Part 1 The auction block was a jagged scar against the sweltering Missouri sky, and the air tasted like dust and cheap whiskey. I could feel the heat radiating off the brick walls of the town square, pressing against my black mourning veil until I could barely breathe. Behind me, the whispers of the townspeople…
Part 1 The squeak of my cleaning cart was the only announcement of my existence. A high-pitched, rhythmic complaint of metal on metal that echoed down the imported Italian marble floors of the Costello estate. In a house where whispers could sign a death warrant, you’d think someone would tell me to oil the damn…
Part 1 The boarding house matron didn’t even look up from her ledger when she delivered the death blow. She just crossed her meaty arms over her chest and sighed like I was a stubborn stain she couldn’t scrub out. Every other girl my age had already left, packed off to some dusty ranch or…
Part 1 The air in the Iron Peak longhouse was thick enough to choke on. It smelled like musk, cedar, and the electric, cloying sweetness of shifter pheromones. To everyone else, this was the scent of destiny; to me, it was just a reminder of what I lacked. I sat behind a granite pillar so…
Part 1 The snow did not care that I was dying. It fell in heavy, silent, uncaring sheets, an endless white shroud intent on burying the crimson stain I had dragged across the frozen earth. A brutal kick to my ribs shattered the winter quiet, followed by the cruel, familiar laughter of the Alpha who…
Part 1 The woman pushing the mop was nine months pregnant, and I almost walked right past her. My world, a carefully constructed empire of steel and glass, was about to shatter, and I was busy thinking about a dinner I didn’t want to attend. I didn’t stop because of the swollen belly straining against…
I never imagined that collapsing into a forbidden Italian leather chair at 2:47 a.m. would shatter my world. My exhausted body gave out after 16 hours of scrubbing floors for a man I’d never met. My boss, Damon Castellano, found me asleep in his sanctuary and didn’t scream—he simply picked up a ruler. I woke…
After another brutal 17-hour shift scrubbing rooms at the Sinclair Grand Hotel in downtown Chicago, I thought the worst was behind me. I never imagined my worst day at work would lead to the most life-changing moment of my life. I was a single mom, former nurse turned hotel maid, barely keeping it together after…
They dressed me in a white gown that felt like a burial shroud. The hospital room on the fifth floor of Walter Reed Medical Center was sterile and cold, smelling of antiseptic and dying flowers. I stared at the man in the bed—if you could even call him that. Captain Marcus Thorne. Once a war…
I stood there in my borrowed white lace dress outside Room 304 at Houston Methodist Hospital, bouquet of white roses heavy in my shaking hands as I stared through the window at Captain James Monroe lying completely still in his hospital bed. My wealthy biological family in River Oaks had betrayed me in the worst…
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