After a series of failed relationships, the last of which left her destitute, she takes advantage of her father’s offer to live rent-free in a property he hasn’t been able to sell. But feeling at home in a house on the edge of a graveyard isn’t easy, especially when things go bump in the night.The only positive is the stunning cemetery caretaker, Rick. Despite her resolve to end her pattern of relationship mistakes, she literally can’t keep her hands off him. The intensity of her attraction seems almost...magical.Once a spirit manifests on her staircase, Grateful can no longer deny that her house is haunted. Rick has a dark secret, and it has everything to do with her personal history, the house, and the spirit who warns her about both.Feisty witches, seductive vampires, and swoon-worthy immortals come together in this page-turning paranormal romance/urban fantasy series.**The Ghost and The Graveyard is a funny, exciting, and sexy read intended for adults. Due to sexual content, language, and violence this book is recommended for ages 18+.**

    Marshal will be the first to show you hers in this sweet and sexy story of celebration and connection from #1 New York Times bestselling author Laurell K. Hamilton. Anita attends the wedding of her close friend but finds that even on the happiest of days there are wounds that need healing. She and the wereleopards Micah and Nathaniel are asked to talk to the bride’s thirteen-year-old brother, Tomas, who is struggling to recover from a recent gunshot wound. Depressed and demoralized, Tomas isn’t doing his physical therapy and could spend the rest of his life in a wheelchair… How can Anita, Micah, and Nathaniel convince Tomas that he can heal when he’s given up? They tell him about their own scars and how they took back their own lives after they were wounded. And Anita will realize how lucky they are to have not only survived their pasts, but to now be able to make their own formal commitment to each other— and the vampire in her life…

    Bound together by ancient bloodlines and a ruthless code of secrecy that punishes traitors with death, the Ikati send their leader Leander on a mission to capture one raised outside the tribe before she can expose their secret. When Leander tracks the unsuspecting outsider to Southern California, the hardened warrior is prepared for a fight—but not for the effect the sensual young beauty has on his heart.Jenna spent her childhood in hiding, on the run from someone—or something—her parents refused to discuss. She trusts no one, not since her father’s mysterious disappearance, not since her mother’s sudden death, and definitely not since she began exhibiting strange, superhuman abilities. When handsome, enigmatic Leander appears, promising answers to the mysteries that shroud her past, she knows she shouldn’t trust him either. But their connection is undeniable, and as powerful as the enemy hell-bent on destroying every one of their kind…

    Explicit language warning but little erotic content. (11,000 words ~ 43 pages) First published in The Mammoth Book of Paranormal Romance 2 (2010).WARNINGContains confused lovelorn werewolves and very pretty ex-Goth mermen who are exclusively interested in each other. May also contain fish, Irish mafia, and a shocking lack of tea.

    Lately, however, he’s started to see sparks of interest. So when he’s assigned to act as her bodyguard during a weekend education conference, he knows it's the perfect opportunity to seduce her out of the friend zone—away from the prying eyes of their pack.To put his plan into motion, Nikan cancels one of their hotel rooms. Is it underhanded? Yes. But he’s playing for keeps with this female. When a dangerous man from Esperanze's past shows up in need of help, Nikan must shield her from a group of rogue shifters and convince her that they're destined to be mates. Since she’s a beta and he’s an alpha she’s afraid things will never work between them. But he knows they’re meant to be together and he’ll do what it takes to make her his forever.

    P. Kelner, editors of Home Improvement: Undead Edition? Your worst school nightmares—taking that math test you never studied for, finding yourself naked in school assembly, not knowing which door to enter—will pale in comparison to these thirteen original stories that take academic anxiety to whole new realms. In #1 New York Times bestselling author Charlaine Harris’s story, "Playing Possum," Sookie Stackhouse brings enough birthday cupcakes for her nephew's entire class but finds she's one short when the angry ex-boyfriend of the school secretary shows up. When her guardian, Kate Daniels, sends her undercover to a school for exceptional children, teenaged Julie learns an all-new definition of "exceptional," in New York Times bestselling author Ilona Andrews's "Magic Tests." For those who like fangs with their forensics, New York Times bestselling author Nancy Holder offers "VSI," in which FBI agent Claire is tested as never before in a school for Vampire Scene Investigation. And in New York Times bestselling author Thomas Sniegoski's "The Bad Hour," Remy Chandler and his dog Marlowe find evil unleashed in an obedience school. You'll need more than an apple to stave off the creatures in these and nine other stories. Remember your first lesson: resistance is fruitless! Includes stories by: ILONA ANDREWS, AMBER BENSON, RHYS BOWEN, MIKE CAREY, CHARLAINE HARRIS, DONALD HARSTAD, STEVE HOCKENSMITH, NANCY HOLDER, FAITH HUNTER, TONI L.P. KELNER, MARJORIE LIU, JONATHAN MABERRY, THOMAS SNIEGOSKI

    While working on the set of a ghost-busting reality show in a haunted castle, she meets a sexy vampire, and together they prevent a Master Demon from killing everyone in the castle. In “Undead Sublet” by Molly Harper, executive chef Tess Maitland is banned from her five-star kitchen in Chicago to recover from “exhaustion.” Choosing a random rental house in Half-Moon Hollow to spend time in, she’s unaware that the house comes with a strange man. Even though Sam Masden’s ex-wife has rented the house out from under him, the divorce settlement allows him access to it for another ninety days. With Tess unable to go anywhere else, and Sam unwilling, a war of epic proportions is declared—and romantic sparks and heavy pots fly. Jessica Sims’s “Out With a Fang” features Ruby Sommers, a lonely were-jaguar who signs up for a blind date through the paranormal dating agency Midnight Liaisons. When she arrives, she finds out that her date, a vampire, was the human she’d been in love with four years ago but was forced to dump.

