Adult

When Sophie Brinkmann --- nurse, widow, single mother --- meets Hector Guzman, her life is uneventful. She likes his quiet charm and easy smile, not to mention the way he welcomes her into his family. She quickly learns, though, that his smooth façade masks something much more sinister. Now she must summon everything within her to navigate an intricate web of moral ambiguity, deadly obsession, and craven gamesmanship. 

Two women live on opposite coasts, but their lives are connected in ways they never could have imagined. Both women are wives and mothers to children who are about to leave the nest for school. They are both in their 40s and have husbands who travel more than either of them would like. They are both feeling an emptiness neither had expected. But when a shocking secret is exposed, their lives are blown apart.

Ashaunt Point has provided sanctuary and anchored life for generations of the Porter family. But in 1942, the U.S. Army arrives on the Point, bringing havoc and change. As the decades pass, Helen and then her son Charlie return to the Point, seeking refuge from the chaos of rapidly changing times. But Ashaunt is not entirely removed from events unfolding beyond its borders, and neither Charlie nor his mother can escape the long shadow of history.

Born into abject poverty, Jim goes from door-to-door salesman to international mogul, the father of the pyramid scheme. To escape his past, as well as government investigators, he leaves the country to become the leader of a lawless and predatory gold-mining operation in the Brazilian Amazon. Worn down by age and a lifetime of shady enterprise, his world suddenly changes when he meets a beautiful, young Israeli woman with dark ambitions of her own.

Now that she has solved her sister's murder, Hallie Michaels has left the army and isn't sure what to do next. Her relationship with deputy Boyd Davies is tentative, there's still distance between her and her father, and she needs a job. The good news is, she hasn't seen a ghost in weeks. All that changes when she gets a call asking her to help an elderly neighbor who is being stalked by black dogs, creatures from the underworld that are harbingers of death.

When a local woman tells Sergeant Hamish Macbeth that she doesn't remember what happened the previous evening, he doesn't begin to worry. She had been out drinking, after all, and he'd prefer not to be bothered with such an arrogant and annoying woman. But when her body is discovered, Hamish is forced to investigate a crime that the only known witness --- now dead --- had forgotten.

Jerome Cardy knew he was going to die and that it would be made to appear like an accident. He might not be able to prevent it, but he was determined to make sure that someone knew what was going to happen. After he is found beaten to death, Ash is unable to forget Jerome’s last awkward words to him: “I had a dog once. Othello. That was its name. Othello.” Certain there is a hidden message in these words, Ash is determined to discover the truth.

In 1998 in Cortez, Colorado, three desperados in a stolen truck opened fire on the town cop, shooting him 20 times. Then they blasted their way past dozens of police cars and disappeared into 10,000 square miles of the harshest wilderness terrain on the North American continent. Self-trained survivalists, the outlaws eluded the most sophisticated law enforcement technology on the planet. DEAD RUN is the first in-depth account of this sensational case.

Genevieve has finally escaped the stressful demands of her sales job and begun a new life aboard a houseboat in Kent. Not many people know that she financed her fresh start by working weekends as a dancer at a less-than-reputable gentlemen's club, and she's determined to keep it that way. But on the night of her housewarming party, the past intrudes when a body washes up beside the boat, and Genevieve recognizes the victim as a fellow dancer.

DAMAGE CONTROL displays Amber Dermont's remarkable gift for portraying characters at crossroads. In “Damage Control,” a young man works at an etiquette school while his girlfriend is indicted for embezzlement. A widow rents herself to elderly women and vacations with them as a “professional grandchild” in “Stella at the Winter Palace.” And in “The Language of Martyrs,” a couple houses a mail-order bride on behalf of the husband’s Russian mother.