A place of shadow and light where thieves, whores, and dreamers mingle, where children play in the cobbled streets by day and a killer stalks at night, where bright hopes meet the darkest truths. Here, by the whispering waters of the Thames, Fiona Finnegan, a worker in a tea factory, hopes to own a shop one day, together with her lifelong love, Joe Bristow, a costermonger's son. With nothing but their faith in each other to spur them on, Fiona and Joe struggle, save, and sacrifice to achieve their dreams.But Fiona's life is shattered when the actions of a dark and brutal man take from her nearly everything-and everyone-she holds dear. Fearing her own death, she is forced to flee London for New York. There, her indomitable spirit propels her rise from a modest West Side shop-front to the top of Manhattan's tea trade. But Fiona's old ghosts do not rest quietly, and to silence them, she must venture back to the London of her childhood, where a deadly confrontation with her past becomes the key to her future.

    Driven by revenge.Bryony Russell and her two sisters are left destitute by the disgrace and unexpected death of their father, a wealthy shipping magnate. He left a cryptic note, and Bryony is determined to find the real villain and clear her father’s name. In disguise as a servant, Bryony infiltrates the home of her father’s business partner to find proof of his guilt…or innocence. It’s not just clues that Bryony finds, but temptation too…Adrian Bruton, Earl of Kilmartyn, immediately suspects there is something not quite right about his new housekeeper. The brooding, irresistible rake plays along because he has his own guilty secrets, and his venal, scheming wife holds the key to them, trapping him in a hate-filled marriage. But against his will he’s fascinated by Bryony, seeing past the scars on her face to show her the beauty she never knew she had. Bryony must uncover the truth and attempt to preserve her father’s legacy, before things go too far and she falls in love with a man who might very well be her worst enemy.

    Just because the Bailey girls had met with one mishap or another after wearing Jenny's loveliest creation, her clientele had begun to stay away in droves. Yet Jenny was still betting she could turn her luck around--by wearing the gown herself at her very own wedding. There's just one hitch: first she has to find a groom...Trace McBride seemed as likely a candidate as any. An attractive widower raising three little girls who were fast becoming three little outlaws, Trace badly needed a woman's loving touch. Jenny wasn't altogether sure she knew how to get a man to propose marriage, but she was willing to take off her spectacles, let down her honey-blond hair, and even give flirtation a try. But when seduction turns into red-hot passion, Jenny will find herself risking everything--even her life--on the chance that she'll be lucky in love.

    Desperate for peace, Radford is ambushed by his unexpected and forbidden love for Evelyn—his brother's fiancée.

    Years later, his step-cousin Justine finds him alive and drug-addicted, and against his family’s wishes, boldly brings him home to reclaim his inheritance.Dark surprises disturb Brandon at every turn—a ruined property, a traitorous, bitter family, his fiancée married to his rival. And Justine, the shy, quiet girl he grew up with is no longer a little girl, but an alluring and determined young woman. Can he trust her or is she a part of the intricate web of lies and half-truths?As they work together to salvage what’s left of Wolfsgate and their place in society, age-old jealousies and shadowy secrets threaten at every turn, but irresistible passions run wild and prove even more powerful.Justine is his wife, after all.Justine and Brandon have been bound in a marriage forced upon them by their family for their own deceitful purposes. But the deep, loyal bond that grows between husband and wife isn’t part of their enemies’ plan.In fact, it could destroy their plan.No one counted on Brandon and Justine falling in love.Not even Brandon and Justine.>> Please Note: This book has been re-edited & re-formatted in July 2020 since the book's release in 2014 <<"Sexy, dark, and suspenseful...Definitely not your mother's historical romance!" - Guilty Pleasures Book Reviews

    She beholds America’s virgin shores with wonder until her cowardly fiancé abandons her in the forest when they are attacked by Indians. In the first moments she faces her captor in terror.The warrior Night Fox reaches out and touches her cheek. What fool would leave a treasure like this behind? He is bewitched by his tribe’s newest captive. Her lustrous hair is red like the fox’s, her silky skin reminds hime of the yellow wildflower. He yearns to kiss the tears from her cheeks. He wants to taste the honey of her lips.”I hate you,” Katelyn trembles so much she can barely get the words out. ”No, you don’t hate me. You fear me, but you don’t hate me.” Night Fox is so close. Katelyn has never heard a man’s husky whisper.She meets his haunting black eyes without flinching. “Yes I do,” she lies. “I hate you because you kidnapped me, because you made your slave…” I hate you because I can’t despise you the way I should.He senses her surrender to his forbidden caress. Fox pulls her close, savoring the warmth of her damp skin beneath his touch.She trembles in his grasp, unable to tear her eyes from his. She remembers the taste of his mouth on hers. “I hate you because you touch me.”“Do not be afraid.”She lets herself be drawn into his arms. No one has ever tried to comfort her, no one has ever cared. Why this man, she wonders, as she bends his head towards her. Why the enemy? BONUS This edition contains a bonus excerpt from RACHEL’S CHOICE by Judith E. French REVIEWS OF FORBIDDEN CARESS 4.09 average rating this edition, 134 ratings, 11 reviews, added by 440 people, 42 to-reads, 91% of people like it–Goodreads4.2 out of 5 stars (24 ratings)–Amazon“A LOVE STORY. I loved this story. I recommend everyone to read this book. I look forward to reading more of her.” Kattie, Goodreads“Awesome Writer!!!!! One of the best, so many struggles, but love conquers all. Must read!!!! Only in fairy tales but the world is a viciously attacking diversity place. But this is a real love story beginning to end!!! Loved it.”—Diana Crane, Goodreads ABOUT COLLEEN FRENCH Colleen French has a unique gift for capturing the essence of passion in her breathtaking tales of romance and adventure. Winner of the Delaware Diamond Award for Literary Excellence and the P.E.A.R.L. award, she is the daughter of bestselling novelist Judith E. French who first taught her how to write. Colleen has written more than 130 print novels which have sold more than 5 million copies and been translated into Bulgarian, French, German, Italian, Mandarin, and Spanish. Her Native American novels are inspired by her English, Scottish, Irish, Welsh, and Lenni–Lenape ancestry and her home near the Chesapeake Bay, where her family has lived for more than 300 years. Her books appeal to fans of Christi Caldwell, Mary Balogh, C. J. Petit, Shirleen Davies, Karen Kay, Madeline Baker, Elle Marlow, Ellen O'Connell, Vonna Harper, Judith E. French, Kathryn Le Veque, Margaret Mallory, Julie Garwood, Caroline Fyffe, Maya Banks, Hannah Howell Fiona Faris, and Alisa Adams.

