He should’ve never left his house. He should’ve stayed at home. He has a legitimate excuse - he’s running a fever and he’s fairly sure he’s developing pneumonia. He should have called in sick...but he doesn’t. He goes to work, because his team is relying on him. Needless to say, when Samuel Adams walks into the pharmacy hours later, he only has one thing on his mind. Ibuprofen. Sadly, he never gets to the Ibuprofen. Mostly because before he gets there, he finds a junkie waving a gun around threatening to kill anybody that moves.

Angie is a survivor. Anything you could throw at her, she could overcome. After her father left her like a pile of unwanted trash, she began fighting. Fighting to build a life. Fighting to keep her child. Fighting to matter. She thought she had it all figured out. Then Bowen Race Tannenbaum walks into her life, turning it into a flurry of confusion, hope, and then ultimately despair. He tore down, brick-by-brick, her carefully constructed world, leaving her heart in tatters and longing for more. Such as a happily-ever-after, something that wasn’t ever going to happen for her.

Amelia loves her good friend, Avery. So much so that she agrees to do the stupidest thing ever. A stranger photo shoot. You know the type. The photographer takes photos of two individuals. Two individuals that, until that day, have never met in their life. The moment she shows up at the photo shoot, she knows that she made a terrible decision. Why? Because the total stranger about to be in an intimate photo shoot with her is the hottest thing that’s ever walked the streets of Kilgore, Texas. If not the entire US of A.

Coke Solomon has lived a full life. He’s a retired army drill sergeant, so he is more than used to getting his way. And if he can’t have it his way? Well, let’s just say that’s never happened before... At least not until Cora Maldonado walks into his life, demanding he fall in line, or she’ll find a way to make his life hell. It doesn’t matter that she’s younger than him, and has a father that would rather see him dead than have his baby girl anywhere near him. Nor does it matter that his ex-wife is highly offended that she’s been replaced with a much younger woman.

There are a few lessons one has to learn for themselves. Then there are the lessons that most people don’t have to learn because it’s just not done. For instance, most people know instinctively that they shouldn’t crave the mother of their brother’s child. Bourne Pena isn’t most men. Bourne does everything he can to fight the attraction he feels for Delanie, but in the end, his refusal to go there almost ends up costing him his life.

Darby has always been "that" guy. The guy that no man, woman, or child wants around their loved one. See, a long time ago he made some bad decisions. Those bad decisions have haunted him ever since. No matter what he does, people still see him as the town’s screw up. The boy that sold his soul to the Devil. Enter Waylynn Jennings. Waylynn has watched Darby Valentine from afar for a very long time. She’s witnessed the changes in him and knows the only reason he’s so mean is to protect the man that lies within.

Royal St. James got her name when she was born. Not because her mother loved her royally, but because Royal was a giant pain in the ass. She’s spent her entire life fighting to live, and the last thing she needs is to deal with some pretty-boy police officer who wouldn’t know a hardship if it came up and bit him in the...you know. Justice Rector wasn’t born with a silver spoon in his mouth. He was raised to work hard and always fight for what he believed in. His father was a cop, and ever since he could remember, he wanted to be one, too.

Peter Parker Penn. Unlike the superhero his mother named him after, Parker is no good guy. In fact, if there’s a picture in the dictionary under anti-hero, it’s his. Parker has spent his life trying to get back on the right side of the tracks, but each step he takes forward, he takes two more steps back. To save one, he hurts others. To make this good, he turns that bad. For appearances’ sake, he plays the part. He does what people expect him to do - mostly.

Booth Pena definitely didn’t make the smartest of decisions when he was a teenager. At eighteen, he knocked a girl up and signed up for the military all in the same day. There weren’t a lot of things that the baby’s mother and he saw eye to eye on after that. He honestly wasn’t sure why he even slept with her in the first place. Okay, that last part is a lie. He knows exactly why he slept with her. Because the real woman he’s in love with, her twin sister, Dillan, won’t give him the time of day. Five years later, and he still wants her.

He saw her from across a crowded ballpark and knew she was about to change his life. Yes, he realizes just how cliché that really is, but the moment his eyes locked on her, he knew that she was the one. At least, the one that royally screwed him over. The one responsible for his demotion and the subsequent disciplinary action taken against him before he’d even gotten out of the probationary period with Kilgore Police Department. It all started with a kiss.

This is for charity. This is for fun. You are a professional. You can do it. Those are the words that Calloway Alvarez chants to herself as she watches all the large men gather into the small room where she’ll be doing the interviews for her employer - Hero Magazine. Honestly, she’s convinced herself that she can’t accomplish the task at hand. That is until she hears his voice, and her head turns to see him standing there. Louis Spurlock. Greek god. SWAT officer. Keeper of her secrets. Ultimate fantasy. Man who will break her heart.

No take-backs. That was the motto that Drew lived by in all things, including his love life. He’s a player, pure and simple. He’s learned the hard way that women aren’t all hearts and flowers. Sometimes their sexy bodies and beautiful faces are just a pretty shield to hide the crazy, and he’s so freakin’ over crazy. For the first time in a year, he’s thinking about his life, and how it would be a lot more enjoyable with a woman like Aspen at his side. Maybe crazy isn’t so bad after all.

Ford Spurlock has known Ashe Trammel since they were babies. He’s also done his level best to stay away from her because every time he gets to within five feet of her, they’re fighting like cats and dogs. Ashe is the apple of her father’s eye. The motorcycle club princess that was never to be harmed in any way - or touched for that matter. Fast forward to adulthood, and Ashe is still off limits. Still driving him insane. Still...beautiful. She never misses an opportunity to give him hell, either.

Candy Ray Sunshine - Yes, that is my real name, thank you very much, Mom and Dad - knew two things. One, she was going to work her butt off and open her very own coffee shop, even if she had to die doing it. Two, Banks Valentine was the world’s worst ex-boyfriend in the history of ex-boyfriends. Even if they were only boyfriend and girlfriend for one evening. She wouldn’t sneeze on him even if he was on fire. Then again, neither one of them expected that night to end the way it did, either - the night that both of them refused to talk about the next morning.

Two days after my boyfriend dumps me, my business goes belly up, and the sperm bank declines my credit card, a gorgeous rock star offers to whisk me away for two weeks of hot, steamy, all-expenses paid...therapy. I should say no. I’m not looking for a fling. I want a man who’ll be a father to the baby I’m desperate to conceive. Or, at the very least, a guy willing to knock me up before we go our separate ways.