Carlotta Hughes

"When I touched the gate, I saw my red thread of destiny. I believe the Source led me across the stars to you. My cridhe." RUTH After my old life burns to ash, I make the wild decision to buy a coastal farm intending to convert it into a Tolkien-inspired bed-and-breakfast. The ramshackle buildings, overgrowth, and daunting hard work are all things I expected. What I didn't expect was to stumble across an enormous washed-up wall of muscle on my beach. Thorn isn't human. He's an orc from across the universe who speaks with a Scottish accent, wears a kilt, and is dead set on making me his mate. But I've got more important things to take care of, like completing the renovations on time and keeping a nosy FBI agent at bay. Thorn stays, he helps me, protects me, and shows me heartbreaking patience. Thawing my heart even as he heats my blood. I want him, badly, but I'm too broken. And the last thing I want to do is break his heart of gold. THORN A dream sets me on a path far from my homeworld of Talam, to a broken gate that awakens at my touch. Drawn forward by fate, I travel through the gate and across the stars. I wake on a strange planet called Earth with the lovely human female from my dream draped atop me. Ruth is my cridhe, my soul-bound mate. But how am I to woo her when we look so starkly different? When her world is beyond my wildest imaginings? When it is so obvious that males in the past have hurt her terribly and still seek to do so? To stay by her side, I make a wild gamble to help her realize her dream. In exchange, I'll get to live with her, be near her, and protect her. Even if she never accepts me as her cridhe. It would have to be enough. But it's a fool's promise because I know in my soul that I could never get enough of her. This is a full-length 65000-word sci-fi alien romance with fantasy elements that is HFN. Content Information is available on the author's website. Originally a short story included in the Big Feels Monster Romance Anthology.All proceeds from pre-orders and the month of June 2022 to go to charity for bodily autonomy rights. Receipts to be posted on the author's website.