Heist Fiction

Essence® best-selling authors Kiki Swinson and De’nesha Diamond are two rising stars in the world of urban fiction. Heist presents two novellas starring young women hustling their way to the top of the game through daring robbery schemes. In Swinson’s The Ultimate Heist, pampered Shannon Marshall is accustomed to a big-money lifestyle. Her world is shattered, however, when her man is thrown into prison for gun running.

Simi Chopra is on a bad-luck streak. She’s lost yet another job, her student loan debt won’t stop growing, her basement apartment is a certifiable flood zone, and now her best friend has been accused of stealing a multimillion-dollar diamond necklace. To put it lightly, she’s desperate for a break—that’s right when Jack waltzes out of the bushes and into her life.

It's been six months since the end of the Gambit. Instead of winning an impossible wish, Ross has the threat of her family’s execution hanging over her head. Devroe, the only person Ross thought she could trust, could wish the Quests into oblivion at any time. Shockingly, despite his betrayal, Devroe is still making a play for Ross’s heart as the two work together pulling jobs for the Organization. But Ross has learned her lesson: A Quest can only trust another Quest.

The Future—as the richest people on the planet have discovered—is where the money is. The Future is a few billionaires leading the world to destruction while safeguarding their own survival with secret lavish bunkers. The Future is private weather, technological prophecy and highly deniable weapons. The Future is a handful of friends—the daughter of a cult leader, a non-binary hacker, an ousted Silicon Valley visionary, the concerned wife of a dangerous CEO and an Internet-famous survivalist—hatching a daring plan. It could be the greatest heist ever. Or the cataclysmic end of civilization.

Once in a long while, a child is born possessing the rarest of gifts, the innate ability to feel impossible beauty, to recognize priceless works of art. When such a child is discovered, a 250-year-old secret organization called Our World trains them to acquire the greatest works of art through theft, bribery, forgery, and even murder. Once found, the masterpiece will disappear again without anyone ever knowing it surfaced and sold for billions of dollars of profit at a secret auction attended by only the wealthiest of the art world’s patrons.

When an armored car heist turns into a bloody and grisly crime scene, Federal agent Blake Wilder is sent to Philadelphia to track down the culprits. But there’s more to this militantly precise and violent crew than meets the eye....

For all of Kat’s life, it’s just been her and her mother, Jamie—except for the forty-eight hours when Jamie was married and Kat had a stepbrother, Liam. That all ended in an epic divorce, and Kat and Liam haven’t spoken since. Now Jamie is a jewel thief trying to go straight, but she has one last job—at billionaire Ross Sutherland’s birthday party. And Kat has figured out a way to tag along. What Kat doesn’t know, though, is that there are two surprise guests at the dazzling Sutherland compound that weekend. The last two people she wants to run into.

This bundle includes Secret of the Red Arrow and Mystery of the Phantom Heist.

In a daring and deadly heist, thieves have made away with an artifact of terrible power - the death mask of Louis Charbon. Made by a master craftsman, it is imbued with the spirit of a monster from history, a serial murderer who terrorized the city. Now Charbon is loose once more, killing from beyond the grave. But these murders are different from before, not simply random but the work of a deliberate mind probing for answers to a sinister question.

Mac Canfield was the last man Lily West expected to see again, never mind aim her gun at. But there he was, the bad boy who'd broken her heart years ago - still a thief, hijacking a priceless artifact - and it was all she could do to push aside the memories of how it felt to have his perfectly chiseled body next to hers. Mac was no less shocked to see the beautiful girl next door again, threatening to shoot him. Little did she know she was blowing his cover. He had to get her out of harm's way without succumbing to his desire to take her on a hot trip down memory lane.

Maya Hoshimoto was once the best art thief in the galaxy. For ten years, she returned stolen artifacts to alien civilizations—until a disastrous job forced her into hiding. Now she just wants to enjoy a quiet life as a graduate student of anthropology, but she’s haunted by persistent and disturbing visions of the future. Then an old friend comes to her with a job she can’t refuse: find a powerful object that could save an alien species from extinction. Except no one has seen it in living memory, and they aren’t the only ones hunting for it.

