Showing results by narrator "Jennifer O'Donnell" in All Categories

Created as an homage to the 1980 classic horror anthology, Dark Forces, edited by Kirby McCauley, this collection contains 12 original novelettes showcasing today’s top horror talent. Dark Stars features all-new stories from award-winning authors and up-and-coming voices like Stephen Graham Jones, Priya Sharma, Usman T. Malik, Caroline Kepnes, and Alma Katsu, with seasoned author John F.D. Taff at the helm. An afterword from original Dark Forces contributor Ramsey Campbell is a poignant finale to this bone-chilling collection.

Former bad boy Mitch Defalco roars into Stone Creek, Texas, on the back of a Harley with his newly discovered daughter riding behind him. Single mom Sarah Cooper cannot believe he's moved in next door. She had a secret crush on him years ago when he dated her older sister back in high school. As Mitch tackles the responsibilities of fatherhood, Sarah admires the way he's turned his life around. She asks him to help her with a personal problem: Her fear of men. Mitch knows he's bad news for sexy Sarah, but how can he refuse her dangerous request, when she's determined to move forward with or without his help?

When Jame returned to Knorth hall to help her brother, Torisen, name all the fallen fighters' death banners stored there, she made the disturbing discovery that those banners splattered with their owners' blood also have trapped their owners' souls. She also found a contract proving her cousin Kindrie to be legitimate, proving that there are three full-blooded Knorth. Three full-blooded Knorth means that the Three-Faced God can be manifested - something that none of the three are likely to want to do, if they have any choice in the matter.

The Broker is dead. The secret network he controlled has lost its restraints. From the darkest deep-state enclave to the farthest reaches of the planet, the world's deadliest assassins are now free to pursue their own agendas. The United States government, unwilling to risk upheaval and global chaos, has preemptively mobilized killers of its own to hunt down and terminate each threat. Among the most dangerous agents on this list are Jack and Jill.

After failing to save the enslaved magical creatures, Lesti and Astria redouble their training efforts. Now, joined by Aurelia and Fang, they continue to unlock new ways of using magic. However, a critical challenge lies just around the corner: the spring tournament. Lesti will have to win if she is to have any chance of taking the lordship of her homeland. At the same time, Astria spots a girl with unique powers at the academy. But she runs away screaming before she can even learn her name.

Arizona Turner has been my best friend since fourth grade, even when we hated each other. We've been there for one another through first kisses and first times, and we've been each other's constant when good relationships turned bad. (We even went to colleges that were minutes away from each other.) Throughout the years, and despite what anyone says, we've never crossed the line. Never thought about it. Never wanted to...until one night changed everything. At least, it should've....

News arrives from Tai-tastigon, the vast city that formed Jame into the master thief, wily fighter, and godling-in-the-making that she has become. It seems something is preying on the gods of Tai-tastigon. The new Pantheon is falling, and the ancient city is in turmoil. The self-serving, beguiling demi-god leader of the Thieves Guild has coerced Jame into finding the soul of his missing brother by holding hostage people she loves. She reluctantly returns to find a Tai-tastigon in turmoil, with citizen pitted against citizen, and day and night-time folk at one another’s throats.

Living with his stern grandfather taught Trevor Callahan one important lesson: Caring makes a man weak. Now the old man is dead, and Trev returns to Stone Creek for one reason and one reason only--to sell the Rocking C Ranch. Maybe then he can put his past behind him and move on.

Jake knows the woman sitting next to him on his business flight to Denver - he just can't figure out how he knows her. Clara Stowe isn't in Jake's line of work. They have nearly nothing in common apart from a deep and shared certainty that they've met before. As their airplane conversation deepens, both struggle to figure out what circumstances could have possibly brought them together. Then, in a revelation that sends Jake reeling, Clara admits she's traveling to the Colorado mountains to kill herself, and she disappears into the crowded airport immediately after landing.

It's finally time for the Alandrian Central Magic Academy's famous Spring Tournament. For Lesti, it's her best opportunity to prove her strength before turning fifteen and becoming an adult. She'll have to do it alone, though. The academy has forbidden Astria from participating. Still, the tournament isn't all about fighting. People from across the alliance gather to watch the spectacle. Amongst the masses and gathered lords, threats new and old plot their moves. As Astria works to neutralize these threats, she finds herself with a choice that could change the course of her new world.

