Do I have a sign on my back that says, ‘Love her and leave her’? Because that’s what it feels like these days. I thought I’d never see Justin again when he ghosted me after the best night of my life. But guess who shows up at the company Christmas party months later wanting to talk? I don’t think so Mr. Burns. Burn me once, shame on you. Burn me twice, shame on me. That’s sober Lucy talking. Drunk Lucy has a different idea—she asks him to stand in as my fake fiancé this Christmas.

Sticks and stones may break our bones…Hockey is my life. After Wren Davis puts my dreams of the NHL in jeopardy, I vow to make her life hell if she ever comes near me again. But she’s my best friend’s foster sister, and even though they don’t live together anymore, their bond is still tight, which makes avoiding each other extra difficult.

When my father passed away, I assumed my grieving would be as simple as closing a book and starting another. Only he had other plans. Leaving me his beloved tattoo shop, I’m stuck to figure out what exactly to do with it, all while being constantly reminded of him.

When my stepbrother, Elec, came to live with us my senior year, I wasn’t prepared for how much of a jerk he’d be. I hated that he took it out on me because he didn’t want to be here. I hated that he brought girls from our high school back to his room. But what I hated the most was the unwanted way my body reacted to him. At first, I thought all he had going for him were his rock-hard tattooed abs and chiseled face. But things started changing between us, and it all came to a head one night.

“I was in a relationship with two men, and neither were giving me up.” That thought flashed through Charlotte’s brain like a bright neon light as she followed her husband out of her marriage counselor’s office. The office where she’d sat twice a week as she tried to repair the glaring problems in her marriage. The marriage that she’d fought hard to save to a man that wasn’t fighting alongside her. She’d been lied to, ignored, and used as a pawn to climb his ladder to success. Charlotte was broken, not just her marriage.

"Jakob Larson is going to be the death of me." That’s what I think every time he strides into my bar. The Kings of Kearny run this small Texas town, and Jakob is their chief enforcer. The Viking, they call him. He’s a criminal. As dangerous as he is sexy. The kind of man who makes my inner cavewoman sit up and take notice. Him big. Make strong babies. Bring home mammoth for dinner. I’m ready to indulge her desires, but just for one night. Unfortunately, Jakob has other plans. Someone in town is breaking one of the cardinal rules set by the leader of The Kings.

If I had known how irrevocably my life was about to change, I would have walked the other way after talking to my coach. I should have taken any other route out of the Toronto Terror head office. But I didn’t and now–everything is different. At first I didn’t recognize the woman doing a victory dance down the hall when she thought no one was watching. Until she turned around. And that beautiful smile was aimed at me.

When my father arranged for me to marry the heir to the Costa crime family, I swore I’d do anything to escape that fate. I have more to offer than being some man’s arm candy and producing heirs. Marcelo Costa might be my fiancé, but he’ll never be my husband. So when he and his father are killed in a car bombing, I consider myself lucky. No longer will I have to go from being a mafia princess to becoming a mafia wife, I can now attend the Sicuro Academy—a private college created for mafia children like me.

The first time I met Dawson Reed, we wound up in bed. The problem was, neither of us knew the other were there. When I woke up in the middle of the night and found a stranger next to me, instinct kicked in and I attacked the intruder. Only it turned out, the man wasn’t an intruder at all. Dawson had rented this cabin, too. Apparently, a system glitch allowed a duplicate booking. We’d soon find out we were in town for the same wedding, and Dawson was the groomsman I’d been warned about. He was as tall, dark and jaw-droppingly gorgeous as my best friend had described.

Trust no one. I learn that the hard way after hockey star Carter Masters stabs me in the back and turns our rival school against me. Suddenly, I'm public enemy number one at Framingham State. Just a year later, that's exactly where I'm forced to enroll. No one has forgotten what I did. The anti-Sydney campaign is led by two gorgeous, psycho hockey players. Oliver Ruiz, captain, and Penn Walker, the devastating goalie.

