Author Spotlight- Kristen Ashley

Kristen Ashley

I've read almost all of Kristen Ashley's books.  I am a big fan and recommend her to any romance/action adventure reader. Kristen mixes a combination of romance and adventure into her books to keeps you turning the ages.

About this Author

Kristen Ashley was born in Gary, Indiana, USA. She nearly killed her mother and herself making it into the world, seeing as she had the umbilical cord wrapped around her neck (already attempting to accessorize and she hadn't taken her first breath!).

Kristen grew up in Brownsburg, Indiana but has lived in Denver, Colorado and the West Country of England. Thus she has been blessed to have friends and family around the globe. Her posse is loopy (to say the least) but loopy is good when you want to write.

Kristen was raised in a house with a large and multi-generational family. They lived on a very small farm in a small town in the heartland and existed amongst the strains of Glenn Miller, The Everly Brothers, REO Speedwagon and Whitesnake (and the wardrobes that matched).

Needless to say, growing up in a house full of music, clothes and love was a good way to grow up. And as she keeps growing up, it keeps getting better.

Rock Chick

Indy Savage is a former wild child (okay, maybe not so “former”) and current used bookstore owner. Lee Nightingale is a former bad boy and now runs a private investigation service. Toss together a quiet barista with a not-so-lawful side-business, a crazy Vietnam Vet, a pothead, a drag queen, family and friends who will notmind their own business, a few stun guns and a bag of diamonds, and mix them all up with some shootings, a high speed chase and car bombs exploding, then hang on for your first wild Rock Chick ride.

 Rock Chick Rescue

Jet McAlister has a secret. Eddie Chavez has the hots for Jet (not to mention Eddie’s just plain hot). Jet’s got too many problems to cotton on that Eddie’s interested. Eddie loses patience when Jet ends her night shift at a strip club with a knife at her throat. Since Eddie’s a cop, he figures he can help. Since Jet’s used to solving everyone’s problems, she doesn’t want Eddie’s help. The problem is Jet’s ne’er-do-well father has got himself in a heap of trouble, and in trying to get him out Jet buys herself even more. So much, unless Eddie can rescue her, it might just get her dead.

Rock Chick Redemption

Roxie Logan is on the run from a bad boyfriend who just will not catch a hint that it is o-v-e-r. She’s not in the mood for love at first sight. Unfortunately, her eyes fall on Hank Nightingale and she knows it’s trouble from the get-go. Roxie tries to hold Hank at arm’s length, but Hank wants to be a lot closer (as in, a lot a lot). Roxie’s trouble catches up with her and Hank wants to help, but Roxie knows in her heart that she’s no good for a White Hat-type of guy. The problem is, no one agrees with her, especially her crazy, hippie, best friend, Annette, or her parents, the even crazier small town Herb and Trish. Roxie’s got the odds stacked up against her and has no choice but to hold on and just ride it out through kidnappings, car chases, society parties and a wild night at the Haunted House.

Rock Chick Renegade

Juliet Lawler has got a score to settle against the drug dealers of Denver. Vance Crowe has made it his mission that Jules won’t get dead while dishing out vigilante justice. Jules doesn’t have time for romance; she’s too busy saving the world. She enlists Zip (the gunstore owner), Heavy (an ex-PI) and Frank (a mysterious recluse) to help. The Rock Chicks get involved to provide advice and guidance. The Hot Bunch adopt Jules as one of their own. Even though Jules tries to hang onto her inner Head-Crackin’ Mamma Jamma, the Rock Chicks, Hot Bunch, Jules’s long-suffering Uncle Nick and Jules’s friend, the rotund, African-American, Jackie-O wannabe, May, will stop at nothing to wear her down. But Jules makes some bad guys pretty angry, and one will stop at nothing to take her out.

Rock Chick Revenge

Ava Barlow hates men. She has reason and she’s vowed not only never to get involved with another one again, but also to exact vengeance on her best friend’s lying, cheating, rat-bastard husband. Since Luke Stark, Ava’s childhood crush, is now a badass mother, she thinks to enlist him, but changes her mind at the last second. Too late. Luke knows she’s up to something and he’s already seen many a Rock Chick try to fight her own battles without the Hot Bunch stepping in. He’s having none of it. She’s having none of him. The clash of the Rock Chick and Hot Guy begins, but Luke’s got the advantage. He has handcuffs and he’s not afraid to use them.