    Chained in the dark, Trevor Descansos endures pain and terror as vampires slowly drain the life from him. He finds mercy in Sentinel Siobhan, a beautiful avenging angel with lethal wings. She draws Trevor from the depths of hell, wrapping him in the softness of the same feathers that she wielded like blades to cut down his tormentors. Ageless and eternal, Siobhan has seen too much to be surprised by anything, but the mortal she finds in the pit of a vampire den shakes her to the core. Broken and near death, his ravaged masculine beauty stirs the heart she hadn't realized she possessed. Though she's tasked with eradicating the vampire disease sweeping across her world, she nurses Trevor back to health, healing him even as he awakens a forbidden longing. But the true test has yet to come. Siobhan faces an even darker fate than Trevor's, as she falls from grace into mortal love... Includes a preview of the next Renegade Angels novel, "A Hunger So Wild"

    Snuggles... Stress. You would think December would be Ivy's ideal time of year. After all, festivities abound and witches everywhere are encouraged to put their feet up and relax. That's not quite the case when she has various Order members attempting to finagle her into Christmas activities and a special artefact from the top of the Christmas tree goes missing. Either someone is attempting to sabotage Winter or something very strange is afoot indeed. This is a short holiday novella.

    Elizabeth was the daughter of two Selkies, you see, and she had just been passed up for a skin. But then a mysterious cousin who calls herself Annie appears, and Elizabeth finds other things to think about...It can be easy to forget that worlds don't wait for heroes before they begin. It can be easy to forget that things happened before the lights came up and the story started. This is one of those things that happened: this is one of those tales that slipped through the cracks. It is the story of a girl named Elizabeth, and a girl named Annie, and what they were to one another, in the sight and sounding of the sea.Maybe it isn't fair. But fairy tales never really are.

    Drama I happily do without. I live in a forgotten corner of nowhere for a reason: there is safety in anonymity. I have enough problems just trying to get by. But when Kieran, a sinfully sexy demigod at the pinnacle of power, crashes into my life, suddenly my whole world is turned upside down. He’s harboring a deadly secret, one that could destroy all he holds dear. He thinks I’m the key to his salvation, and he wants me to help him claim vengeance. He also wants me with a passion that burns my body from the inside out. To ignore him is impossible, but to give in to my desires, even for a night, would thrust me into danger I might not survive. Can I resist the temptation?

    In return for the ability to change at will into a coldhearted predator, Konstantine promised his soul—and the soul of his descendents—to the devil.Then one day a dangerous prophecy reveals the truth: One family has been chosen to battle the darkness—or face damnation.Ann Smith loves her dynamic boss, Jasha Wilder, but her daring plan to seduce him goes awry when she encounters a powerful wolf who, before her horrified eyes, changes into the man she adores. She soon discovers that she can't escape her destiny, for Jasha is Konstantine's descendant, and Ann is the woman fated to break the curse that binds his soul.

    Julia Fairfax is his stubborn American sister-in-law. After tragedy strikes, Douglas and Julia are forced to live together at Sommersgate and raise their newly orphaned nieces and nephew. Douglas has no desire to raise his dead sister’s children nor does he want the distraction of the tempting Julia living under his roof. Julia is struggling with grief and trying to make a go in a new country without much help from impossibly handsome but even more impossibly remote Douglas. Not to mention, she has to deal with the active hostility of Douglas’s frosty, Attila-the-Hun-in-a-skirt mother, Monique. Douglas decides the best way to give the children what they need, get his mother to behave and give himself what he wants is to marry Julia. When he tells her (yes, tells her) she will be his wife, Julia thinks Douglas is (probably) insane. And anyway, she’s decided if she ever has another husband (since the last one wasn’t so great), he was going to be short, balding, have a paunch and worship the ground she walks on (none of these characteristics define Douglas in the slightest). One more thing, Sommersgate House is haunted by the ghosts of the man who built the house and the woman who was the love of his life. They both died mysteriously at Sommersgate months after it was finished. When they did, a curse settled on the house making it seem strangely alive. And the only way for the beautiful but frightening house to rid itself of this curse is for its owner to find true love.

    But truth is, if you were born here, you can never really leave. I’m Kerris Fellwater, and when I returned, I inherited my grandmother’s house—and her gift. As a spirit shaman, it’s my responsibility to drive the dead back to their graves, because around Whisper Hollow, people—and secrets—don’t always stay buried.When I was little, I was told my mother ran off. But now it looks like she was murdered. With the help of my mysterious neighbor Bryan, we begin to unravel the mystery of her disappearance, and in doing so, unearth a dark force seeking to bury Whisper Hollow. Now I must work with the dead, rather than against them, because our enemy will do whatever she can to destroy the town, and she means to start with me.

    While his brother is fair of hair and lithe in body, Eamon sparks fear with his fiery locks and massive frame --a nd rumors of a mysterious power. But when his brother has the good fortune to be betrothed to a beautiful stranger, it's Eamon's help -- and quick wit and romantic heart -- that he needs. Eamon agrees to write the noble lady... a generous offer that will forever leave him a changed man. Lady Luella Jane Moran has no interest in an arranged marriage and tries valiantly to dissuade her betrothed from afar. Though her own letters plainly state her case, the words her husband-to-be writes her leave her aching for his touch. Will Lu give in to the desire the missives have kindled within her? Or will desire turn cold when she discovers their true author?