Read Ebook {PDF EPUB} Where There's Smoke by L.A. Witt Where There's Smoke. Anthony Hunter wonders what the hell he's gotten himself into when he agrees to manage an unproven candidate's campaign for governor of California. As soon as he meets the gorgeous, charismatic - and married - politician, attraction gives Anthony's rock-solid professionalism a run for its money, and Anthony knows he's in way over his head. Jesse Cameron doesn't like the idea of putting himself out there as a happily married, wholesome candidate, but his retired senator uncle insists it'll give him an edge over a challenging rival. The only problem is that Jesse's marriage is over, existing only to maintain his heterosexual facade. Oh, and there's that minor detail about his undeniable attraction to his smoking hot campaign manager. Or the fact that the attraction is very, very mutual. Before long, temptation explodes into a sizzling, secret relationship, but under the microscope of the media and the relentless scrutiny of the voting public, Anthony and Jesse can only keep their secret for so long. And this is one scandal a campaign won't survive. This book was previously published and has been lightly revised from its original version. 111,000 words. Genre: Romance. Covet Thy Neighbor: A Tucker Springs Novel. Tattoo artist Seth Wheeler thinks he’s struck gold when Darren Romero rents the apartment across the hall. The new guy is gorgeous, witty, and single, plus he’s just the right blend of bold and flirtatious. Perfect. Except then Darren reveals that he moved to Tucker Springs to take a job as the youth pastor at the New Light Church. Seth is not only an atheist, but was thrown out by his ultra-religious family when he came out. He tends to avoid believers, not out of judgment but out of self-preservation. But Darren doesn’t give up easily, and he steadily chips away at Seth’s defenses. Darren is everything Seth wants in a man . except for that one massive detail he just can’t overlook. Is Darren’s religion the real problem, or is it just a convenient smoke screen to keep him from facing deeper fears? It’s either see the light, or risk pushing Darren away forever. Where There's Smoke by L.A. Witt. Pia Witte wears heavy, black eyeliner around her big, dark brown eyes, a way of drawing attention away from the wrinkles in her face. Once again, she has spent half the night lying awake. She has had trouble sleeping since the arrest of her son Marcel in Peru five years and eight months ago. This time Marcel called her at four in morning, as he often does. He was crying. He told her that he needed money and was afraid -- almost as afraid as his mother. Marcel Witte has been held in a prison on the outskirts of Lima, Peru since November 2003. More than 3,000 prisoners are crowded into the facility, which was built to house 500 prisoners. Trickles of excrement and leftover food crisscross the prison grounds. A European who hopes to survive there must purchase a cell for $1,000 (€715) and pay $250 (€180) in monthly rent. The cells can be locked from the inside, providing protection against violent prisoners and unpredictable guards. But securing one of these cells is no guarantee of winning the daily battle for survival. It is a struggle that German director Peter Dörfler has documented in his latest film, "Achterbahn" ("Roller Coaster"). "I can't remember the last time I slept well. I'm so afraid that I won't hear the phone when my son calls," Pia Witte told SPIEGEL ONLINE. And yet, when she does hear the phone, she is also afraid of what the call could mean. Is Marcel injured? Has he tried to commit suicide, as he did once before? Is he dead? She blames Norbert Witte, Marcel's father, for the constant pressure, fear and uncertainty of her life today. Norbert Witte is a tall, compact man with a full head of hair and a gray moustache. He is a chain-smoker, has a winning smile and slightly protruding eyes. Some say he is a down-to-earth guy with his heart in the right place, while others call him a charlatan. Witte comes from an affluent German family of carnival performers and ride owners. His grandfather Otto was a famous carnival artist who once swindled his way into acquiring the title "King of Albania." Norbert Witte, who was born in Hamburg, seems to have inherited his delusions of grandeur from his grandfather. From the Biggest Fairground To Bankruptcy. Witte wanted to make it big in the amusement park world. After German reunification, he dreamed of turning the Plänterwald, a popular state- owned amusement park in Berlin in the days of East Germany, into the biggest fairground in reunified Germany. The "King of Carousels," as his friends called him, decided to invest in the park, which he called "Spreepark" and operated under his wife's name. It went well at first, but when the city government eliminated 3,000 of the park's parking spaces, visitors stopped coming and Spreepark went out of business. In December 2001, manager Hans Ludwig Trümper was forced to file for bankruptcy, leaving the city-state of Berlin and banks with a mountain of debt totaling €15 million ($21 million). In January 2002, Witte left Germany and moved to Peru, taking along his family and six carnival rides. He wanted to start over again in Lima and turn the big wheel once again. This time, he planned to open an amusement park, called Lunapark, directly in front of a major supermarket. He sent his wife and their five children ahead. It was the first time Pia Witte had relied on her husband's judgment without asking questions. Uncharacteristically, this time she kept out of the plans and preparations for the family's new life and did not take control. Her husband assured her that he had found a house and that everything had been taken care of. It was the biggest disappointment of her life. When Pia Witte arrived in Peru, a completely foreign country to her, nothing had been taken care of. Nothing at all. She began searching for a house for the family, and was cheated several times, but she eventually found an opulent villa in one of the city's typical wealthy enclaves. It was the beginning of the plight of the family, which had come to Peru with only meager savings. The problems continued when Peruvian customs officials refused to release the carnival rides in their entirety. Instead, they released individual parts from the shipping containers, making it impossible to assemble a single roller coaster or Ferris wheel. "He Must Have Had no Other Choice" The slide into poverty happened quickly. Within a few months, Pia Witte was having trouble feeding the family, and she flew back to Germany with four of her five children. Her husband and their son Marcel, who was 21 at the time, stayed in Lima. Norbert Witte, deeply in debt and desperate, allowed himself to be recruited by an old friend from Berlin -- as a drug courier for the Peruvian mafia. Back in Germany, his wife was completely unaware of his new line of business. "My husband and drugs? He used to complain when the kids smoked," says Pia Witte. "He must have had no other choice." Witte hid 167 kilograms (76 pounds) of pure cocaine -- compressed into 211 small disks, with a market value of €10 million ($14 million) -- in the 12-meter (39-foot) steel mast of the "Flying Carpet" carousel. He told customs officials that the carousel had to be shipped to Germany for repairs. But a supposed accomplice turned out to be an undercover drug investigator, and the smuggling operation was exposed. On Nov. 5 and 6, 2003, Norbert and Marcel Witte were arrested, the father in Berlin and the son in Peru. In May 2004, the Berlin District Court sentenced Norbert Witte to a seven-year prison term. After four years, most of it spent in a low-security, open facility, he was released from the prison. But his son faced a much harsher sentence. "When I was arrested, I thought to myself: I'll be dead soon. Then I was taken to the police station, which was horrific," says Marcel Witte, who is 28 today and weighs 15 kilograms (33 pounds) less than on the day of his arrest. He endured three years in a dilapidated prison until, in October 2006, the Fourth Criminal Chamber of the Lima Court sentenced him to 20 years in prison. "You Have to Try not to Think about It" "I got involved with bandits, ruined Marcel's life and destroyed our family," Norbert Witte told SPIEGEL ONLINE. He is ashamed of what he did, but he is hopeful and is doing everything in his power to bring Marcel back to Germany. Unlike Marcel's mother, Norbert has no trouble sleeping, enjoying life or going out. Life must go on, he says. "To endure the pain, you have to try not to think about it," he says, smoking a cigarette despite his six heart attacks. Witte is good at not thinking about things. No one knows this performer as well as Pia Witte. The couple met when she was 14. Her father owned a bumper-car ride, and at 19 Pia married Norbert, the 21-year-old son of a carnival performer.