August Abrams

The things we want are so very rarely the things we need. Clifton Heights, a modest Adirondack town, offers many unique attractions. Arcane Delights sells both paperbacks and hard-to-find limited editions. The Skylark Diner serves the best home-cooked meals around, with friendly service and a smile. Every August, Mr. Jingo’s County Fair visits, to the delight of children and adults. In essence, Clifton Heights is the quintessential small American town. Everyone knows everyone else, and everyone is treated like family. It is quiet, simple, and peaceful. But shadows linger here. Flitting in dark corners, from the corner of the eye. If you walk down Main Street after dark, the slight scrape of shoes on asphalt whispers you're not alone, but when you look over your shoulder, no one is there. The moon shines high and bright in the night sky, but instead of throwing light, it only seems to make the shadows lengthen. Children disappear. Teens run away. Hunters get lost in the woods with frightening regularity. Husbands go mad, and wives vanish in the dead of night. And still, when the sun rises in the morning, you are greeted by townspeople with warm waves and friendly smiles, and the shivers pass as everything seems fresh and new... Until night falls once more. Handy's Pawn and Thrift sits several blocks down from Arcane Delights. Like any thrift store, its wares range from the mundane to the bizarre. By daylight, it seems just another slice of small town Americana. But in its window hangs a sign which reads: We Have Things You Need. And when a lonely traveling salesman comes looking for something he desperately wants, after normal visiting hours, after night has fallen, he will face a harsh truth among the shelves of Handy’s Pawn and Thrift: the things we want are rarely the things we need. ©️ Crystal Lake Publishing

Vassilia Auva, harus menerima fakta bahwa dirinya tiba-tiba bertransmigrasi ke tubuh Nona Clarence Divn Rivas, tokoh novel favoritnya, tepat di hari pernikahan. Tidak ada jalan lain. Meski dia tidak mengenal calon suaminya -sang Pangeran- dan sama sekali tidak mengerti dunia baru ini, pernikahan politik ini tetap harus berlangsung. Jika tidak, nyawanya adalah taruhannya. Tapi sebagai gantinya, Clarence mengajukan permohonan kepada Pangeran tepat sebelum mereka melakukan prosesi ciuman. "Aku akan memberikan apapun yang Yang Mulia mau. Aku akan membantu anda naik tahta. Tapi, ceraikan aku setelah satu tahun. Posisi Ratu sama sekali bukan yang aku inginkan, Yang Mulia." Seharusnya itu mudah. Mereka tidak saling mencintai. Bahkan menurut bisik-bisik para pelayan, sang Pangeran juga membenci August Rivas, Pamannya yang tidak mau mematuhi aturan Kerajaan. Menyulitkan posisinya. Secara otomatis, Pangeran seharusnya juga membenci Clarence. Tapi mengapa... "Cerai? Gila, gila, gila. Itu adalah hal paling gila yang pernah aku dengar. Jangan katakan itu lagi. Aku tidak ingin menjadi gila karena mendengarnya." Apa maksudmu? Anda telah berjanji! Bukankah ini adalah kesempatan terakhir untuk lepas dari wanita yang kau benci? "Yang Mulia... apakah anda gila?" Pangeran, yang telah naik tahta menjadi Raja, justru mengiyakan tanpa beban. "Setelah dipikir-pikir... ya. Aku telah menjadi gila karena memiliki istri segila kamu." Yah... mau bagaimana lagi? Yang bisa Clarence lakukan sekarang hanya menciptakan insiden besar untuk membuat Raja menceraikannya.

Before my boyfriend, August Cadwell, marked me, we went to register our mate bond at the Pack Affairs Department. Without a word of explanation, he unexpectedly had someone throw me out of the office. Then he walked in with his childhood sweetheart. He didn’t even blink when he saw me sitting there on the ground, shaking with disbelief. "Hailey's pup needs to be part of the Aurelis pack. The best and quickest method is for her to register a mate bond with a werewolf from the Aurelis pack. As soon as we sever the mate bond, I'll form a mate bond with you." Everyone assumed the lovesick version of me would wait just one more month for him. After all, I'd already waited seven long years. But that night, I did something unexpected too. I accepted my parents' arranged mate bond and quietly left for the Lymerian pack, disappearing from his life entirely. Three years later, I returned to my original pack to visit my family. My mate, Ryder Weyland, was now the lycan chairman. Because of an urgent council meeting, he arranged for someone to collect me from the airport. I never imagined that “someone” would be August. The moment he spotted me, his eyes immediately landed on the sparkling bracelet on my wrist. "Isn't this a knockoff of the bracelet Ryder Weyland, the lycan chairman, spent two million dollars on for his mate? Didn't expect you to turn this vain after just a few years. "You've caused enough chaos, haven't you? It's time to return. Hailey's pup is now of school age. You can take on the responsibility of pick-ups and drop-offs." I gently ran my fingers over the bracelet on my wrist. Little did he know that this was the cheapest one Ryder had ever given me.

Grace Monroe was a supermodel who walked away from the runway to build something real… her own sustainable fashion line. When billionaire hedge fund manager Carter Vaughn pursued her relentlessly, she believed she'd found a partner who saw beyond her face. Three years into their marriage, she discovers sex videos of Carter with multiple women, including her former best friend Stella. But the real devastation comes when she finds a contract: Carter married her as part of a bet with his elite boys' club… the first to stay married to a "perfect 10" for three years wins fifty million dollars. She was never a wife. She was a wager. Grace takes the scorched-earth divorce settlement and disappears. What Carter doesn't know: she's pregnant with twins. Grace returns as the founder of GRACE, a feminist fashion empire built on her viral campaign exposing "trophy culture." She's on magazine covers with her twin boys, August and James, refusing to name their father. She's wealthy, powerful, and untouchable. Carter's reputation is destroyed, his boys' club dissolved in scandal, and his fortune is crumbling from boycotts and bad investments. But when Carter discovers the twins are his… through a morally questionable secret DNA test—everything changes. He's not the man who made that bet anymore. Prison time for securities fraud, the loss of everything he valued, and watching Grace become the woman he prevented her from being has broken and rebuilt him. Now he wants his family back. Can a man who treated her as a commodity learn to truly love? Can she risk her sons' hearts on the father who didn't know they existed? And when Carter's former friends try to destroy Grace's empire to punish Carter, will she let him fight beside her or will she prove she never needed saving?