8978 Book(s) Related to perfume the story of a murderer cast

I was doted to the bone by the mafia heir, Ethan — he took bullets for me, endured 99 lashes, and promised to take me to see the Southern Sea that never freezes!
But he let Ashley get pregnant with his child.
He accused me of causing Elara’s pollen allergy, and even gave the only keepsake left by my mother — a bracelet — to Ashley as an apology.
He said, "It’s just a bracelet."

During an argument, he shoved me down, causing my head to bleed, yet he rushed to the hospital with Ashley, not even bothering to look back at me.
I lay in the hospital getting stitches, and his suit still carried Ashley’s perfume. He yelled at me, "You followed me to the hospital to cause trouble!" My heart shattered, yet he still lied to me, "I only love you. After this fake wedding, I’ll take you away!"

They chose her. They always chose her.
For eighteen years, I was the ghost in my own family while my adopted sister was the star. So when the ransom call came and they had to choose which daughter to save, I knew the answer before they spoke.
"Save her," they told the kidnappers, nodding at my sister. Then they turned to me. "She's strong. She can survive."
They were right. I was strong enough to survive the warehouse. Strong enough to disappear. Strong enough to come back.
Now I’m stepping onto the nation’s most-watched reality show, right alongside the people who left me for dead. They’re here to polish their perfect image for the cameras. I’m here to strip it bare—one live scandal at a time.
The problem? The show’s most powerful investor isn't playing their game. He’s a cold, record-breaking F1 champion​ who shuts down my sister’s tears and backs my play every single time. When my family tries a live ambush, he steps in front of the lens and makes it clear: I’m under his protection.
They called me strong because they thought I was disposable. Strong is the last thing they should have made me.

In his previous life, Evan risked his life to protect his fiancée and brothers in the apocalypse, only to be pushed off the fortress and fed to zombies. She thought she had obtained the address of the supply warehouse, but he had already been watching her affair with her lover on surveillance cameras.

Thinking she had his Noah's Ark, she was thrown into an empty warehouse on the day the virus broke out, and then sold as a bargaining chip by the mob.

When the zombie horde surged in, his former "white moonlight" and "true love" knelt before the fortress gate, begging him to open it.

Evan coldly uttered: "This time, it's your turn to taste despair."

In my past life, we were camping in the wilderness area of a state park when my best friend handed out "lucky charms" to the whole group. Charms she'd secretly packed full of wildlife attractant.

A wild boar knocked me to the ground outside the cabin door. Its tusks tore into my stomach. I pounded on the wood with both fists, screaming. "Help! Open the door!"

Inside were my boyfriend of two years and the best friend I'd been quietly supporting for just as long. Autumn Warren.

"I'm so sorry, Brynn." Autumn's voice broke into sobs, but her weight stayed pressed hard against the door. "There are boars everywhere. We open that door, we're all dead."

"Just hold on! I'm calling 911!" Wyatt Fletcher's voice rang out with the kind of conviction that cost him absolutely nothing.

I paid for that trip. I'd fallen behind because I'd stopped to pull Autumn along.

And they stood on the other side of that door, my blood soaking into the dirt, and locked me out.

I open my eyes. I'm back. It's the day we left.

That admissions season, Lily — a poor student who couldn't even clear the state university cutoff — insisted on dragging my two childhood friends off to the worst community college in the state, just so she wouldn't have to go alone.

Ethan held an offer from Yale. Ryan had been accepted to Stanford. Yet the two of them, as if under a spell, were ready to throw away those schools just to follow her.

I wore myself out trying to talk them down. All I got back was: You look down on Lily. You're just jealous.

Behind their backs, I contacted counselors, admissions offices, and their parents, and clawed their spots back one by one just before the deadline.

Lily went to that community college alone. Six months later, she jumped from the roof of her dorm.

Ethan and Ryan handled her funeral, then came back and tied me to the roof of a thirty-six-story building.

"If you hadn't stopped us from going with Lily, she never would have been bullied there."

"You're so capable, aren't you? Then go down and keep her company."

They pushed me over the edge without a flicker of hesitation.

When I opened my eyes, I was back at the start of college application season.

This time, I won't save them.

Ten years of secret love, and what did I get? Watching him fall for another woman at MY art exhibition.

The most ridiculous part? He turned to me and said, "Harper, you have to help me win her over."

I orchestrated their romantic encounters, taught him how to charm women, even told him what flowers she liked. I was the perfect wingman, watching them fall in love while I licked my wounds in the dark.

Until Dr. Avery confronted me with one devastating question: "Do you really think he doesn't know you love him?"

When I finally screamed "I've loved you for ten years!" at Mason, his response froze my blood:

"I know. I've always known."

Turns out, my ten years of devotion were nothing more than a free emotional dumping ground to him—the convenient girl who would never leave. He enjoyed my care while pretending not to see my love, because that was safest, easiest.

Pathetic, right?

