Book picks similar to
In a Heartbeat by Teodora Kostova


new-adult
romance
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contemporary

Leo's Chance


Mia Sheridan - 2013
    Does everyone deserve a second chance? Even someone who lies and deceives to get it?Do we all have a second chance coming? Even if we play a part in our own destruction?How hard would you fight to have a second chance at love? A second chance at life? Another chance to tell your own story?Every love story has two sides. Evie told hers. This time it's Leo's chance.THIS IS A POV NOVEL OF LEO (LEO SHOULD BE READ FIRST). New Adult Contemporary Romance: Due to strong language and sexual content, this book is not intended for readers under the age of 18.

Escaping Me


Elizabeth Lee - 2013
    Forget the memory of walking in on her boyfriend in the middle of, well, another girl. Forget how she had her entire life planned out. And, forget about being perfect all the time. Unfortunately, she was Whitney Vandaveer and despite the fact that she moved to the middle of nowhere – she couldn't. He always knew he would never be more than nothing. No job, no money, no future. Cole Pritchett had accepted the fact that he would always be the screw up and he was okay with it. Until he met her. Here's the thing they quickly found out – sometimes we all need a little help escaping who we think we are.

Breaking Nova


Jessica Sorensen - 2013
    But all of that was taken away in an instant. Now she's getting by as best she can, though sometimes that means doing things the old Nova would never do. Things that are slowly eating away at her spirit. Every day blends into the next . . . until she meets Quinton Carter. His intense, honey brown eyes instantly draw her in, and he looks just about as broken as she feels inside.Quinton once got a second chance at life-but he doesn't want it. The tattoos on his chest are a constant reminder of what he's done, what he's lost. He's sworn to never allow happiness into his life . . . but then beautiful, sweet Nova makes him smile. He knows he's too damaged to get close to her, yet she's the only one who can make him feel alive again. Quinton will have to decide: does he deserve to start over? Or should he pay for his past forever?

Break My Fall


Chloe Walsh - 2014
    I was homeless, strapped for cash, and running from my past.Now I'm here, in a brand-new state, miles away from home, and sleeping in the room next to his. The room with the revolving door of females.I know he's a bad idea for me. He's cocky, a manwhore, and way too self-assured for a sheltered girl with secrets.But when he smiles at me, I lose my freaking mind.I don't want her in my home.She's too sweet for a prick like me. Too innocent.Too f*cking much.I have more baggage, secrets, and commitments than she could ever understand.I need her gone, dammit, but I keep pulling her back in.I'm blurring lines with this girl.She's a temptation I can't resist, and I'm losing my head.I'm so goddamn screwed…Break My Fall is the first installment of the bestselling Broken series. Due to its explicit content, bad language, and graphic sexual content, Break My Fall is recommended for mature readers of seventeen years and above.

Where I End and You Begin


Andra Brynn - 2013
    It may tangle, it may knot, it may stretch or fray, but it will never break. It is a future as indelible as the past.I hope that isn't true. I pity anyone destined to meet me.----For Bianca Ray, the past is always catching up, one way or another. Now in her third semester at college, it's doing it again. Too much drinking has led to plummeting grades and rising absences, putting her scholarships in peril. When she makes it clear that she needs help—all over the floor of her history class—she’s given one last chance to shape up: seek therapy and bring her grades up by the end of the semester, or she’s out.Enter Catholic seminarian Daniel McGuire. The last thing Bianca wants is an aspiring priest to counsel her on how to live her life, but the handsome graduate student is different from the holy rollers she fled from at home. Gentle and unobtrusive, he helps her pick up the pieces and find a new way to live: not running from the past, but facing it head on. But opening up her heart to release the pain means that something else can come in. As Bianca and Daniel grow closer, their relationship moves onto dangerous ground and the fragile courage Bianca has built up threatens to fail her. Can she exorcise the ghosts of her past, or will they catch hold and drag her down where not even Daniel can reach her?

Anti-Stepbrother


Tijan - 2016
    I labeled him an *sshole, but he was more than that. Arrogant. Smug. Alpha. He was also to-die-for gorgeous, and my stepbrother’s fraternity brother. Okay, yes I was a little naive, a tad bit socially awkward, and the smallest amount of stalker-ish, but if Caden Banks thought he could tell me what to do, he had another thing coming. I came to college with daydreams about being with my stepbrother, but what if I fell for the anti-stepbrother instead?

Frigid


J. Lynn - 2013
    They'd been best friends ever since he pushed her down on the playground and she made him eat a mud pie. Somewhere over the years, she fell for him and fell hard. The big problem with that? Kyler puts the 'man' in man-whore. He's never stayed with a girl longer than a few nights, and with it being their last year in college, Syd doesn't want to risk their friendship by declaring her love. Kyler has always put Syd on a pedestal that was too high for him to reach. To him, she's perfect and she's everything. But the feelings he has for her, he's always hidden away or focused on any other female. After all, Kyler will always be the poor boy from the wrong side of tracks, and Syd will always be the one girl he can never have. But when they're stranded together at a posh ski resort due to a massive Nor'easter, there's nothing stopping their red-hot feelings for each other from coming to the surface. Can their friendship survive the attraction? Better yet, can they survive at all? Because as the snow falls, someone is stalking them, and this ski trip may be a life-changer in more ways than one.