Rock Chick Reckoning

Stella Gunn is the lead singer and lead guitarist of the Blue Moon Gypsies, and Stella used to be Mace’s girl. But Kai “Mace” Mason broke up with her and the loss of him rocked her world. One night, Stella gets a call, late (again), from one of the members of her crazy band. She has to go play clean up (again) and runs into Mace (and a shed load of police) and ends up getting shot. Mace finds he doesn’t like it much that his ex-girlfriend got shot right in front of him, but it’s worse. A very bad man has thrown down the gauntlet, and all the Rock Chicks are in the firing line. Stella doesn’t want Mace to be the one to keep her alive, but she has no choice. Mainly because Mace isn’t giving her one.

Rock Chick Regret

Sadie Townsend is known by all as The Ice Princess and she’s worked hard to earn her reputation. Her father, a now-incarcerated Drug Lord, has kept her under his thumb her whole life, and she’s learned enough from living in his world to give everyone the cold shoulder. But one inebriated night, she shows Hector the Real Sadie, and he knows he’ll stop at nothing to have her. Hector Chavez makes one (huge) mistake: he waits for Sadie to come to him. Tragedy strikes, and Sadie’s got a choice. She can retreat behind her Ice Fortress, or she can embrace the Rock Chick/Hot Bunch World. Guided by Hector, the Rock Chicks, the Hot Bunch and her new gay roommates, Buddy and Ralphie, Sadie negotiates a life out from under her father’s thumb. A life that includes poison, arson and learning how to make s’mores.

Rock Chick Revolution

Ally Nightingale has secrets. Secrets she doesn’t even share with the Rock Chicks. But two men know what she’s up to. One has her back. The other has her heart, but he doesn’t know it.
As Ally rewinds the last year of her life, she knows two things. One, she’s never going to get what every Rock Chick should have—her own Hot Bunch guy. And two, she’s a Nightingale through and through. She just isn’t sure what to do about that.
But as her secrets are revealed, the men in her life react. Darius Tucker, a lifelong friend, as usual takes her back. Ren Zano, the man she loves, isn’t quite so sure. The Rock Chicks, Hot Bunch and the entire gang at Fortnum’s weigh in, and a Rock Chick Revolution starts brewing.
It’s up to Ally to control it and prove what she knows down to her bones.
She’s a Rock Chick, she deserves her hot guy and she’s going to keep the one she wants…
Because she’s a Nightingale.

Dream Man Series

Mystery Man

While drinking cosmopolitans in a fabulous little black dress, Gwendolyn Kidd meets the man of her dreams. Then she takes him home. Then she wakes up alone. But her fear that she lost her dream man turns into a relationship with a mystery man when, night after night in the dead of night, he comes back for more. Hoping it will blossom into something real, she lets him.
But she doesn’t even know his name.
Gwen’s struggling with the decision to end their crazy non-relationship when her sister-from-hell, Ginger’s best friend pays a visit and warns Gwen that if she and her sister don’t get smart, they’ll both get d-e-a-d,dead. Gwen has no clue what’s going on but she’s used to Ginger’s antics and decides to lay the problem on her sister’s biker boyfriend’s doorstep. Bad choice. She catches the eye of the biker hottie president of the Chaos Motorcycle Club, not long after she gets the attention of a Denver police detective who surely is on the cover of the DPD’s Hot Guy calendar and lastly she hits the Denver Underground radar with a big, loud ping.
This means Gwen’s Mystery Man, Cabe “Hawk” Delgado has to step in to keep her safe. But when Hawk gets a dose of Gwen in the daylight, he makes the decision that he finally wants real with Gwen. However when Gwen gets a dose of badass, bossy, straight-talker Hawk in the daylight, she decides she’s done.
Thus begins the head-to-head of the Commando vs. Cosmo Girl as Hawk woos Gwen in his own unique way, Gwen survives firebombs, drive-bys, kidnappings, hot pursuits by biker hotties and gorgeous police detectives and discovers the heartbreaking reason why Hawk kept her at arm’s length.
And as all this happens, Gwen finds that her sister’s troubles are serious trouble and she must decide who to keep alive: her sister-from-hell or the man of her dreams.

