Book picks similar to
Beastly by Laura Belle Peters
romance
abuse
arc
dark
This is War, Baby
K. Webster - 2016
Until he invaded it and stole it all away. My captor took me and I became a pawn. His strategy changed and he sent me away to WAR, because money is everything in this world. In my WAR, though, I found peace. I couldn’t help but find love where I least expected it, with a man who lived a battle every day of his life…all inside his head. But then my captor came back for me.Yet, this time, battle lines had been drawn and I was protected.So we thought.Even though my WAR was raging,my captor would fight to the death.The good guys always win, right?Not always.All’s fair in love and WAR, right? Not this time.***WARNING***This is War, Baby is a dark romance. A really dark one. So dark you’re going to wish you had a flashlight to see yourself to the end and someone to hold your hand. Human trafficking, dubious consent, and strong sexual themes that could trigger emotional distress are found in this story. This story is NOT for everyone.
Screaming in the Silence
Lydia Kelly - 2010
While hitchhiking across the country, she and her companion are struck by a car. Her friend is killed but Raleigh survives and her life is thrown into the hands of the three men involved in the accident. Bruised and in shock, Raleigh is locked in the basement of their remote country house, unsure of her fate. Kaden, one of her captors, is handsome and at times protective, and he convinces his friends to spare Raleigh’s life to ransom her. But the safety he provides is only from his friends, and Raleigh must face his sinister intentions. Agreeing to become his lover in return for continued protection, she begins to see a tender and caring side of Kaden despite their short but violent history. As the ransom payment begins to unravel and Raleigh's life hangs in the balance, she wonders how much she can trust Kaden. Are the feelings she has developed for him genuine or a result of her situation? Does he truly care for her, as he claims, or does he just see her as a ransom payment?
Madeleine Abducted
M.S. Willis - 2013
As Maddy learns to save herself… She becomes the one thing that could set the son free. Madeleine Clark was raised to become a concert cellist. Sheltered and naïve, she remains hidden behind her music, a protection from the world around her. On the night of her first solo performance, Maddy accepts the admiration of a stranger and finds herself captive in a cruel and twisted power struggle between a sadistic father and his son, Aaron. Seemingly dangerous and uncaring, Aaron manages the business operations of his father’s estate. Wanting nothing to do with the slaves kept at the Estate, Aaron refuses to take part in the deeper depravities of his father. Despite his resistance, Aaron’s father ‘gifts’ him with a petite, brunette woman he can’t refuse. A bond forged in conspiracy and deceit, Aaron struggles to save Maddy by teaching her to survive in the world in which he’d been raised. An unlikely union, Aaron soon learns that great strengths can exist within small packages, while Madeleine learns that love and light can exist in the darkest of places.
Stay
Emily Goodwin - 2014
When I jumped, sharp teeth would rip into me and the cold water would steal my breath away. The monsters would take everything from me, leaving me shivering and naked in the water. The only difference was that tonight I would be pulled from the icy darkness and forced to do it again. There would be no release from death, only pain.” Home after her first year of college, Adeline Miller is looking forward to a stress free summer filled with reading, working on her blog, and spending time with friends. But all that changes in an instant when she is witness to something terrible, something she wasn't supposed to see. Beaten, drugged, kidnapped. Adeline Miller is ripped from her innocent and carefree life and thrust into darkness, into a world full of pain and horror. As a sex slave, she is forced to do horrible things, and have horrible things done to her. One of her captors has a past as dark as the world she is now living in. Will getting close to him mean freedom? Or will he pull her deeper into the shadows?
The Beast
Jaden Wilkes - 2014
From the rough streets of Moscow to the highest ranks in the Solntsevskaya Bratva, he has seen it all.An attack four years ago left him disfigured and in seclusion, hiding from reactions to his appearance and in safety from those who failed to kill him the first time.Comfortable in his penthouse, managing his billion dollar businesses, he's resigned himself to be alone, simply called The Beast among those who've dealt with him in the past.Columbia Grey is a pseudo-activist trying to save her neighbourhood from a developer intent on levelling it to build apartment towers. She goes along with a plan to confront the CEO of the company on his own turf, to force him to listen to her demands...all in a pathetic attempt to impress a man she barely likes.Little does she know, she's taken herself into the mouth of the beast, a man familiar with death and destruction, sex and seduction, a man used to getting exactly what he wants and a man with nothing left to lose.She's a beauty, but will that be enough to tame the beast and save her life?*** This is not a fairy tale, this is what happens when the music ends and life goes on after the credits roll. This is about simply existing until you find yourself and write your own happily ever after, no matter what form it takes.
