Subject: Marine Will MacIntyre Current Status: Medical leave One day a year Will MacIntyre lets himself remember the woman who left him after he enlisted. But seven years later, on the anniversary of that fateful day, Will is defusing a bomb in Afghanistan—and it explodes. Dr. Oliva Eklund can barely find the boy she loved inside the hard, chiseled body of the man Will is now—a Marine who knows just how to tempt her, just how to seduce her. Olivia is well aware that Will plans to return to his unit after he recovers, but she can't resist trying to heal him. Even if it means sending him back into a war zone. And breaking them apart forever.

LEADER OF THE PACK Ben Tannen was the undisputed leader of his group of best friends, nicknamed "The Deck." He was the Ace, of course. Heidi Malone was the Joker, and the only female among them. All four men were half in love with her Ben maybe more than half . Still, there had always been a certain tension between the Golden Boy and Heidi-from-the-wrong-side-of-the-tracks. And when he'd offered her money for college tuition, she'd lashed out with her pride and a bicycle chain. Fifteen years later, Heidi still owed Ben an apology and he still held an IOU. He planned to collect and prove to her that they'd make much better lovers than fighters. "Rising star Alison Kent holds us spellbound with deeply passionate characters and scorching sensuality." Romantic Times

One of the most beloved novels of all time, Colleen McCullough's magnificent saga of dreams, struggles, dark passions, and forbidden love in the Australian outback has enthralled readers the world over. The Thorn Birds is a chronicle of three generations of Clearys—an indomitable clan of ranchers carving lives from a beautiful, hard land while contending with the bitterness, frailty, and secrets that penetrate their family. It is a poignant love story, a powerful epic of struggle and sacrifice, a celebration of individuality and spirit. Most of all, it is the story of the Clearys' only daughter, Meggie, and the haunted priest, Father Ralph de Bricassart—and the intense joining of two hearts and souls over a lifetime, a relationship that dangerously oversteps sacred boundaries of ethics and dogma.

The Creator sat upon the throne, thinking. Behind him stretched the illimitable continent of heaven, steeped in a glory of light and color; before him rose the black night of Space, like a wall. His mighty bulk towered rugged and mountain-like into the zenith, and His divine head blazed there like a distant sun. At His feet stood three colossal figures, diminished to extinction, almost, by contrast -- archangels -- their heads level with His ankle-bone. When the Creator had finished thinking, He said, "I have thought. Behold!" He lifted His hand, and from it burst a fountain-spray of fire, a million stupendous suns, which clove the blackness and soared, away and away and away, diminishing in magnitude and intensity as they pierced the far frontiers of Space, until at last they were but as diamond nailheads sparkling under the domed vast roof of the universe. At the end of an hour the Grand Council was dismissed. They left the Presence impressed and thoughtful, and retired to a private place, where they might talk with freedom. None of the three seemed to want to begin, though all wanted somebody to do it.