2nd-glance Novels & Stories

Merrielyn Forbes has no idea what kind of life awaits her at Pinnthorpe Academy. She's new, ripe and the object of ruthless desire when she crosses paths with the school's most demented prince, Cormac "Chaos" Graves. She catches him in a compromising position, and he swears to reign down havoc on her to keep her mouth shut. But his secret isn't the only thing fiercely binding them together. Merrielyn just happens to be the fated mate of the feared boy who's determined to destroy her. She has no inkling to why he hates her so much, but like a moth to a flame, the dangerous air around him beckons her. And Chaos? Every time he sees her, all he can think about is everything he lost — everything she cost him two years ago — that she now doesn't remember. Their bond pulls them together like opposing magnets. And like fuel to an open flame, with every stolen glance, they burn hotter. Fate is a funny thing. It tore them apart once. Now? It might be the very thing forcing them back together. And Merrielynn has no clue that the boy who wants to ruin her, might just be the very same one that saves her life.

When down-on-her-luck Rennie Brooks accepts a job as a live-in nanny for the daughter of cold, enigmatic billionaire Shawn Wolfe, she believes it’s just another job—and another clingy child—until the little girl looks up at her with wide, innocent eyes and calls her “Mommy”… then begins mirroring her every habit. The connection is instant. The tension between her and Shawn, undeniable. Because Shawn isn’t just her new boss—he’s the man from her one unforgettable night eight years ago, the stranger who vanished before dawn, leaving behind nothing but memories and heartbreak. Rennie swore she’d never fall for him again. But under the same roof, every stolen glance and forbidden touch reignites the desire she thought she’d buried for good. Her fragile new beginning shatters when Shawn’s glamorous ex-wife suddenly returns, demanding custody of the little girl Rennie has come to love as her own. Just as she prepares to walk away, a devastating secret surfaces— Diane isn’t Shawn’s daughter. She’s Rennie’s. Now Rennie must fight for the child she never knew was hers and face the hardest choice of her life: between the man who broke her heart and the one who might finally mend it.

PSA: This book has high smut intensity, intoxicating chemistry and compelling family and sibling rivalry. Aanoni Adukolapo was raised to lead. He is disciplined, charismatic, egoistic, and heir to a fortune. At twenty-eight, he has carved his name into a perfume empire, a revolt against his father’s tight reins. But power has never unsettled him the way Ere does. Ereadurami is thirty-five: elegant and dangerously alluring. The kind of woman who should be sacred, a taboo, and off-limits in Yoruba culture. Her boutique displays her clothing artistry, work of a master. She is sweet, refined, but behind that subtle demeanor lies a hungry succubus. What begins as a random suggestion inside her boutique soon spirals into a hunger neither of them can resist. Every glance, every stare, every breath is calculated, meant not to seem weak. She is older, forbidden, and everything his father would use to destroy him. But the closer Aanoni gets to Ere, the harder it becomes to care about consequences. Desire is intoxicating, hypnotic and surrendering to her might be the most reckless, irresistible rebellion of all. Ere’s Scent is a sensual and erotic tale of age-gap temptation, power, and passion where legacy clashes with lust, where rebellion clashes with passion , and one forbidden woman could bring an empire to its knees.

I am the only son of the richest man in Fairmont. Before my coming-of-age, my mother selects nine girls for me, one of whom I am to marry when I turn 18. I choose Ruth Lonsdale, the girl who had grown up by my side since we were kids. But on our wedding day, Ruth secretly leaks my whereabouts to kidnappers and takes every single bodyguard my mother had assigned to protect me. After I am abducted, I call her and beg for help, but she answers with a cold laugh, "You're still acting? You had a bunch of thugs go after Jack, and I haven't gotten even with you for that yet! Anyway, I only took your bodyguards to protect him and make him feel safe. Don't make such a big deal out of it." She then hangs up. Enraged, the kidnappers stab me repeatedly before throwing my body from the rooftop. When I open my eyes again, I'm back to the day I'm supposed to choose my bride. This time, I didn't even glance at Ruth's photo. I point to the most ordinary-looking girl of them all and say, "I choose her."

It was cold dark and lonely, she had brought the light, and for that reason, he would keep her, whatever it takes. On the day she is supposed to be married to her beloved, she is suddenly kidnapped by the most dangerous man in the country. He forces himself on her and imposes a marriage on her with a threat to kill the man she loves, and for that reason, she despised him to no end. He is the ruthless Don of the mafia world, he rules over the city and the country itself, not even the law can get to him. He kidnaps her on the day she is to be married to someone else and forcefully takes her to posses her so she could only belong to him and him alone. Excerpt: "You are mine," She shuddered as he took a threatening step towards her trapping her between himself and the wall behind, "Mine and no one else's, and the day you dare glance at another man with affection I will destroy him along with anything and everything he cares about, and if I have to annihilate the whole city even the whole country just to destroy him then I will gladly do so, and you will remain in the middle of it all with me and no one else." From trying to run away to hopelessly falling in love with the mafia lord who'd stolen her from another.

