Hera has reigned over Olympus and humanity for millennia. Seen as cold, sarcastic, and callous, she uses this to her advantage, keeping everyone, including her sisters, at a distance. It’s a lonely life, but it worked, until the Titans decided that breaking her father out of Tartarus was a good idea. A move that put her and her sisters against the Titans in a battle for their thrones upon Olympus.
Dr. Viktor Alden understands being alone. As a man who has spent his immortal life as a nomad, living with an oath that has kept him from allowing anyone to really know him, he is fascinated by the enigmatic woman who quite literally runs the world. Too bad they have a battle they may not win, or even live through, for him to learn the intricacies that make up the Queen of the Goddesses.
Now, two people who have spent their entire lives distrusting the world must learn to trust each other if they want to survive the upcoming war.
C.D. Britt began her writing journey when her husband told her she needed to use her excessive imagination to write stories as opposed to creating a daily narrative for him. Ever since she penned her first words, life has been a lot more peaceful for him.
She currently resides in Texas where she has yet to adapt to the heat. Her husband thrives in it, so unfortunately they will not be relocating to colder climates anytime soon.
Their two young children would honestly complain either way.
When she is not in her writing cave (hiding from the sun), she enjoys ignoring the world as much as her children will allow with a good book, music, and vast amounts of coffee (until it’s time for wine).
C.D. Britt is the author of Shadows and Vines and the upcoming book, Sirens and Leviathans.
Both books are part of the Reign of Goddesses series.
I’m not too proud to admit that finding Mr. Right involves swiping right. Right? Welcome to dating in avocado toastland.
Here I am, on my first blind date, ever, courtesy of a smartphone app and my two annoying best friends.
So what is Chris “Fletch” Fletcher doing, walking across the room, looking at his phone like he’s pattern matching a picture to find a real person he’s never met before?
Oh.
Oh, no.
The guy I drop-kicked in seventh grade cannot be my blind date. The guy who earned me this infernal nickname.
It was supposed to be simple. Graduate, get a job to keep my mom from drowning in mountains of medical debt, and maybe score a scholarship to a decent college.
All of that changed in a single breath. Because it turns out I’m not human. And I just knocked out the power on an entire city block.
In a split second, all of my carefully-laid plans go up in smoke. There’s no chance for college because I’m being hauled off to Kingwood Academy. They say it’s for my own protection and those around me. But I know one thing for sure…
I’m not welcome here.
The mean girls don’t stop at insults and tripping you in the halls. They’re wielding magic that could cost me my life. And the rest of the school sees me as either a halfling that should be cast out or a powerhouse to be brought down.
Everyone except them.
The charmer. The gentle giant. The psychopath. And maybe even the cruel prince.
The royals of Kingwood Academy have taken me under their wing and I can’t help but notice how my skin hums when they touch me. I shouldn’t be dreaming about a single one of them, let alone all four. But I can’t seem to stop myself.
Only someone doesn’t like the attention the royals are showing me. And when the attacks start, the princes will do anything to protect me. But they don’t know the true evil we face. The kind who will do whatever it takes to seize our power, even if that means stealing the very last breath from our lungs…
“I was in a fire.” I blurted it out in the hopes it might distract those two from coming to blows. But I had no idea what came after that fact.
Atlas turned back to me. “When?”
“I was eight. We still don’t know exactly how it started.”
Kai let one hand drop away but left the other on my neck, his thumb stroking back and forth. “But you got out.”
“I almost didn’t.” The words were barely a whisper. “I got trapped in my bedroom. The window was too high to jump out of. The fire was outside my door. I hid in the closet. The floor beneath me collapsed and I fell through to the basement, and a beam landed on top of me. Thought I was going to die.” I rubbed at the raised skin on the inside of my arm.
Phoenix stalked forward, grabbing my arm. He let out a string of curses. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
I shrugged. “I told you I didn’t like fire.”
“But not that you’d been burned. I wouldn’t have pushed so hard if I’d known you’d been through this.”
I tried to tug my arm free, but he held firm.
Atlas studied the scars leading up my arm as Phoenix held it. “You’re okay? Those look bad.
I gave my arm a hard yank and finally broke away from Phoenix’s hold. I wanted a sweatshirt more than anything right now, but I hadn’t shoved one in my bag this morning. “I know they look gross, but they aren’t that bad.”
