The woman, he gradually comes to realise, was his family's beloved servant many years ago, in his native town of Ruffano. He returns to his birthplace, and once there, finds it is haunted by the phantom of his brother, Aldo, shot down in flames in '43.Over five hundred years before, the sinister Duke Claudio, known as The Falcon, lived his twisted, brutal life, preying on the people of Ruffano. But now it is the twentieth century, and the town seems to have forgotten its violent history. But have things really changed? The parallels between the past and present become ever more evident.

    The pressures of war threaten to tear apart two sisters traumatised by their mother's murder by their father.With her new husband Will, a merchant seaman, deployed on dangerous Atlantic convoy missions, Hannah needs her younger sister Judith more than ever. But when Mussolini declares war on Britain, Judith's Italian sweetheart, Paolo is imprisoned as an enemy alien, and Judith's loyalties are divided.Each sister wants only to be with the man she loves but, as the war progresses, tensions between them boil over, and they face an impossible decision.A heart-wrenching page-turner about the everyday bravery of ordinary people during wartime. From heavily blitzed Liverpool to the terrors of the North Atlantic and the scorched plains of Australia, Sisters at War will bring tears to your eyes and joy to your heart.

    It had been a sunny afternoon when she glanced from the cliff where she sat reading and saw below her in the sea a sight that would change her life.Set in England and Italy in 1910, this is the story of a young English girl who by accident starts to unravel the unknown elements of her grandmother's past and is brought by the mystery to the faraway city of Venice. There among the gondolas and canals, she slowly comes to comprehend the meaning of two strange and puzzling dreams--dreams that seem to hold an eerie and menancing prophecy of the future.Here is all the grandeur and excitement of the ageless glory of Venice and the handsome beauty of the English countryside combined in the romantic and suspenseful story of a young girl's confrontation with the past.

    Adam Banting, a somewhat aimless young scholar at Cambridge University, is called to his professor's office one afternoon and assigned a special summer project: to write a scholarly monograph about a famous garden built in the 1500s. Dedicated to the memory of Signor Docci's dead wife, the garden is a mysterious world of statues, grottoes, meandering rills, and classical inscriptions. But during his three-week sojourn at the villa, Adam comes to suspect that clues to a murder are buried in the strange iconography of the garden: the long-dead Signor Docci most likely killed his wife and filled her memorial garden with pointers as to both the method and the motive of his crime. As the mystery of the garden unfolds, Adam finds himself drawn into a parallel intrigue. Through his evolving relationship with the lady of the house - the ailing, seventy-something Signora Docci - he finds clues to yet another possible murder, this one much more recent. The signora's eldest son was shot by Nazi officers on the third floor of the villa, and her husband, now dead, insisted that the area be sealed and preserved forever. Like the garden, the third-floor rooms are frozen in time. Delving into his subject, Adam begins to suspect that his summer project might be a setup. Is he really just the naive student, stumbling upon clues, or is Signora Docci using him to discover for herself the true meaning of the villa's murderous past?

     Soon, she starts receiving a series of anonymous and menacing letters urging her to find her missing son in Venice. Despite the danger involved, Julia has no choice but to follow the taunting messages. With her miserable days in La Rivière still looming over her, she ventures to Italy on a train. But she can’t shake the feeling that the letters were written by someone she knows, someone playing an awful and dangerous game. Meanwhile, Julia meets a handsome stranger on the train, but does she dare fall for him? In the mystical and unfamiliar city of Venice, who can she trust? The journey to Venice brings a new friendship, an old confrontation and, above all, danger. But there is also the hope of happiness, if Julia can fight her way out of the conspiracy around her… ‘Jane Aiken Hodge captures interest from the start. A good holiday read-in Venice or anywhere'. - EVENING STANDARD Jane Aiken Hodge (December 4, 1917 – June 17, 2009) was an American-born British writer. She is also the author of ‘Runaway Bride’, ‘Escapade’ and ‘All for Love’. Endeavour Press is the UK's leading independent publisher of digital books.

