Be Mine: A Dark Romance Novella

by A.J. Brooks

His presence haunted me.
A nameless shadow, a monster lurking in the dark, certain to stake his claim before this day ends.
His declaration of love etched in blood, permanently marring my life for good.
He had one goal this Valentine's; to make me his.

Genres: Dark Romance, Holiday, Romance, Novella, Contemporary

158 pages, Kindle Edition

Published February 14, 2025

About the author

Librarian note:
There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.
This profile may contain books from multiple authors of this name.

Reviews

[June · Rating 5 out of 5]

honestly, exactly what I was looking for and wanting!
short dark a little horror with a HEA and honestly very cute in a way 🤭

[Lauren · Rating 5 out of 5]

He’s obsessed… but so was I

A morally gray butcher with a soft side for his coworker/cake decorating queen??? yes yes and yes. He loves oldies, keeping things tidy and of course, being dirty with his life long obsession, Frankie. I couldn’t put this down. Noah is top book BF material. Go read this right now!!

[Rachel · Rating 5 out of 5]

**eBook, KU**

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
# Pages: 149
Publication Date: 02.14.25

Book Overview:
His presence haunted me.
A nameless shadow, a monster lurking in the dark, certain to stake his claim before this day ends.
His declaration of love etched in blood, permanently marring my life for good.
He had one goal this Valentine's; to make me his.

“When you grow up, you leave the myth of the boogeyman behind. But he exists. No longer hiding under your bed. He walks among you. He lives next door. He buys groceries at the same store.”

Tropes or Trigger Warnings 😈
🖤 Dark Romance
❤️ Macabre Gifts
🖤 Stalker
❤️ Murder
🖤 Kidnapping
❤️ DP With Tentacle Toy
🖤 Bondage
❤️ Knife/ Blood Play
🖤 Obsession
❤️ Touch Her & Die
🖤 He Falls First

“Be Mine” by A.J. Brooks is a “YESSS, YeSsSs, YES, yes, and YES Xs infinity! I really enjoyed this perfect Valentine’s Day read! The perfect amount of world building and character development. I loved the pacing and the flow of the book. The tropes were troping and the smut was smutting. There was a couple parts I giggled even.

“Roses are red, Blood is too, Inside lies a gift, As proof of my love for you.”

Noah, our MMC was swoon worthy. Sir, please take me to church! He has an obsession with records and listening to some of the oldies. (Yes, there is a playlist that A.J. Brooks created) This man not only made our FMC, Frankie, pancakes in the morning, he brought her Cat. Which, Frankie is lovable! She made all the right choices. Thank you girl!

“Oh, baby, I’d never hurt you in ways you wouldn’t want me to.”

Overall, I think she did phenomenal and I’m really excited to read more future works. A.J. Brooks is definitely talented and a promising author!

Do yourself a favor, GO BUY OR BORROW THIS BOOK TODAY!

Trigger/ Content Warning ⚠️
** Please be sure to check them before reading. Not all dark romance books are for everyone. **

[Smuttybookoholic · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was absolutely Phenomenal!! It was the perfect Dark Romance Valentine Short read!! It ticked all of my boxes and had me hooked from page one!! This is this authors debut book and can I just say, she did the damn thing because her writing is amazing! The way she writes is so beautiful and the way she pulls you in to the story and gets you attached to the characters is soo good! I loved Frankie so much and the MMC had me swooning so hard!! I couldn’t get enough of him!! This book was absolute perfection and I will 10/10 recommend this story to everyone and their momma!! It has blood/knife play, dark romantic, stalking, kidnapping, amazing side characters!! Soo deliciously good, I ate it up and you will too if you read it😍

[⛓️🥀 gee 🥀⛓️ · Rating 4 out of 5]

i ATE this novella up! definitely a 4⭐️ read.

the story pulled me in straight away. what’s not to like than a man gifting you a human heart on valentine’s day huh? (only in fiction, ladies 😂)

noah and frankie had me SWEATING. tbh the only reason i didn’t give it 5 is that i felt it could have been longer than an novella. i wish that we had gotten more backstory, then the snippet we had gotten. i would love to have known how noah started killing and how he became so good at it…that makes me sound so twisted. 😂 i wanted more of a lead up to their relationship, more noah pining but that’s a me thing. it’s because i liked the story so much i wanted more cos i’m greedy, i didn’t want it to end! 😭😂

[Brittany (Brit.tea.reads) · Rating 4 out of 5]

𝑭𝒓𝒂𝒏𝒌𝒊𝒆 𝒃𝒂𝒃𝒚, 𝒚𝒐𝒖’𝒗𝒆 𝒃𝒆𝒍𝒐𝒏𝒈𝒆𝒅 𝒕𝒐 𝒎𝒆 𝒔𝒊𝒏𝒄𝒆 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒆𝒊𝒈𝒉𝒕𝒉 𝒈𝒓𝒂𝒅𝒆.

