“Yeah, so was I but you seem to have forgotten that part of your life.” The bet was simple. You draw a name from the hat. That’s the girl you have to seduce. The girl you have to make fall head over heels in love with you. It wasn’t hard for me to do, in fact, it was something I did all the time. I was known for breaking hearts. Sex was just that, sex. And it didn’t take me very long to get a woman on her back. And then I drew her name: Jules Peterson. My former best friend. My first kiss. My first love. She shattered my heart into a million pieces three years ago. She left me right when I needed her most. And as fate who have it, she had entered my life once again, at almost the perfect time. She was a transfer, fresh meat, and she had just put a target on her back. It was my turn to make her pay. It was my turn to break her heart. Holding onto that hate, that anger, that f*cking heartbreak. It does something to you. It breaks you, and it broke me, it tainted me, just like I would do to Jules. She used to be my everything, but now she was nothing but The Bet. **The Bet is book one in the North Woods University series. It is a full length, standalone, novel. It contains adult themes, and content not suitable for all readers. It is NOT a young adult novel.**Dear Reader, We're so happy that you are thinking about reading our newest book The Bet. We hope you enjoy it to your fullest and we cannot wait to read your reviews on it. However, we wanted to leave a little note to warn readers with sensitivity to dubious content, sexual themes, and verbal abuse. For those readers, this book may not be a good read for them. We also would like to say that while the book is entirely fiction we know that abuse, sexual, physical, and verbal is a very real thing in our world and that we do NOT condone any behavior of that nature nor do we think that it's okay to treat someone that way. Just like the makers of gory horror movies dont actually want people to be brutally murdered, we do not want anyone to be bullied or abused in any way.Again, this is fiction and while we don't always agree with the things our fictional characters do, sometimes it works for a story line. As writers, it is our job to draw out real emotions. Sometimes we will make you fall in love with a character and other times we might have you yelling at the book. With love, J.L. Beck & C. Hallman

     Growing up, Ramsey Stewart branded my soul in ways time could never heal. At twelve, he asked me to be his girlfriend. At thirteen, he gave me my first kiss. By sixteen, we’d fallen in love, planned a future together, and had our eyes set on the horizon. Love never fails, right? But for Ramsey, it did. Love failed him. I failed him. The entire world failed him. At seventeen, Ramsey was convicted of killing the boy who assaulted me. Move on, he wrote in his first and only letter from prison. Start a new life, he urged. I don’t love you anymore, he lied. There was no such thing as giving up on Ramsey. Love may have been our curse, but he was mine—then, now, and forever. So here I am, twelve long years later, waiting for a man I don't even know to emerge from between the chain link gates.

    (Yes, I’m well aware that’s not the actual definition, but it might as well be . . .) It’s been ten years since we've seen each other and the feelings are still as strong. I’m not going to bore you with all the details of how our love was once intoxicating, consuming, and perfect. Because it was . . . until it wasn't. I've been fine without him. I haven’t missed his cruelty, his coldness and his spite. And after the ugliest breakup in the history of breakups, I forced myself to move on. Year by year, the feelings I had for him slowly drifted away, but one encounter with him recently changed everything. One encounter made me realize how the heart doesn't forget shit, and how my mind is going to have to work overtime to make sure I never forget my definition of resentment.

    And one of them is my brother-in-law.He’s my drug. My fire. My addiction.But he’s married to my best friend. And I’m married to my husband.I’m not ashamed. I have no guilt.None.I’m not fucked. I’m a fucked up person.This is the story of how I ruined my life.And the life of the one I loved most.

