The Butcher of Lilies by Llianne Olivo

Macro tropes

He falls first… and harder
She wants him even if she shouldn't
Protector turned possession
Forbidden tension / slow burn
First love that scars and stays
Five years apart, still in love
Second chance in Paris
Family secrets, lies, and betrayal
Morally gray (borderline ruthless) hero
Love vs duty

For readers who crave

Tension you can feel in your throat. A love that doesn’t ask permission, only patience. Devotion that bruises before it heals.

Praise for this book

What an advance reader said after finishing it.

“I read this book in one setting.”

“Have you seen the type of love that sets the stage for a future? Well seeing and believing are two different things. It’s a short work with extra short stories I would classify as the epilogue. The short stories are spicy. Enjoy!”

Candice WilsonAdvance reader review

Laura and Jacob have a love that makes my story look like child’s play.

Before you read

Content & trigger warnings

This story contains mature themes, including family betrayal, emotional manipulation, power imbalance relationships, coercion, and intense emotional conflict. It also includes references to alcohol abuse, parental infidelity, psychological distress, and trauma. If you like your romance intense, complicated, and a little dangerous, this is for you.

See the full list

Parental infidelity
Divorce and family breakdown
Emotional neglect from parents
Manipulation and betrayal
Grooming and emotional manipulation by authority figures
Power imbalance relationships
Surrogate pregnancy and disputed parentage
Blackmail and coercion
Psychological manipulation
Threats of harm to loved ones
Mentions of military trauma / PTSD
Alcohol abuse
Emotional distress and panic
Heartbreak and abandonment
Obsession and moral conflict
Intense emotional confrontations

Author’s note: This is a slow-burn, second-chance bodyguard romance. Nothing explicit occurs while the heroine is underage. The relationship unfolds years later. This story centers on longing, restraint, betrayal, and a love that refuses to die.

About the author

Llianne Olivo

Llianne Olivo is a Dominican-American author of dark, taboo, and pitch-black romance. Born in the Dominican Republic in 1994, she immigrated to the United States with her mother in 2005 and grew up between cultures, languages, and the persistent feeling that her imagination was much larger than wherever she happened to be standing.

Today, Llianne writes contemporary, historical, fantasy, and paranormal romance populated by obsessive love, morally black men, complicated women, multicultural characters, and people willing to destroy perfectly good lives in the name of devotion. Her stories explore power, trauma, survival, grief, desire, and what happens when people who were never taught how to be loved decide to love anyway.

When she isn't writing, Llianne is usually singing, dancing, redesigning a book cover at two in the morning, or trying to remember that having social media requires occasionally posting on it.