Atlas got right up in my personal space. “That wasn’t what I said and it sure as hell wasn’t what I meant.” He lifted my arm gently and traced his fingers over the mottled and twisted skin. “There isn’t a thing about you that isn’t beautiful. But I know these mean you were in excruciating pain. That you were terrified. That’s what I meant by bad.”
I swallowed against my suddenly dry throat. “Oh.”
His lips twitched. He tucked a strand of hair behind my ear, his fingers tangling in the waves. “I could only ever see beauty when I look at you.”
Atlas leaned forward and my breath caught, but this time for an entirely different reason than panic. He pressed his lips to the corner of my mouth.
The buzz that lit my muscles was like nothing I’d experienced before. It was its own form of fire that terrified me in a completely different way. Sensation swept through me like a flood on the heels of the buzz.
Atlas jerked back, his fingers flying to his mouth and eyes going wide. “What the hell was that?”
A self-proclaimed ordinarily average girl meets the one larger than life person who will make her yearn for so much more.
Natalie Benton has nursed enough heartbreak in her twenty-one years. But she doesn’t like to complain even though her parents’ marriage might be falling apart, and she’s still mourning her brother, who committed suicide five years ago. On top of that, she was recently ghosted by her lover, an emotionally detached tattoo artist who ran off to California. She’s ready to graduated college in a few months but she’s not sure what her next steps will be. For now, she’ll take each day as it comes, which has become her mantra as an ordinary, average girl in Albee, Pennsylvania where nothing exciting ever happens.
But fate has other plans for Natalie, when a very not ordinary average girl enters her life. It’s the larger than life Gem Grove, one of the most popular singers of the past decade. Gem’s been hiding out in Albee while she also tries her best to take each day as it comes, but her addiction to bigger fame and fortune could lead to her downfall. The public may think she’s entitled and spoiled but she’s ready to prove them all wrong. She’s more than just a singer who performs on demand. She wants to create art with her songs and gain the respect she has always wanted.
Natalie and Gem shouldn’t fit together but they do. The ordinary average girl and the larger-than-life diva might be destined for more, but only if they can achieve it together.
“When you said you wanted to take me to your house, I wasn’t expecting on the lake.” We were twenty minutes outside Albee and surrounded by a huge lake where Dad fished almost every weekend. Most of the houses there were newer and expensive, which was definitely the case with Gem’s. She even had a hot tub in the back, facing the lake. Why would anyone need a hot tub when the lake was in their backyard?
She dropped her bag on the marble island in her kitchen that would make Mom jealous. “I don’t own the house. I’m renting for now because I was sick of staying in hotels. Also, this end of the lake has good security patrols, so I don’t have to worry too much about the press stalking me or trying to snap a picture of me, especially if I go skinny-dipping.”
I turned my head so fast, I might have strained my neck. “You swim naked in the lake in the winter?”
She lifted her hands to her mouth and laughed. “Oh my god, the look on your face is too much! I’m joking. I moved in here at the end of October, so I haven’t been swimming yet.”
“Oh.” I looked out the window again, wincing at how warm my face felt.
She opened the refrigerator. “Want something to drink? I have juice, seltzer…water?”
“No soda?” I scanned the large and airy room. The ceiling was so high!
“I don’t drink soda.” She made a face and took out a bottle of water. “I don’t have any booze, either—”
“Water is fine for me.” I sat on a barstool while she poured our drinks. “The only time I drink alcohol is Friday night at this bar called Bask’s for happy hour. And it’s usually beer.” I accepted the glass and clinked it to hers. “Cheers.”
She smiled. “To new friends.”
I lowered mine. “Is that what we are now?”
She drank almost half of hers while she stared at me, making my face warm again. “I’d like to be.”
Shirley Anne Edwards is a Northeast girl who first found her love for books when she read Nancy Drew’s The Secret of the Old Clock Tower at thirteen. Shirley found her love for writing at a very young age, and since then has let her imagination run wild by creating quirky characters and vast worlds in her head.
Shirley lives in New Jersey and works in the entertainment industry in New York City.
In the immortal words of Mark Twain: “Life is short, Break the Rules. Forgive quickly, Kiss SLOWLY. Love truly. Laugh uncontrollably and never regret ANYTHING that makes you smile.”
