Love Denied

Book excerpt: The omnibus collection of the three TAINTED LOVE series novels: TAINTED LOVE This is a dark and brooding gothic mystery featuring a terrified heroine, a morally ambiguous hero, an isolated setting, an eerie house, and layers of old family secrets. The year 1887, Bar Harbor, Maine. Lily Hill's sexual odyessy begins when she returns home to untangle the lies and distortions of her past, a past involving a lurid sex scandal, a suspicious death, and the very angry man she once loved and wronged, Doyle Donovan. Despite annonymous threats warning her to stay away, Lily is resolved to make reparations to Doyle ... in every manner he desires. And Doyle is a man of many shocking desires. BLEEDING LOVE John does more than stargaze through the lens of his telescope -- he voyeuristically watches Lily, his sister by marriage, his brother's wife, the woman he's always coveted. She's his addiction, an obsession he tries to mask with a habit of another kind. Until Molly, the woman he sleeps with but swears he can never love, issues him an ultimatum. Molly does more than pose nude for artists -- she watches out for John, an absinthe addict hell-bent on killing himself. He's her touchstone, a test of her willingness to open herself up to pain. To save John's life, Molly will do anything. Submit to everything. Allow all. No degradation is too much to demand. For John's soul, she'll face a sexual crucible. For John's heart, she'll explore the dark depths of BLEEDING LOVE. BAD LOVE Siam: The half-caste love child of a concubine. A virgin widow desperate to know a man's touch. An innocent lady schooled in the Oriental art of seduction. A sophisticated socialite with secret naughty yearnings. Siam carved a path to economic independence by forfeiting desire to raise six stepdaughters. Her self-sacrifice ends with the death of her wealthy husband. She can now do as she pleases, think only of herself, and she vows never again to be bound by the chains of love. Passion, yes. Lust, of course. Physical fulfillment -- oh, God, please! But not devotion. After embarking on a series of meaningless and unemotional affairs, she plans to marry into her moneyed New York circle. Then she meets a lowly dishwasher in a backwoods Maine hotel. Theo: The youngest and most inhibited of the three Donovan brothers. A romantic bear of a man on the rebound from a broken heart. A bedroom conservative with repressed sexual needs. A latent alpha male who uncovers his dominance.. With Siam. Despite her reluctance to surrender, he demands she accept all of him, even if that all includes...love.