Book picks similar to
Rules of Engagement by Lily White
suspense
arc
romance
dark
You Loved Me At My Darkest
Evie Harper - 2014
Kidnapped by a rich madman, Sasha is sold into slavery, while Lily is forced to join The Collection, a unique bevy of exotic beauties enduring frequent horrors at the hands of elite bidders. However, no amount of pain and suffering will break Lily, who will stop at nothing to save her younger sister. Possibly with help from an unlikely ally.Love is stronger than loyalty…Attempting to prove his allegiance to his employer, Jake is tasked with guarding the unruly and uncontrollable Lily. He can’t afford to help her in her quest to free Sasha—not if he hopes to fulfill his own agenda. But in their dark, gritty, tension-filled world, solace is taken wherever it’s found. Bonds are formed and hearts engage despite Jake’s resistance and both their attempts at self-preservation.When certain secrets come to light, the resulting explosion has breathtakingly bittersweet consequences that, by the end, may not leave everyone whole…or alive.
Gun Shy
Lili St. Germain - 2017
The second girl in nine years. Identical cases. Identical conditions. Only last time, the girl was found. Dead, stuffed in a well beside the creek that feeds the town's water supply. The killer was never found. As the small town mobilizes and searches for newly vanished Jennifer Thomas, one suspect comes to the fore. But did he do it? Or is there something else at play? Something nobody could have anticipated? For Jennifer's friend Cassie Carlino, the worst is yet to come. As she pins MISSING posters to store windows and joins the search, she begins to suspect that Jennifer's disappearance might be much closer to her than she could have ever imagined.
That Which Destroys Me
Kimber S. Dawn - 2014
Love, happiness, and fairy tales… Yeah, they don't live here anymore. The only things residing amongst these thin and baren walls are Dominance, submission, and twisted obsession. Stella gets knocked down over and over throughout her life… Though she is bloodied and battered she stands back up every single time, smirks and nods before asking, "That all you got?". Wesley has shoved his way through the rich life with both middle fingers up. He's also shoved his way through half of the socialite population, but all that vanilla lifestyle has left him a starved man. He knows he can't keep his Dom fed with kinky little masochistic vanilla's anymore. On his mission to find the perfect sub, Wesley stumbles across a broken, shattered angel, only to find when she comes up swinging, that this little angel knows how to fight. He wants to be the one who breaks her… But it's not a question of who breaks her, the question is who destroys her. “We will fight, angel. We’ll fight hard. But it’ll be worth every strike below the belt. Every hateful or spiteful word said, because when we love, when we fuck, when our passion reaches an intensity so goddamn powerful like it has every single time, it’ll extinguish all the bad. I want all your hate, Stell… Just as much as I want all your love. We are doing this. And there isn’t a damn thing you can do to stop it, angel. Is that understood?” ***Be Prepared to Expect the UNEXPECTED*** ***This is a story of perseverance, trying to overcome the transgressions that others inflict upon you, it’s a story of love gone wrong and obsession gone mad. This book contains explicit descriptions of violence, disturbing situations, and very strong language. This book is intended for MATURE AUDIENCE MEMBERS ONLY, and NOT intended for the weak at heart.***
Rough Edge
C.D. Reiss - 2018
He has a surgical residency, and she has a psychiatric practice in the basement of their Manhattan brownstone.Everything is going to be fine.Caden loves his wife more than he can measure. But soon after she comes home, he starts hearing whispers. Someone else loves her. Someone else wants her. There's someone else, and though whoever's behind the whispers will move mountains to have her, Caden will move heaven and earth to keep her.Everything is going to hell.Greyson will never break her vows, even as their marriage snaps apart one piece at a time; even as the line between dreams and reality blurs. Even as Caden demands control, and Greyson cedes it, she will never, ever turn her back on him.When their marriage crumbles, love becomes the one thing holding them together.The Edge series:Cutting Edge (free prequel)Rough EdgeOn the EdgeBroken EdgeOver the Edge
He Hates Me
Rina Kent - 2020
The entire duet will be released two weeks apart.
Hate Me
Ashley Jade - 2021
The bully you can't run away from. I'm the tormentor who makes your life a living hell. The villain you love to hate.I'm the vicious stepbrother sleeping in the next room.The one who knows all your secrets. And I'll stop at nothing to make you pay.WARNING: This book is recommended for mature readers due to graphic language, sexual content, and dark elements.
Shades
Jaime Reese - 2018
After hunting monsters for over twenty years, he lives under no illusions of happily ever afters and fairy tales. Until he meets a man who threatens to disarm him, by giving him hope for a future and showing him there’s more to life than just death.For Nick, living in shadows is second nature. He’s all too familiar with the dark side of humanity and knows how delicate life can be. Each new day is a gift, even though it means doing it alone. But he’ll risk his survival for the one man who awakens something deep within and leaves him yearning for more.Nick wants to solve the mystery behind the dark, brooding man, while Killian craves the life and light emanating from Nick. They soon discover they have more in common than either could have anticipated. With both their lives and hearts at stake, they must confront the ghost from Nick’s past intent on tying up a loose end. Only then will they truly find peace, and discover the shades of life in between.