I’m head over heels in love with my best friend. Although, I can’t pinpoint exactly when Reeve Lancaster became my entire world. Was it when we were little kids, practically brought up together, after Reeve’s mom died during childbirth and his dad subsequently fell apart? Or when I doodled his name in my school journal at age 10? Maybe it was when we became boyfriend and girlfriend at 14 or when we shed our virginity at 16, pledging our forever?

No wrong moves. Those were the words the first boy I ever loved whispered in my ear on graduation weekend. Naively, I believed him. Now those three little words feel like a bad omen I can’t escape. Every move I’ve made since I returned to South Chapel hurts my ex-boyfriend, Greedy. But it’s for his benefit. That’s what I tell myself. Intentionally hurting him is for the best. It has to be. I said goodbye to the possibility of forever with him the moment my mom and his dad “introduced us” at their engagement dinner. Three years have passed, but that doesn’t matter to Greedy.

With one glance at her in the club, I’m ready to claim her for the night. Dark, flowing hair. A smile that causes my heart to pound. Eyes that pierce my soul. And a perfect body that makes every part of me pulse. She’s addictive. Electrifying. Consuming. I’ve never wanted anyone more. Our eyes meet, but she looks right past me. She isn’t here for me. She’s here for the music. For the first time in my life, a woman makes me work for it. Her indifference fuels the fire inside me. The result? One night. No names. No introductions.

I refuse to spend the rest of my life with my childhood bully for a mate. I may be a cursed shifter, incapable of shifting—but I wasn't desperate. Not till the Alpha Supreme cast me out of the House of Fire and Fluorite for rejecting his son. Now I'm packless. Homeless. No longer under the protection of a House. Until the dark vampire king of Blood and Beryl turns his sights on me. In return for protection from my former House, I have to become his fake mate. I'll be a queen and a fraud. It's a treacherous lie to live—and I find myself forgetting what's real and what's not.

After losing her husband in a tragic accident, Julia Gentry is barely surviving. Raising her young daughter alone takes everything she has—and that’s not enough. She’s barely making ends meet. And then tragedy strikes again. Julia’s only hope lies in the last place she wants to look—in Crew Gentry. Her husband’s brother is broody. Irresponsible. He’s broken her heart more than once and let her down every time she’s needed him.

Do I have a sign on my back that says, ‘Love her and leave her’? Because that’s what it feels like these days. I thought I’d never see Justin again when he ghosted me after the best night of my life. But guess who shows up at the company Christmas party months later wanting to talk? I don’t think so Mr. Burns. Burn me once, shame on you. Burn me twice, shame on me. That’s sober Lucy talking. Drunk Lucy has a different idea—she asks him to stand in as my fake fiancé this Christmas.

I’m in love with not just one man but three. Three brutally devoted men determined to make me theirs one way or another. Jace, the gentle boy I fell in love with, is no more. In his place is Rage, my lovers’ brother. He’s angry, jealous and brutal. Can he accept me and my relationship, or will his devotion to me tear us apart? And what happens when he uncovers my truth, and my life is thrown into turmoil?

I wake up chained to the bed of a stranger. He says I’m his wife. I have nothing—no money. No friends. No escape. He’s everything I never imagined: ruthless, calculating, feared. A beautiful monster with a face like a god’s, cold and untouchable. A mafia kingpin whose wealth could buy empires and whose power makes the world tremble. My captor. My husband.

I married my high-school sweetheart five years ago. We were making plans to have our first child when he tells me, on our anniversary, that he can only stay with me if I allow him to open our relationship so that we can both see other people. Reluctantly, I agree, not expecting to fall in love with the person I meet.