A woman wastes ten years loving a man, only to end up pushing him into someone else's arms.

Until Blake appeared.......

On the seventh wedding anniversary, I woke up in the lounge and found a big word "BITCH" sprayed with red paint on my chest.
The culprit, holding a spray-paint can, had a naive-looking smile on her face and said, "I'm doing you a favor. Your white outfit's way too boring."
I was just about to take action when my husband rushed in to protect her, frowning and scolding me: "She's just a little girl; she doesn't know any better. Do you have to be so petty?"
At this moment, looking at the man in front of me who had risen because of my family's influence, I suddenly laughed.
He probably forgot who had given him this overwhelming wealth.
I unscrewed the red-tipped thick paint pen and walked step by step towards the trembling girl.
"Your face is boring, too. Let me do you a favor."
As for my husband?
I'll make him know that without me, he's worse than a dog.

I’m in love with my sworn enemy.
My touch tames his inner beast.
… Until I find another woman’s bite mark on his neck.

As a holy witch, I shouldn't be sneaking out for Zuri—a cursed shape-shifter from a rival clan.
But our forbidden heat is intoxicating.
When his monstrous Primal breaks free, slaughtering everything in its path, even his fiercest warriors cower.
I don't.
I walk straight to the blood-soaked beast, press my body against his, and tame him with a single, desperate embrace.

There’s just one problem: his clan betrothed him to a Shaman’s daughter.

I tell myself it's purely political. I tell myself his heart is mine.
Until tonight.
He sneaks into the woods for me. We share a deep, hungry kiss under the moonlight.
But as I pull back, my blood runs cold.
Right there, on the neck of the man I just risked my soul to save...
Is a fresh, undeniable bite mark.

"Why should I save you?"
His voice was calm, cruel—even as the fire raged below her.
"Because... I don't want to die," Emma choked, tears mixing with soot.
He smirked, lighting a cigarette. "Not my problem."
Betrayed by the only pack she ever called home, accused of killing the Alpha's mate, and left for dead, Emma—an abused, wolfless omega—finds herself at the mercy of Leo, the infamous Hybrid King. He saves her, but only after forcing her to agree to one thing:
"You're mine now. My Slave"
But as days turn to nights, and pain gives way to sparks, Leo begins to see something more in the broken girl he claimed. And Emma? She begins to feel something dangerously close to power.
When she discovers she's the destined Savior of the very pack that tried to execute her, the lines between love, loyalty, and vengeance begin to blur. Especially when Alpha Damon comes crawling back, begging for forgiveness.
Two kings. One omega. A prophecy soaked in blood.
Will Emma return to the monster she once loved… or rise with the one who saw her worth in the ashes?

"Do you feel that, Wren? That pull between us?"
His eyes darken, flicking to my mouth.
"It's wrong. Your brother would slit my throat for just standing this close. But tell me, little bird" his breath ghosts my skin, "are you trembling because you hate me… or because you've wanted this just as much as I have?"
Wren thought she'd buried the chaos of New Orleans for good—the clubs, the blood-soaked loyalties, the men who lived and died by their kuttes. Seattle gave her everything she ever wanted: freedom, love, a future.
But one betrayal shatters it all.
Dragged home by tragedy, Wren finds herself under the watchful eye of Ezra Jax—the Raven Reapers MC's vice president and her brother's best friend. He's infuriating, dangerous, and far too tempting for a man she should never touch.
And the deeper Wren is pulled back into his world, the more she realizes nothing about her past—or about Ezra—is what she believed.
In the chaos of gang wars, mounting debts, and old betrayals, he becomes the one constant. The more she fights him, the harder she falls. And the more he pushes her away, the more lethal his pull becomes.
Because in this world, love isn't sweet.
It's brutal. Bloody.
And it's bound to break them both.
When loyalty is everything and love can cost your life, will Wren risk her heart on the one man she was never meant to love?

Abandoned in the forest as a baby and raised by the Dark Light Pack, Elara grows up invisible. Overlooked. Maltreated. Treated like she was never meant to exist.

Until the mate bond awakens.

Bound to the Alpha, she expects a new beginning. Instead, she is rejected. Broken. Put through cruelty and torture that nearly destroys her.

But instead of breaking... she snaps.

In a moment that should have been impossible, Elara takes control of the mate bond and shatters it.

And then she runs.

What she doesn't know is that her breaking point was only the beginning.

Because Elara is not just a wolf.

She is something far older. A rebirth. A power that once walked the world three thousand years ago... and vanished after sealing away a force that threatened to destroy everything.

Now, that power is rising again.

As her abilities awaken and memories begin to surface, Elara is drawn to a truth she cannot escape and a man she cannot ignore.

Beros.

Powerful. Mysterious. And bound to her in a way she cannot understand.

Their connection is deeper than fate. Older than time. A love that has waited centuries for her return... and refuses to let her go again.

But just as she begins to step into her true strength, the past she tried to leave behind comes crawling back.

