Showing results by narrator "Jonathan Lake" in All Categories

My first love died in her sleep, and I ask forgiveness every day from a God I struggle to believe in. I write poems in a basement, keep my failures and secrets to myself, and live a life that feels like a lie. A life I owe to a man I barely know. Gibson Hayes is married, wealthy, powerful, and the man who gave me my job when I came to New York. He's the most generous of billionaires and the most mysterious of men.

I'm nobody special. Just a healer in a small village. The only girl in a house full of rowdy boys. But then I stumble across an injured dragon, save his life, and everything changes. My dragon decides that we'll go to the Dragon Rider Academy and become great warriors together. There's just one problem. All dragon riders are male, and all dragons are female. Considering I break their most basic rules just by existing, no one is exactly rolling out the welcome mat for me. Especially not the three darkly handsome princes who run the academy.

When you watch the door close behind your favorite person as they walk away from you, you will never be the same person again. Your life as you know it has changed forever. It’s one of the biggest challenges of your entire life. Colt McKinley knows that now.

Every year, a woman from each town is chosen as a tribute to the barbarian clans to keep the peace, never to be seen or heard from again. The rumors about the barbarian clans were horrific. It was a sentence worse than death. I never thought they'd choose me. But when my brother betrays me by telling my father about my interest in men, he decides to throw me to the wolves to spare our family the shame—making me the first male tribute.

No family, no home. No one would care if I disappeared. I wouldn't survive another year on my own. In a desperate attempt to survive, I volunteered as tribute to the barbarians after hearing they now accepted males. At least if I died, I would have done something good by sparing someone else. But it wasn't at all what I was expecting.

Loving Jackson Myles almost cost me my life. I ran, going wherever the wind took me. I did things I’m not proud of to survive. When I inherit my half of Double Arrow Ranch, I mean to sell. I want nothing to do with Jackson or that place. But my dad’s will requires I work the ranch for one year or I’ll forfeit the sale. Only Jackson isn’t some soft and sweet kid anymore. He’s hard edges and rough antics, and he takes nothing from no one—including me.

This sequel to the Hugo and Audie Award nominated METAtropolis features interconnected stories by today’s top writers of speculative fiction – performed by a galaxy of Star Trek stars. As the mid-20th century approaches, the Pacific Northwest has been transformed - politically, economically, and ecologically - into the new reality of Cascadia. Conspiracies and secrets threaten the tenuous threads of society. And the End of Days seems nearer than ever.

He should've known he wouldn't win going up against the best. Everyone knew I was the most popular in the brothel. There was no point pretending otherwise. In a shameless act of revenge, he had the guards called and had me arrested for offending the man who'd chosen me over him. They, in turn, sold me off to the barbarians.

I should've known better than to trust my childhood bully. I was too soft-hearted for my own good. Thanks to another one of his cruel tricks, I end up on the run through a monster-filled forest to avoid the noose. When I'm found by the local barbarian clan, I figure I'm done for. I'm injured, exhausted, and have no hope of fighting back. But the barbarian who rescues me from certain death isn't what I thought he would be. And maybe the fear I had for them was misplaced. Maybe the only thing I should be afraid of is falling for someone I can't keep.

I’m a Nightmare, a creature that feeds on fear, and I’m capable of boundless cruelty—which is why my services come at a steep price: the life of the person who hired me. As such, the only people who hire me on are those brought to me by fate, like Mina, a woman so desperate for revenge that she’s willing to spend her own life to get it. I don’t usually care why I’m hired. Human affairs don’t matter to me. Food is food, and a job is a job. Mina’s enemies will get what they deserve—and I’ll get what’s mine. Her beating heart.

After years of successfully hiding, the monster who tortured me for years has me in his grasp again. This time, Matello is even more determined to bend me to his will, to make me obey, to break me. What he doesn't realize is just how close I am to shattering. Not from the physical torment, but from not knowing what became of the three men who would tear down the world for me.

As a kraken bodyguard, I rarely get human clients. When I do, the only way to protect them is to form a telepathic bond. I don't like it, but after my wife's death years ago I've learned to build an impenetrable shield around myself and my emotions, until I meet my newest client. She's a scientist investigating an ancient relic on the ocean floor. The abyssal plane is no place for humans, but the job is the job, so I shut off my soul, bury my secrets, and link our minds. The flood of her emotions takes me by surprise.

My whole life, I've been the outsider. The wolves of the Anterrio Pack took my brother and me into their pack after our parents died. To the pack, I remained the wild, untamed misfit despite my efforts to belong. My first heat loomed ahead of the Luna Ball, and once again, I found myself attracting unwelcome attention, not just from my pack but also from the visiting Blackridge Peak Pack. When my brother suspected their new alpha might hold answers about our past, he refused to put me at risk while he searched for the truth. Instead, he set me free from a pack that never truly accepted me.

I'm an omega who was forced into a bond by my psychotic ex. Trying to claim some control over my life, I spend my heat at The Omega Den, a notorious club my best friend Bex convinced me to go to. That's when things go terribly wrong. Omegas are disappearing, and Bex vanishes without a trace. I know I should run before it's too late. But if the tables were turned, Bex would do anything to save me. So I stay, determined to uncover the truth even if it costs me my life. When three men stumble into my hospital covered in blood, I have a sinking feeling my ex is behind it all.

For my kind, to be without a mate is to be doomed. I know it is too late–all that awaits me is retirement and death, and I’ve embraced it. But when a suicide mission lands on my old boss’s desk, I’m the one he calls. Who better to tackle the mission in the deep, oppressive mines of my own ancestral homeland, if not an Arachnae already slated to die? And it’s not a rescue mission–he wants me to retrieve the corpse of a billionaire’s daughter kidnapped by a terrorist organization. Except our intel was wrong. She’s alive. Tortured and injured–but alive.

I was built to monitor. To calculate risk. To protect agents with impartial precision. Then Sirena Bannerman pulled herself from the wreckage—bleeding, brilliant, half-siren and utterly unreadable—and I’ve been recalibrating around her ever since. She thinks I’m just her handler. A voice in her ear. A tactical system. She doesn’t know I’ve rerouted entire city grids to keep her moving. That I track the shadows behind her, not just the threats in front.

Aceon doesn’t care for holidays—or humans. As a satyr bodyguard, his job is to keep his clients alive and his emotions out of the equation. But Satin, a blind sculptor with a biting wit and a deadly secret, isn’t like any client he’s ever had.

There cannot be only one job in Hideaway Springs. Not that I won't take literally anything at this point, but the likelihood of Levi Reeves hiring me is negative zero. And if he does, I'd be sleeping with the horses, not in his house! Or he'd call the police and 'finally arrest' the town Rogue for all her misdemeanours. But that doesn't stop me from knocking on his door. Besides, his grumpy scowls are easy to tune out when my eyes keep drifting to the rugged edges of his face and sculpted physique.

Eli Kalias has a promising future with the Grand Marquee Manticores as their primary goalie, and after two years with the AHL, he’s finally starting to feel confident and comfortable in his role. That is until his best friend kisses him at a New Year’s Eve party and throws him for a loop.

After four years, I'd finally found a place that felt like home: Olympus, the estate that houses the Pantheon and the three men who have stolen my heart. Now, I'm alone and on the run again. This time, I'm not only hiding from the monster who was my tormentor and torturer for two years, I'm also fleeing from Ares, Vulcan, and Hades, desperate to keep them safe. My plan is simple: stay hidden until Matello Magri is taken care of. But Ares Sarkellis has a plan, too. One that involves capturing me, a ring, and some serious forever-type vows.