Wild Man

While filling the display case in her bakery, the bell over the door sounds and Tessa O’Hara looks up and sees the man of her dreams. Within thirty seconds he asks her out for a beer. Thirty seconds later, she says yes. But after four months of falling in love, she discovers he’s an undercover DEA Agent investigating the possibility she’s involved in her ex-husband’s drug business.
Obviously Tess decides this means it’s over.
But DEA Agent Brock Lucas disagrees. A man on a mission who’s really committed to his job, he’s spent years in the underbelly of Denver with the dregs of society. And spending four months with Tess, who’s as sweet as her cupcakes, he seriously enjoyed his job. But during Tess’s interrogation, Brock learns the devastating secret Tess is carrying and he’s determined to be the man who helps her heal as well as take her back as she walks on the wild side.
As wild and sweet mix, they face challenge after challenge of family struggling with history and terminal illness. Not to mention, Tess’s ex-husband, the drug lord, and Brock’s ex-wife, who has a very big playbook, are scheming to tear them apart.
But Brock Lucas has wild in him and in his past on the trail of vengeance he let that wild loose, making a mistake that he would have no idea years later will put his sweet Tess in the position to pay his penance.

Law Man

I am delighted to mention that Law Man won the RT Book Reviews Reviewer’s Choice Award for Best Romantic Suspense 2013! I’m so proud of Mitch and Mara for acheiving this awesome tribute!

Four years ago, Mitch Lawson moved across the breezeway from Mara Hanover and she fell in love with the tall, good-looking police detective who had an uncanny ability to dress well even though he’s single. It was not a stalker kind of love; she knows she has no hope since Mitch is way out of her league. That doesn’t change the fact that he’s her dream man.
Then one day Mara’s faucet won’t turn off and she knows nothing about plumbing. Being a good guy, Mitch offers to help then he invites himself over for pizza. Mara gives it a go but finds herself running away from him (literally) on their first date, standing him up their second and then she runs into him (again literally) on her way to save her ne’er do well, criminal cousin’s kids who’d just run away from their ne’er do well, criminal Dad.
Suddenly, Mara finds she has on her hands the guardianship of two kids and a gorgeous police detective who’s willing to do anything to help out…including giving fabulous foot rubs.
But Mara knows who she is and where she came from and she knows Detective Mitch Lawson is better than her. Hot law man Mitch disagrees and his challenge is to convince Mara to let go of her past. He sets about building a family at the same time he finds he also needs to protect them all against known and unknown adversaries that would tear them apart.

Motorcycle Man

Motorcycle Man made the final round for the Goodreads Choice Awards 2012 coming in the top ten! A huge honor for Tack, Tyra and moi! A big thank you to all who voted!

Stuck in a colorless world, Tyra Masters decides to chuck her old life and starts searching for something. She doesn’t know what it is until she meets her dream man. The goateed, tattooed, muscled, gravelly voiced motorcycle man who plies her with tequila and gives her the best sex of her life. But she knows it isn’t the tequila and sex talking. He’s it. He’s who she’s been daydreaming about since she could remember.
Until he makes it clear she isn’t who he’s looking for.
Tyra slinks away from his bed, humiliated. The problem is, he’s her new boss. She just may or may not have forgotten to tell him that part.
Kane “Tack” Allen has a rule. He doesn’t employ someone he’s slept with. And he lets Tyra know that in his motorcycle man way. Tyra fights for her job and wins it using sass and a technicality. Tack challenges her that if she hits his bed one more time, she loses her job.
Tyra is determined to keep her job and keep away from Tack. But she makes a big mistake. During their head to heads, she lets it all hang out and shows Tack she is who he’s looking for. And Tack has had a good woman slip through his fingers, he’s not about to let that happen again.
Although Tack colors Tyra’s world with a vibrancy that’s blinding, being with him means she has to live in his Motorcycle Club world. Full on, no holds barred. And since Tack’s world, not to mention Tack, is a little scary, Tyra isn’t so sure.

It’s Tack’s job to convince her.

The Colorado Mountain Series

The Colorado Mountain Series takes place in a trinity of fictional Colorado towns situated close to each other, Gnaw Bone, Carnal and Chantelle. This series that will be seven novels follows the stories of seven connected men on their rocky road to second chances.