The Alpha who rejected her now wants her.

Desperate. Obsessed. Determined to have her back at all costs.

Now caught between a love that once broke her, a love that has endured lifetimes, and a power that could change the fate of the world, Elara must rise into who she truly is.

Because the same darkness she once destroyed is rising again.

And this time...

It knows she's back.

Stabbed in the back by the people she called her family, Tinsley William's life ended up in shreds. Her sister called her names and tainted her reputation. She was all over the news as a husband snatcher and desperate jealous bitch which resulted in her having a one night stand with a well known Billionaire at the club she went to drink out her sorrows before leaving the country.
Fast forward seven years later, now a successful anonymous Millionaire author and a mother of three, Tinsley regained her fame and decided to move back to the place she called home.
Little did she know that her sudden appearance would stir up a crisis in the life of her family and everyone around her, including the Triplets father, but her three little genius kids were one step ahead of her.

In a world where shapeshifters live under rigid hierarchies, Maya learned early on to hide. Among a race considered inferior, she camouflages her true identity: a wolf descended from a powerful and ancient lineage. To protect herself, she maintains the lie that she cannot transform—a trick that keeps her away from prying eyes, but also isolates her from who she truly is.

Everything begins to spiral out of control when Conrad, the alpha king, arrives in her region. Cold, imposing, and respected, he is there to investigate a series of events linked to black magic—something that threatens to destabilize the fragile balance between the races. Upon meeting Maya, he immediately recognizes the rare and profound bond between souls linked by destiny: she is his mate. But Maya doesn't want to be found, nor claimed. Maya fears what Conrad will see when he truly looks at her.

With the dark threat intensifying and her past beginning to surface, Maya finds herself trapped between the instinct to flee and the need to protect herself. Conrad, torn between his duty as king and the bond that ties him to Maya, will have to decide whether to trust a woman who hides more than she reveals.

Because when the truth comes to light, nothing will be the same—and not everyone will survive what is to come.

A time of ancient ignorance. Humans did not yet exist, the ancestors of the elves were still trolls, and the titans ruled the earth and the dragons ruled the skies. At the end of the Age, the Titans and Dragons fought and lost. At this time, a traveler descended on a tribe of Hawkmen, leading them gradually out of their own evolutionary path, and eventually became a tribe of angels. Countless years later. The King of Angels, the Lord of Judgment, Jiang You, was on the throne of heaven. Endless beings sang in unison: 'Holy! Holy! Sinners can't look upon the majesty and glory of God. Each one is crowned with a crown of jade and honored with a golden throne."

Sienna Alexander's mate didn't just betray her. He stood there and let it happen.
On her coronation night, Lucas broke their bond and claimed her stepsister in front of the entire pack, too proud to see what his own mother-in-law was doing behind him.
While the crowd was still cheering, Morrigan carved Sienna's power out of her body, vein by vein, and planted it inside her own daughter's womb like something she'd been owed for years.
Then they left the body behind. Nobody checks if a corpse is still breathing. They should have.
Half-dead in the woods, Sienna feels her wolf clawing to break free, and every instinct in her screams to let it happen. But the Moon Goddess's law is older than her pain: an omega who shifts before her power settles doesn't survive it. Shifting means dying.
She shifts anyway.
A rival Alpha finds her collapsed at the tree line before the goddess can collect what she's owed. His name is Damien, and he has no idea he just pulled the Millennium Wolf out of the dirt.
Call the dead, owe the dead.
Lucas and Morrigan are about to learn what that means.

The Secret Lover in the Movie Star's Heart is a suspenseful romance novel that transcends time and space. Modern-day detective Sophia stumbles upon a thirty-year-old buried corpse and, through a mysterious photograph, is transported back in time to meet the deceased, William—a gifted but missing actor with whom she forms an unbreakable bond. As Sophia journeys across different eras, she uncovers the truth behind William’s disappearance, while their love story unfolds across time itself. However, each passage through time brings unknown dangers and challenges, and Sophia must solve the mystery while protecting William from the twists of fate...

They call it a curse whispered beneath the Blood Moon, a prophecy that binds lovers in chains of fate and rips packs apart in rivers of blood. Iria Korrin has spent her life running from it, hiding her true name, her true bloodline, and the shadows that stalk her every step. When she arrives at Lunar Crest University, she swears she’ll keep her head down, stay invisible, and finally build a life that belongs to her. But fate has other plans.

Two brothers feel the pull of Grey, the brutal, magnetic Alpha whose touch is command and destruction in equal measure, and Brian, the cold strategist whose silence conceals the hunger he cannot fight. To be chosen by one is rare. To be claimed by both is impossible. It means the curse has awakened again.

As secrets unravel, false friends circle like vultures, and betrayal burns hotter than love, Iria must decide whether she will be the curse’s victim… or its breaker. But breaking it may demand the ultimate price: her blood, her crown, or her heart.