Nothing says I love you like your secret admirer sending you a human heart for valentines day 🩸🖤

𝑰’𝒎 𝒈𝒐𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒕𝒐 𝒅𝒆𝒔𝒕𝒓𝒐𝒚 𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒓𝒚 𝒔𝒊𝒏𝒈𝒍𝒆 𝒐𝒏𝒆 𝒐𝒇 𝒚𝒐𝒖𝒓 𝒉𝒐𝒍𝒆𝒔, 𝒇—𝒌𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒚𝒐𝒖 𝒔𝒐 𝒉𝒂𝒓𝒅 𝒂𝒏𝒅 𝒇𝒊𝒍𝒍𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒚𝒐𝒖 𝒔𝒐 𝒅𝒆𝒆𝒑 𝒕𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝒃𝒚 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒆𝒏𝒅 𝒐𝒇 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒏𝒊𝒈𝒉𝒕, 𝒕𝒉𝒆𝒓𝒆 𝒘𝒊𝒍𝒍 𝒃𝒆 𝒏𝒐 𝒎𝒊𝒔𝒕𝒂𝒌𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒘𝒉𝒐 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒇—𝒌 𝒚𝒐𝒖 𝒃𝒆𝒍𝒐𝒏𝒈 𝒕𝒐.

LOL 😆 James Noah you fucking psycho but I loved it.

Being jealous of her tentacle dildo lmao 😂🤣

𝒀𝒐𝒖’𝒓𝒆 𝒎𝒊𝒏𝒆, 𝑭𝒓𝒂𝒏𝒌𝒊𝒆. 𝑰 𝒅𝒐𝒏’𝒕 𝒍𝒊𝒌𝒆 𝒔𝒉𝒂𝒓𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒘𝒉𝒂𝒕’𝒔 𝒎𝒊𝒏𝒆, 𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒏 𝒊𝒇 𝒊𝒕’𝒔 𝒘𝒊𝒕𝒉 𝒂 𝒓𝒖𝒃𝒃𝒆𝒓 𝒅🍆𝒄𝒌.

What more could a girl ask for? He sends her presents, flowers, k💀lls for her, dr*gs and kidnaps her, and f—ks her so good. I mean SWOON. 😆😂

𝑹𝒐𝒔𝒆𝒔 𝒂𝒓𝒆 𝒓𝒆𝒅, 𝑩𝒍🩸🩸𝒅 𝒊𝒔 𝒕𝒐𝒐, 𝑰𝒏𝒔𝒊𝒅𝒆 𝒍𝒊𝒆𝒔 𝒂 𝒈𝒊𝒇𝒕, 𝑨𝒔 𝒑𝒓𝒐𝒐𝒇 𝒐𝒇 𝒎𝒚 𝒍𝒐𝒗𝒆 𝒇𝒐𝒓 𝒚𝒐𝒖.

[Alexandra · Rating 5 out of 5]

An absolutely perfect short dark romance read!

Noah and Frankie are far from your classic romantic book duo (okay more so Noah, than Frankie!), but if what he does to show Frankie his feelings doesn’t scream obsession, I don’t know what does!

I absolutely devoured this book in one sitting! I just couldn’t stop reading!

He’s unhinged, completely crazy, but I would like a carbon copy, please! I mean, who doesn’t want gifts on Valentine’s Day?

This is the first book of this author I have read but will certainly read any and all others!

[Ashley Jeffers · Rating 4 out of 5]

⭐️4 1/2 stars for me! -spoilers in review-

I loved this book! It was the perfect valentine dark romance!

SPOILERS ***
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.
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The only reason I marked the half star was because I had a little hard time imagining how Noah played out the scene at Threshold to convince her friend Taylor that she was as functional as she described after the Dr*gging.

And also, on the last chapter, Noah told Frankie “Best not to ask” after his latest un-aliving GIRLLLL! I’m askinggg 😅 Was it the cop? Was it the landlord??? I’ll never know. But all in all this was an amazing read!