The Gamble

Nina Sheridan’s on a timeout adventure in the Colorado mountains. She needs distance from her clueless fiance, distance to decide whether she wants to spend the rest of her life with a man who doesn’t care enough to learn how she takes her coffee.
Arriving in a blinding snowstorm at the A-Frame she rented for two weeks, she comes face to face with the most amazing man she’s ever seen.
Minutes later, when he kicks her out of his house, she goes head to head with him.
Beyond angry because she’s flown half a world away to start her timeout adventure, not to mention her sinuses hurt, she heads back down the mountain and ends up in a ditch. Unable to extricate herself, she gives up, hopes for rescue and falls asleep in the backseat.
The next morning she wakes up in the amazing man’s bed and she’s sick as a dog.
Holden Maxwell spends days nursing her back to health and then he spends the next two weeks trying to convince her to take her Colorado adventure further, in other words, make it permanent and take a gamble on him.
Nina has a tough time fighting her attraction to Max, especially when it seems all Max’s friends, her mother, stepdad and the whole town of Gnaw Bone want them together. Not to mention, both she and Max get embroiled in the murder of Max’s ex-friend and the town of Gnaw Bone’s most detested resident – a man everyone has motive to kill, especially Max.

Sweet Dreams

Lauren Grahame has spent her whole life thinking something special was going to happen. She didn’t know what it was, she just knew it would one day be hers.
But she learned the hard way that special wasn’t on offer.
So, after divorcing her cheating husband, Lauren searched for nothing special and she thought she found it when she landed a job as a waitress in a biker bar in Carnal. It was perfect: a nothing job in a nowhere bar in Nowheresville.
Then Tatum Jackson walked in. Part-owner of the bar, he took one look at high-class Lauren and wanted nothing to do with her. And he made this known, loudly.
Tate’s angry insults seared in her brain, Lauren decides the feeling is mutual and she doesn’t want anything to do with the gloriously handsome Tate Jackson. The clash of the bartender and barmaid begins but, even though Tate makes his change of mind clear (in biker-speak, a language Lauren is not fluent in), Lauren is intent on going her own way.
Until a serial killer hits Carnal and Lauren finds out Tate isn’t a bartender, he’s a bounty hunter. He stakes his claim for Lauren before he goes on the hunt for a killer. But Laurie doesn’t speak biker nor does she understand bounty hunters and Tate comes back from the hunt to find his old lady has moved on.
Life throws curveball after curveball at Laurie and Tate as secrets are revealed, women are brutally murdered, Tate leads Lauren to special and Laurie tries to find her inner biker babe.

Lady Luck

Ty Walker was wrongly imprisoned. For the five years he was inside, he honed his plan so when he gets out, he has nothing but vengeance on his mind.
But then he walks straight to stylish, leggy, beautiful, goofy Lexie Berry and he suddenly has something else to think about. He knows within seconds he wants her and within days he can love her. But with the filth that was flung at him clinging, he also knows he can’t have her.
Since birth, Lexie Berry has been Lady Luck’s favorite toy and because of that, Lexie is cautious. But within a day, she senses Ty is something special. With her luck, however, she can’t trust it. Then she finds out what was done to Ty and she’s willing to do anything to make it right.
Even what Ty will never forgive her for doing.
Ty clings to vengeance and Lexie goes all out to give him back the time he lost. But Ty is battling demons within and he and Lexie are up against dirty cops and criminals who will stop at nothing to sway Lady Luck against them. All Ty and Lexie have is hope Lady Luck will finally swing their way.

Breathe

In order to protect a father he does not respect, in Lady Luck, we learned that good cop Chace Keaton went bad, sacrificing his career and his future. But when the local police department’s secrets are revealed and the wife he’s forced to marry is murdered, Chace finds himself the town of Carnal’s hero. Knowing how deep in the mud he was forced to sink, Chace feels he’ll never get clean. The quiet, content future he envisioned of the love a good woman with whom he could build a family was now beyond his reach. The only thing he can do is find his wife’s murderer.
But he isn’t the only one looking.
While searching for new leads, he runs into Faye Goodknight, the town’s quiet, shy, pretty librarian. Chace has long since had his eye on what could possibly be the town’s last remaining virgin but he has also long since given up hope he could make her his. Faye is pure and clean and Chace refuses to dirty her with his sordid past.
Pure and clean Faye may be, but when the shy librarian is forced to go head to head with the man who she’s had a crush on since he hit her hometown, Chace finds Faye is full of surprises. And he doesn’t know what to do with her.

