The Damaged Enforcer

I don't make mistakes. I fix them. It is the only thing I have never gotten wrong.

So when the front office orders me to fake a relationship with the enforcer they can't afford to keep and can't afford to cut, I do what I always do. Control the narrative. Control the man. Control the fallout.

Except Zach Novak knew me before the armor. Before I walked away from him the first time. Before I learned that vulnerability is not a weakness. It is a weapon someone else will use against you.

He is supposed to be a problem. An aging fighter with a temper and a shelf life, one bad night from being cut. But the man who bleeds for his teammates and goes still when he touches me is nothing like the headlines they keep writing.

And somewhere between the staged kisses and the real ones, I stop managing him and start needing him.

Then the leaks start.

Photos that should not exist. Stories built to ruin me. And behind all of it, the ex-husband who already taught me exactly how far a man will go to break the woman who got away.

Now the fake relationship is the only thing holding me up. And the man I was sent to control is the only one in my corner who is not on someone's payroll.

If I trust him, I hand my ex the last weapon I have.
If I don't, I lose the first man who ever stood beside me instead of in front of me.

Part of the Stampede series, but it can be read as a standalone.

This is an open-door hockey romance with on-page intimacy. The heat is earned, character-driven, and never gratuitous. All intimacy is consensual, and protection is used on page. The tone is emotionally intense rather than spice-forward, and the pull between them is there from the first page. Sensitive-content note: the story includes an emotionally abusive, controlling ex-husband, coercive control and manipulation, and an on-page physical altercation. If this is your lane, thank you for reading. I hope you enjoy it!

Previously published as The Wrong Knights. This is a revised, re-titled edition. Same story, refreshed. If you have already read The Wrong Knights, you have read this book.