Defiantly Devoted

She doesn’t trust him. He never stopped watching over her.

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Tessa Calder has spent four years surviving the fallout of one impossible night—the night her brother went to prison, her family fractured, and Shane Smith stood on the wrong side of the truth.

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Now Trey’s parole hearing is days away, and someone is rewriting the past in real time. Altered records. Cloned credentials. Missing files. A stranger who knows details no one should know. Every new clue points back to the same case that destroyed her life—and every step closer to the truth puts Tessa deeper in the crosshairs.

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Shane Smith doesn’t wear a badge anymore. He traded the rules for the shadows, building a private investigation practice in the gray spaces the law can’t reach. He knows Tessa has every reason to hate him. He also knows someone is setting her up to take the fall.

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Protecting her should be simple.

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Wanting her is the problem.

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The heat between them never died. It only waited—buried under guilt, resentment, and four years of unfinished need. But as Shane and Tessa are forced into each other’s orbit, old anger turns into dangerous temptation, and every near touch becomes harder to resist.

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Tessa doesn’t want a savior. Shane doesn’t deserve forgiveness. But when the people hunting her start closing in, trust may be the only weapon they have left. And surrendering to each other might be the most defiant choice of all.

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Defiantly Devoted is a steamy romantic suspense novel featuring a protective ex-cop turned private investigator, a fiercely guarded heroine, second-chance tension, forced proximity, family secrets, corruption, and explicit open-door romance.