Showing results by narrator "Tomas" in All Categories

"Look out for Zach, and don't hit on him." My brother's request sounds easy enough. Keep an eye out for his best friend on campus and keep my hands to myself. Easy. Even if Zach is a quintessential nerd, who I've always thought was cute, I don't have the time to think with my...stick. There's only one stick I should be focused on this year, and that's my hockey stick. My goal once I graduate is to get an NHL contract. The last thing I need is a distraction. On or off the ice. Only, keeping to the rules is harder than I thought it would be.

I've always been the outcast—awkward, invisible, a loser. My pet rat and my computer are my only friends. I've accepted the fact that I'll probably die a lonely virgin—until I pick up the hottest man I've ever met for a ride home. An impulsive invitation, a strange encounter. He's way out of my league. Then he tosses me out, sending me back into the hole I'd crawled out of. I didn't think I'd ever see him again—until I walked into my new job two months later. Turns out, he's my new boss.

Ari had a game plan for life: shoot people. Get money. Hang out with fellow criminal friends. He saw absolutely no reason to change that plan until one dark night in Memphis, when a little girl reached out to him with pocket change and a desperate plea for him to help her. Adopting an abused little girl off the streets was, needless to say, not part of the plan. Ari had no idea what he was doing with an eight year old. He especially didn’t know how to juggle taking contracts and raising a little girl.

Annette Marie presents Book One in the Guild Codex: Warped series. Make sure to check out the companion series, The Guild Codex: Spellbound and The Guild Codex: Demonized, available now.

I have one rule to live by: Don't Date a DILF. I've seen the consequences of blurring the boundaries between teaching life and dating life, and I'm not about to take that kind of risk.

It took Theo Amato one look to know he wanted me. It took me one glance at his chiseled jaw and dimpled smile to know I was in over my head. My wild love affair was Netflix without the chill. I had no business dating the older man who looked as though he'd stepped out of an expensive advertisement. But he was determined to have me. Wickedly sweet, Theo gently and strategically pulled me from my rut, handing me the world in the process. Growing up with nothing, I suddenly found myself with everything. More than I'd even known to dream of.

It turns out making out with my best friend in high school could be considered gay. Who knew? Apparently, everyone but me. Now that it's been pointed out, I can't help reliving it in my head. Repeatedly. Good-bye Denial Town, hello Confusionville. When my path leads me down the gay dating app route, I don't expect to meet anyone I like, but then I meet him. He can't be more opposite than me. He's smart, he hates hockey, and he identifies as demi - something I've never heard of. Yet I can't deny something's there.

Word of advice: Don't come out to random guys in public restrooms. Even if they're charming and adorably nerdy and offer to help. My family believes I can't be happy if I'm not out to the world. I have a bitter ex-boyfriend and an unstable NHL career to show for it. A fake boyfriend seems like an easy and quick solution to get my family off my back, and this guy is volunteering. I take him up on it without asking his name. I really should've asked for his name.

After my divorce, I’m ready to have fun, date around, and not get into anything serious. Then I meet Gabe Crosby, superhero firefighter and a disgrace to the Crosby name. He doesn’t even like hockey! Yet, there’s a draw to him I can’t deny—something I haven’t felt since my teens. But that’s the problem. I have no idea what dating is like, let alone how to do it with another man. He makes me flakey and nervous, and I’ve never been that guy.

My new teammate pisses me off. Everyone else is falling over themselves when Golden Boy flashes a fake smile. Me? I just want to wipe it off his face. Off the ice, there's no escaping Nick Sandoval's dimples and plastic grin—because he's my new roommate. And on the ice? We need to get our act together, or else our final year of college hockey's going to waste. I can't ignore him, and I won't put up with that bullshit front he puts up for everyone. Especially when I push his buttons just right and get a glimpse at something no one else has seen—the real Nick Sandoval.

Waking up alone in a strange hotel room, missing my prosthetic legs, and having no memory of what happened the night before is not how I wanted to spend my estranged twin's bachelor party trip. Yet there I was, legless and with zero idea how I got there. Or who I spent the night with. Which is… not great. Though I suppose that trauma lies somewhere between losing my legs in a car accident, which killed my career in the NHL, and my brother running off with my fiancée. So, in the grand scheme of things, not the worst weekend I've had.

