Big City

The Deamhan Chronicles is the flagship series of the Dark Magic Universe. Set in Minneapolis, it follows the hidden world of the Deamhan—psychic vampires who have existed for centuries, locked in ancient rivalries and governed by laws older than civilization itself.

Darian Whitmore is the Alpha of the Silvercrest Pack and CEO for Whitmore Terra Acquisitions, the corporate facade that handles all of the Pack’s financial and territorial needs. When human financial analyst, Theresa “Tess” Beaumont comes in for a financial audit of his company, the life of cool, calm, collected control that Darian once knew shatters the second the wolf screams “Mate!” Now the only thing Darian cares about is how to keep Tess there.

Victoria Armstrong is running for senate on a promise she can't keep. Something in Kins City's water finds the para gene and turns it into a death sentence, and proving it means going after the men who own the labs, the insurance companies, and the ballot. Winning means becoming the thing her wife and best friend may no longer respect, but if it keeps her alive... does it matter? October Sky reads tarot for a living and insists that's all it is. When a fourteen-year-old slips her a note about the people going missing, she lands in a vigilante crew run by a detective and starts seeing disasters her cards deliver just late enough to watch. Dannika once hunted paras for the government. She was sent to infiltrate a youth center, and now the man who runs it is helping her with her own para abilities, and she has no idea how to tell him what she came there to do. Everyone standing in their way believes they're the hero. Before it's over, one of these women will erase a mind to save a life. One will erase a nation's records to save a people. And one will ask to have her own gift taken from her. *For readers of M.L. Wang, J.D. Evans, and Krystle Matar.*

If killing a superhero were easy, everyone would do it. But for Julian Godfrey, defeating Storm Warning was far from the hardest part. What began as victory over the city's biggest hero quickly unravels into a mess, once he learns that the mysterious source of Storm Warning's power has found a new host. Charlotte Hathaway has no idea how to use her new abilities, but she won't stop trying until she destroys Julian's alter ego, Citadel. Julian should have taken her new powers from her when he had the chance, but he let her go in favor of a new plan: training her for a real fight. It's the only way to prove he didn't get lucky when he killed Storm Warning, and show the city--and the other villains--that he's a force to be reckoned with. Getting close to Charlotte comes with far more than Julian bargained for. She's the perfect hero. Determined, confident, and selfless above all else. She's even nice to him, of all people. But if Julian doesn't follow through with his plan despite his growing feelings for her, he has another force to reckon with: Blazar, the villain who raised him and taught him to use his powers. It seems that no matter what choice Julian makes, he's going to lose. And it's not just his life in danger. With its biggest hero gone, the fate of the city of New Atlas hangs in the balance.

