Julian Hawthorne has built his life around control and discipline. As the youngest professor at Crestview University and the presumed heir to Hawthorne Investments, he has a pristine reputation and intends to keep it that way.
Then Beckett Landry walks into his classroom.
Twenty-one, confident, and impossible to ignore, Beckett unsettles Julian in ways no student ever should.
To the world, Beckett is confident, self-assured, and completely unbothered. What no one sees is the searing loneliness he’s carried for most of his life. Determined to build something better for himself, he carries the pain quietly and presses on. Then Julian makes him feel seen in a way he never has before, offering him a glimpse of a life where loneliness isn’t inevitable.
What begins as forbidden attraction soon becomes something neither of them is prepared to lose. But the closer they become, the more they stand to risk. Family pressure mounts, and the threat of exposure puts Julian’s career and Beckett’s future in jeopardy, forcing them to choose between the lives they’ve fought to build and what’s growing between them.
Told in alternating dual POV, Love Me Hard is an angsty, forbidden M/M romance about desire, sacrifice, independence, and choosing a love worth fighting for, with a guaranteed happily ever after.