Showing results by author "Winter Renshaw" in All Categories

The name on the screen was "Absinthe". But I knew her as the sultry voice blowing up my phone for late-night chats about Proust and Hemingway interspersed between the filthiest little...mutually satisfying exchanges...I'd ever experienced in my life. We'd never met. Until the day she walked into my office, her cherry lips wrapped around a candy apple sucker and an all too familiar voice that said, "You wanted to see me, Principal Hawthorne?"

The most humiliating moment of my life begins with an early morning message from my ex’s notoriously heartless best friend. I waste no time removing my accidental tag before the sharp-tongued novelist in me fires off a response to the man who harbored extreme and inexplicable hatred of me during the three years I dated his best friend in college. But I didn’t expect him to respond. And nothing could have prepared me for what he would say…or for all the ways this gorgeous villain with cruel icy blues would become the biggest plot twist my life had ever known.

Being an identical twin has its perks, but when my sister asked me to sub in for a date with Roman Bellisario, I wasn’t exactly thrilled. Sure, he’s sinfully handsome and successful, but he also got me fired from my dream job three years ago. This time, my sister’s promotion is riding on this date, so I have to say yes. And as it turns out, we’re strangely perfect for each other. I sell art. He collects it. We’re both obsessed with the same obscure, mysterious artist that most people don’t even know exists.

I didn’t know her name, but I heard her laugh, tasted her lips, and felt her warm skin as I held her in my arms. Together, we watched our young children playing in the sand, the warm ocean lapping at the shore behind them as the setting sun painted the sky. She was my soul mate, and this was our life, our beautiful forever.... Then I woke up - alone in a hospital room, connected to wires and machines. There was no wife, no kids, not a single soul waiting for me. That life I dreamt of never existed. The woman I loved, the woman I knew better than I knew myself - she wasn’t real.

"The first time I saw him was at a bar called Ophelia’s on a misty Thursday night. I was there to drown my sorrows after a trying day, he was there to escape the storm. After a brief yet incredibly cruel exchange, the handsome stranger bolted before I had a chance to tell him off. Tearing after him in heels and barely able to keep up in the freezing rain, I ended my chase when I realized where he was going. They say never to judge someone unless you know their story. I never could have anticipated his..."

Alec Mansfield haunts my memories like a cruel specter. In high school, he was my tormentor and the bane of my existence. When he wasn’t defying authority alongside my older brothers, he was sabotaging my dates and sending me “anonymous" messages signed “yours cruelly.” Alec was merciless, an emerald-eyed devil spending his daddy’s money and wreaking havoc over our hometown of Sapphire Shores like he owned the place. But mostly, he hated that I didn’t fawn over him like all the other girls did. It’s been ten years since he left town. But now he’s back.

Bogie had Bacall. Carrie had Big. I had Wyatt. Growing up, he was the handsome cowboy next door - an unlikely confidant, my best friend, my first kiss, and my favorite person. We were just a couple of small-town kids with ambitions bigger than the stars in our eyes. The summer after graduation, we made a pact: I’d go to college in New York and he’d stay and take over his daddy’s ranch. If, by 28, we were both still single, we’d get married…But as we stood in our high school gymnasium the night of our 10-year reunion, Wyatt told me he loved me too much to marry me.

The words “For Lila, forever” adorned the front of the envelope in blue ink, the handwriting all too familiar. But it didn’t matter what it said. I didn’t have the heart to open it. We couldn’t be together. Not after everything.... Leaving Rose Crossing, Maine was one of the most painful moments of my life - or at least it was until the day I came face-to-face with Thayer Ainsworth again. After a decade of searching, he’s found me, and he wants to know why I quit my housemaid job and left his family’s island estate without so much as a goodbye.

He said it would only hurt a little... On her 16th birthday, Sleeping Beauty pricked her finger on the spindle of a spinning wheel. On my 22nd, I pricked mine on the needle of a tattoo machine wielded by a beautifully complicated man who would go on to become my ruin.

The moment Jude Warner walked into my life, he was just some handsome stranger in an expensive suit. A moment later I discovered he was my neighbor, both of us new to the building. Then he was the knight in shining armor who rescued my place from a late-night plumbing fiasco. The prince charming who offered me refuge and ice cream during a storm-fueled power outage. The bona-fide saint who volunteered to accompany me to my crazy sister’s wedding back in North Carolina. Falling for him was easy. Finding out exactly who he was? Earth-shattering.

Before this ridiculous little arrangement commences, I’d like to make myself indubitably clear: I know who you are, I know that my father hired you, I know why my father hired you, and last but not least: Your services aren’t needed. In fact, I want no part of my father’s billion-dollar empire, and him “gifting” me with one of the “best concierges in the county” won’t change that. However, seeing as my father has strong-armed me into taking this position, it appears as though we’re stuck together - at least until your contract is up next month.

Dear Melrose, The first time I met you, you were a stranger. The second time, you were my roommate. The third time, you made it clear you were about to become the biggest thorn my side had ever known. You sing way too loud in the shower and use all the hot water. You’re bossy as hell. You make my life all kinds of complicated. But no matter how hard I try, I can’t stop thinking about you. Truthfully...I can’t stop wanting you. I was going to tell you this.

Reed York was never my boyfriend. He was the pen. I was the company ink. Though if you want to get technical, we were more like colleagues who hated each other...with benefits. Everything was fine until the charming jerk went behind my back, stole my promotion, and became my boss - literally overnight. Refusing to work beneath him, I transferred 2,014 miles away to our Chicago division. But he’s just announced a last-minute site visit the week between Christmas and New Year’s, and he’s audaciously designated me as his "right-hand gal" during his visit.

The last time I saw Nevada Kane, I was 17, and he was loading his things into the back of his truck, about to embark on a 14-hour drive to the only college that offered him a full ride to play basketball. I told him I'd wait for him. He promised to do the same. But life happened. I broke my promise long before he ever broke his - and not because I wanted to. We never saw each other again.... Until 10 years later, when Nevada unexpectedly returned to our hometown after an abrupt retirement from his professional basketball career. Suddenly, he was everywhere.

There's a name for girls like me: Sugar Baby. I’m used to being passed around the sexually depraved, middle-aged senators of Washington, DC, like candy, but when I meet him - the mysterious man who buys my exclusivity for three months for price that should frighten me more than his demands - everything changes. He's younger than the others. His touch is softer. His lips sweeter. His need fiercer. He has only one requirement.... A blindfold to protect his identity...and to protect me from the danger I'd face if our arrangement leaked to the world.

I'm in the midst of scrawling "I quit!" onto his fancy cardstock letterhead when my boss corners me. He needs a favor, he says. And then he asks how well I can act. Hudson Rutherford needs a fiancée. With his old-moneyed parents forcing him to marry some bratty hotel heiress and his hedonistic, playboy lifestyle at stake, the only way to get them to back off is to make them think he's truly, madly, deeply in love...with me - his third personal assistant this year. But I can hardly stand working for him as it is.

I believe in soul mates but I never wanted to fall in love with mine. Two men want my heart. One is everything I want. The other is everything I need. One makes me feel safe. The other makes me feel terrified and wonderful all at the same time. Both of them have secrets. But to be fair, so do I.