Jagged

Introduced in The ‘Burg Series, For You, we learned that Graham Reece was connected with February Owens. Too late he learns he should have made his play. When he becomes the victim of the sick man obsessed with Feb and finds himself the recipient of a hatchet blow to the shoulder, Reece rethinks the way he led his life and the woman he let slip through his fingers.
As the traveling man recovers from a hatchet wound, he’s forced to sort through the string of casual relationships he’s had, and the woman he kept on the back burner, Zara Cinders. He heated things up with Zara only when he swung through town.
Or when she needed him.
And he knows she’s a good woman who could make him happy. But more, he’s found it’s time to end his aimless life and devote it to making her happy. So the minute he’s released from protective custody, he heads back to Gnaw Bone to do just that.
But while Reece has made his decision, Zara’s thought on her life too. And her life isn’t going all that well. She needs to focus on that downward spiral and stop focusing on men like Graham Reece…or any men at all.

Kaleidoscope

For years, Jacob Decker couldn’t get out of his mind the woman he let slip through his fingers.
The problem was, he was wrong about which woman he let get away.
But when he meets Emmanuelle Holmes again on a sidewalk in Gnaw Bone, Colorado, things quickly start becoming clearer. And Deck now has new problems seeing as Emme has a boyfriend. A boyfriend he instantly doesn’t like. A boyfriend he soon discovers there are a variety of reasons not to like.
That isn’t the only challenge Deck faces as he discovers his Emme is a puzzle he’s having trouble solving. Warm and sweet then distant and clueless, Emme holds Deck close even as she pushes him away.
But Deck doesn’t like unsolved puzzles. And he’ll stop at nothing to discover the solution to the mystery of Emmanuelle Holmes.

The Chaos Series

The Chaos Series is a spin-off of my Dream Man Series, taking us on the journeys of the lives and loves of the boys of the Chaos Motorcycle Club. Tune in here to get all the news on what’s happening at Ride!

Series Reading Order

Own the Wind

Tabitha Allen has a not-so-secret crush on Parker “Shy” Cage. Shy thinks he knows the path Tabby’s on and it isn’t a good one. So he decides to teach her a lesson to lead her to the right path. Unfortunately, he was wrong and his actions wound Tabby, breaking her heart. It’s Tabby who then teaches Shy a lesson about casting judgment and Shy Cage learns what it feels like to be invisible. But when tragedy strikes and Tabby’s heart is broken again, Shy does what he can in the background to help. Trying to forget her heartbreak, Tabby finds herself in danger. To keep it secret from her biker family, the Chaos Motorcycle Club, she calls Shy to rescue her.
But when she lets him back in, she gets much more than she bargained for.

Fire Inside

Lanie Heron isn’t looking for love—no surprise, considering her last serious relationship nearly got her killed. So when Lanie propositions Hop Kincaid, all she wants is one wild night with the hot-as-hell biker who patrols with the Chaos Motorcycle Club.
For Hop, Lanie has always been untouchable. She’s too polished and too classy for his tastes. But when she gives Hop the once-over with her bedroom eyes and offers him a night in paradise, he can’t say no. And he doesn’t regret it when he finds that Lanie is the best thing that’s ever happened to him—in or out of bed.
Now the trick will be to convince her of that.

Ride Steady

Once upon a time, Carissa Teodoro believed in happy endings. Money, marriage, motherhood: everything came easy–until she woke up to the ugly truth about her Prince Charming. Now a struggling single mom stranded by flat tire, Carissa’s pondering her mistake when a vaguely familiar knight rides to her rescue on a ton of horsepower.
In high school, Carson Steele was a bad boy loner who put Carissa on a pedestal where she stayed far beyond his reach. Today, he’s the hard-bodied biker known only as Joker, and from the way Carissa’s acting, it’s clear she’s falling fast. While catching her is irresistible, knowing what to do with her is a different story. A good girl like Carissa is the least likely fit with the Chaos Motorcycle Club. Too bad holding back is so damned hard. Now, as Joker’s secrets are revealed and an outside threat endangers the club, Joker must decide whether to ride steady with Carissa–or ride away forever…