I took her innocence as payment. She was far too young and naïve to be betrothed to a monster like me. I would bring only pain and darkness into her sheltered world. That's why she ran. I should've just let her go. She never asked to marry into a powerful Russian mafia family. Unfortunately for her, I don't care. I own her, and after three years of searching, I've found her. My runaway bride was about to learn disobedience has consequences...punishing ones. Nothing was going to keep me from claiming her before the eyes of God and man. She's mine now, and I'm never letting her go.

It was supposed to be one night with a handsome stranger. I never thought I would see him again. Until the first day of class. He’s my new professor. And my ex-boyfriend’s father. He has a world of secrets in his eyes, and the weight of the world on his shoulders. I should stay away from him, but the more I try, the more consumed he gets.

Millicent Foxboro is haunted. Not by ghosts, but by the anguish of her past and the uncertainty of her future. After all, even in the progressive year of 1928, most people would balk at hiring a woman who’d spent two months in a mental ward for traumatic amnesia. So when an uncommon assistantship to a reclusive Professor of mythology falls into her lap with an ungodly salary attached, her desperation for stability overrides her cautious nature.

I never thought I’d see her again—the woman I left behind at the motel after our one-night stand. Picture my surprise when she strolls into the office as my new assistant. But wait, there’s more. I come home to find her with suitcases, nowhere to stay. I could decline to have her move in, yet I see a chance. My nosy aunt’s visiting, expecting to meet my non-existent spouse. My assistant’s onboard with the madness of playing my newlywed wife.

Former Hostile Operations Team soldier Blaze "Shadow" Connolly knows what it’s like to lose everything. He’s got nobody except his job and his team and that’s the way he likes it. But when he walks into a gas station during a robbery and locks eyes with Emma Grace Sutton, he knows he’ll do anything to protect the pretty girl with the blue glasses.

Niko West is the most beautiful man I’ve ever laid eyes on: six feet, four inches of broody, chiseled Greek god in a firefighter suit. He’s also been my best friend since kindergarten. He always says the only solid thing in his life is our friendship. He’s Honey Mountain's favorite player and I’m what you’d call "a relationship girl". But when I find myself single for the first time since turning sixteen, I make Niko an offer he can’t refuse. Who better to show me what I’ve been missing?

Remi Hayes is beginning to think she’s cursed—her fiancé cheated on her, her brother Jude is a major pain in her ass, and the moldering mansion she inherited from her uncle might just be haunted. Flipping Blackleaf Manor already feels impossible, even before Remi is blackmailed by Dane Covett, the dangerously hot doctor-next-door, and Grimstone’s most eligible bachelor—if you can ignore the fact that everyone in town thinks he murdered his wife.

As the second youngest Ravage brother, I’ve spent my entire adult life rectifying our tainted family name and keeping my urges behind closed doors. Until my best friend’s little sister shows up at The Hunt ready to play, and I lose control. I tell myself it’s just a taste. Except, with her, I should’ve known a single taste wouldn’t be enough. And then the good girl I’ve known most of my life drops to her knees. For me. From that moment on, I knew she would only ever be one thing. Mine.

Ezra Knight is the biggest rockstar to ever walk the planet, but before he belonged to the world, he belonged to me. He was my brother's best friend, my soulmate and protector, and when their band—Demon's Curse—took off, so did he. He was like a roaring tornado, crashing through my world and sweeping me off my feet, and just when I had it all, I was abandoned. Left to fend for myself at the hands of a monster. For eight long years, I blamed him for everything that was out of his control. But one phone call changed it all.

As a single father, I often feel like the weight of the world sits on my shoulders. When my daughter’s nanny gives me her two weeks’ notice, I’m sweating bullets. Fear that my NHL season with the New England Bay Sharks could be derailed consumes me. Finding a replacement seems impossible when, suddenly, Maci McKenzie—a struggling author who’s running from some deep, dark secret in her past—steps into the picture. She needs a change of scenery to help her write, and I just need someone who isn’t a complete weirdo to watch my kid when I’m not around.

Jax ‘The King of Chaos’ Carter and Lily’s story begins the new era of the Beneath the Secrets series.