Showing results by author "A. A. Black" in All Categories

Years ago, Hadria Imperioli vanished after her father refused her mafia inheritance in favor of her younger brother. Now, she's resurfaced as Hades—ruthless leader of the Styx Syndicate mercenaries that terrorize Chicago—and she's hell-bent on finally claiming what's hers. When her brother announces his engagement to sheltered beauty Aurora Verderosa, Hadria decides it's time to take back her mafia crown and everything else that belongs to her... Including Aurora.

He thinks I’m off-limits. But rules were made to be broken. I’m the perfect daughter—an heiress with a spotless reputation and a ring on my finger to prove it. But perfection is a fragile thing, and mine shatters the moment I meet Isaak. My bodyguard. Ex-military. Battle-scarred. All sharp edges and dark glances. He’s the last man I should want—older, all grit and danger, and everything my family would never approve of. Also, he hates me. He thinks I’m spoiled, entitled, a rich girl playing pretend. But there’s one thing he can’t fake: The way his eyes darken when I walk into the room.

There comes a time in your life when you’re faced with a choice—one that has the potential to alter the course of your life. That day, I answered my mother’s phone call, and everything changed. The path I chose was a turnpike masquerading as a meadow, and the tolls I paid have been grave. So I made a promise to myself that I will have my vengeance. With my Irish gods at my side, I will wreak havoc on everyone who had a hand in the destruction of the girl I used to be. I was remade in the cabin in the woods. I was forged in the warehouse fire. And like a phoenix, I will rise anew.

My whole life has been about waiting. Playing it safe. Be the good girl, don’t color outside the lines. Put in the hard work trying to prove myself to Dad, then to my college professors, then to my boss at New World Media. Just waiting for the day when it will all pay off. And right when it was all starting to - I finally had the house, the job, I was even thinking about getting a cat - boom!

Why would suicide need a witness? On the east coast of Ireland, Victor Delahaye, one of the country's most prominent citizens, takes his business partner's son out sailing. But once at sea, Davy Clancy is horrified to witness Delahaye take out a gun and shoot himself dead. This strange event captures the attention of Detective Inspector Hackett and his friend Pathologist Doctor Quirke.

I've always been on the outside looking in. A female tech genius meeting every conceivable human need for others, yet struggling with a basic fundamental necessity—connection. My days are filled with code and algorithms, but my nights are haunted by isolation and loneliness. When I'm asked to beta test a new advanced AI system created by three brilliant and painfully good-looking colleagues, what I thought was a straightforward task quickly turns into something far more complex. They started watching me. Tracking my every move.

1950s Dublin: When a body is found in the canal, pathologist Quirke and his detective friend Inspector Hackett must find the truth behind this brutal murder. But in a world where the police are not trusted and secrets often remain buried there is perhaps little hope of bringing the perpetrator to justice. As spring storms descend on Dublin, Quirke and Hackett's investigation will lead them into the dark heart of the organisation that really runs this troubled city: the church.

Historical True Crime — assassins, gangsters, mobsters and lawmen; manhunts, scandals and unexplained phenomena. Stories of the wildest and darkest chapters of America's past.

Riley Black brings us back in time to prehistoric seas, swamps, forests, and savannas where critical moments in plant evolution unfolded. Each chapter stars plants and animals alike, underscoring how the interactions between species have helped shape the world we call home. As the chapters move upwards in time, Black guides listeners along the burgeoning trunk of the Tree of Life, stopping to appreciate branches of an evolutionary story that links the world we know with one we can only just perceive now through the silent stone, from ancient roots to the present.

After spending weeks trying to reach Raine Kendall, Dominants Liam O'Neill and Macen Hammerman have finally broken past the walls to their submissive's wounded heart. Before they can enjoy their newfound closeness, Liam's past comes back to haunt him when his ex-wife drops in - with a secret that could tear his world apart.

Here, for the first time, is a complete history of the world based on the beliefs and writings of secret societies, researched with the help of an initiate of more than one secret society.

The last thing I thought I'd be doing in Vegas was protecting some wannabe gangster girl. But as a rising star in the Consortium, an elite arms-trading organization, I do what I'm told. That's how I find myself gifted as a bodyguard to Brie "Breezy" Colombo, widow of a powerful Mafia Don, after someone takes a shot at her. Everyone knows she's just a gold-digging trophy wife, her grief as fake as her long blonde hair, her perfect smile, and her… Well, maybe they're real.

Told from two lively first-person perspectives, Ego Free Leadership brings listeners along for Encore's incredible success story. They'll see a CEO overcome his unconscious resistance to modeling the change he wants in his team and discover a time-tested road map for eliminating the destructive effects of the ego in teams and organizations.

Quinn Roberts is dead and she wants to know how it happened. She's angry, confused and disappointed that her life is over. Most of her friends have moved on and it seems like no one cares who was responsible. Her adult children are in shock but their mother's death is too painful, so they do nothing. Soon after her murder, Quinn's husband, Alec, acquires a new wife and Quinn becomes a distant memory. Only her sister, Erin, and Detective John McQuillan continue to search for answers.

The two crime experts are enlisted by legendary rock star Billy Diamond to find his missing daughter. A level-headed student at Yale, Devon left six months earlier with her boyfriend, Carlos, for a career development retreat in Nevada. Her calls and notes became less frequent until they stopped. Billy wanted to give his daughter space—but after learning Carlos' body was found a few miles upstream from the ranch, he needs answers.

1950's Ireland. As a deep, bewildering fog cloaks Dublin, a young woman is found to have vanished. When Phoebe Griffin, still haunted by the horrors of her past, is unable to discover news of her friend; Quirke, fresh from drying out in an institution, responds to his daughter's request for help. But as Phoebe, Quirke and Inspector Hackett speak with those who knew April, they begin to realise that there may have been more behind the young woman's discretion and secrecy than they could have imagined.

There'd always been something wrong with Charlie Hall. Crooked from the day she was born. Never met a bad decision she wasn't willing to double down on. She may be good enough to steal a shadow from a tower, but will she be good enough to steal back a heart?

As 1941 draws to a close, brave young men are fighting for freedom in countries across the globe. But for Sub-Lieutenant Harry Gilmour, washed up in neutral Spain alongside 'interned belligerents' from both sides of the war, hostilities have come to a pause. Before long, his unlikely comrades must once again become his enemies, and he is back at the frontline of the battle for the Mediterranean.

Paige Bennett is fulfilling her childhood dream of working and living on the land as a station hand on Whitetail Ridge. Getting her hands dirty, riding horses, working with cattle and kicking up red dust. Life can't get much better. Or so she thinks, until a devastating act of violent betrayal leaves her unemployed, homeless and broken. A fight with his father drove Jackson Brady off Karilga, his family's cattle station in the Queensland outback. Now he's made a life for himself away from the land, joining a band and settling into the city.

Alea Binte al Mussad, Princess of Bezakistan, was abducted from her university, mentally tortured, and forced to witness the worst of humanity. She was rescued, but not before fear and her shattered soul made her retreat into herself. Two years later, she's living behind the palace's locked gates and the walls she's built surrounding her heart. Alea is comforted by the joyous family around her, but inside she feels so alone-except when she's with the steady trio of guards who relentlessly keep her safe…and tempt her with a passion she isn't sure she'll survive.