Karen Robards

Hailed by Colum McCann as a "funny, smart, intuitive book," SLEEPWALKER introduces a true new Irish talent.

In this town, anyone is replaceable. . . . After a tragic chain of events led to the deaths of their spouses two years ago, D.C. philanthropist Sloane Chase and Senator Whit Montgomery are finally starting to move on. The horrifying ordeal drew them together, and now they’re ready to settle down again—with each other. As Sloane returns to the world of White House dinners and political small talk, this time with her new husband, she’s also preparing for an upcoming hip replacement—the latest reminder of the lupus she’s managed since her twenties. With their hectic schedules, they decide that hiring a home health aide will give Sloane the support and independence she needs postsurgery. And they find the perfect fit in Athena Karras. Seemingly a godsend, Athena tends to Sloane and even helps her run her charitable foundation. But Sloane slowly begins to deteriorate—a complication, Athena explains, of Sloane’s lupus. As weeks go by, Sloane becomes sicker, and her uncertainty quickly turns to paranoia as she begins to suspect the worst. Why is Athena asking her so many probing questions about her foundation—as well as about her past? And could Sloane be imagining the sultry looks between Athena and her new husband?

The French Quarter: where seduction is a game...The Game: ObsessionThe Players: Josie Villefranche, notorious hotel owner; Drew Morrison, business sharkObject of the Game: Have a Cajun-hot love affair, without getting burnedBordello-turned-hotel-owner Josie has a hands-off rule when it comes to men. Too many have wanted her only for her talents in bed. But when too-sexy-to-resist Drew checks in, she decides to make an exception: use him, then lose him—no regrets.Ruthless businessman Drew has a hidden agenda: to buy the cash-strapped hotel. But he's been bedding its bewitching proprietor instead. When a murder puts Josie in both financial and legal trouble, Drew must make a choice: grab the hotel and run—or sacrifice everything for another night in her bed....

When beautiful advertising executive Maddie Fitzgerald is attacked in a New Orleans hotel, she thinks that she's a victim of random, senseless violence. FBI agent Sam McCabe thinks otherwise--that she's the target of a serial killer who's eluded the FBI for weeks. He also knows that there's only one way to catch him: use Maddie as the enticing bait. But as McCabe's intimate protection ignites irresistible passion, Maddie finds herself in greater danger than she believed possible--and closer to the killer than she ever imagined.

"When Christy Petrino discovers that her fiance, Michael DePalma, and the law firm where she works are linked to the mob, she breaks her engagement and quits her job. But no one walks away from the DePalma family so easily. Christy's freedom comes on one condition: She must deliver a locked briefcase to a motel on North Carolina's Ocracoke Island. Her late-night drop-off is only the beginning of a tide of terror: In the shadows of the Outer Banks, Christy senses she is being followed...and suddenly she is a witness in a police investigation of a serial killer known as the "Beachcomber" - who targets young women who all resemble her! Handsome surfer Luke Rand offers the best kind of shelter in his strong arms. But as their sensual attraction flares, Christy hears warning bells telling her 'if you want to survive a hot and deadly summer, trust no one...'" (less)

Left bankrupt after her billionaire father's sudden death, Alexandra Haywood returns to Shelby County, Kentucky -- that bit of Southern splendor known as Paradise County--to sell the family's magnificent horse farm. Part of her mission is to fire Joe Welch, the sexy, stubborn farm manager who worked hard for the Haywoods while raising his children. But Joe refuses to be fired, and he and Alex clash. They also fall for each other--hard. Just as their attraction flares, a shocking murder with ties to the past rocks the county--and cuts close to home when Joe's teenage son, Eli, and Alex's wild-spirited younger sister, Neely, vanish. Now, the evil that lurks beneath Paradise County raises its gruesome head--and Alex is targeted as the next victim.

A freed slave from a parallel universe, Quinn has come to this world on a vital mission. But then she's stopped in her tracks by the seductive attentions of a mysterious spirit. He's a ghost named Caleb Marshall—a werewolf who was supposedly murdered by the ancestors of her dearest friends…When Caleb finds a way to take over a human body, Quinn can no longer resist her overwhelming desire, even though she's not sure she can trust him. But soon she discovers that they have a shared enemy—and if she doesn't act fast, she may lose the man she's come to love, along with her life…

An enormous fortune would be hers on day. Melina was grateful that her grandfather, a Greek shipping magnate, had chosen her as his heir. Yet there was one issue that she hotly disputed with him: the question of whom she would marry. She wanted only one man -- Anthony Seaton, a fiery individual who lived on a neighboring island ... and who'd been haunted by his wife's tragic death until he met Melina. Together they were caught up in a swirl of passion. But their happiness was soon cut short. Because someone was aiming to destroy the shipping empire -- and its only heir, Melina.