Dark romance, deadly games, and forbidden desire weave together beneath the Blood Moon where love is a weapon, betrayal is destiny, and survival is never guaranteed.

“The Devil always collects his debts.”
Sold by my father to settle his gambling debt, I walked down the cathedral aisle toward a sadistic mafia tyrant. Meanwhile beneath my wedding dress, I hid a lethal secret: I was three weeks pregnant by my bodyguard.
Then the doors blew off their hinges.
Through the smoke walked Lorenzo Genovese, the Devil of the East Coast. I grew up amongst powerful, dangerous men. And I saw the way they flinched at the sound of his name. That was the kind of man I was promised to by my father ten years ago.
Ten years ago, my father signed a blood oath to save his life. The price was my hand, delivered to the devil the day I turned twenty-three.
One bullet ended my wedding. One command stole my freedom.
“You are going to take off this dead man’s blood, you are going to put on my ring, and you are going to be my wife.”
I should have agreed. That's what he expected of me. Instead, I looked into his silver eyes and whispered, “I’m not yours.”
Now, I am a captive inside his mountain fortress. Lorenzo demands pureblood heirs, oblivious to the rival bastard growing in my womb. To survive, I must play a dangerous game—enticing the devil into my bed to pin the pregnancy on him and save myself and my baby.
But the Don is an enigma who sees through every lie. And then I discover that even the Devil hides secrets of his own.
But if he uncovers mine... I won't be the only one he destroys.

Growing up as the Princess of Ever Moon Pack, Regina never thought that she would be betrayed and sold by her own husband. Then she found this marriage is all a lie from day one. Thank the moon goddess that her older brother Gray saved her from her abusive husband and brought her home. But when she discovers that Ever Moon Pack's new, handsome alpha is not really her biological brother, her world is turned upside down again. ...And not to say Gray has been in love with her since forever. --- "Here's my wife! Pretty, huh?" My husband cackled, "You two can have a night with her and all my debts go away. Great deal, right?"

Sable Cross has one rule left standing after eight years of chasing supernatural skips for cash under the trade name Wraith, don't take a job that isn't already half finished, and don't ask too many questions about what your target actually is until the payment clears.

She breaks both rules on what is supposed to be her very last bounty, a routine skip trace that turns into a dead sprint through downtown alleys when her target shifts, mid chase, into something with claws and considerably more teeth than the file photo suggested.

She survives the night only because a stranger built like a small apocalypse steps directly between her and a very large wolf and ends the confrontation without breaking a sweat, and she survives the following morning only because that same stranger, Kieran Sinclair, decides not to have her memory wiped or her body disposed of, the two standard options for humans who accidentally witness the world Sable just fell into.

Kieran does not explain, at first, why he already knows her name, her birthday, and the exact street corner where her family was murdered when she was seven years old.

He does not explain, either, why an old, patient dread has been sitting behind his eyes since the moment he recognized her face in that alley.

What he offers instead is a job, considerably better paid than skip tracing, considerably more dangerous, and requiring her to pose as his fiancée at a gathering of packs that includes the same faction responsible for burning her childhood pack to the ground.

Sable came looking for one last payday.

I was nothing. A rejected mate. A worthless omega. A slave forced to endure the cruelty of my pack. Alpha Ryker, the man destined to love me, cast me aside without a second thought. I wasn’t just betrayed by him but I was also betrayed by him and my step sister. I was left to suffer, to break, to fade into nothingness. Until he came. Kaiden. The rogue. The monster. The man whispered about in nightmares and spoken of in fear. They say he’s cursed, that his very existence is a death sentence. Packs tremble at his name. Alphas bow to his wrath. And now… I belong to him. I was stolen in the dead of night, ripped from one prison and thrown into another. But Kaiden doesn’t just want a captive. He wants a wife. A mate. Me.

On the eve of our mating ceremony, Dante sold me to the blind, mad tomb keeper on the back mountain for a single coin.
The pack elder furrowed his brow. "Young Alpha, if you want to make that rogue Omega your Luna, you can simply break the engagement with Maeve. Maeve once risked her life to heal you. Throwing her to that cruel monster is going too far."
Dante replied dismissively.
"It's just a small lesson. Who told her to be so stubborn, refusing to step down and accept the title of concubine? Besides, it's her cold attitude that triggered Chloe's panic attacks."
"Lucian is an absolute lunatic. Give it three hours, and her mind will break. When that happens, she'll naturally be crying on her knees, begging me to take her back."
The elder sighed heavily. "Aren't you afraid she'd rather marry Lucian than bow her head to you?"
Dante scoffed.
"Impossible. She loves me to the bone. Even if she goes to hell, she'd save herself for me. Tomorrow, after the mating ceremony, I'll play her savior one more time. Once she's suffered enough, she'll be completely devoted to me."
I didn't cry or make a scene. I simply clutched that coin tightly and walked away without looking back.
The next day, when Dante frantically smashed open the cemetery gates, the rumored blind monster had me wrapped securely in his arms. And clearly branded on my neck was the fresh mating mark he had just bitten into my skin.
The high and mighty Young Alpha stood there, eyes bloodshot, his voice trembling as he demanded to know how I could be so heartless.