\# \*\*“Cold Keys” (Urban Fiction Novel)\*\* \### \*\*Chapter 1 — The Delivery That Didn’t Come\*\* The city always told on you eventually.   Vance Mercer sat in the back of his black SUV, tinted glass turning streetlights into melted gold. The warehouse district was quiet in the way a room gets quiet when somebody’s about to say your name.   His phone lit up.   \*\*MARI.\*\*   He let it buzz twice before answering. “Where’s the load?”   Mari’s voice came through even and controlled. “What load.”   Vance leaned forward. “The one you promised. The one you confirmed.”   Silence—just long enough to be deliberate.   Then: “The driver called. Yard got switched.”   Vance’s knuckles tightened around his key ring. “Switched by who.”   Mari didn’t answer quickly. That hesitation was the first crack.   “Someone who had access,” she said finally.   Access meant keys. Access meant schedules. Access meant people who didn’t move like crew—people who moved like architects.   Vance looked at Calvin Price by the warehouse door. Calvin’s eyes were scanning corners like the dark owed him money.   “Wrong dock,” Vance told him, and his voice made it sound like an accusation, not a problem.   They went inside. Crates sat in formation like props waiting for a scene that never came. Vance stood in front of his whiteboard—codes, names, routes, times written in the tidy hand of a man who never trusted chaos.   He added one line in thick marker:   \*\*LOCK KEYS. COUNT AGAIN.\*\*   Calvin frowned. “So we got a rat.”   Vance shook his head. “No. We got a key.”   He called Mari again—but this time his tone wasn’t controlled. It was surgical. “Send me confirmation.”   Mari’s breath sounded close to the mic. “I can’t.”   Vance stood still. “Try.”   “I tried to keep you out of it,” Mari said softly.   “Out of it,” Vance repeated, and something in him cooled.   Then she finally gave him the place she’d rerouted everything to.   “Shaw Yard.”   Rowan Shaw—the inspector who smiled through tragedies. The man with clean hands and a habit of appearing just after the city decided to look away.   Vance ended the call.   He handed Calvin a burner phone and a jammer like opening the first trap. “Dre needs eyes. Now.”   Calvin hesitated. “You think Dre—”   “I don’t think,” Vance said. “I test.”   He left Mari close enough to watch and far enough to breathe. If she was betraying him, Vance wanted to see the moment her story broke from reality.   Outside, the city’s bass thumped somewhere down the block. A siren rose in the distance, then faded, then rose again—like the night was counting down.   That’s when Vance understood the betrayal wasn’t just personal.   It was structural.   Someone had rewritten the system from the inside, and Vance was the signature on the wrong page.   \---   \### \*\*Chapter 2 — Eyes on Shaw Yard\*\* Dre Holloway came through like a rumor—always moving, always listening, never quite landing in the same place twice.   He met Vance in a backroom of a barber shop that smelled like menthol and overheated clippers. Dre wore a fitted hoodie even in summer, like he was afraid sunlight might discover him.   “You want Shaw Yard watched,” Dre said, not asking—confirming.   Vance slid a stack of bills across the table. “I want to know who touched the schedule.”   Dre’s eyes flicked to the money and stayed on Vance. “You already know.”   Vance didn’t blink. “I know the destination. I don’t know the hand.”   Dre leaned back. “Then here’s what I can do. I can tell you what I see.”   He disappeared for an hour. Came back with silence instead of words—until he spoke.   “Lights went out,” Dre said. “Dock crew changed. Not cops. Not guards. Guys with the right calm.”   Vance frowned. “Calm like what.”   “Calm like they’ve done it before,” Dre said. “Calm like they weren’t afraid of getting caught because catching them doesn’t happen.”   Calvin, standing near the door, asked the obvious question. “So it’s a setup.”   Vance exhaled slowly. “Not necessarily.”   He tapped the table. “Shaw Yard doesn’t care about my shipment. Shaw Yard cares about my legitimacy. Someone wants me looking weak.”   Dre nodded. “You’re the one with the ‘empire.’ If you get hit publicly, the city starts believing you can be replaced.”   Vance stood. “Then we don’t let the city finish the replacement plan.”   He turned to Calvin. “Track the driver. The one who reported the yard switch. Find out who his last call was to.”   Calvin hesitated. “And Mari?”   Vance’s jaw tightened. “Mari stays close.”   Calvin’s voice lowered. “You really think she did this?”   Vance’s eyes went hard. “I think she knows more than she admits. And tonight I’m going to find the exact shape of that knowledge.”   Dre stood too, like he didn’t like being left out of consequences. “Just so you know—Shaw’s people don’t do loud. They do clean. Paperwork clean.”   Vance smiled without humor. “Good. Then we’ll beat him where he thinks he can’t bleed.”   \---   \### \*\*Chapter 3 — Mari’s Soft Threat\*\* Mari met Vance in the kind of quiet that felt staged.   Not the silence of fear—the silence of control.   They sat in a low-lit diner where the windows were thick and the menu was just a prop for people who wanted to seem normal. Mari didn’t look like a traitor. That was the problem. Traiters usually looked guilty.   Mari looked tired.   “You called me back twice,” she said. “You were waiting for me to fold.”   Vance watched her hands. Hands told the truth faster than mouths. Mari didn’t fidget. She didn’t rush. She only held her posture like she was bracing against a wave.   “What did you do?” Vance asked.   Mari sighed. “I didn’t do what you think.”   Vance leaned forward. “Then explain.”   Mari’s gaze shifted briefly toward the window—toward a reflection that wasn’t theirs. “You want the whole story now?”   “I want the part where you stopped protecting me,” Vance said.   Mari’s mouth twitched. “Protecting you doesn’t mean saving you. Sometimes it means keeping you alive long enough to choose better.”   Vance’s voice sharpened. “Choose better? Or obey better?”   Mari stared at him like she hated that he was right. “I’m in this because I made a deal.”   Vance’s stomach tightened. “With who.”   Mari’s eyes didn’t waver. “With Rowan Shaw.”   Calvin arrived then—right on cue—like the room itself had turned into a trigger. He didn’t sit. He just stood there and stared at Mari like he was deciding whether she was a human being or an equation.   “You’re lying,” Calvin said.   Mari didn’t flinch. “I’m not.”   Vance stood slowly. “Then why.”   Mari’s voice dropped. “Because Shaw offered me something you couldn’t. A way to stop the city from swallowing people we can’t replace.”   Vance laughed once. Not friendly. Not even amused. It sounded like a warning. “You think I don’t see the collateral?”   Mari leaned in. “Then you already know what Shaw is doing.”   Vance’s eyes narrowed. “Explain.”   Mari’s words came slower now, heavier. “He’s collecting names. He’s making arrests before you even move. He’s putting your people in a position where they’ll fold. And when they fold, the city will blame you.”   Vance’s mind raced through his own operation—every small inconsistency, every missing count, every “how did this get approved.”   A system didn’t break on accident.   It broke because someone in the room held the pen.   “Why reroute the load to Shaw Yard?” Vance asked.   Mari swallowed. “Because if the shipment disappears, you’ll go looking. And if you go looking, you’ll walk into a room where your choices are already decided.”   Vance looked at Calvin. “She’s trying to warn me.”   Calvin shook his head hard. “Warn you or set you up with your eyes open?”   Mari’s gaze fixed on Vance like it was a final confession. “Both can be true.”   Vance’s voice went calm. “Here’s what happens next. You tell me exactly what Shaw wants, down to the detail. And then you help me bait him.”   Mari blinked. “Bait him how.”   Vance stood over the table. “Cold keys. Hot traps.”   \---   \### \*\*Chapter 4 — Calvin’s Loyalty Test\*\* Calvin didn’t like puzzles. Calvin liked decisions.   So when Vance ordered him to find proof that Mari’s deal was real—proof beyond “she said”—Calvin moved like a man hunting a lie that had already cost someone blood.   He pulled records from a driver contact. Not official. Not legal. Calvin’s specialty was the gray area where truth got lost and then found again.   The driver—Jose “J” Ortega—had called Shaw Yard two times before the reroute. Not a crew number. Not a guard station.   A line with a blocked caller ID and a name tag in the logs: \*\*R. SHAW\*\*.   Calvin brought the printouts to Vance.   Vance didn’t look impressed. “People with blocked IDs can lie.”   Calvin slammed the pages down. “Vance. It’s his line.”   Vance stared at the paper, then at Calvin. “You sure it’s his line.”   Calvin’s throat tightened. “I’m sure.”   Vance reached for the papers and kept his voice low. “Then we have a bigger problem.”   Calvin blinked. “Which is.”   “The betrayal isn’t only inside my crew,” Vance said. “It’s inside my assumption that Mari would betray me for money. Shaw’s doing it for leverage.”   Calvin took a step back. “So what do you do.”   Vance smiled thinly. “We take away the leverage.”   He asked Dre for another set of eyes. “Watch Jose. Watch who he meets next.”   Dre returned an hour later with a new kind of dread. “Jose got picked up.”   “By who,” Vance demanded.   “Not cops,” Dre said. “Vehicles with no plates. Men who move like their bodies are trained to obey.”   Calvin’s fists clenched. “They’re removing witnesses.”   Vance nodded once. “Exactly. That means Shaw isn’t just setting a trap for my shipment.”   He looked toward the dark window like he could see across the city.   “Shaw is setting a trap for my story.”   \---   \### \*\*Chapter 5 — Hot Load, Cold Lie\*\* Vance called it a test, but he knew it was a war.   They staged a fake load—product that wasn’t meant to survive long, money that wasn’t meant to last, timing that was built to fail on purpose. The kind of plan you only run when you’re trying to draw a predator out of its den.   Mari didn’t argue. She watched. And Vance watched her watching.   At 9:07 p.m., the fake delivery rolled toward Shaw Yard.   At 9:09 p.m., the yard lights flickered like a throat clearing.   At 9:11 p.m., the shipment was “interrupted.” Not stolen. Not destroyed.   Recorded.   There were cameras. There were logs. There were witnesses who didn’t even look afraid.   Dre’s voice came through Vance’s earpiece, tight with adrenaline. “They’re letting it happen. They want it seen.”   Vance exhaled. “Because if Shaw can show it to the city, the city will believe.”   Mari whispered from beside him, the first time she sounded genuinely shaken. “Vance, you can’t outsmart a machine that writes its own evidence.”   He turned to her. “Watch me.”   Rowan Shaw arrived in a clean suit that looked like it had never touched grime. He didn’t need to raise his voice. People stepped aside for him automatically.       \---