Where the Blame Lies
Mia Sheridan - 2019
Zach was just a rookie on the perimeter of that case, but he’s never forgotten the traumatized woman with the haunted eyes.As more information emerges, the crimes take on an even more sinister similarity. But Josie’s attacker died by suicide. Does the city have a copycat on its hands? A killer who picked up where the original perpetrator left off? Or are they facing something far more insidious?Josie has spent the last eight years attempting to get her life back on track, but now there’s a very real chance she could be the unknown suspect’s next target. As Zach vows to keep her safe, and Josie finds herself responding to him in a way she hasn’t responded to any man in almost a decade, the investigation takes on an even more complex edge of danger.As past and present collide, Josie and Zach are thrust toward a shocking and chilling truth. A revelation that threatens not only Josie’s life, but everything she’s been fighting so desperately to reclaim.
Mine to Take
Cynthia Eden - 2013
Not just watching - stalking her. Months ago, Skye was involved in a dangerous car accident. The accident ended her dancing career and sent her fleeing back to Chicago. Skye is convinced that her stalker caused the crash, and she fears that he won’t stop pursuing her, not until she’s dead.When someone breaks into her apartment in Chicago, Skye turns to the one man she believes can protect her - Trace Weston. Once, Trace was her lover. Two lost souls, they’d come together in a firestorm of need and desire. But then Trace had pushed her away. He’d joined the military, vanishing from her life. She’d put all of her emotion into dancing, and she’d tried to forget him.Now Trace is one of the most successful men in the United States. Rich, driven, and carrying dark secrets, he agrees to help Skye. He’ll protect her from the danger that lurks in the darkness, but Trace wants more than to just be a guard for Skye.He wants her. And he’ll take her. The years have changed him, hardened him. He’s not just a poor kid from the streets any longer. Now, he can have anything - or anyone - that he wants. And the one woman he has always wanted has just come back into his life. He won’t let her go again.But with the threats mounting against Skye, she suspects that her stalker may be intimately close. He’s a man who knows her too well. As his attacks grow ever more dangerous, she realizes that if she trusts the wrong man, she could be making a fatal mistake.Lust. Love. Obsession.Just how far would you go in order to possess the one person you want the most?Author's Note: MINE TO TAKE is a sexy romantic suspense novella—it contains approximately 41,000 words. MINE TO TAKE is intended for adults. Sexy situations and adult language will be found within the pages of this story - please consider yourself warned.
This Love Hurts
W. Winters - 2020
Some love stories are a slow burn. Others are quick to ignite, scorching and branding your very soul before you’ve taken that first breath. You’re never given a chance to run from it. That’s how I’d describe what happened to us.Everything around me blurred and all that existed were his lips, his touch… The chase and the heat between us became addictive.Our nights together were a distraction; one we craved to the point of letting the world crumble around us.We should have paid attention; we should have known that it would come to this.We both knew it couldn’t last, but that didn’t change what we desired most. All we wanted was each other…
Unloved
Katy Regnery - 2017
My name is Cassidy Porter...My father, Paul Isaac Porter, was executed twenty years ago for the brutal murder of twelve innocent girls.Though I was only eight-years-old at the time, I am aware - every day of my life - that I am his child, his only son.To protect the world from the poison in my veins, I live a quiet life, off the grid, away from humanity.I promised myself, and my mother, not to infect innocent lives with the darkness that swirls within me, waiting to make itself known.It's a promise I would have kept...if Brynn Cadogan hadn't stumbled into my life.Now I exist between heaven and hell: falling for a woman who wants to love me, while all along reminding myself that I must remain...Unloved.**NOTE: This book is intended for readers 18+**
Enemies and Playmates
Darcia Helle - 2009
Lauren Covington's family maintains a grand facade that belies the life they live behind closed doors. Alex Covington, Lauren's father, keeps a tight rein on his family through dominance, abuse, and obsessive control. Consequently, Lauren doesn't believe she could ever trust a man, much less fall in love with one. When Lauren meets Jesse Ryder, her carefully constructed protective wall shatters. She falls hopelessly and completely in love. It's only fitting that Jesse is a private detective who had once worked for her father, had defied him, and was now the subject of Alex Covington's wrath. Amidst devastating loss, betrayal, and her father's destructive pursuit of Jesse, Lauren finds the trust and love she had always longed for.
The Bourbon Thief
Tiffany Reisz - 2016
The only item stolen—a million-dollar bottle of bourbon. The thief, a mysterious woman named Paris, claims the bottle is rightfully hers. After all, the label itself says it's property of the Maddox family who owned and operated Red Thread Bourbon distillery since the last days of the Civil War until the company went out of business for reasons no one knows… No one except Paris. In the small hours of a Louisville morning, Paris unspools the lurid tale of Tamara Maddox, heiress to the distillery that became an empire. But the family tree is rooted in tainted soil and has borne rotten fruit. Theirs is a legacy of wealth and power, but also of lies, secrets and sins of omission. The Maddoxes have bourbon in their blood—and blood in their bourbon. Why Paris wants the bottle of Red Thread remains a secret until the truth of her identity is at last revealed, and the century-old vengeance Tamara vowed against her family can finally be completed.
The Girl in the Mist
Kristen Ashley - 2022
Her security team has suggested a house by a lake. Secluded. Private. Far away. In a beautiful area of the Northwest close to the sleepy town of Misted Pines. It's perfect. So perfect, Delphine has just moved in, and she's thinking she'll stay there forever.Until she sees the girl in the mist.After that, everything changes.Delphine quickly learns that Misted Pines isn't so sleepy. A little girl has gone missing, and the town is in the grips of terror and tragedy. The local sheriff isn't up for the job. The citizens are up in arms. And as the case unfolds, the seedy underbelly of a quiet community is exposed, layer by layer.But most importantly, girls are dying.There seems to be only one man they trust to find out what's happening.The mysterious Cade Bohannan.