Short Stories

Just Life: Book One

Daron’s looking for a certain type: he loves tall, slim older men, and he’s sure one of them will be his one true love, even though he doesn’t truly believe he deserves it. His lack of confidence leads him to a series of meaningless encounters with strangers, convinced that eventually he’ll find a relationship to last a lifetime. His best friend and coworker, Rebel, offers Daron the only stable relationship he’s ever known. Rebel is younger than Daron and only slightly taller, so definitely not his type. Daron enjoys the time they spend together, but refuses to allow himself to think it could be anything more than friendship. He’s never bothered to consider what Rebel thinks….

A Bittersweet Dreams title: It's an unfortunate truth: love doesn't always conquer all. Regardless of its strength, sometimes fate intervenes, tragedy strikes, or forces conspire against it. These stories of romance do not offer a traditional happy ending, but the strong and enduring love will still touch your heart and maybe move you to tears.

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Gentle and shy, William has lived life on the sidelines. Solitude and his tiny bookshop have been a safe haven, and he's watched New York evolve from Stonewall to the gay marriage bill. At 61, he falls in love with Tommy, a young veteran going to school on the GI Bill. William doesn't believe Tommy could possibly care for him, and he begins to fear that Tommy and his troubled roommate Marley are setting him up for a heartbreaking fall. When Tommy disappears, William has to risk leaving his safe haven and walking into danger, maybe into betrayal, to save the boy he loves.

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A year ago, Brandon was Jared’s roommate’s boyfriend—and completely off limits. Rex and Brandon have since broken up, and now, as Christmas approaches, Jared runs into Brandon again… and wonders if Brandon might return his once-helpless longing.

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Author Cole Stanton is hiding in the backwoods of rural North Carolina, nursing grief and an overwhelming sense of loneliness when Eric Sartori shows up on his doorstep. Eric—his editor and friend—is there to get Cole back home to the bustling metropolis of New York. But Eric will have to melt the ice around his prince’s heart to keep Cole from spending his Christmas in silence and regret.

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Ella is fifty-five, unhappy, and one drink shy of becoming a Christmas suicide statistic. On a joyless Christmas Eve, Ella takes a walk and looks into a window and sees the present no one would ever think to give her, a present that will change her outlook on life.

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After grieving over the death of his partner for a long, lonely year, Matt is finally starting to feel the need to pursue love again. Andy, an A-List model just back from Milan, longs for someone special to spend his life with but for the time being, sets out to find the hot guy he tried to pick up the year before from the local Christmas tree lot. The magic of a snowy Christmas Eve may prove that Saint Nick’s not the only one who can ring in the Yuletide—sometimes you just need a hottie from St. Barts.

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After growing up poor in rural West Virginia, Jase McCoy doesn’t have a single good thought for Christmas… until he dreams of a mysterious stranger who follows him home and treats him to a night of magical passion designed to convince Jase of the joys possible in the holiday season.

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Since he’s housesitting a gorgeous inn over the holidays, Garrett invites his single friends to help keep Christmas merry. Then the snow hits and his friends can’t make it up as planned. Alone on Christmas Eve, Garrett makes a private Christmas wish for Ethan to see him as more than a best friend and a willing sub to spank. When the snow stops, will Garrett’s hopeful wishes come true?

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Crispus Birchmount takes his responsibility to guard the gateway to the elven kingdom of Ashdale very seriously. But while the post itself is an honor, Crispus hates the human world—especially during the humans’ Christmas season when his elven ancestry is made into a mockery for the benefit of children! When he’s assigned to protect a young human, not even an altercation with a mall Santa can stop Crispus from locating Michel LeVandre, a unique man who awakens desires within Crispus he thought were long dead. The new distraction proves disastrous when enemy forces conspire to take the gate, but now Crispus has a human he really cares about and a renewed lust for life, and he’ll use the vanguard’s gift to defend Michel, the gate, and maybe the world.

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Now that Curt Knutzen’s family has found their footing with his sexuality, he’s finally coming home for Christmas. He almost doesn’t make it, though, placing his plans—and his life—in real danger until Oscar Nylund bails his car out of a snowdrift. Oscar is in the same straits Curt was three years ago, but with Curt’s open heart—and his family’s acceptance of him and Oscar—they may be able to rescue each other for longer than just the holidays.