"I'll have her in my bed before prom."
That's what my "perfect boyfriend" wrote about me, in a group chat with his best friend — betting on me like I was some kind of prize, with his friend's ridiculously expensive vintage Porsche on the line.
Me, the nobody scholarship girl, somehow ending up with the most popular playboy in school? I actually thought it was fate. I thought it was my fairy tale.
Turns out, I was just the trophy they were fighting over the whole damn time.
So if you boys want to treat my heart like it's just some stupid bet, fine. Let's play this game to the very end.
At prom, I'll make sure they know it: they picked the wrong girl to mess with.

I caught my husband sleeping with my sister, so I burned it all down.
The fire burned fierce, swallowing that abandoned cabin in the woods, along with my shattered marriage.
With the stench of gasoline still lingering on my fingertips, I thought I had finally buried the man who betrayed me.
Until the next morning, when he walked through the front door without a single scratch.
My mind reeled.
If he was still alive... then who the hell did I burn to a crisp last night?

I longed for family affection and true love all my life. I tried my best to get along with my stepbrother Karen, and wholeheartedly loved his friend Nolan. However, my sincerity was trampled into the mud. They conspired to hurt me, spread indecent content to ruin my life, and even broke the last relic left by my grandmother. I suffered countless humiliations and injuries, then chose to leave without saying goodbye. Years later, the two men were trapped in endless regret, but I had already walked out of the shadow of the past. Trust is gone, and so is my tenderness for them.

“Bro, it’s not a big deal. I’m just fucking her.”

My heart stopped.

Kendall’s voice replied, “But man, what would people think if you made her your girl? That’d be crazy work.”

“I’m not stupid,” Jalen said flatly. “I’d never make her mine. It’s only sex, nothing more. And honestly? It’s not that good anymore. I was gonna let her down easy before break.”
......

Aria, a plus-size beauty, thought her scholarship and condo arrangements were a dream until she met her roommate, Talia. Rich, spoiled, and instantly cruel, Talia made Aria's life miserable.

Talia’s new boyfriend, Jalen, was the campus golden boy. When Aria and Jalen were paired for a project, they clicked in ways neither expected from late night talks to shared secrets and undeniable sexual chemistry.

On Halloween night, during an all campus party, Aria sees Talia cheating on Jalen. One emotional night led to an affair that changed everything… until Jalen says some really damaging words to his roommate that were unforgivable and also heard by a once happy but now upset Aria. Disappointed, fed up, and heartbroken, Aria leaves campus and never looks back.

TEN YEARS LATER
Aria returns for the ten year reunion, confident, stunning, and a self-made CEO. Jalen is still gorgeous… but stuck in a miserable marriage with Talia.

She ignores him. Talia tries to humiliate her. Aria wins the room.

As she leaves, Jalen kisses her. She lets herself feel it, then slaps him and walks away.

THE BUSINESS MERGER

Jalen’s cruise line needs Aria’s brand to revamp their image. She agrees, reluctantly.

Now they’re forced to work side by side, trapped between old wounds and new sparks.

Some love stories never die. But some can burn you twice.

“A masterpiece of thriller and mystery. Blake Pierce did a magnificent job developing characters with a psychological side so well described that we feel inside their minds, follow their fears and cheer for their success. Full of twists, this book will keep you awake until the turn of the last page.” --Books and Movie Reviews, Roberto Mattos (re Once Gone) NEXT DOOR (A Chloe Fine Mystery) is book #1 in a new psychological suspense series by bestselling author Blake Pierce, whose #1 bestseller Once Gone (Book #1) (a free download) has received over 1,000 five star reviews. FBI Evidence Response Team intern Chloe Fine, 27, finds herself forced to confront her own dark past when her troubled twin sister needs her help—and when a body turns up dead in her small, suburban town.Chloe feels life is finally perfect as she moves back into her home town, and into a new house with her fiancé. Her career with the FBI looks promising, and her wedding is on the horizon. But, she learns, all is not as it seems in suburbia. Chloe begins to see the underside—the gossip, the secrets, the lies—and she finds herself haunted by her own demons: her mother’s mysterious death when she was 10, and her father’s imprisonment. And when a fresh body is found, Chloe soon realizes that her past, and this small town, might hold the key to solving both.An emotionally wrought psychological suspense with layered characters, small-town ambiance and heart-pounding suspense, NEXT DOOR is book #1 in a riveting new series that will leave you turning pages late into the night. Book #2 in the CHLOE FINE series will be available soon.

