Lila James is my best friend’s little sister, and I’ve always looked out for her. She's five years younger than me, and when she left for college, she was just a kid. But now she’s home for the summer—and she’s definitely not a kid anymore.

Zanders: Chicago hockey isn't complete without me—everyone's favorite player to hate. I know my role, and I play it well. In fact, I thoroughly enjoy spending the majority of my game time in the penalty box before leaving the arena with a new girl on my arm each night. What I don't like is the new flight attendant on our team's private plane. She works for me, not the other way around. But I'll be sure to remind her of that, and I can guarantee, by the end of the season, she'll be begging to quit her job.

Football is my everything. I live, eat, breathe the sport. But when I transfer to McKee University to escape the distractions that nearly cost me my future in the NFL, I’m faced with another consequence: retake and pass the writing class I failed at my last college, or lose any chance I have at making it big. That’s where fellow senior Beckett Wood—gorgeous, stubborn, and just my type—comes in. She’s the key to my success in this class… but the price of her help is a fake relationship, and I never do things halfway.

After my ex crushed my dreams in the music industry, I’m done with getting my heart broken. Working as an assistant for an NHL player was supposed to be a breeze, but nothing about Jamie Streicher is easy. He’s an intimidatingly hot, grouchy jerk who can't stand me. The guy has a massive ego. Keeping things professional will be no problem, even when he demands I move in with him.

I’m the face of professional bull riding—the golden boy. Or at least I was, until it all blew up in my face. Now my agent says I have to clean up my image, so I’m stuck with his ball-busting daughter for the rest of the season as my “full-time supervision.”

Everyone says opposites attract. And they must be right, because there’s no logical reason why I’m so drawn to Colin Fitzgerald. I don’t usually go for tattoo-covered, video-gaming, hockey-playing nerd-jocks who think I’m flighty and superficial. His narrow view of me is the first strike against him. It doesn’t help that he’s buddy-buddy with my brother. And that his best friend has a crush on me. And that I just moved in with them. Oh, did I not mention we’re roommates?

After being dumped on her 21st birthday, Bailey James rebounds right into the arms of her ex’s biggest competition... Chase Carter: antagonizer, womanizer, and infamous left winger for her college’s rival team. Following a string of scandals and substandard grades, Chase is on thin ice with his teammates and tyrannical coach. The last thing he needs is to have his focus and loyalty called into question by fraternizing with his team’s #1 competition, but a beautiful stranger who throws herself at him one night is too tempting to pass up...until she throws up on his shoes.

As the days pass, I begin to realize how much my life is missing. Companionship. Romance. Intimacy. When I discover my heart has space for one more female, it’s a lost cause, another curveball. The hot-as-hell nanny is leaving soon for a mission trip to Central America. No sense in letting myself fantasize about Jessa being a permanent part of my life. The closer we get, the more difficult it becomes to keep my feelings in check, because my heart won’t listen. And neither will my libido.

When I discover my boyfriend is cheating on me, I move out right away taking what I love most – my dog. As I fly out the door, I make sure to swipe the thing my ex loves best–the VIP tickets he won to a hockey game, complete with the chance to spend an evening with the city’s two biggest NHL stars. I can’t wait to snap selfies with my ex’s idols and rub it in his face.

Carter Beckett is the NHL’s resident bad boy, top player both on the ice and in the bedroom, and quite possibly the sexiest man to ever grace my field of vision. But worst of all? He knows it. He’s arrogant, self-centered, and the man doesn’t seem to know what a filter is, let alone how to use one. He’s had everything served to him on a silver platter, including endless strings of women, and apparently, I’m up next. I have the solution to all my sexual frustrations in a drawer at home, and it’s far less complicated than Carter Beckett.

Winslow Covington believes in life, liberty, and the letter of the law. As Quincy, Montana’s new chief of police, she’s determined to prove herself. According to her pops, all she has to do is earn favor with the Edens. But winning over the town’s founding family might have been easier if not for her one-night stand with their oldest son. Winslow does her best to avoid Griffin, but when a woman is found dead on Eden property, the two of them have no choice but to cross paths.

I have a type. I love the good guy. Responsible and stable. Safe. So when a beer-drinking, quick-witted, tattooed hockey player asks me to tutor him, I'm suddenly thrust into the world of bad boys and bad decisions. Jordan is a renowned player on campus. He doesn’t take anything seriously, except hockey and partying. But he gives me butterflies. I’m a wallflower tutoring Valley University’s hottest player.

I had a foolproof plan. Finish college playing the best sport on earth. Hockey. Get drafted by an NHL team. Make my senator father at least a little proud of me. I was on track to do just that…until Violet Reece and I collided. Literally.

I'm in the business of creating fairy tales. Theme parks. Production companies. Five-star hotels. Everything could be all mine if I renovated Dreamland. My initial idea of hiring Zahra was good in theory, but then I kissed her. Things spiraled out of control once I texted her using an alias. By the time I realized where I went wrong, it was too late. People like me don't get happy endings. Not when we're destined to ruin them.

He was my boyfriend’s best friend—and the bane of my existence. I wanted to hate Luke Taylor. I did hate him. I just never hated him enough. Now, a decade later, tragedy has brought us back to the place where it all happened—my best times and my worst. Our lives have changed, but that pull between us is just as strong as ever. Only this time, it’s more dangerous too.