Storm Damages


Magda Alexander - 2013
    For mature audiences. There's a fine line between love...and obsession Promising law student Elizabeth Watson struggled her entire life to claw out of her dirt-poor background. And now the thing she's dreamed of, an associate position at her law firm, is within reach. As long as she keeps up her grades, makes law review. And stays out of trouble. But trouble is just what walks in the door one scorching hot summer day.When Gabriel Storm crashes into Elizabeth's life she wants nothing to do with him. After all, he's on the opposing side of a business deal her law firm represents. If she's seen with him, she can kiss her career goodbye. But she can't stay away from the billionaire who put the "B" in bad boy, and soon she's embroiled in an affair hot enough to make every ounce of her being burn. She should walk away, hell, she should run away, but she can't. Because all she cares about is his kiss, his touch, and the way she feels when she's in his arms. Even if to be with him means the ruin of everything else.

Heart on a Chain


Cindy C. Bennett - 2010
    At school, her second-hand clothing marks her as a target. Her refusal to stand up for herself makes her the recipient of her classmates taunts and bullying. That is, until Henry returns. Henry Jamison moved away six years earlier, just as he and Kate had begun to develop feelings for one another. He returns to find the bright, funny, outgoing girl he had known now timidly hiding in corners, barely speaking to anyone around her, suspicious of even him. Kate can't figure out what game Henry is playing with her - for surely it is a game. What else would the gorgeous, popular boy from her past want with her? Kate finally decides to trust Henry's intentions, opening her heart to him. Just when it seems he might be genuine in his friendship, tragedy strikes, threatening everything Kate has worked so hard to gain. Can Henry help her to overcome this new devastation, or will it tear them apart forever?

Silence


Natasha Preston - 2012
    At the age of five, she stopped talking, and no one seems to know why. Refusing to communicate beyond a few physical actions, Oakley remains in her own little world. Bullied at school, she has just one friend, Cole Benson. Cole stands by her, refusing to believe that she is not perfect the way she is. Over the years, they have developed their own version of a normal friendship. However, will it still work as they start to grow even closer? When Oakley is forced to face someone from her past, can she hold her secret in any longer?

Take Me for Granted


K.A. Linde - 2014
    Adrenaline junkie. Lead singer of ContraBand. What you see is what you get. I make no apologies for my actions, and by now no one expects any from me. I live my life the way I want and as long as it pushes the demons back, then I'm solid. I've never needed a chick for more than a good lay. Why would I need just one when I can have a different one every night?Until she walks into my world.AribelMouthy. Perfectionist. Princeton student. Chemistry major. Yes, that pretty much describes me. Oh, and virgin. But I'm only nineteen, and have more important things to concern myself with. What really matters is finishing my degree and getting a good job. I’ve worked hard for what I want, and do what’s expected of me. I don’t need anyone to get in my way.Until he opens up my world.But if I give you my world, whatever you do…don’t TAKE ME for granted.

Butterfly Weeds


Laura Miller - 2012
    But she should have known better. Her past haunted her every chance it got these days, and tonight it came in the form of lyrics she never expected to hear again—not after a decade, not in the arms of another man and definitely not in the form of a confession. Now, Julia must discover for herself if the song—and more importantly, the man behind it—is enough to leave her new life for her small-town, Missouri roots and a second chance at love.

Where I Belong


J. Daniels - 2014
    One person that she’d do anything to avoid.Benjamin Kelly. World’s biggest dickhead.Mia hates him with a fury and has no desire to ever see him again. When she decides to start her summer off with a bang and finally give away her v-card, she unknowingly hands it over to the one guy that excelled at making her life miserable, learning a valuable lesson in the process.Always get the name of the guy you’re going home with.Ben can’t get the girl he spent one night with out of his head. When she leaves him the next morning, he thinks he’ll never see her again. Until he sees her lounging by the pool with his sister.Mia is determined to hate Ben, even though she can’t forget him.Ben is determined to prove he’s not the same guy he used to be.What happens when the one person you wish never existed becomes the one person you can’t imagine being without?

Perfectly Imperfect


Harper Sloan - 2015
    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.

Tragic


J.A. Huss - 2013
    Some girls get parents. Rook got the foster care system. Some girls get Prince Charming. Rook got an abusive frog. Some girls get lucky…Rook got a second chance.And she took it. Because when fate throws you a bone – you grab it with both hands and run.Antoine Chaput knows the minute he spies Rook in his photography studio that she’s got The Look. The dark and desperate look he must have to land the exclusive TRAGIC media contract.Rook is paired up with top model, Ronin, and he’s everything her abusive ex-boyfriend wasn’t. Patient, gentle, happy, attentive, and sexy! He knows exactly what to do to make Rook blush for Antoine’s camera. Rook’s luck changes in an instant and suddenly she’s the darling of the modeling world. It’s a dream job to go with a dream guy and all she has to do is look pretty and follow directions. But there’s always a price to pay – and Rook is about to get the bill.New Adult Contemporary Romance *Mature Content* Recommended for ages 17+ due to sexual situations and language usage