Can I Read The Magpie Coffin Online For Free?

Violet Harlow is out of options when she signs a one-year contract to work inside Cain House, the private estate of billionaire CEO and widower Theodore Cain. The offer sounds like survival: high pay, housing, protection, and a chance to finally breathe. But Cain House is no ordinary mansion, and Theodore is no ordinary man. Cold, dominant, and dangerously controlled, he gives Violet rules she is expected to obey. But Violet is independent, stubborn, and terrible at surviving quietly. What she does not know is that the contract was written by Theodore’s dead wife, Eleanor Cain. Hidden inside it is a clause that could make Violet trustee of the Widow’s Fund, a billion-dollar foundation holding the Cain family’s darkest secrets. If Violet lasts one year, she gains control of the one thing the family would kill to protect. Everyone wants Violet gone. Theodore needs her to stay. But he cannot tell her why. In this dark romance filled with mystery, steamy forbidden love, betrayal, and shocking twists, Violet realizes Theodore may not be the monster in the story. He may be the prisoner. And saving him could destroy them both. #DarkRomance #Steamy #Mystery #CEO #Dominant #Independent #ContractMarriage #ForbiddenLove #Twist #Billionaire #Widower #Betrayal #FamilySecrets #Possessive #GothicRomance

The tale of a widow's harrowing journey through grief and peril into the cold remnants of a dead world. Damon Sharpe had in part found victory, he believed, in his battle to unearth a truth obscured by time. By autumn, he was dead, leaving to his wife Anne a house of unfulfilled wishes, remnants, and the key to the enigma of his obsession, the Mourner’s Cradle. A journey through grief and peril delivers Anne Sharpe from her home in St. Charles to the faraway skeletons of a long-dead civilization where she will find the desperate answers she seeks…or die trying. ©️ Crystal Lake Publishing

Ari is content to live her life in her pack and help her best friend, Sage, be Luna of the pack. That was until her parents led a rebellion against their pack with rogues that put Ari’s life in danger. Now imprisoned, she fears death until her Alpha and best friend come to the dungeons with a drop-dead sexy warlock who immediately catches her attention. Zane is hell-bent on claiming his familiar that he has waited long enough for. The shifter that will be his partner in crime, his soul mate. Ari has two choices, go with Zane and be his familiar, or become a rogue. Ari chooses Zane, but when she does she has no idea the adventure she is about to go on. Zane belongs to the Coven of the Crow and Shadows, a special coven that works for Death. They reap fresh souls and collect the spirits that got away. Zane ranks high in his coven as he is one of the leader's sons. He’s the most powerful and dangerous member of his coven for a reason and Ari will learn exactly why he is feared and highly respected. As secrets of Ari’s past come to light that was hidden from her, she finds herself faced with more challenges than she knows what to do with. Adjusting to a new realm, a new life, and trying to resist her sexy master, Ari isn’t sure she will make it out alive. Can Zane help his beloved familiar while he lays claim to her everything? Can they find their happiness in the darkness they face?

A priest has shown up at my first birthday party. He claims that I'm a cursed soul—that my presence will bring doom to those close to me, and my existence itself can snatch everyone's luck. The only way to counter this is to give me up to an orphanage and let me live a life of poverty and suffering. Without a family, I'll be able to overcome my fate as a cursed soul. Daddy has the priest cast out of our home immediately. Meanwhile, Mommy hugs me tightly. "My son is the luckiest boy in the whole wide world!" But everything has changed when my younger brother, Andy Lawson, has fallen off the 20th floor. His body is completely shattered from the fall. I can only stand by the window uneasily. Fear is evident in my eyes as I wave my hands with all my might. "It wasn't me! It really wasn't me!" The wind that day is very strong, but it can never drown out Mommy's cries. Daddy hoists me up and stuffs me into Andy's coffin. I keep latching onto the sides of the coffin to the point my fingers are all bloodied and trampled over. At the same time, I keep screaming for Mommy. Mommy stares at me blankly at first. But her hollow gaze is soon filled with hatred. "Why aren't you the one dead? That priest told us that you'll have to stay in the coffin for seven whole days and nights just to atone for your sins! Only then can Andy's soul rest in peace! "This is your fate and your sin, Adam!" The heavy lid slowly covers the coffin, soon sealing my hoarse cries and screams away. A long time later, a few voices ring out amid the sorrowful melody played by the organ. "Why is there a tiny gap in the coffin? Hurry up and nail it shut! We can't afford to have misfortune spread to us!" When the final nail is bolted onto the lid, I close my eyes. Mommy, Daddy, I'm no longer a cursed soul.

I was the only female carpenter in town, and I made caskets at cost price for anyone in the area who needed one. Everyone said I was generous, kind-hearted, the whole routine. Then one afternoon, Doug Hadley showed up at my shop with his wife Trish Grady and a handful of neighbors to order a cremation urn. Trish stared at the price tag. "An urn for only 50 dollars? What is this, scrap wood?" Doug shot her a look. "Don't run your mouth about things you don't understand. It's solid ebony. Bridget makes them herself, so it's cheaper." Trish snickered behind her hand. "Solid ebony? That might fool someone who doesn't know any better. My cousin runs a funeral supply shop, so trust me, I know what I'm looking at. This isn't ebony. It's plywood. It's five dollars' worth of material, tops. "I can take you all to my cousin's place. I'll make sure he gives us a deal." The neighbors were already nodding. "The urn's supposed to last a hundred years. Obviously, I want the best for my mom." "Selling plywood and calling it ebony... You ought to be ashamed." "Come on, let's all go to Trish's cousin. I'm not giving her the chance to make dirty money off any of us." Dirty money? As far as I knew, mine was the only shop in town that actually stocked real ebony. Everyone else used MDF. If they were not afraid of the thing falling apart, they were welcome to go for it.

A secret society of widows. A cold billionaire with a deadly past. One woman sent to seduce him... and destroy him. When Genevieve Holloway buries her husband, she thinks the worst is behind her. But the black-veiled woman at the funeral of her husband says otherwise. “You’ve been chosen.” Drawn into a shadowy society of grieving wives turned silent assassins, Genevieve is given one final task before she can walk free: infiltrate the life of Dominic Rourke—the enigmatic tech billionaire tied to her husband’s mysterious death—and expose the truth. Her mission is clear: seduce him. Infiltrate him. Ruin him. But Dominic Rourke is nothing like she expected. Cold. Calculating. Unreachable. And he’s never let any woman get close—until her. Worse still, his five-year-old daughter clings to Genevieve like a lost soul, whispering secrets she shouldn’t know. Secrets about her dead mother… and the club Genevieve now serves. The deeper Genevieve sinks into Dominic’s world, the more dangerous her own becomes. The women she trusted have blood on their hands. The man she was sent to destroy might be innocent. And the lies that bind them all go deeper than any grave. Genevieve begins to develop feelings for the man she’s sent to ruin, and he sees himself letting go of his cold nature to make her happy and find her husband’s killer. In a game of power, seduction, and betrayal, only one can survive. And Genevieve must decide: Is she the hunter or the hunted? Will she be Dominic’s ruin, or will she become his everything?