Essie

Prologue Aria Vale walked into the Velvet Noir club that night with a single goal: freedom. She thought her five years of dangerous service to a crime boss were finally over. She wanted one wild, perfect moment inside the Velvet Noir club. One night to feel alive. So, she picked a handsome stranger, wanting one perfect, intense memory. The man she took to her bed was meant to be forgotten by morning. She was wrong. The man she broke her rules for was a detective, the very one investigating her boss, Victor Moretti. But freedom had a price. Victor demanded one final job as her bargain for release. The mission was simple: get close to the detective, use the trust from that single night, and betray him to save the entire operation. Aria looked at Damien’s file. The man who had once held her now had a target on his back, because of her. She became the perfect spy, moving into his home as his cook. She learned his routines, his silences, his secrets. But she couldn’t stop the fierce love that grew between them. And when the time came to betray him, the danger arrived first. A secret warning reached Damien, telling him that the “seductress” in his home was a threat. He ordered her to leave, desperate to protect her. She refused, because leaving meant abandoning the only man who had ever mattered. She was a spy who had finally found her truth. But her truth was a bullet aimed straight at the man she loved. “Loving Me at Your Own Risk.”