The Rival Rule

She wrote a rule to protect herself. He became the reason to break it.

Mara Ellison has spent nine years keeping one promise to herself: never fall for a hockey player. She knows the type too well - the men who save their best for the ice and their silence for the woman waiting at home. So when she takes an assistant coaching position at a small-town rink, she brings her clipboard, her whistle, and her rule. She does not expect the man standing at the far blue line.

Elias Vaughn is one of the greatest defensemen of his generation - and utterly incapable of finishing a sentence off the ice. He fumbles her name. He apologizes too much. He hides behind his gloves the moment he is seen. What he does not realize is that she has already recognized him, because she recognizes the habit. It is hers.
What begins as coffee left quietly on the boards becomes a whistle warmed in a pocket, a hundred-yard walk in the snow, and six hours trapped in a dark rink with no heat and no way out. Two guarded people, one freezing night, and every secret they have never said aloud.

But Mara has a brother. He and Elias share a history neither has spoken of in eleven years. Elias is the man who saved her brother's career - and the man her brother has hated ever since. Now she must choose between the brother she owes everything to and the man she was never supposed to want.

Some rules are written to keep you safe. Some are written to be rewritten.

The Rival Rule is a slow-burn, emotionally immersive romance about a woman who learned to leave first and a man who never learned to ask for anything - and what happens when they finally stop waiting and choose each other.
If you believe in love that is earned, in heroes who are gentle before they are strong, and in stories that hold you long after the final page - this is the one you have been waiting for.

Start reading today. Let Elias Vaughn steal your heart on page one - and do not let go until the very last line.

Selina D. Ward writes emotional romance for the reader who comes home tired - and wants something that gives back.