Books

They dressed Harmony Saint Clair in black lace and called it a wedding.

Eleven days ago she was engaged to a preacher’s son. Then her father confessed what he owes the Duvernay family, a debt from 1999 that no amount of money can settle, and the price became his daughter.

Now she’s married to Messiah Duvernay, the heir the streets call Menace, for one public year while a war with Miami heats up.

Her terms: separate wings, her own work, and his hands to himself. His one rule: no lies under his roof.

She swore she would never love him. He never planned to ask.

The vows were the easy part.

Nadia Cortez’s father died owing $286,000 to men who don’t send invoices. Her brake line is cut. Her storeroom burns. Then a card lands on her counter: VOSS.

Damon Voss offers a way out: one year of marriage, the debt cleared at signing, separate lives. Nadia wins five terms of her own, including the one that matters most. Lie to me once, and I walk.

She doesn’t read item thirty-one closely enough.

Damon didn’t marry her for love. He married her for what her father hid, and for what her father saw the morning Damon’s mother fell from a roof.

The con is working. The problem is, he’s falling for his mark.

Cara arrives at the Brandt estate with three hundred dollars and nowhere else to go. Elliott Brandt hires her on the spot, for far more money than the job should pay.

The house has rules. Closed rooms. A six-year-old who won’t speak. A wife who is “traveling.”

And every night, footsteps overhead in a house Elliott swears is empty.

Cara found the diary. She found the death certificate. She was sure she knew which Brandt to fear.

She was wrong about everything except the footsteps.

Margo booked a seven-night singles cruise with a laminated itinerary and one goal: prove she’s over the man who walked out three years ago without a word.

Then she opens cabin 734 and finds Liam standing in it.

One cabin. One bed. A booking error guest services swears they can’t fix. They draw a line down the middle of the mattress and agree on rules: no touching, no questions about the past.

Seven nights is a long time to keep rules.

And Liam didn’t board this ship by accident.