The Black Card Novels & Stories

During the day, Nalani Contreras works at the local diner, while at night, she's bussing tables at one of the most exclusive clubs in LA. Though struggling to pay her bills, Nalani feels blessed and contented with her life, making her in no way prepared for the storm about to tear through her peaceful existence. A chance encounter sees Nalani gaining the attention of famous actor Julian Easton. But what begins as a whirlwind romance, quickly becomes a series of events filled with lies, betrayal and an unknown assailant wishing her harm. When all is said and done, will Nalani find herself Treasured or Discarded? Book 1 in the Conflicted Hearts Trilogy.

They caught my fiancé with my sister on the night of our engagement party. Tangled in a private wine cellar. My family name was dragged through the mud. We became the laughingstock of the Chicago Outfit. Then came Don Lorenzo Falcone. He proposed in front of all the Families, saving my honor and forging a more powerful alliance. For four years, he put me on a pedestal. But an old injury left him unable to father an heir. This year, through the family’s private doctor, I finally got pregnant. After that, his devotion became absolute. I thought this powerful man was my savior. My only protector. Until I heard him talking to his right-hand man. “Boss, Arabella worships you. How could you do it? You had the doctor switch the vials, made Arabella the surrogate for the Moretti heir. Just 'cause Isabella couldn't handle the pain? The kid’s due in two months. What’s the plan?” He was silent for a moment. When he spoke, his voice was ice. “When the child is born, it goes to Isabella. It's the only thing that guarantees her future with the Morettis.” “And Arabella?” “I’ll tell her the baby didn’t make it.” “She’ll still be Mrs. Falcone. She’ll have everything she could ever want.” So that was it. My great protector. All of it… for another woman. This tainted bloodline? I don’t want it in me. And this sham of a marriage? I’m done.

“You really think a chrome leash makes me yours?” Timothy’s voice was a jagged shard of glass, his pulse thrumming frantically against the cold metal of the Blackwell collar. Kan leaned in, the scent of expensive bourbon and gunpowder clinging to him. He captured Timothy’s chin, forcing those defiant lavender eyes to meet his own. “It doesn’t make you mine, little ghost. It just keeps you still long enough for me to show you why you’ll never want to leave.” Behind him, Gideon’s shadow fell over them both, heavy and suffocating. “Careful, Kan,” the enforcer rumbled, his knuckles still stained with the blood of the men who’d tried to stop them. “He’s a reaper. He doesn't want a home. He wants a body count.” One Ghost. Two Predators. No Escape. Timothy Gal is a shadow. A high-level operative for the Nash Rebellion, he’s spent his life as a nameless tool in the war-torn Sopttyi District. He doesn’t feel, he doesn’t miss, and he certainly doesn't belong to anyone. But when a routine surveillance mission in Saati Town goes south, he catches the eye of the two most dangerous men in the Blackwell Mafia. Gideon Blackwell is the muscle—a man of controlled violence and territorial hunger. Kan Nelblack is the mind—a predator with a silver tongue and a taste for absolute submission. They don’t just want Timothy’s secrets. They want his soul.

Richard Franklin has left his Midwestern roots behind to live on the coast of Maine with his family. But in the autumn of the year 2000, he must return to his Illinois birthplace on a sorrowful journey. His wife Michelle has been killed in New England by a hit-and-run driver who is never found, so back home he comes with her cremated remains, to fulfill a final wish and on her birthday scatter her ashes in the park along the river in Blackwater Valley—simply Blackwater Val to locals—the small town where they both grew up and fell in love. With him he brings his six-year-old daughter Katie who still grieves for her lost mother: Katie, who can sometimes guess who’s going to be on the phone before it rings. Who can stop all the clocks in the house, and break up clouds in the sky with her mind, and heal sicknesses, and who sometimes sees things that aren’t there...people who are no longer alive. All gifts she inherited from her mother. Only something isn’t quite right in the Val. Sinkholes are opening up, revealing the plague pits the sleepy hamlet was built over in the 1830s, when malaria and cholera outbreaks ran riot. Mysterious bird and fish die-offs begin to occur, and Katie can see ghosts of the dead gathering all around. But what she can’t see is the charred, centuries-old malevolence which has been waiting for her, and wants her for its very own. Or the pale Sallow Man who haunts the town’s nighttime streets...or the river witch—another Blackwater Val, of sorts—each of whom will be drawn one by one into the nightmarish bloodletting about to take place. ©️ Crystal Lake Publishing