Walk Through Fire

Millie Cross knows what it’s like to burn for someone. She was young and wild and he was fierce and even wilder – a Chaos biker who made her heart pound. They fell in love at first sight and life was good, until she learned she couldn’t be the woman he needed and she made it so he had no choice but to walk away. But after spending twenty years apart, a chance run-in sparks a desire she just can’t ignore…
Bad boy Logan “High” Judd has seen his share of troubles with the law. Yet it was one woman who broke him. After ending a loveless marriage, High is shocked when the love of his life walks back into his life. Millie is still gorgeous but she’s just a ghost of her former self. High’s intrigued at the change, but her betrayal cut him deep, and High doesn’t want to get burned again. As High sinks into meting out vengeance for Millie’s betrayal, he’ll break yet again when he realizes just how Millie walked through fire for her man.

The ‘Burg Series

Based in my hometown of Brownsburg, Indiana, The ‘Burg Series is six books following the interweaving tales of friends, family, love and crime in a small town.

Series Reading Order

For You

Lieutenant Alexander Colton and February Owens were high school sweethearts. Everyone in their small town knew from the moment they met they were meant for each other. But something happened and Feb broke Colt’s heart then she turned wild and tragedy struck. Colt meted out revenge against the man who brought Feb low but even though Colt risked it all for her, Feb turned her back on him and left town.
Fifteen years later, Feb comes back to help run the family bar. But there’s so much water under the bridge separating her and Colt everyone knows they’ll never get back together.
Until someone starts hacking up people in Feb’s life. Colt is still Colt and Feb is still Feb so the town watches as Colt goes all out to find the murderer while trying to keep Feb safe.
As the bodies pile up, The Feds move in and a twisting, turning story unravels exposing a very sick man who has claimed numerous victims along the way, Feb and Colt battle their enduring attraction and the beautiful but lost history that weaves them together.

At Peace

Violet Winters and her daughters once had it all, but lost it when Lieutenant Tim Winters was murdered by a criminal madman.
Over a year later, during a cold winter night, cop’s widow, Violet, has to leave her warm bed to tell her neighbor to turn the music down.
And that’s when she meets sinister, scarred, scarily attractive security specialist, Joe Callahan.
She wants to deny it, but she can’t beat back the hunger she feels for Joe so she gives in again, and again, and again. Feeling it himself, Joe feeds Vi’s hunger, breaking his own rules to keep her in his bed.
Even though Violet had only one man in her life, she’s sure Joe is giving her the signals and Vi decides she’s ready to take a second chance at life and, maybe, love.
But Violet doesn’t know the dark secrets in Joe’s past, secrets so soul-wrenching, they’ve drained him dry. With nothing left to give, Joe’s determined to live his life alone.
But Violet’s husband’s murderer is obsessed with her and heartbreak again haunts the door of the Winters girls. When it does Joe is forced to face the knowledge that he can’t fight the combined pull of Violet and her daughters, they’ve gotten under his skin and filled him full to bursting.
Joe needs to win them back and put his life on the line to keep Violet safe.
But, having had it all twice, can Violet endure losing Joe?

Golden Trail

Tanner Layne and Raquel Merrick fell in love young, hard and fast and both of them knew a beautiful life they thought would be forever.
Until Rocky left Layne, no explanation, no going back.
Layne escapes the ‘burg only to come back years later because his ex-wife has hooked herself to the town jerk and Layne needs to make sure his sons get raised right. Layne manages to avoid Rocky. But when Layne gets three bullets drilled into him while investigating a dirty cop, he can’t do that because Rocky stops avoiding Layne. They make a deal to work together to expose the dirty cop but they have no idea the strength of their enduring attraction or the sheer evil at work in the ‘burg.
As Tanner Layne and Raquel Merrick play their game and dance around the pull that draws them together, Layne has to discover the dark secrets buried so deep in Rocky’s heart she doesn’t even know they’re there at the same time untangle a sinister web of crime so abhorrent it has to be stopped…at all costs.
And to do it, Layne has to enlist everyone, including his ex-CIA mentor, Rocky’s detective brother, the town’s unpredictable informant and Layne’s two teenage sons. All the while stopping Rocky from doing something crazy and keeping their game secret so Layne won’t get himself dead.