Rich girl Lindsay Peyton is throwing the biggest and best Sweet Sixteen bash that Bayport has ever seen. But when Frank and Joe discover that her car has been keyed, it looks like someone isn't so happy that Bayport's princess is showing off. Meanwhile, a group calling themselves the Scaredevils is filming themselves committing random mischief around town - including keying Lindsay's car - which threatens the security of Lindsay's big day.

Katarina Bishop and W.W. Hale the fifth were born to lead completely different lives: Kat comes from a long, proud line of loveable criminal masterminds, while Hale is the scion of one of the most seemingly perfect dynasties in the world. If their families have one thing in common, it's that they both know how to stay under the radar while getting-or stealing-whatever they want.

At only seventeen years old, Ross Quest is already a master thief, especially adept at escape plans. Until her plan to run away from her legendary family of thieves takes an unexpected turn, leaving her mother’s life hanging in the balance. In a desperate bid, she enters the Thieves’ Gambit, a series of dangerous, international heists where killing the competition isn’t exactly off limits, but the grand prize is a wish for anything in the world—a wish that could save her mom.

A fabulous "lost masterpiece" becomes the ultimate prize - for an art historian whose ambition consumes everyone around her, an angry young painter with a plan for revenge on the art establishment, and a desperate gallery owner who may have double-crossed his own life away. Behind the elegance and glamour of the art world, anything goes - theft, forgery, betrayal, and maybe even murder....

Years after the death of her brother and the theft of her heirloom jewelry, ex-con Elle is on the run—until she spots a stranger wearing a signature piece. Determined to take back what is hers, Elle stalks and befriends the woman, using her gemology skills as a ruse. Elle offers to appraise and clean the jewelry, replicating and replacing the pieces instead. Olivia is drowning. She maxes out credit cards behind her financially strict husband's back in order to pay for fertility treatments. When Olivia meets Elle, she finally feels understood…and inspired.

Gabriela Rose, recovery agent extraordinaire, can find just about anything. Too bad she can’t seem to lose her gorgeous-but-infuriating ex-husband Rafer Jones. And now he needs her help. His cousin, Harley, is in trouble…big trouble. As the president of a too-big-to-fail bank, he invested an astronomical amount of money in insuring some of the world’s most priceless artifacts at the urging of his board. It seemed like a low-risk, high-reward business move, so he jumped in with both feet. But recently, these insured pieces started going missing.

Tommy O’Brien once hoped to leave his run-down industrial hometown. But, marriage and fatherhood have kept him running in place, working a job that doesn’t even pay the bills. And now, he seems fated to stay for the rest of his life: He's just learned he’s going to die young - and soon. But he refuses to leave his family with less than nothing - especially now that he has nothing to lose. Over a couple of beers with his best friends, John and Sherm, Tommy launches a bold scheme to provide for his family’s future. One man’s war with God may impact us all.

London, 1988. Royal fever sweeps the nation as Britain falls in love with the ‘people’s princess’. Which means for Scotland Yard, the focus is on the elite Royalty Protection Command, and its commanding officer. Entrusted with protecting the most famous family on earth, they quite simply have to be the best. A weak link could spell disaster. Detective Chief Inspector William Warwick and his Scotland Yard squad are sent in to investigate the team. Maverick ex-undercover operative Ross Hogan is charged with a very sensitive—and unique—responsibility.

Shannon Mitchell gambled that betraying her husband's biggest heist ever was her way out of the game for good. Losing that bet put her in lockdown - and at the top of Todd Mitchell's revenge-fueled hit list. Now she'll work every seductive move and lethal play to survive. 'Cause when it comes to wreaking her own vengeance, this devious beauty isn't taking any prisoners....