All Raven Caruso has ever known is blood, bullets, and betrayal. Born into the infamous Caruso crime family, Raven was raised not with dolls or lullabies, but with guns, knives, and a ruthless code of silence. Trained from childhood to be an assassin, she became her father’s most dangerous weapon,and his greatest pride. Jack Caruso doesn’t just want to rule the South. He wants the North, too. But the North belongs to his bitter rival, the Moretti mafia,and standing between Jack and total dominance is one man: Leon Vitali. They call him The Butcher. Cold. Calculated. Lethal. Jack’s solution? A union of blood and power. Raven will marry Leon Vitali. And when she bears his child, the Carusos will strike,wipe out the Vitali bloodline and rule using Ravens child. Raven knows her mission. She's loyal. Deadly. And ready to make her father proud. There’s just one problem. Leon Vitali is supposed to be the enemy. But he’s also devastatingly charming, maddeningly confident, and far more complicated than she expected. With every stolen glance and dangerous kiss, he awakens something in her she doesn’t recognize,something soft. Something real. Now Raven must decide: stay true to her blood... or betray it for love.

As soon as I've moved into my new home, Rebecca Zangler, the white-collar office worker who lives across from my apartment calls the cops on me. Her reasoning is that I've been peeping on her whenever she's taking a shower because my unrequited love toward her has transformed into brimming hatred and resentment. When the police show up, Rebecca starts crying her heart out. Then, she begins berating me. "You pervert! Every night, you're the one peeping at me with your binoculars! You even uploaded my photos to the Internet! "I saw everything, you know! Those eyes of yours are nothing but lecherous! You really are disgusting!" My neighbors begin pointing at me while mumbling about me. Someone even comes over and starts roughing me up and calling me a scumbag. "Perverts like him should be chemically castrated!" "He looks decent at first glance, but you'll never know that he's actually a peeping Tom!" When faced against everyone's backlash, I take off my sunglasses quietly, revealing my cloudy eyes. "Officer, may I ask how can a blind man like me peep on others in the first place?"

I’d been married to my husband James for three years. On Valentine’s Day, he gave his stepsister, Mia, one hundred and eighty thousand dollars, along with millions in jewelry. I, on the other hand, received a free bouquet of roses. When I didn’t look thrilled, he accused me of being a gold digger. “Mia never had anyone to care for her growing up. Why are you competing with her? Isn’t being Mrs. Smith enough to feed your vanity?” Furious, I stormed out of the house. When a car lost control and came barreling toward me, he instinctively rushed to protect Mia, who was standing a full ten feet from the road. I was the one who ended up in the hospital. Lying in that bed, I finally gave up. I signed the divorce papers without hesitation. “Giving up the title of Mrs. Smith is the dumbest decision you’ll ever make,” he told me, looking down at me from above before walking away. Seven years later, we met again. He took one glance at my simple dress and laughed out loud. I didn’t bother to respond. I just held my daughter close and waited for her father—the richest man in the city—to arrive.

I was always flying for work, so I left the whole renovation thing to my husband, Daxton Pruitt. This time, my flight got scrapped last minute, so I swung by the house to check in. The second I stepped inside, some woman named Mona Scambley, who claimed she was the designer, chucked a stack of invoices at me. Couples' lingerie display case: $15,000. High-end waterbed: $40,000. One glance at that pile of overpriced tacky nonsense made me nauseous. My brows pulled tight. "Ms. Scambley, this is a private house, not some couples' motel. What is all this?" Her face flipped in a heartbeat. She jabbed a finger at me. "The owner gave those orders. You're just the site supervisor. Disobey me again, and I'll have Mr. Pruitt fire you!" Then she spun around and called Daxton right there. I laughed, cold and low, about to ask what kind of clown show designer he'd hired—until I heard his voice. Gentle. Doting. "This is Mona and my love nest. We'll do whatever we want. Don't like it? Get out." I smiled, snatched the list from Mona, and nodded. "Sure." One week later, that overpriced waterbed showed up—Daxton, very much not smiling.

The boy, George Larson, whom I once saved as a child, when he was struggling with asthma, repaid my kindness by imprisoning me for seven long years. "Luna, you're my everything. I won’t let you out of my sight," he said, his voice filled with obsession. He tied my hands and feet, keeping me bound to the bed like a helpless doll, but I did not love him; I wanted to escape. In his madness, he set fire to my family’s ancestral home. The last traces of the Sachs burned to ashes, disappearing into the wind. He said that since my home was gone, I could just live with him and that it would be my new home. However, because I refused to let him touch me, he found someone else—a girl with a beauty mark under her eye, just like mine. The girl, drunk on his affection, thought I was trying to imitate her by faking the same tear-shaped mark. In a fit of jealousy, she gouged out my eyes. My face was covered with tiny, bleeding holes, blood streaming down my body. When George came home, the girl gleefully stuffed me into a trash bag, proud of her handiwork. “George, look! I caught some trash that broke into the house!” George did not even glance at me. He just loosened his tie, his voice calm and detached. “Just toss it where trash belongs.”