    *Bonus in this collection only: Hawk Brothers Reunion* The Hawk Brothers aren't just famous, wealthy, or handsome. They're the face of the Hawk Family fortune, and practically their own high-end brand. Don't miss each of their stories as they find the right woman to humble, tease, and love them. The Determined Groom: A broken football star becomes the trainer to an elite female athlete who can’t decide if she should tell off the flirty billionaire or fall in love with him. Cambree Kinley is the toughest chick she knows, except when it comes to protecting her heart. Yet how can she resist the billionaire superstar Emmett Hawk? When he pursues her—treating her like gold and making her smile nonstop, only sheer grit can keep her from sprinting toward the Cinderella route again—loving a wealthy man who will dump her like moldy garbage when she offends his high-society friends and family. The Stealth Warrior: A Navy SEAL returned from the dead. The world-renowned dancer he left behind. Misunderstandings tear them apart. Can anything bring this wounded couple together again? Creed Hawk was imprisoned in Syria for three months. The only thing that kept him fighting to be free was knowing Kiera Richins would be waiting for him. When he’s finally released he finds her, in the arms of another man. Her Billionaire Boss Fake Fiancé: Farm girl sass takes on America's Most Eligible Bachelor in this fun fake fiance romance. Callum Hawk has it all--fame, money, and a family that loves him. He doesn't have time for romance but that's all right, his head of marketing does a great job scheduling dates with models and actresses for the necessary social events. When he almost hits Alexia Hall with his motorcycle, he's intrigued by the feisty blonde and offers to hire her to be his fake fiancé for his brother's wedding. When she not only turns him down but tells him to never come near her again, he has no clue what went wrong. Risking it All: A world-renowned extreme athlete. A motivational speaker and philanthropist. He thinks they're a match destined for heaven. She's convinced they're polar opposites. Bridger Hawk has been in love with Avalyn Shaman since childhood. He knows he'll never be worthy of her charitable heart so he throws himself into a life-threatening extreme sports career. When they reconnect at his brother's wedding, he can't resist kissing her at every opportunity. She demands he stay away from her and her heart. After multiple rejections, he gathers what's left of his pride and leaves. Avalyn has always loved Bridger but he shredded her heart in high school and she knows given a chance, he'll do it again. When she's kidnapped and forced to be the pawn and prize in dangerous events that risk her life and her virtue, Bridger is forced to compete in the deranged challenges and is the only hope she has to survive. Can Bridger win and prove to her that his love isn't just a show for his fans? Bridger knows he has to save Avalyn at all costs ... even if it means he can't have her.

    Life for Randa in the Brewster household was hard because of an uppity aunt and a pair of cousins who considered the young girl beneath their standing. They labeled her the shame of the elite black Brewster family, a dark mark on the good Brewster name, and made her life miserable because of it. Unwanted and unloved in a house filled with strangers, things looked bleak for Randa, but her circumstances took a sudden and dramatic change when her grandfather was made aware of her plight. Vowing to her that things would be different from here on out, her grandfather took a shy, introverted little girl under his wing and over time molded her into a strong, intelligent young woman. After the death of her beloved grandfather, the now wealthy Randa, thanks to a deathbed blessing, moved to Tullahassee, Oklahoma with the desire to locate the mother she was taken away from, but what she found instead was a life she never imagined she would ever have.

    But now there’s another kind of trouble brewing in the Lucky Ace Casino. Her winning streak at blackjack hasn’t gone unnoticed and Owen Rockford, head of casino security, has been dogging her every move. She wants to cut and run, but not when it means sacrificing the only friend she’s had in a long time.Owen Rockford has his own demons from his past military life and the woman that betrayed him. He’s not about to let that happen again, so when the gorgeous redhead who caught his eye in the casino turns out to be a suspect in a card-cheating ring, he’s more than happy to prosecute her like any other criminal.But it soon becomes clear that nothing is as it seems. When the stakes become deadly, Alison is forced to make the biggest gamble of all- one that could cost her her heart ... not to mention her life.

    

    and visions of the past.

    from an internationally renowned author.This haunting tale follows two cursed families in a saga of romance, black magic, and music set in an ancient abbey where the lines between the past 500 years and the present are blurred into oblivion. The handsome, mysteriously compelling owner of Beauregard Abbey, Nicholas Beauregard, must help Zuleika Rathbone as she traces the path of a murderous ancestor, rousing an unimaginable evil centered around a mystical violin. An unlikely romance amidst the havoc wreaked by practitioners of the dark arts takes the reader deep into the thrilling world of the occult.

    Tormented by horrific nightmares since the death of her baby five years before, literary agent Lyn Ravenshaw agrees to accompany an author to Wales, where she encounters an eccentric young widow desperately afraid for her own infant's safety and a reclusive playwright who could be her only salvation.

    Three years after her husband, Alex, disappeared, shot down over Germany, Jo Manders still mourns his loss. Working as a paid companion to Alex's wealthy, condescending aunt, Dottie Forsyth, Jo travels to the family’s estate in the Sussex countryside. But there is much she never knew about her husband’s origins…and the revelation of a mysterious death in the Forsyths’ past is just the beginning… All is not well at Wych Elm House. Dottie's husband is distant, and her son was grievously injured in the war. Footsteps follow Jo down empty halls, and items in her bedroom are eerily rearranged. The locals say the family is cursed, and that a ghost in the woods has never rested. And when Jo discovers her husband’s darkest secrets, she wonders if she ever really knew him. Isolated in a place of deception and grief, she must find the truth or lose herself forever. And then a familiar stranger arrives at Wych Elm House…

     Devlin Morgan, the reclusive owner of Morgan’s Keep, coolly turns away her inquiries, and the villagers, who respect Devlin, refuse to cooperate, as well. Worse still is her own unwanted attraction to him. Especially once she begins to suspect he’s involved with her sister’s disappearance and the mysterious “Chiming Ghost.” In order to solve the mystery of her missing sister, she’ll also have to probe Devlin’s dark past, discover the truth about the “ghost.” and decide whether to trust the passion in her heart or play it safe and return to England. Whatever happens, she’ll never be the same when she leaves the island.