the motel. I know the room number. And I know what's behind that door.
If she walks away from him tonight, everything changes — for both of us.