“A masterpiece of thriller and mystery. Blake Pierce did a magnificent job developing characters with a psychological side so well described that we feel inside their minds, follow their fears and cheer for their success. Full of twists, this book will keep you awake until the turn of the last page.” --Books and Movie Reviews, Roberto Mattos (re Once Gone) SILENT NEIGHBOR (A Chloe Fine Mystery) is book #4 in a new psychological suspense series by bestselling author Blake Pierce, whose #1 bestseller Once Gone (Book #1) (a free download) has over 1,000 five-star reviews. When a flashy, new neighbor flaunts her wealth in a suburban town, it isn’t long before she’s found murdered. Did her flaunting ways upset her envious neighbors? Or was there a deeper secret to her husband’s fortune?FBI VICAP Special Agent Chloe Fine, 27, finds herself immersed in a small-town world of lies, cliques, gossip and betrayal as she tries to separate truth from lies.But what is the real truth?And can she solve it while also dealing with the release of her troubled father from jail, and the spiraling down of her troubled sister?An emotionally wrought psychological suspense with layered characters, small-town ambiance and heart-pounding suspense, THE SILENT NEIGHBOR is book #4 in a riveting new series that will leave you turning pages late into the night. Book #5 in the CHLOE FINE series will be available soon.

“A masterpiece of thriller and mystery. Blake Pierce did a magnificent job developing characters with a psychological side so well described that we feel inside their minds, follow their fears and cheer for their success. Full of twists, this book will keep you awake until the turn of the last page.” --Books and Movie Reviews, Roberto Mattos (re Once Gone) TINTED WINDOWS (A Chloe Fine Mystery) is book #6 in a new psychological suspense series by bestselling author Blake Pierce, whose #1 bestseller Once Gone (Book #1) (a free download) has over 1,000 five-star reviews. When a popular personal trainer is murdered in a high-end suburb, FBI VICAP Special Agent Chloe Fine, 27, is summoned to sift through a small town filled with cheating spouses and figure out who may have wanted him dead—and why.Behind the manicured lawns, Chloe learns, lie broken marriages, lonely spouses, secrets, and endless lies—all hiding behind the veil of perfection. Beneath the carefully built façade of a polished, upstanding community lies a populace dishonest to its core.What secrets led to this man’s being murdered?And who will be next to die?An emotionally wrought psychological suspense with layered characters, small-town ambiance and heart-pounding suspense, TINTED WINDOWS is book #6 in a riveting new series that will leave you turning pages late into the night.

The day I achieved telepathic breakthrough, I heard my fiancée's inner voice telling me to "get lost."
In the restaurant, she abandoned me as I coughed up blood to embrace another man.
I signed the death contract for the meat grinder frontline, determined to die, but when bone spikes pierced through my chest, my telepathy revealed the truth—she pushed me away not because she didn't love me, but because she had been bitten by a zombie three years ago.

In order to prolong the life of my supposedly sick "white moonlight" (my love interest), my wife forced me onto the operating table and removed my kidney while I was still alive.

To force me to leave with nothing, she even cut off my mother's medication, coldly declaring, "Your mother is just a liability that deserves to be optimized."

She thought I would wag my tail and beg for mercy like a stray dog.

Little did she know, suffering from single kidney failure, I transformed myself into the deadliest viral code before my death, dragging her business empire and that male mistress into an inescapable hell.

On the day the truth came to light, the once-powerful tech queen went completely mad. She squandered her fortune, kneeling in the frost of the morgue, kowtowing and weeping blood, begging me to look at her one last time. But she couldn't find a single hair of mine.

Because I had already made a will, ordering my remains to be cremated as high-risk medical waste.

She treated me like dirt when she was alive, and after she died, I found her disgusting and didn't even bother to leave her a handful of ashes.

Ethan and I grew up together. We were supposed to exchange rings at the altar, make our vows. But on our wedding day, he left me standing there to go save his so-called suicidal ex. Almost killed my parents from the shame.

Four years later, I'm back in Portland with my husband. The city isn't that big, and of course fate decides to throw him in my path again.

He has the nerve to ask me to be his mistress.

I hold up my left hand, the ring catching the light. "Are you blind?"

A wealthy socialite slapped me hard across the face in the emergency room.
What she didn't know was that I was actually a specially appointed expert ranked number one in the world in cardiac surgery. What
she didn't know even more was that three hours later, I would be holding the scalpel, deciding the life or death of the head of her entire family.
When the most authoritative hospital director in New York, accompanied by a group of experts, stumbled into the emergency room, sweating profusely and bowing to me, this socialite's dream of a life of luxury was shattered completely.

My mother was dying, and I—the fallen heiress of the Sterling family—had no choice but to ask my husband for the $200,000 stipulated in our prenuptial agreement, less than a week after our wedding.

He transferred the money without a word.

But that night, the way he looked at me changed.

"So the Sterling family is drowning in fraud scandals. I guess greed really does run in the blood."

From that day on, Theodore never looked me in the eye again.

He started openly parading other women at social events, letting everyone mock me as a gold-digger who only married him for money.

Today is my birthday. I'm sitting in the emergency room with unbearable stomach pain.