The Fallen: Genesis
Tillie Cole - 2019
*****THE FALLEN: GENESIS (A Deadly Virtues Prequel)IN THE BEGINNING...They told them they were evil.They told them they were possessed by demons.They told them that darkness ran in their veins.Holy Innocents Home for Children is a haven for orphaned boys who have nothing and no one. The priests watch over them, educate them, raise them in the family of the church.Except for some.Seven of the orphans are no ordinary boys. They attract the attention of the priests for their acts of violence, of bloodlust. The priests realize these boys are drawn to the darkness.And the priests are no ordinary priests. They are the Brethren, a secret sect who believe themselves on a divine mission to seek out evil in the boys in their care. Seek it out, and then drive it out.The seven have fallen from God’s grace. And the Brethren will cleanse their blackened souls…Dark Contemporary Romance novella. Contains sexual situations, violence, sensitive and taboo subjects, offensive language and topics some may find triggering. Recommended for age 18 years and up.
Bang
E.K. Blair - 2014
But I’m not innocent. I haven’t been for a very long time. My innocence was stolen from me. Taken was the life I was supposed to have. The soul I was born with. The ruby heart embedded in a life full of hopes and dreams.Gone.Vanished.I never even had a choice. I mourn that life. Mourn the what-ifs. Until now. I’m ready to take back what was always meant to be mine.But every plan has a fatal flaw. Sometimes it’s the heart.**Due to the dark and explicit nature of this book, it is recommended for mature audiences only as some scenes may be particularly disturbing.**
Pretty Stolen Dolls
Ker Dukey - 2016
Kidnapped and held prisoner by the psychotic serial killer, they spend years in captivity, lost to the world. Resolute in seeking freedom, Jade finally manages to escape the clutches of the brutal monster of a man and his sadistic torture. But it comes at a devastating price. Macy is left behind. Years later, and now a detective herself, Jade is determined to hunt down her kidnapper and finally free her sister. She soon learns, after a string of new murders with an eerie familiarity…She's not the only one on the hunt.Her past is about to catch up with her. And Benny is a lot closer than she thinks.This is a dark title with adult themes.
Target This
Lily White - 2014
It was a normal Thursday, nothing new or exciting had occurred in the morning. I’d risen from bed, taken a shower and brushed my teeth. I’d then jumped on the 8:05 bus that ran a short distance between my house and the county library where I worked. The ride took its usual 15 minutes before it left me standing fresh faced in front of a building of gothic construction that was my favorite place in the world. After straightening my knee length skirt, I pushed open the door that led into the interior of the library. It was at that moment that my world would change – impossibly and forever. It was a fateful movement of wood that collided with the shoulder of a man that would alter my very existence. It wasn’t fear that I felt at that moment – more like the feeling of being watched. It was the feeling of knowing that danger lurks - the sensation of the hair standing on end at the back of your neck. Looking back on a moment that happened so many months ago, I now realize that I should have listened to that feeling. As I would later find out, the man standing in front of me referred to himself as Master Lucas… …and I was his next target. Disclaimer: This book is intended for mature audiences only (18+) and contains explicit descriptions of violence.
Flawed
Francette Phal - 2014
That's the only memory he carries from a childhood he does not remember. And now it is all he knows. Blood is his life.Knox Bishop has done a lot of horrible things, all at the command of the man who holds his leash. It's a matter of loyalty for him. Allegiance to the man who saved his life when he was a child. So he goes where he is needed and does what he is told. He tortures. He kills. He kills. He tortures. It is an unrelenting cycle that he constantly craves and can never quite satisfy.Until her.Eighteen year old Lacey Barnes distributes her assets to fund her dreams. Medical school is the end game and she is determined to get there by any means necessary. But a family member's careless mistake derails her plans and now she must pay a price in order to save him. She goes to Knox willingly offering him the only valuable thing she has. Herself. In doing so he allows her into his world, a world she quickly realizes is void of any light and hope for escape is utterly elusive. But escape is something she finds that she no longer wants. "He lays a path of pleasure laced agony for me to follow and I do. Stupidly I follow him down the blinding darkness of his euphoric hell."Disclaimer: This is book is intended for mature audiences (18+) due to description of violence and sexual situations.
