Nothing Left to Burn

Maura Fitzgerald just wants to see the world. She's alone after her parents' deaths, and she wants to make the best of her shitty situation. In the penultimate year of her PhD program at Granton University, her mentor is presented with the opportunity to put on a once-in-a-lifetime exhibit, and he wants her to run it. The catch? The other person working on the exhibit is someone she can't stand: trust fund pretty boy JC Blackwood. The man who can do no wrong. He's cruel and arrogant, all the things Maura despises. She's shocked to find out they have much more in common than she expected.

JC is running from the control of his psychopathic and abusive father. He's fairly certain his mother's 'accident' wasn't an accident at all, but instead, she was pushed down the stairs while heavily pregnant. JC is also fairly certain his father is the one who did it. As a result, he's desperate to carve out a place of his own in the world outside of his father's control. The first step was graduate school, to his father's dismay. If his father got his way, the next step would be marrying Liz Greene, an heiress whose parents promised an injection of cash into Blackwood Holdings if JC marries her. Instead, he chooses Maura, which causes his father to give him an ultimatum: choose Maura or the money, but he can't have both.

JC and Maura's unexpected whirlwind romance is almost enough to sweep her off her feet, but she can't shake the nagging feeling that he isn't telling her everything. He reveals his father's ultimatum, which has been sweetened by a deal: If JC marries Liz Greene, he can have his trust fund and keep Maura as his mistress. And if he doesn't? Maura might end up like his mother.

This book is the first in a forthcoming series called No Happy Endings.

Content Warning: death, violence, abduction, implied off-page abuse, mental illness, eating disorder, pregnancy