My best friend. My fierce protector. A safe space to breathe. He always remained my one constant, never wavering. For years, I've masked my love for him but it still had me in a chokehold. Anytime I pictured my future, it was with him. That was until August.

He's rough around the edges, a sweet talker with a protective heart. Johnny works his Southern charm under my skin despite my best efforts to resist him. He's my best friend, my other half. He says he loves me until one decision alters our lives forever. The damage is irreparable. Johnny's sorrow runs deep. He takes his pain out on his friends and pushes me into the arms of someone who does more harm than good—then disappears without a word.

Mascen Wade, star pitcher of the Aldridge University baseball team, is a lot of things. Rich. Hotter than sin. The campus’ reigning bad boy. We knew each other once upon a time, but even if I’m named after a princess, it doesn’t mean my life is a fairy tale. My plan is to keep my head down, get my degree, and leave this town. But the moment Mascen Wade recognizes me, all my carefully laid plans come crumbling down. He’s decided he wants to make my life a living hell, but I’m not so easy to push around.

I wasn’t sure what to expect when arriving in Salem. Forced to marry a man I’ve never met, attend a private university I’d never heard of, and the whispers of a rumored secret society filling the halls. This life would be near unbearable with my insufferable fiancé if it wasn’t for his uncle, his best friend, and his enemy. When none of them are willing to let me go, it sends us down a path I’m not sure any of us will survive. The life I was promised is distorted behind smoke and mirrors. The truth cloaked by Deceit.

From the moment Lev Leokov spots the young woman hiding behind her hair in the middle of the gentleman's club, he can't take his eyes off of her. For the very first time in his life, he is affected. Having been told his entire life that he can't process or understand emotion, he considers it a big deal. When Mina Harris gets caught red-handed with a wallet that isn't hers, she falls apart. She's tired, lonely, and hasn't eaten in days. Lev offers her an ultimatum...a nice warm bed, a hot meal, and a job, or the cops. Mina takes her chances with Lev.

Delilah "Lily" Flynn is used to her drab existence. Lily's been living it for twenty two years. Her boring life is suddenly turned on its head when she's rudely kidnapped from her bedroom. Or so she thinks. Nox Taylor is far too high up in his field to be assigned a babysitting job. There's nothing more he wants than to complete his mission so he can be rid of the smartass tomboy, Lily.

Blinded by anger, the man who had sworn to protect me, shot me in a fit of rage when I was only sixteen years old. He thought he killed me. But my job wasn't finished yet. My days are spent as President of the Heavens Guardians MC. Nights are spent searching for the scum of the earth. Rapists, Murderers, Pedophiles. They all answer to me. I thought I'd seen it all. Thought my heart couldn't be any darker. Thought I knew exactly how far I was willing to go. Then a battered and broken woman was found behind our clubhouse, and I realized, I've never had a clue about the monster that lurks within.

Bastian Bishop. That’s his name. He’s rough, rugged, and utterly unpredictable. He’s not cautious or contemplative. He’s a volcano. Silent and steady one second, and a nightmare in the next. But that’s not the worst of it. This guy? He’s an outsider, and in my world outsiders don’t belong.

The Anguis, a secret society of power-hungry individuals, have long controlled Port Macabre from their seat at Noire House, a place where the wealthy rub shoulders and chase hedonistic pleasures. However, behind the mansion's facade lies a poisonous, hidden underworld.

I’m in debt up to my eyeballs. School has drained everything, including part of my soul. Now that I’ve graduated, the economy has turned, and there aren’t enough jobs available. I have to figure something out before I drown. My friend Alyssa may have been joking about going on television for a fast cash infusion, but it’s starting to look like a viable option.

He could have been my hero. He saved my life that night, a beautiful dark angel slicing through my fear and the water, dragging me from its deadly clutches. He should have been my hero. I thought maybe he was.

Gabriel Wolfe, the fallen dark angel and club president of the Hounds of Hell MC. His life has been infused with darkness and trauma since the day he was born, forcing more than just desensitization to violence and chaos. Forcing him to crave it to feel stable. Secure. Whole.

Kieran Murphy is an Irish mob boss and one of the most powerful men in Boston. When he walks me home, people step aside out of respect for him. He could have any woman he wants. So why does he have eyes only for me? Is it how he has to lift my chin with his fingers to keep my eyes level with his when he scolds me and how I cover my bottom instinctively when he tells me that I've earned a spanking? Or is it how I quiver at the thought of everything I'm too ashamed to beg him to do to me? Maybe it's all of those, but I'm pretty sure there's something else too.

Raylee Lexington Adams is my stepsister and the one woman in the world who can make my blood boil. She’s vindictive, a lot of crazy, and absolutely stunning. I hate everything about her except for when she’s on her knees begging me to use her as my own personal toy. We’ve been playing a game of cat and mouse for far too long. We have used each other for our own sick pleasure.

Ember doesn't know how, but on the brink of death, she calls to them. They come in the darkness, like phantoms in masks, and rescue her from her pain. But that rescue comes with a price—her soul. She must give all she is to the Cirque, where it doesn't only house you, it owns you. Nothing is ever as it seems, and the truth behind the striped curtain is no small matter. Can Ember keep her vow? Can she embrace the madness the Cirque demands?