SOUTH SIDE QUEEN || LIP GALLAGHER

Lip Gallagher had two rules for surviving the South Side: stay sober, and stay away from his best friend's sister.

Valentina Morales is heavily guarded royalty. To the rest of Chicago, she is Mateo's untouchable younger sister and the chilling obsession of Dante, the deadliest kingpin on the streets. Lip knows the rules. You don't look at Val. You don't talk to Val. And you definitely don't touch her.

But Val is keeping a massive secret. To pay off her brother's debts and keep him breathing, she lives a double life. Stripped of her South Side armor and hidden behind a platinum wig and a dark lace mask, she dances in an exclusive downtown club to buy her family's freedom.

On the night Lip is finally ready to throw his hard-earned sobriety down the drain, he stumbles into that exact club looking for a distraction. He pays for an hour in a locked VIP room, expecting to lose his mind with a stranger.

But when the curtains close and the mask slips, the illusion shatters. Lip recognizes the devastating dark eyes, and the exact perfume of the girl who was sitting on his couch just yesterday.

He knows exactly whose waist his hands are resting on.

She expects him to ruin her. He expects her to run. But in the dark, stripped of their armor and trapped by their loyalties, they strike a dangerous, breathless bargain. Keeping her secret means betraying his best friend. Touching her means going to war with a cartel boss. But Lip has always been addicted to self-destruction, and Val is the most beautiful wreckage he's ever seen.