Showing results by narrator "Alexander Cendese" in All Categories

Humans have always been fascinated by darkness. Especially the darkness of a city at night, when the black sky is made ever more inky by the pools of illumination dropped under streetlights. Whether the mean streets be in an alternate past charmed with dark magic or the dirty alleyways of futuristic crowded space stations, the city—and its darkened streets—will always fascinate us. Here then, an anthology of all new stories of science fiction and fantasy with a hardboiled noir twist that acknowledge that the city is a living, breathing entity...and it isn’t always on our side.

Korie Potter’s got goals. Goals that do not include following in her mother’s footsteps. Rock stars and the life of the rich and famous? Yeah ... not interested. She likes her heart in one piece, thank you very much. Until a weekend of booze and bad decisions at camp Pour Judgment finds her fake-engaged to country music’s most notorious bad boy, Rhett Taylor, and completely at his mercy. You see, Korie Potter’s also got a dream, and her new “fiancé” just may have the connections to make it come true.

Sarah Keating was sure she'd be married by 30. Husband, kids, the kick-ass career helping adults with Down Syndrome - she assumed she'd have it all, and there'd be no need to fall back on the marriage pact she made with her best pal from college. But a tipsy message she sends from her birthday party brings Ian Nolan to her door ready to rock her world, and not just with mind-blowing sex. He's up for tying the knot, and has a million pragmatic reasons it makes perfectly good sense.

Everybody feared the man with the metal band over his mouth. Stryker was part of an elite group of Cyborgs genetically enhanced with inhuman DNA. He was known as the Creeper, the quiet, the man with half a face. His fate was his own and his freedom hard-earned, having nothing to live for but the hunt and his perfect record. Until he received a distress call that changed his bleak existence.

Deciding to spend the holidays in the tiny Colorado ski town of Amber Falls brings some Christmas magic to the lives of the Portland Pirates linebacker Jackson Kincaid and his former team doctor husband, Simon Taylor. Family time, reconnecting with old friends, and some sexy nights by the fire with the husband is all a man could ask for, right? How could life get any better than what they have now with their son Parker? But through a fortunate turn of events, the Kincaids just might get their Christmas wish.

Hi, my name is Fisher, and I'm hooked on my dad's rival. I've been in love with Hudson Nash for years, but he's too stubborn to admit he wants me, too. For a whole bunch of stupid reasons. Like the fact that I'm too young. (What's a twenty-year gap? Age is just a number, am I right?) And a virgin. (Which he could easily fix!) And maybe not the best choice, given he and my dad hate each other. (It's not that ba—Okay, it is that bad, but our love could totally rise above, right? It would be epic!)

I escaped a brutal past. Created a life I loved. But when your fake proposal with your one-night stand ends up plastered all over the internet, suddenly you're right back where you started. Fighting for my life and the future I deserved. Only this time, I wasn't sure I'd survive.

It was easy to make the promise but much harder to keep it. Everyone knows I'm in love with Drew…except Drew. I made a promise a long time ago, and if I break it, I will lose him, so I'm keeping my lips sealed. The problem is that someone else is more than willing to put their lips on Drew, and let's just say that green is not a good color on me.

I've always been the dutiful son, living my life for everyone else but me. So, walking in on my fiancée with someone else during our engagement party should have filled me with devastation, but instead, I felt relieved. When a drunken message to the woman whose heart I broke all those years ago comes back with a reply, will this be the second chance I've always hoped for, or is it too late?

“Les Normaux is one of my favourite webcomics of all time. Featuring a gloriously diverse cast of characters, this story is a celebration of love, friendship, community, and self-expression.” — Alice Oseman, #1 New York Times bestselling author of the Heartstopper series “A whimsical...

Being called a "loner Knight" doesn't faze me; I'm not a typical eighteen-year-old, and that’s fine. I prefer solitude. The only reason I'm a Knight is because my mom thinks I'm alone too much. She wants me to make friends, which is why I joined the Knight's fencing club.

Girl meets boy...on the worst night of her life when she’s decided to take a drastic step that there is no going back from. Girl is used to sitting by, letting fate deal cruel hand after cruel hand to good people with soft hearts and she’s had enough. Girl thinks it’s time to fight back against fate and against men who aren’t careful with all the precious things a woman in love has to give him. Fate shows girl who’s boss and turns her world and plans upside down without breaking a sweat.

Born to the secretive, prepper enclave on the other side of Red Sky Hill, Adah Lee has no birth certificate, no social security number, and no school records. To the outside world, she simply doesn't exist. So when she's kidnapped on her seventeenth birthday, it might just be the perfect crime. Only this girl means something to someone dangerous.

Joss McMillan’s perfect life crashes down the night he witnesses his sister’s murder - at the hands of a vampire. He then finds out his family’s secret heritage: They are part of the Slayer Society, a group whose mission is to rid the world of vampires. Joss is their new recruit. As Joss trains, bent on seeking revenge for his sister, he discovers powers that could make him the youngest, strongest Slayer in history. But there is a traitor in the Society, one whose identity would shake Joss to the core... if the traitor doesn’t kill him first.

Ariana hoped never to know the horrors of living in captivity again. But she wakes to find herself a prisoner once more, and no one can save her this time. Her captors have bound her beasties inside her, her mates don't know where she is, and a betrayal shatters her last hope. Soon she learns the terrible truth. Her captors plan to use her blood to exterminate vampires. Trapped in a science experiment from hell, Ariana has no escape.

After surviving the latest vampire attack, Ari's mates are certain that the bloodsuckers are out to get her. Is someone else after her, too? Vampires, humans, and warlocks all have reasons to want her. Worse, she's not sure she can trust her own mates. Maximus struggles with jealousy, and Jett still hasn't accepted the mate bond.

After a massive attack is launched by the Lamia Queen, Ariana and her mates are left weakened. Monster attacks become all too common in New York, threatening to expose the entire supernatural world. If Ariana can't pull the four clans together in time, life as they know it will erupt into chaos. Will Ariana be able to unite the clans, or will the Lamia Queen and her monsters destroy the world as they know it?

He’s the most beautiful man I’ve ever seen…and the most dangerous. Eternally young and full of a brilliant passion that may ultimately be the end of me: my perfect Dorian Gray. The painting that’s kept Dorian Gray flawless for over a century is beginning to fall apart, rotted by his life...

Ivy Stone came to Cold, Montana, to film a movie about The Cold-Hearted Killer. What she didn't expect was to come face-to-face with a real-life killer. Or that the killer would have his sights set on her.

Marry the girl I've had a crush on my whole life. Check. Inherit a $100 billion company. Check. Produce an heir...Wait. What? I have 90 days to knock up my brand-new fake wife. There's only one problem: she hates my guts. And in the fine print of the contract? The requirement that we produce an heir. She can't stand to be in the same room with me and says she'll never be in my bed. But I've never backed down from a challenge, and I'm not about to start now. Mark my words, I'll have her begging for me, and it won't take 90 days.