Title: Unshackled Author: Cara Dee Genre: Contemporary Mafia Romance
Standalone MM Mafia Romance Best Friend’s Father Age Play Hurt/Comfort Unshackled spares no one, and along the way, you’ll get everything from high-speed car chases, secret meetings in the dark, and the rawest hours of grief, to strong family ties, humor, and unconditional love.
In the wake of the bloodiest war the Sons of Munster had seen in a long time, we were supposed to celebrate our victory and move on with our lives. I wanted to see my brothers-in-arms dance and drink way too much. I wanted to hear laughter and Irish music. Instead, we were a syndicate crushed by grief.
Shannon O’Shea had lost more than most, and every fiber of my being screamed at me to pull him from the depths of his despair. As the father of my best friend, he’d been there for me when my parents kicked me out for being gay. Now it was my turn. I had to find the answers. I had to rescue him.
The day he asked for a favor and demanded discretion, the plan unfolded before my eyes, and I couldn’t resist the temptation. No names, no faces. He wouldn’t know it was me in the darkness. At the same time, the shackles around my wrists tightened as old enemies slithered back out of the gutters of my city, and my brothers and I were once again on the warpath.
Seventeen minutes later, I returned to my own place a changed man. A deaf man.
I rubbed my ear and tossed my keys on the hallway table.
Shan was sitting on the couch, sipping a drink. Vodka, judging by the bottle on the coffee table.
“What’s the occasion?” I asked.
He glanced over at me, and the languidness of his movements told me everything I needed to know. He’d been at it for a while.
I removed the bottle and returned it to the cabinet.
“I need a favor,” he muttered. “I…I can’t ask sober.”
I frowned and sat down next to him. How bad could it be? Our guys in the syndicate turned to me for favors all the time. With my position, I was more connected than the boss himself, ’cause Finn had to stay clean. He couldn’t get his hands dirty for nothing.
“Whatever you need, sir. You know that.”
He nodded with a dip of his chin, then finished his drink and set the glass on the table. “You’ve set men up with mistresses and girlfriends before.”
Shite.
I’d been waiting for this, yet I hadn’t expected it so soon.
“Aye.” I eyed him carefully. His pain was as evident as usual.
But maybe it wasn’t so soon after all. It’d been over a year since Grace had died.
“Do you want me to arrange something for you?” I asked. “I can get it done in a couple of hours.”
He swallowed hard. “I miss human touch, but I don’t wanna see anyone.”
I felt my forehead crease. I could relate to the yearning, but I wasn’t sure if he was talking literally about the last part. “You mean you don’t want a relationship, or you want it anonymous?”
“Both,” he rasped. Then he cleared his throat. “I’m not looking for intimacy. Just physical. No faces, no names, no talking, no off-the-books apartment, nothing social.”
I nodded slowly, the alternatives appearing in my head—or disappearing, one by one. I wanted to say intimacy was exactly what he needed, but it was his choice. There were still options.
“That leaves you with massage parlors and fetish clubs,” I answered.
“It has to be dark,” he insisted. “Pitch black.”
Okay. He really didn’t wanna risk seeing a face. Fine, I could work with that. A certain underground club came to mind, and it was run by a friend of Colm’s. Aside from the main club being an essential location for our drug trade, it had an upstairs area with a VIP section, a hallway full of private booths, and a couple rooms with viewing windows for live porn.
“Any other preferences?” I asked. “I reckon you don’t care if she’s a blonde or a redhead in the dark, but body type? Age? You want her screened and on birth control so you can go without rubbers? You care about safewords? You want a subservient little thing or a bossy—”
“Jesus,” he muttered and rubbed his temples. “It suddenly feels too complicated. And at the risk of making it worse, I’d prefer a man.” Fuck my life. Fuck my life hard.
I’m often awkwardly silent or, if the topic interests me, a chronic rambler. In other words, I can discuss writing forever and ever. Fiction, in particular. The love story—while a huge draw and constantly present—is secondary for me, because there’s so much more to writing romance fiction than just making two (or more) people fall in love and have hot sex.
There’s a world to build, characters to develop, interests to create, and a topic or two to research thoroughly.
Every book is a challenge for me, an opportunity to learn something new, and a puzzle to piece together. I want my characters to come to life, and the only way I know to do that is to give them substance—passions, history, goals, quirks, and strong opinions—and to let them evolve.
I want my men and women to be relatable. That means allowing room for everyday problems and, for lack of a better word, flaws. My characters will never be perfect.
Wait…this was supposed to be about me, not my writing.
I’m a writey person who loves to write. Always wanderlusting, twitterpating, kinking, cooking, baking, and geeking. There’s time for hockey and family, too. But mostly, I just love to write.
Title: Tor Author: Jennie Lynn Roberts Series: The Hawks #4 Genre: Fantasy Romance
What is it about her that makes him lose his mind? Every. Damn. Time.
Tor’s world is falling apart. The king he’d sworn to guard? Dead. The family he worked so hard for? They certainly wasted no time disowning him. All he has left is the Hawks… and an intense desire to win Keely’s heart. It won’t be easy—especially after the mistake he made—but he has to try, because the alternative, living without her, is unthinkable.
Losing someone you love leads to nothing but pain; Keely learned that the hard way. But there is something about Tor that makes her wonder if loving him is worth the risk… if only he felt the same way. Now her best option is to create a new future on her own—no matter how much she might wish her relationship with Tor could be different.
