In this riveting dark fantasy debut, a woman with missing memories fights to survive a war-torn world of necromancy and alchemy—and the man tasked with unearthing the deepest secrets of her past. “What is it you think you’re protecting in that brain of yours? The war is over. Holdfast is dead. The Eternal Flame extinguished. There’s no one left for you to save.” Once a promising alchemist, Helena Marino is now a prisoner—of war and of her own mind. Her Resistance friends and allies have been brutally murdered, her abilities suppressed, and the world she knew destroyed. In the aftermath of a long war, Paladia’s new ruling class of corrupt guild families and depraved necromancers, whose vile, undead creatures helped bring about their victory, holds Helena captive. According to Resistance records, she was a healer of little importance within their ranks. But Helena has inexplicable memory loss of the months leading up to her capture, making her enemies wonder: Is she truly as insignificant as she appears, or are her lost memories hiding some vital piece of the Resistance’s final gambit? To uncover the memories buried deep within her mind, Helena is sent to the High Reeve, one of the most powerful and ruthless necromancers in this new world. Trapped on his crumbling estate, Helena’s fight—to protect her lost history and to preserve the last remaining shreds of her former self—is just beginning. For her prison and captor have secrets of their own . . . secrets Helena must unearth, whatever the cost.

Theo Silva. Rowdy bull rider. Notorious ladies’ man. Scorching hot trouble wrapped up in a drool-worthy package. And he’s looking at me like I might be his next meal. But I’m almost free of my toxic marriage and have sworn off men entirely. So all I see when I look back is temptation served up with a heaping side of heartbreak. The man is hard to trust—and even harder to resist. Make that impossible. Because Theo is persistent. And no matter how hard I try to freeze him out, he melts my icy exterior and pulls apart all my defenses. Over a drink in a small town bar, I blurt out my deepest, darkest secrets. Then I spend the singular hottest night of my life with him. He worships my body. He makes me blush. I come alive beneath his hands. Then I tell him to forget it ever happened. I want simple, and with him it all feels complicated. It was supposed to be a one-time thing. A secret. But that little plus sign is going to make this secret impossible to keep.