Ashes & Anthems

Ashes & Anthems: Book One: Sweetness on My Tongue Seven years ago, Ashton Rhodes left Wells, Kansas with nothing but a guitar, a head full of grief, and a promise never to look back. Now the lead singer of the world-famous rock band Ashes & Anthems, Ashton has everything he thought he wanted. Money, success, sold-out tours, and a name known around the world. But when his estranged mother dies, he's forced to return to the small town he spent years trying to forget. He expects to spend a week settling the estate and escaping as quickly as possible. Then he opens the door to his childhood trailer and finds Lauren Carter standing inside. Lauren was his first love. His best friend. The girl he left behind. The girl who moved on. Married now with two children, Lauren has built a quiet life far from the chaos that defined their youth. She has a good husband, a comfortable home, and every reason to leave the past where it belongs. But helping Ashton clean out his mother's trailer forces them back into each other's orbit, awakening old memories, old wounds, and feelings neither of them ever truly buried. As the summer stretches on, what begins as friendship slowly becomes something far more dangerous. Because some loves never disappear. They simply wait. Caught between the stability of the life she built and the intensity of the life she lost, Lauren finds herself pulled toward the boy who became a rock star. Ashton, still battling addiction, grief, and the ghosts of his past, discovers that fame never replaced the one thing he spent years running from. Home. But every choice has a cost. When buried secrets finally come to light, the fallout will destroy more than one family. In a town that never forgets, a marriage is shattered, loyalties are tested, and two people are forced to face the consequences of a love they never truly left behind. Sweetness on My Tongue is a raw, emotional story of first love, addiction, forgiveness, and the devastating reality that sometimes getting what you want costs everything. Ashes & Anthems Book One ends with a birth, a heartbreak, and a choice that will echo through the entire series.