Games of the Heart

From the balcony of his house, Mike Haines can see the quiet, commonplace beauty of the Holliday farm. But what he remembers is Dusty, the little sister of his high school girlfriend, who grew up there. As a teen, Dusty had gone off the rails but when she was a kid, she was sweet, she was funny and she had a special bond with Mike. After high school, she took off and Mike never saw her again.
Tragedy strikes Dusty’s family and she comes back to town. Mike thinks she hasn’t changed back to the sweet, funny girl he knew but instead continued to be selfish and thoughtless, leaving her family alone to deal with their mourning. He seeks her out and confronts her in an effort to understand what went wrong and to force her to sort herself out.
He finds out quickly he’s wrong about Dusty Holliday. Very wrong. After Mike discovers that, the bond they had years before snaps back into place in ways he would never suspect.
But Mike Haines had a bad marriage and then he played games of the heart for a good woman…and lost. In order to protect himself and his kids, he’s cautious, he’s careful to read the signs and he’s not interested in finding a woman he has to fix.
When he learns what happened to Dusty, he thinks she needs to be fixed.
He swings, he misses and in this new game of hearts, Mike just got strike three.

The Promise

Since his brother’s death, Benny Bianchi has been nursing his grudge against the woman he thinks led to his brother’s downfall. He does this to bury the feelings he has for Francesca Concetti, his brother’s girl. But when Frankie takes a bullet while on the run with Benny’s cousin’s woman, Benny has to face those feelings.
The problem is Frankie has decided she’s paid her penance. Penance she didn’t deserve to pay. She’s done with Benny and the Bianchi family. She’s starting a new life away from Chicago and her heartbreaking history.
Benny has decided differently.
But Frankie has more demons she’s battling. Demons Benny wants to help her face. But life has landed so many hard knocks on Frankie she’s terrified of believing in the promise of Benny Bianchi and the good life he’s offering.
Frankie’s new life leads her to The ‘Burg, where Benny has ties, and she finds she not only hasn’t succeeded in getting away, she’s doesn’t want to.

Hold On

Since she was young, Cher Rivers knew she was not the kind of girl who got what she wanted. A girl who could hope. A girl who could dream. She knew a happily ever after just wasn’t in the cards for her.
In love for years with the last bastion of the ‘burg’s eligible bachelors, Garrett Merrick, Cher worked hard at making him laugh. Being one of the guys. Having him in her life the only way she could. All this knowing he was in love with another woman.
The Merrick Family is known for loving deep. So when Cecelia Merrick was murdered, it marked the Merricks in a way none of them recovered. Both Cecelia’s children found love. Both turned their backs on it. But Garrett “Merry” Merrick knew in his soul the woman he divorced years ago was the one for him.
Until the night when Cher took Garrett’s back and things changed. The Merrick family loves deep. They also protect fiercely. And with his eyes finally open, Garrett sees the woman who truly is for him and he goes after her. The problem is she’s surrounded by danger. So he has to win her at the same time keep her safe.

The Unfinished Hero Series

The Unfinished Hero Series are not my usual steamy romances, they are erotic romances. Not erotica, as such, but the sex in these books, starting with Knight, is quite explicit and explores the intricacies of love and trust in a relationship, including sexually.
That said, these are love stories. It isn’t about sex, it is about happily ever after. As always.
And last, one final warning, the heroes of these books are anti-heroes. They are good men who do bad things. They have their reasons. They have their own codes. They may seek (and find) redemption. Or they may not. They simply are who they are, do what they do, and find love along the way.

Knight

Anya Gage has learned that to get anything good in life, you have to work for it. She has no expectations, no dreams.
Then she finds herself at a party where she doesn’t want to be…and she meets Knight.
Knight Sebring knows who he is, what he wants and what he likes. And he gets it. But he never expected something as sweet as Anya Gage to wander into his bedroom­ – during a party he did not expect to be having – to borrow his phone.
Knight tries to leave Anya to the life she deserves of white picket fences and a man who watches football on Sundays – good, normal and clean. But when Anya comes to his nightclub and finds herself in a situation, he knows someone has to look after her. He can’t fight it anymore, and he decides that man will be him.
Knight teaches Anya that, just as with the bad, in life you should also expect the good. And he teaches her this by giving it to her.
But Knight has a dark past and just as he desires Anya for exactly who she is, he fears when she finds out exactly the man he has become and always intends to be, she’ll leave him for good, normal and clean.