     Daisy Smith has spent eighteen months of her life paying for a crime she didn’t commit. Now out of prison, she has only one focus—to get back custody of her younger brother, Jesse, who is deep in the foster care system. Desperate to rebuild her life and show the system that she is responsible enough to care for Jesse, she takes on the only job available to her—working as a maid at the Matis Estate. On day one of her new job, Daisy meets Kastor Matis, the only son of the owners and her new boss. An enigmatic, handsome Greek god of a man, Kas is closed off, cold, and…well, kind of a bastard. The more time Daisy spends around Kas, she starts to see there might be more to him than just his cold, bastard ways. He may actually have a heart beating in that frozen chest of his. But Kas has secrets, too. Secrets that he’s determined to keep. Secrets make Daisy curious. And you know what curiosity can do…

    They never imagined the future could hold anything other than together-forever. When Lea's father dies in a tragic fishing accident, she's crushed under the weight of her grief and catches a glimpse of another type of future, one she knows she's not strong enough to face. Austin is angry. For the past fifteen years, he's believed the woman he loved with every ounce of his soul left him without so much as a backwards glance. When Lea unexpectedly returns to their hometown, all the years of heartache inside Austin bubbles to the surface and presents itself as blinding rage. Faced with the truth about the past, a newly discovered secret, these former lovers will learn that if they want to have any chance at the future they'd given up on all those years ago, they will have to rescue one another from drowning in pain so debilitating it will leave them both fighting to breathe. Contains mature themes.

    What she doesn’t have—and doesn’t want—is a husband. Fifteen years ago her high school flame broke her heart so badly she swore she’d never love again. Drop-dead sexy restauranteur and infamous playboy Parker Maxwell has only three rules for the women he dates: no questions about his past, no expectations for the future, and no spending the night. When he meets Victoria, however, he’s willing to break his own rules if it means sating the explosive desire she arouses in him. What he doesn’t know is that the alluring Victoria Price used to be the mousy Isabel Diaz, the girl he deflowered and dumped long ago. Presented with a perfect opportunity for revenge, Victoria decides the game is on. But when her connection with Parker proves more than just skin deep, she has to make a choice: continue with her plan for payback, or risk her career, her reputation, and her heart by taking a second chance on love?

    A fairy tale that had girls pretending they were the fairest, the most beautiful, and the most entitled. A fairy tale most couldn’t grow out of turned my haunted childhood memories into a living nightmare. Girls who grew up believing that pile of garbage became the meanest of all ‘mean girls.’And those mean girls were right – it was a line meant for all the beautiful people in the world – and I knew the answer would never be me.The women with long legs, flat stomachs, and perfect chests.The type of women Kane Masters gravitated toward.Well, that’s definitely not Willow Tate.No. That will never be me.Because I’m completely imperfect.And … I hate myself.I have no idea what Kane could possibly see in someone like me when he could have them.

    Doing it when you’re haunted by past betrayal and so many things left unsaid?Feels nearly hopeless. Is it impossible to come back from so much anguish and all the regrets? Can you ever truly mend your heart and move on?Or are Penelope and Linc destined for a life of punishment and pain?They're about to find out whether the line between love and hate is clear. And if moving on after loss and the sting of deception is even possible.

    And the secret society that meets deep in the woods is even more exclusive. Only a select few will get in during the summer rush--and Cadee Hunter wants to be one of them. Too bad it's Cooper Valcourt's mission to make sure she fails. Bully boys.Arrogant tyrants.Blue-blood bastards.Call them whatever you want.Around here, we just call them Kings.Fancy boats.Lakeside mansions.Luxe watches and bespoke suits.The Kings of High Court College act like Gods.And Cooper Valcourt is the worst of them.He is the bully king.His family owns everything.And his mission is to put me in my place and send me packing.But Cooper and I have a history filled with secrets.And everyone knows that power doesn’t come from having money.It comes from holding secrets.And I’m holding one of his.A very dark secret that can bring him to his knees.***** Bully King is new-adult, dark, bully romance from New York Times bestselling author JA Huss featuring boys with power and girls at their mercy. It’s a campus shrouded in lies and a summer rush into an elite society that can propel a poor girl straight into the ruling class.If… she’s willing to pay the price.