CIA operative Alex Parker is one of the most successful ghosts the agency has. Recruited as a 17 year old, she has over 100 kills to her credit. But 10 years of blending in, disappearing, and assassinating targets has taken a toll on her and she'd like to get out. Now, she has a new problem...her partner's gone rogue. After stealing government secrets, he intends to sell them to the highest bidder. It's up to Parker, and her new partner, to find him and bring him in...dead or alive.

They did their best to destroy everything I hold dear, but heaven made one fatal flaw - they didn’t kill me when they had the chance. You don’t attack the ones I love and get away with it. I never asked for this. I never wanted to become what I am. But the path to hell isn’t paved with good intentions. It’s paved by the retribution of the worst kind of monsters. The ones we create. And heaven is about to face the deadliest of their makings.

Just because she has wings, doesn't mean she's an Angel... It's front page news on every Angel gossip rag: "Marcus & Ameana: Gone the Way of Brad & Jennifer". So, Who Is the "Angelina"? Emmy Baxter - a mere mortal! Ameana tries to avoid her ex and his new love by focusing on the other evil out to destroy the team. But soon her pain turns to fury. And before the end... a girl plots revenge, a leader is on the edge, and an Angel falls.

Corey and her best friend, Kyra, are inseparable. Corey is the only person who understands Kyra's high-highs and low-lows. So when Corey's family moves away from their Alaskan town, she makes Kyra promise to stay strong during the long, dark winters and wait for her return. Except Kyra doesn't. Two days before Corey is to visit, Kyra is found floating underneath the ice. While everyone in Lost Creek deems Kyra's death a suicide, Corey knows something is wrong. With every hour, her suspicion grows.

Diana Moore has led a charmed life. She's the daughter of a wealthy senator and is living a glamorous city life, confident that her handsome live-in boyfriend is about to propose. But everything is turned upside down when she learns of a mysterious woman who works nearby - a woman who is her identical mirror image. Diana is compelled to discover the truth about this woman's identity, but the truth leads her down a path of secrets, betrayals, and shocking discoveries about her past.

Eighteen years ago a teenage pregnancy changed Kate Worthington's life forever. Faced with many difficult decisions, she chose to follow her heart and embrace an uncertain future with Glenn Ferguson, her devoted first love...and the father of her baby. At the same time, in another part of the world, sixteen-year-old Ryan Hamilton makes his own share of mistakes, but learns important lessons along the way.

>Live bait makes all the difference. Sent on a mission to lure Budapest's vampire Overlord into a trap, Connie Bence is instead caught red-handed by the dark Casanova. Her employer has concrete proof of the dubious leader's misdeeds but she is surprised when this ruthless killer, Rurik, offers her protection and rescues her from his own kind. It plants seeds of doubt in her mind and she begins to question his guilt. Now she is thrown into his world where blackmail determines her every move....

Alex Parker is back and, along with her partner, Jim Cole, still on the trail of a rogue CIA agent. Their pursuit takes them all over the world. Every time they get close to nabbing their target, he manages to slip away. Just as they're about to nab Heath Davis in Brazil, Parker is faced with the option of either capturing Davis or saving an innocent person's life. She defies orders and is temporarily suspended. Once Parker returns from suspension, she's hot on Davis' tail.

When Corie Geller asked her parents to move from their apartment into the suburban McMansion she shares with her husband and teenage daughter, she assumed they'd fit right in with the placid life she’d opted for when she left the Joint Anti-terrorism Task Force of the FBI. But then her retired NYPD detective father gets a call from good-natured and slightly nerdy film professor April Brown—one of the victims of a case he was never able to solve. When April was a five-year-old, she’d emerged unscathed from the arson that killed her parents. Now, two decades later, April is asking for help.

I was just your average 17-year-old girl, until I was Marked. Some may sell their souls; mine was taken. Not only are angelic hunters out to kill me, but Hell's deadliest Mage - the devilishly charming Crown Prince of Lust - is just as desperate to get his hands on me...again. No, he doesn't want me dead. This seductive trickster only has one thing on his mind: making me his new blushing bride. He can call me his "mate" all he wants. I'm not about ready to sign my soul away into eternal damnation, no matter how gorgeous he may be.