I got the dreaded phone call, the one every baseball player hopes and prays never comes. I was traded - yeah, that phone call - traded from my longtime team of over 10 years to not just any team...to my childhood rivals, the Chicago Rebels. I was completely and utterly screwed, right? Wrong. The trade was the least of my concerns. I met a girl, Natalie. She was perfect, but I swore I would never get involved with anyone during the season. It was too complicated. But can you believe I had zero restraint when it came to this girl?

Carter Beckett is the NHL’s resident bad boy, top player both on the ice and in the bedroom, and quite possibly the sexiest man to ever grace my field of vision. But worst of all? He knows it. He’s arrogant, self-centered, and the man doesn’t seem to know what a filter is, let alone how to use one. He’s had everything served to him on a silver platter, including endless strings of women, and apparently, I’m up next. I have the solution to all my sexual frustrations in a drawer at home, and it’s far less complicated than Carter Beckett.

Fake. That's what we are. That's what we agreed to be. So why does it feel so real? I thought it would have been harder, convincing everyone our school's star receiver was mine and mine alone, but I was wrong. We played our parts so well that the lines between us began to blur until they disappeared completely. The thing about pretending, though, is that someone's always better at it, and by the time I realized my mistake, there was no going back.

Kelley Pierce is my person. He has been since the 9th grade. He gets me like no one else does. My quirks. My love of pros/cons lists. My need to have everything under control. He accepts me just as I am, because he is the perfect...friend. My best friend. But Kelley is also totally gorgeous. And confident. And tempting.

It's bad enough Jade Frost's boyfriend dragged her to a boring poker game. It's even worse that he actually threw her into the betting pot during an intense round - and lost. Talk about the perfect excuse for Jade to make him her ex-boyfriend. Now she supposedly belongs to the ultrarich, extremely gorgeous Shep Prescott. He could have anything he wants, yet he seems to be in hot pursuit of her. No matter how rude, how snarky, how impossible she acts, it doesn't stop him.

The start of Lee Burrows and I was a college girl’s biggest fantasy. Campus’ most popular guy, the starting quarterback, the same guy I’ve crushed on forever, notices me—the quiet introvert. Although, he never would’ve noticed me if he didn’t need my help passing our biology class. I didn’t think I had a chance with him until he started flirting with me and asking me questions like, “Who was the guy you were talking to?” and “Do you have a boyfriend?”

Scarlet Reed has returned to Polson Falls, convinced that 12 years away is long enough to shed her humiliating childhood identity as the town harlot’s daughter. With a teaching job secured and an adorable fixer-upper to call home, things in her life are finally looking up. That is, until she finds out that Shane Beckett lives next door.

Perpetual good girl Caterina Longo is dependable to a fault. At 33, she’s never called in sick. Never had a one-night stand. Never taken a chance in her entire life. When she walks in on a cheating ex and sees everything wrong with her life, she takes off on a solo vacation, busting out of her comfort zone and into the arms of a guy she never saw coming.

I’ve recently become the pawn of a meddling mom. Yes...a meddling mom - who's been trying to set me up all summer. Now, I understand it’s not a crime for a mother to want her child to fall in love, but when she makes it her relentless mission, the heinous act should be classified as a misdemeanor at least. Of course, my mom, the evil matriarch in the devil’s leggings, made her final stab at finding a girl for me days before I went back to college.

Temporary. That's the word I'd use to describe my life right now. I'm temporarily working double shifts - at least until I can break free. I'm temporarily raising my little brother - since apparently our actual mother doesn't give a crap about either of us. And I always end up as nothing but the temporary girlfriend - the flavor of the week for every guy who's heard the rumor that I give it up so easily.

As Tampa Bay's star center, Mark Carmelo's life was hockey, and after a bitter and public break up, all he wanted to do was focus on the game. Until he saw her - the one that got away, the one he thought he'd never see again. For 13 years, Stevie West drowned in her lackluster life. Recently divorced from her “roommate” with passionless benefits, she was ready to start over on her own. Until she ran into him. The same man she'd met one year ago. The temptation that had finally given her the courage to find herself again.

Sadie Slade was the love of my life. I left for college promising her I’d be back in four years. She stayed behind promising me she’d wait. We both broke our promises. When we bump into each other five years later, my feelings for her come rushing to the surface. I want her back. She wants me gone. How quickly my Sadie Girl has forgotten - I’ve never been the type of man who accepts defeat. No matter the cost.

For 21-year-old Sydney, being in love with Kyler isn't anything new. They'd been best friends ever since he pushed her down on the playground and she made him eat a mud pie. Somewhere over the years, she fell for him and fell hard. The big problem with that? Kyler puts the man in man-whore. He's never stayed with a girl longer than a few nights, and with it being their last year in college, Syd doesn't want to risk their friendship by declaring her love.

Jesse Lee is the worst! He’s a multi-millionaire, triple-platinum-selling, Grammy-Award-winning man-slut - a worldly, self-indulgent heathen. I wouldn’t sleep with him if he were our last chance to ensure survival of the human race. The only reason I put up with him is because he’s my boss’s brother. Playing by Heart is an enemies-to-lovers romance where opposites not only attract, they ignite.

When it comes to life's fun and games, always know: The rules. What's at stake. When to quit. Wise words from...well...my fortune cookie. But wise words, nonetheless.