    Robinson comes this standalone contemporary romance full of feels and angst... In a world where I had no say, violence became my refuge, and nothing else mattered. Not even my own life. Until her. Skyler Bell. It all started the first time I heard that voice. Giving me hope for tomorrow. My first love was everything all at once. Consuming. Maddening. Forever. Mine. Except, I never imagined there were secrets that needed to be shared. Lies that needed to be confessed. Truths that needed to be told. Demons that needed to be buried. Once I realized the depth, the longing, the sadness and sorrow in her eyes mirrored mine, it was too late. Love didn't come to me as heartbreak, it came as everything I've ever wanted. Walking away wasn't an option, but it was the only choice I had. I finally found the price of love and it cost me... My soul.

    They're the ones with experience. The ones with secrets. The ones that exude sex just by saying your name.From the minute I laid eyes on Lorenzo, I knew he wasn't just bad news. He was the headline.My opinion didn't change on our second meeting. Or our third. But my head and my heart are at war. He’s too mysterious, too gorgeous, too wild, and now, he wants me. I should run far away. So why am I racing toward him? I’m totally going to get burned. I know it. A man like Lorenzo won’t leave me unscathed.He'll make ashes of me.

    Sela Halstead lost her innocence in a way that no sixteen-year-old should ever have to endure. She’s spent years trying to forget that night even while wondering about the identities of the monsters who brutalized her—until a telltale tattoo flashes across Sela’s TV screen. The incriminating ink belongs to Jonathon Townsend, the millionaire founder of The Sugar Bowl, a website that matches rich older men with impressionable young women. Obsessed with revenge, Sela infiltrates Townsend’s world, only to come face-to-face with a tantalizing complication: Beckett North, his charismatic business partner. The tech mastermind behind The Sugar Bowl, Beck always gets what he wants, in business and in bed. And yet, for a man who’s done every dirty thing imaginable, there’s something about the naïve, fresh-faced Sela that sparks his hottest fantasies. Because with her, it’s not just about sex. Beck opens up to her in ways he never has with other girls. So why does he get the feeling that she’s hiding something? In a world of pleasure and power, the shocking truth could turn them against each other—or bind them forever. Note: Sugar Daddy ends on a cliffhanger. Sela and Beck’s story continues in Sugar Rush and Sugar Free!

    I like to think it was more.We lived on nothing but the excitement of finding ourselves through music (you were obsessed with Jeff Buckley), photography (I couldn’t stop taking pictures of you), hanging out in Washington Square Park, and all the weird things we did to make money. I learned more about myself that year than any other.Yet, somehow, it all fell apart. We lost touch the summer after graduation when I went to South America to work for National Geographic. When I came back, you were gone. A part of me still wonders if I pushed you too hard after the wedding…I didn’t see you again until a month ago. It was a Wednesday. You were rocking back on your heels, balancing on that thick yellow line that runs along the subway platform, waiting for the F train. I didn’t know it was you until it was too late, and then you were gone. Again. You said my name; I saw it on your lips. I tried to will the train to stop, just so I could say hello.After seeing you, all of the youthful feelings and memories came flooding back to me, and now I’ve spent the better part of a month wondering what your life is like. I might be totally out of my mind, but would you like to get a drink with me and catch up on the last decade and a half?MFrom the USA TODAY bestselling author of Sweet Thing and Nowhere But Here comes a love story about a Craigslist “missed connection” post that gives two people a second chance at love fifteen years after they were separated in New York City.

    She hides beneath her beautiful mask, never revealing her true self to the world... until she comes face-to-face with her new photographer — sexy, possessive Jude Anderson. It's clear from the first time she meets him that she's playing by his rules. He says jump, she asks how high. He tells her to unzip her cream Dior gown; she knows she has to comply. But what if she wants him to take charge outside of the studio as well?Jude Anderson has a strict "no model" dating policy. But everything about Charley sets his body on fire. When a tropical photo shoot in Hawaii forces the stubborn pair into sexually charged situations, their chemistry can no longer be ignored. They’ll have to decide if they’re willing to break their rules and leave the past behind or if they’ll stay consumed by their demons forever. Will Jude persuade Charley to give in to her deepest desires?**Recommended for ages 17+ due to language and sexual situations.**