[Renee · Rating 5 out of 5]

5 stars means I would read it again

Wow. Not the story I expected but darn it was good. This had some twists in it that made me surprised. Very morally dark so if you think you may not like that topic, turn away. BUT...if you can, the MMC is one you wish you could get your own model of without the carnage. 2.5 for spiciness. I need to come up with a rating for spine tingly twists.

[Christine Miller · Rating 3 out of 5]

Okay-ish, at best

I’ve read several books that have a similar vibe but there’s just something about this book that gave me the ick. I don’t necessarily know what it is, but it made me want to DNF it at several points. In the best words and with respect to the Author, it just seemed…amateur. I don’t know how else to word it. It wasn’t great but it wasn’t the completely worst thing either.

[Natalie Yanez · Rating 4 out of 5]

Heart giver

This is the first book I've read by this author and can't wait to read more. Noah and Frankie's story was romantic with a little bit of crazy in there. He would do anything for her and he did. Wow! This was a great read.

[Valerie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Be Mine

Loved this story. A twist I wasn’t expecting with how her stalker first see’s her. Great Valentine’s Day stalker story. Couldn’t put it down, I had to keep reading to see what happened next. Not super dark, but perfect for me.

[Ann · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a good, fast paced read. You can’t start off much darker than receiving an actual heart on your doorstep for Valentine’s day! Add that to the fact that you aren’t dating anyone, well, it just gets better from there. I enjoyed this quite a bit. It’s dark and delicious.

[Sara Duran · Rating 4 out of 5]

Noah & Frankie

Loved the side characters, hooked from page one. Noah is dark and sweet, Frankie is incredible, and the twists kept coming. Definitely reading more by AJ. Also… that last chapter?! Noah, explain yourself.

[Alyissa · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not what I expected, but was not in a bad way either. I could already tell the mystery of the man behind the heart felt Valentines gifts he had left for Frankie (pun intended). It was an over obvious telling, but it had the right amount of heat, plot and secrets that kept me intrigued.

[Emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this novella. It was fast paced, as expected, but the chemistry was obvious between the main characters.

Noah is definitely a top tier morally grey book boyfriend.

[E.K.Moore · Rating 5 out of 5]

If I don't receive a human heart, roses and a vial of blood for valentine's day so help me god 😫

The WAY I fell in love with Noah 😫🤭🤤

[Emilie Ocean · Rating 5 out of 5]

Be Mine is my new favourite dark romance. I loved it so much. I never read a book so fast (I’m a slow reader)! Can’t believe this is the author’s debut novel. It’s so so good!

[s · Rating 4 out of 5]

i need a man to want me like this wow

[Clare · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely awesome! 🙌🏻 highly recommend for dark romance novella

[Rubie Hopper · Rating 5 out of 5]

Intense

The characters go so well together . Implied violence/death. Another if they hand communicated they could of been together much earlier

[Jaweria Rehman · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked it I just wish the fmc gave him the same type craziness that he did I know at the end she wished she did but I wanted her to know she wants him AS MUCH AS HEEE WANTS HER

[LastNightInVegas · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5

[Saige Santora · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars
I so wanted this to be more and it had all the faculties to be more but just wasn’t.
So. Much. Smut. (Also kinda felt like it was trying a bit hard at some points to make it “more” yaknow?)

[Colleen Beville · Rating 5 out of 5]

There’s something so swoony about a man in a white t-shirt and leather jacket. Who listens to records and makes you pancakes the morning after drugging and kidnapping you. Who brings your cat, too, because he’s stalked you well enough to know you’d be distressed without the little furball. And he’s really great at taking out the trash?! Ugh. Sign me up.

[Brianne · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this dark and spicy novella! I thought the story was good and oddly realistic given the circumstances. I ended up loving the both Noah and Frankie equally and when they were together was just wonderful.

While this is definitely a dark romance, there were quite a few sweet moments, and there was also plenty of humor, which I love! And fear not, there is puh-lenty of spice!

I appreciated that Brooks was able to create some depth and personality for the main characters in such a short time.

I would love to read more with Noah and Frankie and I will definitely be reading more by A.J. Brooks!

[Dark Book Girlie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Exactly what I was looking for and wanted!!
Short, dark, and a little horror with a good ending. It is a fun short read.