But all is not well in Brythoria. The treaty still isn’t ratified, and the mountain border is filled with enemies poised to destroy them. Can Tor and Keely find their way back to each other? Or will their second chance at happily ever after burn in the fires of impending war?
Tor, book 4 in The Hawks series, is a sexy, steamy, adult fantasy romance full of swords, shifters (kind of), and tons of action. But fair warning: This book is intended only for readers who love fast-paced adventure, soul mates and found family—and characters who curse when they fight for survival. If that’s you, happy reading.
Tor found Keely in a small glade, the pale afternoon sunlight streaming around her. The ground was littered with fallen leaves, muffling his footsteps, but she still spun to face him before he’d fully entered the glade, lifting a crossbow, and pointing it straight at him.
He stopped instantly. Her grip was firm and confident, and if she released, he’d have a bolt through his heart in an instant.
They stared at each other for a moment, and then she lowered the crossbow, pointing it safely away toward the ground at her side. Her posture was one of strength and experience, even though she still seemed to be protecting her shoulder slightly, and he remembered her mentioning that she had some skill with shooting.
“Archery?” he asked, stepping closer.
She raised one eyebrow. “I wasn’t allowed weapons in the palace. I’ve been feeling out of practice.”
Bloody Ballanor. He could only imagine how awful it had been for Keely, a maid, with no status, no power, and not even a weapon to defend herself, in Ballanor’s court.
“No wonder you hated it,” he admitted quietly.
“Hated what?” she asked in her soft Verturian accent.
“Hated Ballanor. The court. Brythoria.” He paused, not wanting to include the guards, although he knew he should. “All of it.”
She shrugged again. “At least it’s over.” She hefted the crossbow in her hand, taking its weight. “And now I’ve got a weapon.”
He grunted. “I see that.”
She raised her eyebrows, waiting for him to say more.
“I’m glad,” he admitted.
She grinned back at him, pleased with his answer, and he couldn’t help adding, “You said that you shoot.” Gods. Mathos was right, he did have a habit of stating the obvious. But the obvious always seemed so much safer than saying anything else.
“Yes, I used to. I’d like to start again.”
Late afternoon sunshine streaked across the small glade and the trees were filled with the evening calls of birds, and suddenly it didn’t seem so quiet anymore.
He stepped closer, wishing he could have put a crossbow in her hands long before, wishing he could apologize for the time she’d spent in Ballanor’s court, but unable to find the right words.
Gods, she was so strong. And so beautiful. The golden sunlight caught her hair like a halo, and he ached to run his hand through the silky strands. When he’d pulled her into his arms in the moat, her damp hair had smelled of heather—woody and slightly floral—and he wondered if that soft scent would surround him if he gave in and reached for her.
How many hours had he spent remembering the torture of cutting her jerkin away? Balancing the knife so that it cut smoothly, never jarring her or pressing into her more than he absolutely had to. Utterly, acutely aware of her. Every breath, every movement. The way her elegant hands gripped the blanket, like a woman might grip her sheets as she lost herself in pleasure. If he had leaned forward, just an inch, he would have been able to run his tongue over that perfect skin; pink and flushed from the cold.
“Shall we have a competition, then?” she asked eventually.
Yes, they had to do something. Because otherwise he was going to take another step forward, and another, and then he would be close enough to touch her. He had to remind himself that he had no right to touch her. No right to reach toward her, despite how much he wanted to. How desperately he wanted some of her light to shine on him, to ease the cold he’d wrapped himself in.
Jennie Lynn Roberts believes that every strong, kickass heroine should have control of her own story, a swoony hero to support her at every turn, and a guaranteed happily ever after. Because that doesn’t always happen in real life, she began creating her own worlds that work just the way they should. And she hasn’t looked back since.
Jennie would rather be writing than doing anything else—except for spending time with her gorgeous family, of course. But when she isn’t building vibrant new worlds, she can be found nattering with friends, baking up a storm, or strolling in the woods around her home in England.
If you want to talk books, romance, movies, reluctant heroes, or just about anything else with Jennie, feel free to contact her atwww.jennielynnroberts.com. But be prepared to settle in for a long chat if you bring up shifters, vampires, Star Wars, or The Princess Bride….
Raw heat is still streaking through my body just from the mere handshake.
I don’t think I’ve ever seen a more perfect man.
Eyes the shade of a crow’s wing are locked on mine, and full symmetrical lips quirk up into a mercurial smile.
His face is all angles with high exotic cheekbones and a chiseled jaw you’d find on a storybook prince. The bright morning sun shines over his skin, making it look like the sun kissed it that color bronze.
The gray streaks in his beard, hairline, and temples only serve to highlight his beauty and strength in what I can see of the rest of his body. As if to highlight that his perfection came with age and he’ll look even better and better, and sexier, the older he gets. The silver hoop in his ear tames him a fraction, adding to his style but also conjuring the image of a pirate in my mind. It gives a glimpse of the conquering cartel king he is.
Of course, I was given a picture of Alejandro Ramírez before coming to this ill-fated interview. So, I already knew he looks like a seamless blend of Antonio Banderas and my all-time favorite Mexican actor Eduardo Verástegui.
Alejandro is what they would look like if they were one person.
The lucid image makes me wonder if I really am stuck in a fucked-up rendition of a dark fairytale. One where he is the prince and I’m the villain, or maybe everyone is the antithesis to good in this story.