When Jason Carter arrives in Houston searching for a better future, the last thing he expects is to become entangled in the world of billionaire Richard Blackwood. After unknowingly saving Blackwood’s life, Jason is drawn into a dangerous web of wealth, corporate power, family betrayal, and long-buried secrets. As hidden truths begin to surface, Jason discovers that the greatest inheritance is not money, but the burden of a legacy built on sacrifice, deception, and blood. With powerful enemies closing in and every decision carrying life-or-death consequences, he must fight for his future while uncovering the truth about his past. **BLOOD MONEY** is a BOOKY Award-winning crime thriller filled with suspense, emotional twists, unforgettable characters, and shocking revelations that will keep readers turning pages until the very end. Its feature screenplay adaptation was officially selected by the ICJ International Film Awards.

Titus Wolfe - high school music teacher by day, and DJ extraordinaire by night, becomes a wolfman. But not your typical wolfeman. Not the vicious, brutal and savage man-eating killer, but a savior. Titus's love for music is his saving grace, and also for his alter-ego wolfman. Music calms this savage beast, and along the way he meets the woman of his dreams and befriends those he saves. Romance, humor, adventure, music & dancing ensues. The ride is just beginning....

Investigative journalist Mara Reynolds has built her career on uncovering the truth, but she's about to discover that her own life is built on lies. When Mara interviews billionaire tech entrepreneur Elijah Williams about his revolutionary energy project, the Prometheus Initiative, she's drawn to his charisma and vision. As their professional relationship evolves into something more intimate, Mara begins experiencing disturbing fragments of memories she can't explain—nightmares about guns, blood, and a murder she witnessed as a child. But every time Mara gets close to remembering the truth, something pulls her back. Therapy sessions with Dr. Catherine Reeves seem to help at first, but soon Mara realizes she's been manipulated in ways she never imagined. The "random" mugging that traumatized her wasn't random at all. Her mother's early-onset dementia may not be natural. And the gaps in her own memory aren't accidents—they're erasures. As Mara digs deeper, she uncovers a horrifying conspiracy: twelve years ago, she witnessed the murder of Elijah's parents by his younger brother David. To protect his family's reputation and his brother from prosecution, Elijah hired a pioneering neurologist to erase Mara's memories. But this wasn't a one-time intervention—Elijah has been manipulating her memories for over a decade, erasing and rewriting her reality every time she gets too close to the truth. The Prometheus Initiative isn't just about clean energy. It's a cover for something far more sinister: a facility where Elijah has perfected the technology to manipulate human memories on a massive scale. Mara is just one of seventeen victims whose lives have been systematically erased and rewritten. Now, as fragments of her true past surface, Mara must race against time to expose Elijah before he can erase her again—permanently. But with her best friend compromised, her mother's mind destroyed, and powerful forces aligned against her, Mara faces an impossible question: How do you fight someone who can rewrite your reality with the touch of a button?

Status Legacy Series Power is earned. Loyalty is tested. Legacy is forever. From the unforgiving streets of North Philadelphia to the glittering boardrooms of global empires, the Status Legacy Series follows a cast of hustlers, visionaries, killers, lovers, and survivors who discover that the most dangerous battles aren't fought over money—they're fought over power, family, and legacy. At the center of it all is Rasul Baker, a brilliant strategist whose ability to read people turns a street hustler into the architect of a hidden empire. Alongside allies like Nyazia, whose legal career conceals a far greater influence, and a coalition bound by loyalty, ambition, and sacrifice, every victory creates a new enemy and every betrayal carries deadly consequences. As fortunes rise, romances ignite, blood feuds erupt, and empires expand from Philadelphia to Atlanta and beyond. The line between love and manipulation, business and crime, justice and revenge grows thinner with every decision. New kings emerge. Queens refuse to bow. Old debts demand payment. And every generation must decide whether to protect the legacy...or destroy it. Blending gritty street realism with psychological suspense, romance, high-stakes crime, and relentless ambition, the Status Legacy Series is an interconnected saga where every book reveals another piece of a larger game. In the world of Status, respect is currency, loyalty is priceless, and only the strongest leave a legacy. The Status Legacy Series by Don Shaze—where every move matters, every secret has a cost, and every chapter brings you one step closer to the throne.

Marian Michaels spends her nights singing in New Orleans jazz clubs and her days chasing the career she has always wanted. After witnessing a violent attack that appears to target Black residents, she finds herself frustrated by a lack of evidence and official inaction. Unwilling to let the incident go, Marian begins investigating on her own. As more attacks occur across the city, Marian adopts the masked identity of The Butterfly and follows a trail of intimidation, recruitment, and organized violence. What begins as a single assault soon points to a coordinated movement gaining influence in New Orleans. Balancing her growing music career, complicated relationships, and increasingly dangerous investigations, Marian must decide how far she is willing to go to stop it. Set in New Orleans, The Butterfly is a grounded crime drama that blends vigilante fiction, mystery, and noir with the city’s music scene and culture.

This story is about being a square and faced with survival and the hard streets living in Atlanta Ga.