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Miranda Beckett has been born and bred in Chicago, and with that comes the knowledge that the city built firmly on criminal enterprises is still a city where crime is as much of the economy as the retail shops and hotels that line Michigan Avenue. Just like others in Chicago, a blind eye is a content eye—until it’s all brought into sharp focus by her younger brother one late night. She hasn’t seen her brother in years, and the last time she told him she never wanted to see him again, so she knows it’s desperation that led him to her door. Before, he flat-out stole from her, but now he’s pleading for the money. He pleas for the money that he owes the head of the IRA in Chicago, and then he threatens that Declan Kelly knows about her and that she has the money, and if she doesn’t give it than Kelly will come for it himself.
Miranda refuses her brother, and she knows she’ll be able to refuse Declan Kelly when the time comes. But she’s wrong, so very wrong. It isn’t money Kelly wants, it’s her. Her expertise as an accountant to audit his books and find who is stealing from him—that’s it, he tells her, but his eyes tell her there’s more.
Without even being quite sure how and why she agreed, a deal is struck, and Miranda wonders how long she can fight the need for a man she can’t have. It’s one thing to know what Declan Kelly does and another to allow herself become involved with him. She is sure she can keep Declan at bay—she has plans to become a gangster’s girlfriend or lose her heart to him.
