The Roughneck & the Lady

When Laura Fry returns to her childhood home to care for her invalid mother, she hopes the writer’s block that has swallowed her writing career will disappear. She doesn’t plan on turning into a “yard girl” but her mother’s long neglected lawn beckons her to return it to the lush and colorful display it had been before her mother’s accident. She also doesn’t plan on making friends with the “nympho lesbian” next door but she finds it impossible not to watch the parade of playmates the neighbor brings to her pool.

Dr. Galen Burgess has a reputation for keeping it casual. She likes women close - but not too close. Nothing is more important to her than her budding surgical career as chief surgical resident at Boston City Hospital. After spending years trying, and failing, to please her father, Galen knows getting close enough to care is a recipe for heartbreak. Everything in her carefully structured life begins to change when she meets her newest intern, the disconcertingly beautiful Dr. Rowan Duncan.

For Addison Fairchild, success is a guarantee. Groomed since childhood to run a division of Fairchild Enterprises, she takes her birthright seriously. Maybe a little too seriously, if you ask her friends. But work is so much easier than the rest of her life. For Katie Cooper, money has never been important. That is, until her father gets dementia and needs full-time care. As the bills start to pile up, Katie takes a second job as a temporary personal assistant. Two minutes and one spilled cup of coffee later, she's sure she's not ready for Addison Fairchild.

Emmett McCabe never expected to see Sydney Stevens - a woman with whom she'd shared a brief, incendiary connection before it all went up in flames - again. Luckily, ascending the cutthroat ladder of a high-pressure surgery residency to reach the top spot makes it easy to ignore what's missing in her life. Then Sydney reappears after nearly five years. Emmett is barely over her shock when she discovers Sydney is her new competition for the coveted chief's position everyone, including Emmett, expects will be hers.

As New Orleans recovers from Hurricane Katrina, Detective Sept Savoie recovers from a gunshot wound with the help of her new love Keegan Blanchard. As the city returns to normal, so does the crime rate. Sept’s first case back on the job is a strangely ritualistic killing, which quickly escalates into serial murder. As the bodies start to pile up, the last thing Sept needs is the city’s newest celebrity crime writer, Nicole Voles, poking into the case looking for information for a new bestseller, especially when Nicole appears just as interested in Keegan as she is in murder.

Hayley Carpenter has always dreamed of being a famous screenwriter, but dreams don’t pay bills and LA living isn’t cheap. So when a temp position at a celebrity gossip magazine becomes available, she goes after it. Emerson Sterling has been acting since she was little, but a rough patch as a teenager has given her a bad rap in Hollywood. Just when she thinks her dream role can turn around the public’s image of her, a conflict with her co-star and America’s Sweetheart, Rachel Blanche, puts her on the front cover of every magazine, the villain once again.  

Hadley Cooper believes in happily-ever-afters with her whole heart. Described by her friends as a wide-eyed, eternal optimist, she looks for the bright side in most any situation. However, when her job as the assistant manager of Silhouette, a posh boutique on Rodeo Drive, is on the line, she realizes it's time to pull her head out of the clouds and find a way to turn business around, and that just might mean partnering with the most stubborn up-and-coming fashion designer she's ever encountered.   

Fifth-generation lobster-woman Mat Pero loves her traditional Portuguese family and living in the lesbian hub of Provincetown, even if they feel like two different worlds. Or two different lives. Since she has no plans for them to collide, it's not a problem. Graham Connor is a romantic at heart, but she hasn't had a date in over a year. She vows to let loose and have a little fun, and the charming and confident Mat is more than happy to help. 

Agent Knight looked up at the garden wall. It was easily eight feet tall or more. “The...abductor threw your sister on its shoulder and leaped over the wall?” “Not over it,” Eden said, her brow furrowed as she recalled the horrifying event. “To the top of it. A wall this tall is also deep. It's about four feet thick. It stood on top of the wall and...and...” “And what?” Knight's voice was low and persuasive. “Howled!” Eden slapped her hand over her mouth as if trying to keep the words from tumbling out. “It howled like a wolf.”

Emma Harvey is a brilliant and gifted young pianist, accepted into one of the most prestigious music conservatories in the country and prepared to do whatever it takes to accomplish her dreams of playing professionally. With a renowned jazz musician for a father and a world-famous mentor growing up, she is convinced her path is easy. Until her world is suddenly silenced when she loses her hearing. 

Susanne Wolff isn't thrilled when her mother sends her all the way across the country to Freiburg to save her uncle's stationery store from bankruptcy. Freiburg is too provincial for her taste, and besides, pen and paper are outdated anyway. Anja Lamm, Paper Love's only full-time employee, takes an instant dislike to the arrogant, digital-loving snob who's supposed to be her temporary boss. But thanks to a meddling cat, a business trip to a stationery fair, and an armada of origami boats, Anja soon starts to see beneath Susanne's aloof exterior.

Senior purser Mia Donoghue is always on the go, leaving her little time for herself. Being busy provides distraction from painful memories and her daily struggle to stay sober. Captain Ava Alfarsi has just been promoted. As a single, young, and attractive captain, Ava has no problem meeting women, but her control issues and fear of people finding out she’s far from perfect stand in the way of connecting with others on a deeper level. When the two become aware of each other’s deepest secrets, they find comfort in the knowledge they’re not alone.

Personal trainer Rebecca McCall is furious when her coworker is sidelined and she's forced to teach the “Be Your Best Bride” class. As if being a size two for your wedding photos is all for which exercise is good. Could the whole thing get more vain and sexist? The class is full of preening, giggling bridezillas, but one woman stands out: the one who confesses she's only there because her fiancée signed her up. Who does that to someone about whom they care? And why can't Rebecca take her eyes off her?  

Can love be measured in percentages? After her girlfriend leaves her for a man, brokenhearted novelist Charlie Cross moves from New York to Los Angeles to work on a TV show based on her books. Charlie vows to never date any woman who isn't a hundred percent certain of being a lesbian. But when she is seduced by gorgeous bisexual cooking show host Ava Castaneda, whom she's had a celebrity crush on for ages, Charlie is forced to review her belief in percentages because true love could very well be on the line.

In the literary world, she was flamboyant, sexy-as-hell Darcy Lake wildly successful lesbian author. In the real world she was…well, she was something else entirely. Jules Divine had nursed a crush on lesbian author Darcy Lake from the first moment she saw the author’s photo. Beautiful, charismatic and elusive, Lake was adored by millions, but known by few. Was she what she appeared to be or a promoter’s ultimate well-crafted success. Jules weaves her way through the maze of the ruthless literary world to uncover murders and liars. Her life would never be the same after spending a weekend with Darcy Lake.