Meanwhile, Theodore is throwing a party for his new girlfriend.

Clutching the $185 emergency room bill, I call him.

"Theodore, let's get a divorce."

"Here we go again. How much are you trying to extort from me this time?"

The day I received my medical report and found out I was pregnant, my husband—Alpha Godfrey Hansen—held a small wedding ceremony in the hospital garden with his first love and former mate, Gillian Boyd.
He explained, “Her final wish in this life was to be my bride.”
But what about me?
What was I to him? A replacement?
It finally hit me—ten years of unwavering devotion and sacrifice meant nothing compared to a single tear shed by his first love.

Before the wedding, my fiancé, Alpha Kendrick, stood in front of me. Hesitation flickered in his eyes, but so did hope.
“Can you give me a month?” he asked, his voice softer than I’d ever heard it.
A month. Time to see if he could patch things up with Elena Manwaring—his ex-girlfriend. His fated mate.
“If it works out,” he continued, the words deliberate, like he was convincing himself as much as me, “then it’s the Moon Goddess’s blessing. But if it doesn’t… I’ll come back. I’ll marry you. And I’ll leave her behind—forever.”
He meant it. He truly believed this was the honorable thing to do.
I didn’t argue. I didn’t cry. Instead, I let a small, knowing smile tug at my lips.
“Go ahead,” I said, my voice calm and steady. “Give it a try. Life’s too short for regrets, right?”
Relief broke over his face like a wave, as though I’d just untangled him from a chain he hadn’t known how to break. That night, he drove off, lighter than I’d seen him in months.
Meanwhile, I packed my bags in silence.

Everyone said I’d traded five years of my youth and my unwavering devotion for an engagement that every woman envied.
My fiancé, Felix Smith, seemed to believe it, too. He gave me pearls, promised me a bright future, and wrapped me up in a web of tenderness, layer after layer.
Until that afternoon, when he held me close, yet used a language he thought I didn’t understand to weave the perfect "wedding" con over the phone.
That was the moment I finally realized: over these five years, who had he really been looking at through me? And every pearl he ever gave me, whose tastes was he remembering?
When the elevator failed and darkness crashed down, the person he protected on instinct wasn’t me.
When the wind howled across the empty outskirts, the person he chose to abandon was me.
I’d been learning how to love him, how to become a proper bride. In the end, what I learned was how to exit quietly, out of his world with Serena.
Only when I slipped off that pearl ring did I understand—
Some love stories, from the very beginning, are nothing but long letters written to someone else.

After Grandpa passed away, he left two inheritances behind.
One was an underground shelter costing over a hundred million yuan.
The other was a crumbling old house on the brink of collapse in the village.
My younger sister Su Rou rushed to pick the underground shelter first, so I settled for the old house.
No one expected an extreme cold apocalypse to descend just days later.
Su Rou moved into the shelter with her boyfriend.
But her boyfriend leaked the gate password, attracting a mob of thugs.
Su Rou was reduced to their plaything, trapped in a fate worse than death.
As for me, I discovered the old house’s cellar connected to a natural underground hot spring. I managed to survive by sheer luck.
When Su Rou heard the news, she was consumed by envy. She led the thugs straight to me, forcing me to take her place.
"Sister, you’ve always been the nicest to me since we were kids. You’ll save me, right? You take my place and serve them instead."
I could no longer endure the humiliation. I set fire to the place and died alongside them all.
When I opened my eyes again, I was back at the very moment we chose the inheritances.
Seeing Su Rou pick the run-down old house without the slightest hesitation, I knew she had also been reborn.
I bowed my head to hide all my emotions, then silently chose the underground shelter.
My dear sister… that drafty, ramshackle old house is nowhere near as wonderful as you think it is.

"Mum? I'm sorry, I'm so sorry." Amelia begged, trying to leave Fernando's side but he didn't let her.

"How could you commit such a sin, Amelia?"


My mother was a lot of things but I never knew she would dare leave her Billionaire husband on the Alter stranded.

My soon to be stepfather was a lot of things, but he wasn't one to accept humiliation. And for that reason, he made me Amelia, the daughter of my runaway mother to take her place on the alter.

My fate was sealed the moment I stepped inside that school. A simple sentence, seven measly words that put a target on my back, was all it took to turn three years of my life into a nightmare.

Savaş Ewald became my tormentor and my nemesis without knowing a thing about me… or did he? How was I supposed to know, when I didn’t have a single memory of my past and no one willing to tell me anything?

I need Savaş in order to find out about my past, but he doesn't play by the rules. He trades answers for kisses, clues for pieces of myself, but how much of myself am I willing to give him in order to find out the truth?

The closer I get to finding out who I am, the more I realize Savaş Ewald will be my destruction.