The Sordid Promise
Courtney Lane - 2014
She thought she'd left her "baggage" behind her on the opposite coast, only to find that it never left her side. As her self-destructive thoughts begin to consume her, her mother -- realizing Nikki's torment -- pushes Nikki to complete her last wishes.Eric Brenton, Nikki's new neighbor, lives in a dark, chaotic world that is easily hidden behind his model good looks and cocky demeanor. Unapologetic about his dirtier intentions, he sets his sights on Nikki with an offer to help her. But his help comes with very unorthodox conditions and a huge price.And Eric...comes with an extensive black box warning label.
Chosen
Barbara Elsborg - 2011
She chose her apartment with care—a safe district with a good neighbor—a place where she can live a quiet, unassuming, under-the-radar existence. Then she makes one mistake and opens her door to accept a delivery of flowers from a secret admirer and her life will never be the same again. A guy she’s never seen before bursts into her apartment and asks her to marry him. Jack Thompson won’t take no for an answer and drags Kate on a cross country journey to hell.Invalided out of the police, Nathan Beranson works as a private investigator in San Antonio, Texas where he spends too much of his time following unfaithful spouses and delivering the bad news to their partners. When his fiancée cheats on him with Jack Thompson, the half-brother Nathan’s only just met, he becomes obsessed with Jack in the same unhealthy way as his revenge-seeking clients. By the time Nathan finally realizes putting the ghosts of the past to rest is a wiser option than settling an old score, it’s too late. He’s already been drawn into his sibling’s latest deadly game and Nathan and Kate find their nightmare is only just beginning.
Tight
Alessandra Torre - 2015
In my life as a single, thirty-two year old woman. I had a good job, wonderful friends, my independence.I also hadn't got laid in three years. Hadn't been on a date in two. Had stopped counting calories and wearing makeup... a while ago.Then Brett Jacobs waltzed in. Caressed my thigh, dug rough fingers into my hair, lowered his soft mouth to my skin, took sexual control of my mind and stirred it all around with what he packed in his pants. He flipped my quiet life upside down and crawled into a place in my heart I thought was dead.The issue is his secret.The issue is her.The issue is that I don't even know she exists, and he thinks she's dead.The issue is that shit is about to hit the fan and I can't hold on to him tight enough.
Number Thirteen
Bella Jewel - 2014
A master we've never seen.Obedience will become all we know in our shallow existence. It is the only emotion we're permitted to feel.When we're bad, we're punished. When we're good, we're rewarded. Our scars run deep. Yet we survive, because we have to... because HE teaches us to.All of us are special, we feel it with everything we are.He has us for a reason, but it's a reason we don't know.We've never seen his face, but we know that something deeply broken lies beneath the darkness. With every touch, with every punishment, we know it. Then something changed. He showed me who he truly is.Now I want him.I'll go against everything I know to be with him. A monster. My monster. Loving him is a sin, but a sinner I am. I won't stop until I see every part of him. Even the parts he keeps locked deep down inside. I am Number Thirteen, and this is my story.
Slammer
Tabatha Vargo - 2015
Ten years later, the boy he used to be is gone. In his place is the shell of a man with murder under his belt. Any emotion he once had was left under the gavel when he was given life in prison. That is until the new nurse in the infirmary joins the block. Putting your hands on a prison employee will get you the hole, but some things are worth their punishment, and something tells him Lyla will be worth more than he bargained for. Lyla Evans isn’t sure about her new job at a maximum security prison, but showing uncertainty and weakness isn’t an option. Taking care of murderers and rapists isn’t ideal, but survival is key. She’s warned ahead of time about a prisoner named X, but when she’s attacked, it’s the dangerous X that saves her. Fraternizing with the prisoners is forbidden, but sometimes the most forbidden things are the sweetest.