Ruby Secret

The Pulse of the Stone

He owned the skyline from a glass tower. She heard the secrets buried in his bloodline. In the City of Stone and Sin, the only thing more dangerous than a billionaire's lie is a gemstone's truth.

Visualized Storytelling: This volume features exclusive conceptual imagery and "Evidence Folders" that capture the high-stakes contrast of the Alistair world-from the cold, clinical obsidian of Manhattan's corporate vaults to the jagged, mist-drenched resonance of the North Ridge.

Ren'ne Alistair is a Titan of the digital age-a man whose life is a series of "efficiency metrics" managed from the sixty-fourth floor of his Manhattan headquarters. To Ren'ne, the world is a grid of data points, and the ancient "Sanguine" legacy of his father, Julian, is just a ghost story-until he meets Ruby Nichols.

Ruby is the "Resonance." A specialized Iowa nurse fighting to escape the "Stone Slums," she is the first person in Ren'ne's life who isn't impressed by his bank account. But Ruby carries a secret in her blood: a high-frequency signature that can "link" with the Alistair Master Diamonds. To the predatory Julienne Van Der Meer, Ruby is a threat to be drained; to Ren'ne, she is the only bridge to a power he doesn't yet understand.

To protect his legacy from a "Mercury" takeover, Ren'ne does the unthinkable: he claims the "Iowa stray" as his own and enters into a Sanguine Contract that binds their fates.

In the heat of a pressurized ballroom and the shadow of a coming resonance storm, the billionaire's lie begins to fracture. As a catastrophic "neural brownout" threatens the city, Ren'ne is forced into a Shear Point of the soul. He must decide if he is willing to sacrifice the woman who grounded him to satisfy the Council of the Facet, or if he will burn his empire to save her.

The Ruby Secret is the gripping first volume of "The City of Stone and Sin" series. It is a story about the high cost of power, the anatomy of the heart, and the devastating question:

What is a heart truly worth when it is turned into a stone?