Island Flame

What can a beautiful captive say to a handsome, ruthless pirate? Anything but “no.”

     He was her husband, her lover, the pirate who seized her body, then stole her heart. Lady Catherine Aldley fled England to make a home with the infamous Jonathan Hale in Carolina. But their perfect life was shattered when Cathy was summoned to England to her ailing father, and discovered that her marriage to Jonathan was a sham. He was a wanted man, one step from the gallows. The only way she could save him was to wed her despised cousin, to let Jonathan think she had betrayed their love.

     With a price on his head and vengeance in his soul, Jon Hale led a mutiny aboard the prison ship Cristobel and recaptured his faithless wife. Cathy could rile his blood as no other. The fire in her eyes infuriated and beguiled him. Cathy said she hated him, yet melted at his touch even as Jon tried to despise what he most desired. Then fate threatened to part them forever and Jon risked his life to rescue the woman he could not live without….

It’s not that Micayla Lange is afraid of the clinking she hears coming from the first floor of the empty McMansion she’s housesitting for her uncle Nicco. She’s a cop, after all. It’s just that finding out her boyfriend was cheating on her was enough drama for one night. Now she’s alone on New Year’s Eve, wearing flannel pajamas and wielding a Glock 22 as she zeroes in on the unmistakable source of the sound: Uncle Nicco’s private office.

Jason Davis steals things for a living, so unexpected developments are a natural part of the job. Getting caught red-handed by a hot, pigtail-sporting police officer in what is supposed to be a gangster’s deserted house is just one more twist in the game. Kind of like finding incriminating photos in Nicco Marino’s safe, only to discover the cop—and the security cameras— have gotten a real good look at his face.

Unfortunately for Mick, she also got a good look at the damned pictures. Her “uncle” might love her like family, but if he knows she’s seen evidence that implicates him in the murder of a city councilman, she doesn’t like her chances. Which is why she’s having a hard time reconciling her professional instincts with what she is rapidly concluding is an inescapable fact: She’s about to help a criminal get away with a suitcase full of stolen money. And she’s going with him.

Mick and Jason’s race for their lives hurtles them through the dangerous Michigan wilderness on speedboat and snowmobile. As their adventure heats up and their enemies close in, Mick is torn between her duty to the force and the combustible passion engulfing her and her unlikely partner in crime. She’ll have to turn Jason in sooner or later . . . if they survive. But will they ever get a second chance at love?

Romance writer Clara Winston dedicates her newest book to her cat, Puff, without knowing what havoc she is about to unloose on her placid (boring?) life. Because there’s a rogue CIA agent out there whose code name is Puff, and some very bad guys want to kill him. When the bad guys show up at mild-mannered Clara’s house, thinking that she can lead them to the man they’re hunting, she is rescued by that man, disgraced CIA agent Jack McClain. Jack is green-eyed, black-haired, infuriatingly macho—and every bit as sexy as the romantic heroes she’s always writing about. Clara hates him on sight, but if she wants to survive he is the only game in town. With Puff very reluctantly in tow, they go on the run for their lives, battling each other until the sizzling chemistry between them explodes into red-hot passion. This is a funny, romantic thrill-ride by the New York Times, USA Today and Publisher’s Weekly bestselling author that Romantic Times called “the mistress of sizzling sensuality.”

“NIGHT MAGIC with captivate and delight you. You have GOT to read it.” – Affaire de Coeur

NIGHT MAGIC is the winner of Waldenbooks Award for the Bestselling Original Contemporary Romance of the year.

Romantic Times’ Reviewer’s Choice Award Winner.

Karen Robards is the six-time winner of Affaire de Coeur’s Silver Pen Award for favorite romance author.

“Karen Robards is one of the most popular voices in women’s fiction.” – Newsweek

“Robards is one terrific storyteller.” – Chicago Tribune

About the Author:

Ever since I was a little girl, I’ve loved to write. My first book was a ten-page effort written at age five for my grandmother. Throughout grade school, high school and college I wrote for various school publications. When I was eighteen, my first professionally published piece—a humorous anecdote—appeared in Reader’s Digest. Still, it never occurred to me that I might become a professional writer. I aimed for a career as a lawyer and was actually in law school when I sold my first book. When that happened, the world lost a would-be lawyer and gained a writer. That book, which is still in print, is Island Flame, and it was published when I was twenty-four. Since then, I’ve written over forty books, which regularly appear on the New York Times, USA Today, and Publisher’s Weekly bestseller lists, among others. The mother of three sons, I read, I write, and I chauffeur children. That’s my life.

Hugh Battancourt -- a dark and dangerous nobleman who long ago turned his back on the ton and now leads a life secretly dedicated to his country's service -- is determined not to be swayed by his prisoner's beauty as they share a cabin on a ship bound for France. Lives depend on his retrieving from her a letter full of secrets she intends to turn over to the enemy. But even as Claire and Hugh engage in a battle of wits and wills, captor and captive find themselves drawn irresistibly to each other. Is it possible, Claire wonders, that she could discover the true meaning of love that has eluded her with this handsome stranger? One who will lay his life on the line in order to protect her from someone who is intent on placing Claire in the path of danger?

With this sensual and entrancing tale, bestselling author Karen Robards continues her wonderful trilogy of three sisters taking their rightful place as the belles of Regency England's ton.