I'm the Grinch who saves Christmas… Yep, you read that right. Every year, I save Christmas—and Christmas Falls—by organizing a massive festival that sustains tourism in our little town. It turns out that when Christmas is your life 24/7, the shine wears off the twinkly lights after a while. The holidays are a heck of a lot of work, and when I go home, I want peace and quiet, not fa-la-la-ing on my porch. That all changes when my sister brings me an early Christmas gift. One I didn't ask for. One that's tall, broad, and handsome...

A year ago, I lost everything and moved across the country to try and start over. It wasn't easy, but I found a job I love, I have friends who've become my family, and I'm ready to start exploring my bisexuality. Just when I think things are finally starting to go my way, I show up to work and find out the new guys on the crew are the super-hot couple I hooked up with last weekend.

Harper Reid has no money and nowhere to go, but he can't spend one more day under the same roof as his abusive boyfriend. Desperate to start fresh, he takes on a special case through the caregiver agency that contracts him. The client has fired everyone else, but this job includes lodging, so Harper will find a way to make it work until he's back on his feet.

Finding out those closest to me don’t see me as the great guy I think I am not only kicks me in the gut, it makes me question everything. Until that happened, I didn’t think I had many regrets in my life. Now, I have nothing but regrets. And when my NHL team is bought out, and the new owner makes his presence known, my existential crisis kicks up a notch. Because he might be my biggest regret of all. Parker Duchene. I made his life a living hell in high school, and now he’s inserting himself into my career to repay the favor.

Hotel-room-trashing tantrums? Check. Daddy issues galore? Check. Glitz, glamour and general debauchery? I wrote the f**king book. I’m a textbook bad boy rockstar cliche, and I’ve never claimed to be anything else. Hell, I own it. At least, I did, until he came along: Mr. Self-Righteous who acts more like a priest than a drummer. Now he’s my bodyguard and the guy in charge of making sure I don’t OD before the tour ends. Oh, right. I also have a crazy stalker who’s been obsessed with me since I was a kid. So that’s fun.

When Talon left to play pro ball six years ago, the hole in my chest confused me. I focused my heartache into making my own NFL dreams come true, and by the time I was drafted, the longing I had for my best friend was buried deep. Now, he wants everything to be like it was in college, but we can't have threesomes and be reckless like we once were. The media storm would be enough to break both our careers. That's not my biggest concern, though. The torch I had for him burns brighter after so long apart, and there's nothing I can do about it. Marcus Talon is straight.

My newest obsession is nothing like any of my past hookups. A perma-scowl and general leave-me-alone attitude? Yeah, that's the kind of thing I usually stay away from. But the most shocking part about all of this is that the person who's got me all out of whack . . . isn't a girl. Bash is a six-foot-four-tatted personal trainer who seems to want nothing to do with me. Until I'm naked, that is. As soon as I'm dressed, he's more than ready to say goodbye. But if there's one thing getting a taste of Sebastian Crawford has taught me, it's that one taste just isn't enough.

Once upon a time, playing for the NHL was my dream. Then Radimir Novicov skated circles around me and made it clear I’d never be good enough. He was smart, talented, and worst of all–sexy. Every closeted guy knows that you don’t hit on your teammate, even if his gaze lingers longer than it should. All it took was one drunken close call before our friendship was in tatters, he was called up to the NHL, and I was sent for further conditioning. Playing in the NHL was off the table, so coaching became my new dream. And seventeen years later, I’m finally heading to the big time.

Sometimes things happen that test our resilience and our strength. My life was changed forever one fateful night last year when I lost my leg in an accident. It’s affected my independence and my confidence. But there is one thing—one person—that hasn’t changed, hasn’t wavered when life gets hard. Finn Ledger. He’s been my best friend since the moment we met in middle school. We’re grown now, with separate lives, but he still always manages to be there for me when I need him, even when circumstances try to wrench us apart. He always holds me when I need it and cares for me like no one else can.