Creed

Way too young, eleven year old Tucker Creed and his six year old neighbor, Sylvie Bissenette, find they have something awful in common. Creed then decides he’s going to do everything in his limited power to shield his Sylvie from her ordeal. So he does, and Creed and Sylvie form a bond that grows and blossoms with their ages.
They plot to leave their lives behind. The town they live in that will hold them down and the histories they share that, unless they break free, will bury them. Sylvie goes to their special place, Creed never shows and she doesn’t see him again until it’s too late.
With Creed gone, Sylvie is forced to endure a nightmare and do the unspeakable to end it. To deal, she develops a hard shell with sharp edges that very few can break through. When Creed again finds his Sylvie, he discovers the girl he loved is locked away and he has to find his way back into her heart without getting shredded in the process.

Raid

Hanna Boudreaux has lived in the small town of Willow, Colorado all her life. The great-granddaughter of the town matriarch, she’s sweet, cute and quiet.
Too quiet.
Hanna has a moment of epiphany when she realizes her crush for forever, Raiden Ulysses Miller, is not ever going to be hers. She sees her life as narrow and decides to do something about it.
Raiden Miller is the town of Willow’s local hero. A former marine with the medal to prove his hero status, he comes home, shrouded in mystery. It takes a while but, eventually, Hanna catches his eye.
But after all these years of Raid and Hanna living in the same town, the question is, why? Is Raid interested in Hanna because she’s sweet and cute? Or does Raid have something else going on?

Deacon

New York Times, USA Today, and #1 IndieReader Bestseller!
Deacon has an ugly history, a history that broke him, leaving him a ghost of a man. Out of necessity, he left the normal world to descend into the criminal world and found he fit. So he stayed. Cold as ice and living off the grid, Deacon has no intention to connect, not with anyone.
Then he returns to some remote cabins in the Colorado Mountains and finds they have new owners. One of them is Cassidy Swallow, a young woman willing to work hard to live her quiet dream in a house by a river surrounded by aspen and pine.
Suddenly, Deacon finds he’s at war. Cassidy’s pull for him to connect is strong. He fights it, but he loses, always coming back for more. But when he does, he gives her nothing.
From the first time she sees him, Cassidy knows Deacon is dead inside. She knows he’s the kind of man who could destroy a woman. But one night when Deacon’s control slips, Cassidy takes a chance.
He might break her. He also might be her dream come true.

The Magdalene Series

The Magdalene Series is a new series starting in 2014 (I know, I’m crazy, but there it is…these stories have to be told). It will be a trilogy of romances set in the fictional town of Magdalene, Maine.

The Will

Early in her life, Josephine Malone learned the hard way that there was only one person she could love and trust: her grandmother, Lydia Malone. Out of necessity, unconsciously and very successfully, Josephine donned a disguise to keep all others at bay. She led a globetrotting lifestyle on the fringes of the fashion and music elite, but she kept herself distant.
While Josephine was trotting the globe, retired boxer Jake Spear was living in the same small town as Lydia. There was nothing disguised about Jake. Including the fact he made a habit of making very bad decisions about who to give his love.
But for Josephine and Jake, there was one person who adored them. One person who knew how to lead them to happiness. And one person who was intent on doing it.
Even if she had to do it as her final wish on this earth.

Soaring

American heiress Amelia Hathaway needs to start anew.
Her husband cheated on her, and when everything she wanted in life slipped through her fingers, she fell apart. When she did, she took another heart wrenching hit as she lost the respect of her children.
When her ex took her family from California to live in the small town of Magdalene in Maine, Amelia decided it was time to sort herself out. In order to do that and win her children back, she moves to Cliff Blue, an architectural masterpiece on the rocky coast of Magdalene.
Her boxes aren’t even unpacked when she meets Mickey Donovan, a man who lives across the street, a man so beautiful Amelia takes one look at Mickey and knows she wants it all from him.
The problem is, she finds out swiftly that he’s friendly, he’s kind, but he doesn’t want that back.
Amelia struggles to right past wrongs in her life at the same time find out who she wants to be. She also struggles with her attraction to the handsome firefighter who lives across the street.
But Amelia will face a surprise when her friendly neighbor becomes not-so-friendly. As Amelia and Mickey go head to head, Amelia must focus on winning back the hearts of her children.
She soon discovers she also must focus on winning the heart of a handsome firefighter who understands down to his soul that the beautiful heiress who lives across the street is used to a life he cannot provide.