Lydia Darnell died after betrayal. She was framed by her family, abandoned by her husband, and discarded like trash. But death wasn’t the end. She wakes up three months before her murder with one chilling resolve. Once bitten, twice shy. This time, she would never take the fall for her sister’s crimes. She would not stoop low to beg for her cold billionaire husband’s attention. Lydia sets out to dismantle the gilded cage they had used to imprison her. And she certainly will never let the so-called “gratitude” be used as a leash. Adrian Blackwell watches in stunned silence until the wife he ignored becomes the woman he can’t live without. Now that he is obsessed with her, he would do anything to win her back. But Lydia’s done playing victim. Her revenge is quiet, lethal, and flawless without an iota of empathy. Along comes Lucas Costello, a kind architect who shows her what real love looks like. And Adrian realizes too late that the woman he had been hell-bent on destroying is the only one who ever truly loved him. He wants her back again, but some second chances, they come too late.

I loved him for years. Alpha Xavier. But we weren't fated mates. So I did what any woman in love would do: after one night together, I convinced him to marry me, hoping to win his heart like my parents did. And it worked... until his fated mate showed up. Suddenly, I was the villain.I was framed for attacking his mate, rejected, and despised. The divorce papers were already on the table when I discovered I was pregnant. Pregnant with his children—a secret I knew I had to keep, because a man who hates you would never want your babies. So I lied, I ran, and I vanished into the world. Three years later, at an airport with my twins when I run into the last person I ever wanted to see again. Xavier He looks at my kids, his eyes filled with a warmth that I know is a lie. "How old are they?" he asks. My lie ready on my tongue. "They're not yours. I had a test before our divorce, remember?" And he believed me. Because the dates don't add up, and he can't possibly know the truth. But as he stands there, unable to shake the connection he feels to the kids and me, all our secrets and past wounds resurface. The man who cast me aside now looks at me with an agonizing mix of longing and confusion, and I have to wonder: is fate really done with us?

Aria is an orphan living with her uncle, when she turns eighteen, she realizes it was her turn to enter into the family pattern but in her case she was engaged to the Mafia enforcer of an opposing group, Viktor of the Blacktop, the most powerful Russian group in New York. He's rumored to be cold, cruel and doesn't have feelings, his brother who is the capo is a mad man and more importantly, she isn't a virgin as everyone thought, what then happens if Viktor realizes he isn't getting what he bargains for.

When Ava walked into that bar, she only wanted to forget. Forget the man who left her for money. Forget the wedding she was never meant to attend. But one drink, one stranger, and one reckless night changed everything. She woke up in a stranger’s bed only to find out he wasn’t a stranger at all. He was Adrian Blackwell, her CEO. Cold, powerful, and dangerously irresistible. Adrian swore he didn’t do love. He didn’t chase. He didn’t lose control. Until Ava. Now he wants her body, soul, and every breath she takes. But loving Adrian means walking a thin line between passion and danger… because the man who owns her heart might also be the one who ruins her.

It was a bad idea. She knew it but she had no choice. After finding herself penniless after the death of her parents who nevertheless had a good fortune, Rose had no other idea than to loot the trunk of her old house to pay for her little sister's treatment. Anyway, it wasn't a theft because nobody knows about this safe... The house was empty because it was for sale, she was going to sneak in and she would never set foot there again. It was a perfect idea... When she entered the house, she suspected that there was someone but she persisted and continued... -Who are you? What are you doing at my house? She was so relieved that no one had touched her money so she hadn't even heard the footsteps... She turned to see a man...a man with a mask covering half his face. .. Frightened, she did not expect that this night could change her life... -I'll let you take your trunk and I'll offer you double more so that you serve as my escort, for one night... Rose could not understand such a proposal. However, she had no choice...

SYNOPSIS: After being with her husband, Dyson for three years despite his family’s disdain towards her. She is heartlessly tossed aside by her husband after he brings home a woman with a baby bump, claimed to be his fated mate. Alexis is devastated by this, but Dyson is indifferent about it. She is treated even worse by his mother and sisters with this happening. After being involved in an accident and Dyson is nowhere to be found, she decides to go back to her family, build herself and become the most sought after. Within this time she meets Xavier, a charming young billionaire, who isn’t exactly who he seems to be, they build a connection together. But just as Alexis thinks she's rid of Dyson, he comes back and this time he doesn’t go down