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It’s 1914 and David looks up from his Post Office counter to see the man of his dreams. Carl is everything he’s ever wanted, but Australia has laws against ‘deviants’ and the two men must be circumspect. When World War I breaks out, Carl tries to enlist but is rejected. People see his delicate features and stature and assume he’s ‘less than a man’. He’s scorned for not doing his duty while David is applauded for serving his country at home. Public condemnation turns violent, and Carl and David are torn between love and honor.

A Bittersweet Dreams title:

It's an unfortunate truth: love doesn't always conquer all. Regardless of its strength, sometimes fate intervenes, tragedy strikes, or forces conspire against it. These stories of romance do not offer a traditional happy ending, but the strong and enduring love will still touch your heart and maybe move you to tears.

Read more...

Lioqi and Vaedo have been friends – and sometime lovers – since meeting six years ago at an induction ceremony for imperial army recruits. Now guards at the royal palace, Vaedo is the first to notice the beauty of the emperor’s new concubine, but it is Lioqi who puts their lives in peril in an act of thoughtless bravery. Though Sanui has been trained since birth to please other men, it seems a great injustice to the concubine that a man should die for a good deed. But are honor, loyalty, or even love enough to stand against the emperor’s unbreakable law?

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Every Cornishman comes into the world with the soul-deep knowledge that his land straddles the narrow shallows between the solid rocks of English practicality and the ocean of myth that lies beyond. Jamie Tregellis has no time for old men’s tales; working at The Lamb Inn keeps him too busy even to pine for his lost love, Will Andrewartha, who’d split Jamie’s heart in two when he left to become a sailor. Will promised to come back for him, but Jamie had long since given up hope – until one night he hears a noise in the stableyard….

A Bittersweet Dreams title: It's an unfortunate truth: love doesn't always conquer all. Regardless of its strength, sometimes fate intervenes, tragedy strikes, or forces conspire against it. These stories of romance do not offer a traditional happy ending, but the strong and enduring love will still touch your heart and maybe move you to tears.

Second Edition
Previously published by Alpheratz Press, 2010.

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Until now, Drew and Garrett have been playing at dominance, but things have to change. Drew is already losing himself to the implacable will of his new Master and they have yet to make anything official. That’s what this weekend is supposed to be about—Garrett making Drew his—unless the memories from Garrett’s past are too strong to let him meet Drew’s ultimatum of the real thing or nothing at all.

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When Bobby Kincaid is walking the slackline—a narrow, flat webbed rope stretched between two anchor points—he offers a silent gift of beauty to the air and sky.  Making peace with the world is one reason he’s drawn to the seastacks off Scotland’s Orkney Islands.  Colin Rose, the Olympic skier who pushed Bobby away after a horrific accident two years earlier, is another.  But Bobby and Colin will each need to heal before they can return to that space between earth and heaven where they both can fly.

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Nathan has cared for horses all his life, but Haji is the first he’ll train on his own. When the Arabian stallion arrives at Bitter Coffee Ranch, Nathan thinks he is the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen. And then he lays eyes on Haji’s handler, Yousef. Nathan has much to learn about horses, about pride, and about love, but with the ranch’s hopes riding on Haji, he’ll also learn that all things have their price.

A Bittersweet Dreams title: It's an unfortunate truth: love doesn't always conquer all. Regardless of its strength, sometimes fate intervenes, tragedy strikes, or forces conspire against it. These stories of romance do not offer a traditional happy ending, but the strong and enduring love will still touch your heart and maybe move you to tears.

Read more...

Merrick and his boyfriend Roberto have been together long enough that they know all about each others’ pasts. But there’s a vast world of difference between knowing and experiencing it firsthand. When the two are visiting LA for Roberto’s ex-boyfriend Paul’s art opening, a mostly unplanned threesome takes on some BDSM elements Merrick hadn’t quite prepared for. With Roberto’s and Paul’s loving hands to guide him, Merrick begins to explore a new erotic world.

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A Partnership in Blood Story

Facing the Germans outside Amiens, Denis was prepared for the possibility he wouldn't survive the battle. Shot and left for dead, he didn't expect to open his eyes to a vampire offering him a chance at a different existence. Now newly turned, the hunger for blood grows insistent, but an instinct Denis doesn’t understand presses him to make the right choice for feeding, not the most expedient one. Which will Noël prove to be: a temporary succor or the companion of a lifetime?

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