Nothing in anchorwoman Lynn Nelson's high-profile TV career prepared her for saddle sores, frayed tempers, or her teenage daughter Rory's raging hormones as they vacation in Utah's mountain wilderness. The object of Rory's passion is their guide, drop-dead-gorgeous Jess Feldman, a man the divorced Lynn instinctively distrusts, even as she shields herself from his blazing baby blues. But in a terrifying moment when both Lynn and Rory fall off a cliff of sheared rock, Jess becomes their only hope. Risking his life to save them, he guides them through the impenetrable forest thousands of feet below, unwittingly plunging them into a danger more menacing than any of them could have imagined. Exhausted and injured, all they have is each other--a terrified child, and a man and a woman who rediscover passion in each other's arms--as they race against time for their lives....

WAS HE DEAD, OR... The nude male body an the embalming table, battered beyond recognition. Gingerly, Summer McAfee, chairwoman, CEO, and sole employee of Daisy Fresh cleaning service reached out to touch an arm to reassure herself that she hadn't just seen the corpse move. Suddenly, shockingly, her hand was in the viselike grip of a man very much alive and desperate enough to take her captive on a no-holds-barred run from cops, killers, and his own decidedly complicated past.... Summer's former life as a New York lingerie model had gone south with her marriage, leaving her, at thirty-six, single and back home in Tennessee, on her hands and knees scrubbing other people's bathrooms. But the drab present vanishes in a flash as she's forced to flee into the Tennessee wilds with the stranger she calls Frankenstein, first as his captive, then his companion, as they run from enemies determined to destroy them both-straight into a raging passion that could only he the last laugh of fate....

Fate brings cockney commoner Jewel Combs to the mansion on Grosvenor Square to face the icy demeanor of Sebastian Peyton, Earl of Mooreland. She doesn't know why blue-blooded Sebastian accepts the sudden challenge to transform her into "Julia Stratham"--to turn a diamond in the rough into a glittering gem--but she knows his plans will give her a home where she will never be hungry, shivering or frightened again. And "Julia" has a little surprise of her own in store for this breathtaking man: she'll show him that although she isn't a lady, she is all woman. SHE WHISPERED "YES, MY LORD", AND PROMISED TO OBEY HIM ... WITH HER BODY AND HER LOVE London street urchin Jewel Combs had no future but one of whoredom and shame. Then a dying gentleman looked at her topaz eyes and still untouched innocence --- and wed her to torment his aristocratic family with a final, scandalous joke after his death. But Sebastian, Earl of Moorland, found nothing humorous in the cheeky young widow's claims on his cousin's inheritance ... or in the smoldering sensuality of this rough Jewel. Appraising her with his ice blue eyes, he wondered if it might be amusing to polish her into a lady, call her Julia Stratham ... and seduce her. Jewel had kept her virginity amid England's roughest men, yet when this devastatingly handsome lord lowered his mouth to her burning flesh, an irresistible fire consumed her ... and even if he called her wanton, she vowed to be the lady he loved tonight ... and forever.

I've a feeling you'll soon rue this day. . . . These were the fateful words Sarah Markham's father uttered after she threw herself between the convict lashed to the ship's mast and the captain's whip. Transported to Australia for crimes against the Crown, Dominic Gallagher had been labeled a troublemaker. No humor lightened his handsome face; everything about him looked dark, deliberate, and dangerous. But independent, feisty Sarah couldn't bear to see any man flogged to death. Instead she insisted her father buy this young Irish rebel and bring him back to their ranch. Soon a forbidden passion began to blossom between the indentured man and his mistress in this lush, primitive land. A twist of fate swept them together amid betrayal and intrigue as a man faced risking everything for freedom and a woman faced risking everything for love.

Journalist Lisa Collins was fast discovering she was out of her element in a world of war. She had come to Africa to get a story. She got more than she bargained for--a dramatic rescue from terrorists by a masculine, rugged soldier of fortune named Sam Eastman, and feelings as primal as terror and desire. Shaken, yet safe in Sam's strong arms, Lisa Collins, intrepid and independent reporter, had shocked herself by begging to be loved. Lisa's only previous sexual experience had been in a tragic marriage devoid of desire. Now she had thrown herself at a man who ordered her around like a soldier and treated her like the kind of woman he believed she was, a tramp. She hated him. She fought him. And she admitted she had found what she had been starved for--the hard, fierce lovemaking of a man. But in the isolated African bush, safety was far away, danger was very near, and time was very short to convince a mistrustful, embittered mercenary to fight one last battle . . . for her heart.

New York Times bestselling author Karen Robards deliciously mixes adventure and romance in her beloved tale of a buccaneer and a convent girl--a romance so magnificent it will make your pulse pound and your heart rejoice. Orphaned heiress Lady Amanda Rose Culver wanted to run from the injured man she found on the rocky shore near her convent school. But his hard-muscled hand stopped her even before she saw the pain and longing in his eyes. And she trembled, not with fear, but with a desire to believe in his story, his innocence, his passion. New World privateer Matt Grayson, unjustly accused of murder by the British Crown, has narrowly escaped hanging. Now his freedom depends on winning this beautiful girl's co-operation so he can sail back to New Orleans. He never meant to hold her captive on his ship. He never meant to fall in love. . . .