Book picks similar to
Scars and Tats by Kristi Pelton


single-parent
contemporary
arc
romance

Iron Crowne


C.D. Reiss - 2019
    Byron Crowne is a gentleman on the outside, and a pure savage on the inside. I detest him. I can't resist him. He’s awakened desires I didn’t know I had. When he touches me, I need to fight him . . . and I need him to win. Our one night stand bruises my skin and leaves dents in the walls, but the sheets aren't the only thing we shred that night. And suddenly, the stakes are higher than ever. Olivia Monroe lights a fire in me that died a long time ago. I’m a different man when I’m with her. I need to own her, take her, mark her as mine. Everything changes when she might be pregnant and for the first time in my life…I’m powerless against this stubborn, untamable woman. She’s the one in control and I have an impossible job: Prove I’m worthy to be a father.

Say You'll Stay


Corinne Michaels - 2016
    Instead, he got on that bus and took my heart with him.That was seventeen years ago.I moved on. Marriage. Kids. White picket fence. Everything I ever wanted, but my husband betrayed me and I was left once again.Alone, penniless, and with two boys, I had no choice but to return to Tennessee. He wasn’t supposed to be there. I should’ve been safe. However, fate has a way of stepping in.This time around, the tables are turned. It’s my decision. Second chances do exist, but I don’t know if we can repair what’s already been broken . . .

The Wedding Game


Meghan Quinn - 2021
    So it’s only natural that Luna would convince her brother and his husband-to-be to compete on The Wedding Game, a “do-it-yourself” TV show, for the title of Top DIY Wedding Expert.As a jaded divorce lawyer, Alec Baxter scoffs at weddings and romance. But when his recently engaged brother begs him to participate in The Wedding Game, Alec grudgingly picks up a glue gun and prepares for some family bonding.Both fierce competitors, Luna and Alec clash on national TV as harsh words and glitter fly with abandon. But as they bicker over color swatches and mood boards, they find themselves fighting something else: their growing mutual attraction. While Luna is torn between family loyalty and her own feelings, Alec wonders if he might have been wrong about love and marriage all along…

In a Lifetime


Ariadne Wayne - 2015
    At the very least, lust. But when fate steps in, Matt ends up playing Good Samaritan and losing the girl he wants to his best friend, Sam. When Ella and Sam marry, Matt leaves the country, desperate to get over the deep feelings he has for his friend’s wife. When he returns, he finds a couple struggling with infertility; cracks appearing in their relationship. Making things worse, his feelings for Ella have intensified. When you’re in love with your best friend’s wife, whose side do you take when everything falls apart? Recommended 18+ for sexual situations

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.

The Tillman Crush


Kelly Gendron - 2021
    His hold was firm.The next day, he vanished. After seven years, he’s back with a sexy smile, flirty eyes, and jacked muscles.Not that I care.Let him slather on the charm.I won’t give in to The Tillman Crush. Not this time. BRITT Sadie Holland. Beautiful. Smart.The untouchable girl next door.Growing up, I wanted her.To keep her at a safe distance, I was mean to her.Then, the accident happened.With my mom gone, my father turned to the bottle.So I left town the first chance I got.Now, I’m back and not just for Sadie.The other thing I want.Well, the girl I came back for might not like it.Still, I won’t stop until I get what I want.Not this time.

You Don't Know Me


Mandy Lee - 2015
    When she takes on an office job at a construction company, she finds herself firmly in the sights of the owner, Daniel Foster - a dangerously attractive man with a dark past and particular tastes in bed.Although she tries to resist him, Maya soon finds herself embroiled in a steamy relationship with Dan. And while he slowly encourages her to paint again, she begins to peel back his layers. At last, when she believes that she's finally come to understand his ways, he has one final secret to reveal … and it's a secret that threatens to blow them apart.You Don’t Know Me, an erotic romance, is the first book in a trilogy.

Illicit Temptations


Janine Infante Bosco - 2015
    That's all I was before New York's most notorious gangster recruited me.Now here I am, following in my father's footsteps and breaking my mother's heart. And I'm torn between the only life I've ever known and the possibility of something else. Because the only beacon of light in this dark world is the one woman I can't have. The Boss's daughter. The nightclub king's girl. Her irresistible spirit struggling to be respected for who she is, and not just who she belongs to. I see her. All of her.She's the sweetest temptation I've ever known.And the most illicit. Publisher's Note: Illicit Temptations is volume one in The Tempted Series but it may be read and enjoyed as a standalone mafia romance. This book has been revised and edited as of January 2021.

