Trigger warnings:
Abusive Relationship, Alcohol, Anxiety, Blood, Drugs, Emotional Abuse, Rape, Sexual Abuse, Stalking,
Description:
At Emberfall Café, Hailey Carter blends into the background by design. Between grueling shifts and the relentless pressure of Ravenwater Law School, she keeps her world small and controlled. It's safer that way. After what happened with her ex, she's learned that people who claim to care can be the ones who hurt the most.
So she keeps her guard high. Unbreakable. Untouchable.
Then Jake Rowan walks in.
Ravenwater's beloved soccer star. Arrogant, magnetic, and infuriatingly persistent. A man used to getting anything-and anyone-he wants. To Hailey, he's exactly the type she promised herself she'd never go near again.
But Jake sees what others miss. He notices the tension hidden in her smile, the way she flinches at unexpected shadows, the fire she tries to keep buried. And Hailey sees right through him too-beneath the ego, beneath the fame, to a boy who's lonelier and more dangerous than he lets on.
They clash. They provoke. They push and pull until the line between hatred and hunger blurs.
Jake wants her walls down. Hailey wants him gone.
But fate-and desire-have other plans.
In a city full of secrets, their connection becomes the most dangerous one of all.
Slow, sharp, inevitable.
Some flames burn gently.
Theirs was always meant to scorch.
*Wattys 2018 Winner / Hidden Gems*
CREATE YOUR OWN MR. RIGHT
Weeks before Valentine's, seventeen-year-old Kate Lapuz goes through her first ever breakup, but soon she stumbles upon a mysterious new app called My Dream Boyfriend, an AI chatbot that has the ability to understand human feelings. Casually, she participates in the app's trial run but finds herself immersed in the empathic conversations with her customizable virtual boyfriend, Ecto.
In a society both connected and alienated by technology, Kate suspects an actual secret admirer is behind Ecto. Could it be the work of the techie student council president Dion or has Kate really found her soulmate in bits of computer code? She decides to get to the bottom of the cutting-edge app. Her search for Ecto's real identity leads Kate to prom, where absolute knowledge comes with a very steep price.