    But all their trials on the battlefield can't prepare them for their greatest challenge yet: winning the hearts of four willful Scottish beauties. After years of fighting abroad, Ian MacDonald comes home to find his clan in peril. To save his kin, he must right the wrongs from his past...and claim the bride he's long resisted. As a young lass, Sìleas depended on Ian to play her knight in shining armor. But when his rescue attempt compromised her virtue, Ian was forced to marry against his wishes. Five years later, Sìleas has grown from an awkward girl into an independent beauty who knows she deserves better than the reluctant husband who preferred war to his wife. Now this devilishly handsome Highlander is finally falling in love. He wants a second chance with Sìleas—and he won't take no for an answer.

    When her father gambles away his fortune, the duke's only chance for recouping his losses lies in marrying off Lady Helen to any man wealthy enough to take a bride with nothing to recommend her but a lovely face and an eight-hundred-year-old pedigree. Enter Mr. Ethan Brundy, once an illegitimate workhouse orphan, now owner of a Lancashire textile mill and one of England's richest men. When he glimpses Lady Helen at Covent Garden Theatre, he is instantly smitten and vows to marry her. But this commonest of commoners will have his work cut out for him if he hopes to win the heart of his aristocratic bride.

    or her own?Cruel false gossip and scandal follow Velvet Campbell everywhere she goes in London—and for the sake of her sanity she must get away. Accepting a position as governess at an estate in remote Cornwall, Velvet hopes to start over, untainted by rumor. But she finds to her dismay that her new employer—the darkly handsome Lucian Pendar—is, himself, the subject of whispered insinuations...that he hurled his wife to her death from nearby treacherous cliffs. But angel or demon, Lucian affects Velvet in ways she never dreamed possible, causing her heart to race, stealing the breath from her body with a look. As their mutual attraction grows, there is no resisting the passion that flares between them. Yet, as secrets from both their pasts rise to the surface, Velvet is haunted by one inescapable question: has she found a kindred spirit, her destined love...or placed herself in dire peril?

    Each of them is handed a tantalizing clue to her true heritage—a clue which takes Maia across the world to a crumbling mansion in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Once there, she begins to put together the pieces of her story and its beginnings.Eighty years earlier in Rio’s Belle Epoque of the 1920s, Izabela Bonifacio’s father has aspirations for his daughter to marry into the aristocracy. Meanwhile, architect Heitor da Silva Costa is devising plans for an enormous statue, to be called Christ the Redeemer, and will soon travel to Paris to find the right sculptor to complete his vision. Izabela—passionate and longing to see the world—convinces her father to allow her to accompany him and his family to Europe before she is married. There, at Paul Landowski’s studio and in the heady, vibrant cafes of Montparnasse, she meets ambitious young sculptor Laurent Brouilly, and knows at once that her life will never be the same again.In this sweeping, epic tale of love and loss—the first in a unique, spellbinding series of seven novels—Lucinda Riley showcases her storytelling talent like never before.

    and the keeper of his heart.Richard de Claiborne, the dark earl of Dunsmore, serves King Edward Plantagenet well. Sworn to obey his king's every order, he nevertheless chafes at the command he wed the daughter of his enemy — a man who slew his father in cold blood. But King Edward wants peace in his lands, and he will stop at nothing to get it. If he has to order his most powerful Marcher lord to marry a Welsh princess, he considers it a small price to pay.Princess Gwenllian is a political pawn. When she's forced to marry the evil Black Hawk de Claiborne, she quakes at his fierceness and brutality. But she does her duty to her father and her people, knowing she will never surrender to her enemy. In the halls of Black Hawk's great keep, Gwen glimpses a man who can be tender and passionate — and who teaches her about breathtaking sensuality and a desire so great it threatens every vow she ever made to keep her heart locked tight.As war once more looms between Wales and England, Gwen realizes a terrible truth: she's in love with the enemy. When long-buried secrets threaten to destroy her fragile happiness, she must make a terrible choice-or watch the man she loves sacrifice his life to save hers...