Wanted by You


Steph Nuss - 2014
    Carter was captivated by Ellyson Evans the moment he laid eyes on her, but she was the one girl who didn't beg for his attention.He wanted her.Ellyson vowed to never fall in love, because love can destroy you, but then she met Carter Jennings.She wanted him.Unwilling to risk their comfortable friendship, neither confessed their desires.Losing touch after college, a chance meeting reconnects them.They want each other.But love in the city is never quite that easy.

Undertow


Elizabeth O'Roark - 2013
    It almost seems like enough until Nate Sullivan comes home. Nate – her childhood best friend, her first love. The boy who left without a trace one night and broke her heart. When their attraction threatens the future she and her parents have so carefully crafted, loyalties will be tested and secrets will be uncovered. Giving in may cost her everything. But how do you resist the only thing you’ve ever really wanted?

Fixing Fate


Anna Brooks - 2017
    My brother’s friend and ex-partner is everything I’ll never be. Sexy, confident, and perfect. He calls me sunshine and tells me I’m beautiful. He asks me to stay. When my past come back with a vengeance, he proves just how much he’d risk to shield me from the demons that were never supposed to resurface.

Be Here Now


Andrea Wolfe - 2013
    Attacked her. Raped her. Left her for dead. She lost her whole life in New Orleans and fled to Seattle, hoping to find sanctuary from her dark past. Simone LeClair isn't sure if she'll ever love anyone again—or if she even wants to.That is, until she meets the beautiful Aiden Meyers, a man with a myriad problems of his own, a man that wears different masks to keep his conflicting worlds separate from each other. For some strange reason, as soon as Simone lays her eyes on him, she can't look away. He's unlike any man she's ever met, and that makes him all the more unbelievable.When she's with him, all her pain becomes a distant memory, pain that she believed she'd never escape. But as Aiden's walls start to crumble, and the worlds he juggles start to collide, Simone realizes he's dangerous in a whole new way - she's fallen hard for him, even though he's on a downward spiral that threatens to take her down with him.Will Simone sink with him?Or will she pull herself out before it's too late?Full length (93,000 word) New Adult Contemporary RomanceMature Content Warning: Contains adult language and content.HEA ending.

Merciless


Willow Winters - 2018
    Women like her are made to destroy men like me. I couldn’t resist her though. Given to me to start a war; I was too eager to accept. But I didn’t know what she’d do to me. That she would change everything. She sees through me in a way no one else ever has. Her innocence and vulnerability make me weak for her and I hate it.I know better than to give in to temptation.A ruthless man doesn’t let a soul close to him.A cold-hearted man doesn’t risk anything for anyone.A powerful man with a beautiful woman at his mercy… he doesn’t fall for her.

Heart of a Thief


Ella Miles - 2017
    And then watched the heartbreak that occurs in my wake. Love doesn't survive once I enter the picture, if it ever existed at all. Although, stealing Sloane might be my greatest challenge of all. Asher is a villain trying to a put a horrible life behind him by doing the only two things he knows to do: surf and steal. Sloane is an angel that runs a charity helping children needing a fresh start. Asher will do anything to have her. There is just one problem...she's about to marry another man.

Finley's Claim


Atlas Rose - 2021
    We take the money. We control the war.So when our ‘launderer’ decides to run with one hundred million dollars of our money, you can bet we’ll hunt them down.Only they’ve run to a place they think they’re safe.A place that’s heavily guarded.An island in the middle of nowhere.Where the son of my family's enemy promises me a bloody and violent end. Only I don’t care about him…My sole focus is her.Pretty, plain Annalise Eden. I’ll hunt her. I’ll corner her. I’ll claim her too.She’s the one they secretly call ‘the Ghost’.The woman who’s made my family millions.Millions we want back…Finley's Claim is a FULL LENGTH dark mafia romance standalone. This series can be read in any order but it is recommended to start with Finley's Claim.