Summer vacation is finally here, and Olivia has big plans! Unfortunately, news of Olivia and Luca’s success in finding one of the Seven Supreme Hallows at the Holy Draconic Spring of Tritonis has reached the king of Shutora, and before the two can even leave the school grounds, a royal summons arrives. Olivia, Eldraco, and Luca are going to the capital! The search for the Seven Supreme Hallows continues, and though the royal edict seems like it will spell doom for their summer vacation, the eternally optimistic Olivia comes up with a great idea to make their journey as fun as it can be!

I spent a month pretending to be a coward in a mercenary cannon-fodder camp.

A recruit shattered my nose with a punch and ground his combat boot into my face; the instructor cut off my water during drills in forty-degree heat, waiting for me to drop dead from dehydration. To prevent the military AI surveillance overhead from catching my tactical muscle memory, I forcibly locked down my combat instincts and swallowed blood mixed with dirt.

They thought I was just a sluggish forty-two-year-old drifter, unaware that in the Pentagon's top-secret sealed files, I am a former Joint Special Operations Command "Tier 0" Ghost Operative.

Until that day, when heavily armored mercenaries raided the camp, and an EMP grenade paralyzed the entire surveillance grid.

Staring at the extinguished infrared indicator lights above, I snapped an enemy's neck and picked up a rifle from the ground.

"Alright, restrictions lifted."

I work for the government. My job was simple on paper: steal a key-chip from the man behind an organ-trafficking network.

The problem was access. He never moved without bodyguards, and any new face got screened out fast. The only opening was his son’s wedding—the one day he’d show up in public.

But I couldn’t hide what I am. Professional habits give you away. So I did the only thing that would make me invisible: I put myself under deep hypnosis, locked every memory, forged a new identity, and spent six months inside the estate as a disposable security guard.

For half a year, I hauled crates, swallowed insults, and scrubbed floors on my knees. Everyone thought I was easy to break.

On the wedding day, the groom came looking for trouble. He slapped me, forced me down, and my nose bled all over my uniform. I could barely breathe.

Then the wedding march started.

That was my trigger. The moment the music hit, everything came back—my name, my mission, and what I came to take.

They thought I was a dog they could kick. Nobody knew that the bloodied guard on the grass had just remembered everything.

Next, the wedding became my field.

Three days after the miscarriage, I dragged my body — still not healed — to a rooftop club in Manhattan.
All because tomorrow was Bradley's birthday.
I wanted to buy him a gift. With money I'd earned myself.
But just before I pushed open the door to the VVIP suite, I heard his voice.
"That broke girl from Brooklyn? She was just a bet. A toy I won."
I peered through the crack in the door.
The man who'd shown up every day in grease-stained coveralls, crying about how tight money was — that same man now stood in a tailored suit, a watch on his wrist that cost more than I made in a year.
Someone asked, "So what about your fiancée?"
Bradley laughed — easy, unbothered.
"The wedding's still on. Obviously."
I stood in the hallway, one hand pressed against my stomach, where the ache still hadn't left, and suddenly everything made sense.
Three years of love — fake. His poverty — fake. Even the part where I believed he'd loved me. Had that been fake too?
I didn't cry. I didn't storm in and demand answers.
I just looked down at the birthday gift in my hands.
And in that moment, I made my decision —I was done with him.

Lysa loved Damian for seven years, yet hypnotic manipulation warped his memories, leading him to brand her the killer of his parents. With his own hands, he cut her bones and implanted canine fur, transforming her into a deformed half-human beast and subjecting her to endless humiliation and torture. She watched her mother die a brutal death and was forced to swallow her mother’s cremated ashes. At the brink of death, her ancestral sea spirit pendant awakened, shedding her mangled hound form to birth a tyrannical deep-sea siren. Once the scheming fake heroine’s lies were laid bare, Damian descended into madness, drowning in desperate remorse. Wielding the immortal power of a siren, Lysa cast all her tormentors into an endless living hell—and she would never grant them forgiveness.

My best friend Bella had a cluster of mushrooms growing on her back, every color you could imagine.

They throbbed like something alive, and the smell coming off them was like nothing I'd ever smelled.

She called it Moonlight Bloom, a gift straight from Viscount Lucas himself.

If she kept that thing on her body for forty days, not one more, not one less, until it bloomed its brightest spores, the viscount would marry her and take her into his estate.

So she refused to shower. Wouldn't let a drop of water touch her.

Everyone in the pack knew me as the one who always looked out for people, and I figured she'd been cursed with dark magic. So one night while she slept, I grabbed a bucket of soapy water and a stiff brush and scrubbed that thing clean off her back.

The next morning, she ran her hand over the raw patch of skin where it used to be, grabbed a silver dagger, and drove it straight through my heart.

"You jealous bitch! You just ruined my whole future!"

Bleeding out on the floor, that's when it hit me. She never cared how disgusting that thing was, or what it was doing to her body. All she cared about was marrying into money and status.

When I opened my eyes again, I'd gone back in time.

This time around, I decided I wasn't going to stick my nose where it didn't belong. I was going to sit back and watch that mushroom grow.