Tonia Brown brings you nine short, short stories to shock and terrify!

Renee Thornton is on the brink of despair, ready to take a final plunge and join the other tragic souls at the bottom of Bradford Lake - known to locals as Suicide Lake. Her plans change when she's startled back to reality after a body brushes up against her from the depths below. Terrified, Renee runs away and slams into her old flame Cliff Simpson, a deputy with Whitten County Sheriff's Department. Strange events unfurl after the discovery of the corpse.

Some people are ordained for greatness. Those people usually have a lot of drama in their life. Drama I happily do without. I live in a forgotten corner of nowhere for a reason: there is safety in anonymity. I have enough problems just trying to get by. But when Kieran, a sinfully sexy demigod at the pinnacle of power, crashes into my life, suddenly my whole world is turned upside down. He’s harboring a deadly secret, one that could destroy all he holds dear. He thinks I’m the key to his salvation, and he wants me to help him claim vengeance. He also wants me with a passion.

Korede is bitter. How could she not be? Her sister, Ayoola, is many things: the favorite child, the beautiful one, possibly sociopathic. And now Ayoola’s third boyfriend in a row is dead. Korede’s practicality is the sisters’ saving grace. She knows the best solutions for cleaning blood, the trunk of her car is big enough for a body, and she keeps Ayoola from posting pictures of her dinner to Instagram when she should be mourning her “missing” boyfriend. Not that she gets any credit. Korede has long been in love with a kind, handsome doctor at the hospital where she works.

When a suicidal client seeks her help, Dr. Angela Blackwell cannot turn him away, despite the fact that he isn’t seeking the kind of help she normally provides her clients. The man, who won’t fully identify himself, wants the distinguished psychologist to stand witness after his planned death in six months’ time, ensuring his wife will not be charged as an accessory or be hindered from collecting the death benefit he carefully provisioned for her. He calls himself DJ and won’t willingly share anything about his past.

Everyone thinks fourteen-year-old Violet is a murderer. After a summer-night swim with her best friend, Ainsley, Violet is found confused, wandering in the forest - and Ainsley’s never seen again. But without a body, murder charges won’t stick, so Violet is sent away. After more than a decade in a psychiatric ward, Violet returns to her broken-down hometown of Normal, Alabama, to claim her dead mother’s inheritance and help her overworked sister care for their unstable, alcoholic father.

Ambrose Young was beautiful. He was tall and muscular, with hair that touched his shoulders and eyes that burned right through you. The kind of beautiful that graced the covers of romance novels, and Fern Taylor would know. She'd been reading them since she was 13. But maybe because he was so beautiful he was never someone Fern thought she could have...until he wasn't beautiful anymore.

Is there anything as horrifying as what David's wife gave birth to? How about that advertisement Tobias found that was selling a human head, condition used? Then there's Ha-yong's experience in heaven (which isn't nearly as nice as it sounds)...and Kyle encountering that bionic cult that's a long way short of being human. Spine-tingling terror from horror writers around the world. Dozens of diverse short stories containing gruesome murders, supernatural mysteries, grotesque hellscapes, and more.

When a letter from his supposedly deceased mother finds its way into his hands, life changes in an instant for international pop star Bodhi Beckett. Reeling from the deception of those closest to him, Bodhi spirals out of control and is sent to a secluded mansion in the coastal mountains of Southern California for some rest and relaxation. But the retreat proves to be anything but relaxing when a raging wildfire sets the landscape around him ablaze. While escaping the flames, Bodhi rescues Breeze, a quirky, pet-loving woman, and together the two fight their way to safety.

Ophelia Lang needs money, and she needs it bad. Her parents' restaurant is going under, and ever since she lost her job teaching third grade elementary, scraping enough cash together to pay the bills has proven almost impossible. Her parents are on the brink of losing their home. The vultures are circling overhead. So when Ophelia is offered an interview for a well-paid private tutoring gig in New York, how can she possibly say no?

The quiet world of Melody and Jack Dickinson is about to be turned upside down. Twenty years of marriage hangs in the balance when Melody finds out about Jack's infidelity. The betrayal is made worse when Melody discovers his lover is Serena Rowland, a young woman who works at Melody's law firm.

Angela and Terry return home after several grueling months of filming the popular television show, Let's Switch Houses!, only to find their residence in ruin. Sure, the décor and framed photographs are the same; the color of the walls hasn't changed; the furniture sits unmoved. But something is off. Their quiet New Jersey home feels tainted. Angela can sense it. Crawling inside her. Infecting her mind. Poisoning her thoughts. Then the nightmares begin. Awful, lucid visions that cause her to question her own reality.

Sloane Munster had the perfect life - until she didn't. Now 17-year-old Sloane is trying to reboot her life after a serious accident left her badly scarred and emotionally traumatized. Starting her senior year at a different school, she recognizes Luke Naughton, a swimmer whom she once had a crush on, in her new class. But when she smiles at him, he glares back with revulsion, and she's sure he's disgusted by her ugly scar.

With his marriage on the rocks and his life in shambles, washed-up true-crime writer Lucas Graham is desperate for a comeback, one more shot at the best-selling success he once enjoyed. His chance comes when he's promised exclusive access to death row inmate Jeffrey Halcomb, the notorious cult leader and mass murderer who's ready to break his silence after 30 years, and who contacted Lucas personally from his maximum-security cell.

It was an absolutely perfect day...until everything went absolutely perfectly wrong. Kent Anthony is a brilliant software engineer who is cashing in on a brilliant career. He's finally living the idyllic life, far from thoughts of theft and murder and other kinds of horrible criminal behavior. He's left his past far behind...or so he thinks.