Amanda Foody - Ace Of Shades

Welcome to the City of Sin, where casino families reign, gangs infest the streets...and secrets hide in every shadow

Enne Salta was raised as a proper young lady, and no lady would willingly visit New Reynes, the so-called City of Sin. But when her mother goes missing, Enne must leave her finishing school—and her reputation—behind to follow her mother’s trail to the city where no one survives uncorrupted.

Frightened and alone, Enne has only one lead: the name Levi Glaisyer. Unfortunately, Levi is not the gentleman she expected—he’s a street lord and con man. Levi is also only one payment away from cleaning up a rapidly unraveling investment scam, so he doesn’t have time to investigate a woman leading a dangerous double life. Enne’s offer of compensation, however, could be the solution to all his problems.

Their search for clues leads them through glamorous casinos, illicit cabarets and into the clutches of a ruthless Mafia donna. As Enne unearths an impossible secret about her past, Levi’s enemies catch up to them, ensnaring him in a vicious execution game where the players always lose. To save him, Enne will need to surrender herself to the city...

And she’ll need to play.

Also available from Amanda Foody and HQYA

Daughter of the Burning City

Ace of Shades

Amanda Foody

Copyright

An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd.

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

First published in Great Britain by HQ in 2018

Copyright © Amanda Foody 2018

Amanda Foody asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Ebook Edition © April 2018 ISBN: 9781474055529

Version: 2018-08-31

Praise for Amanda Foody and

Daughter of the Burning City

‘Wow! A dark and dangerous tale, a world like no other, and heroism of the weirdest kind!’

—#1 New York Times bestselling author Tamora Pierce

‘A fantastic, magical setting, a seedy mix of titillation and sin... Readers who enjoyed their whirl in Garber’s Caraval will want to get in line for entry.’

—The Bulletin of the Center for Children’s Books

‘Amanda Foody’s stunning debut is full of velvety language, intricate worldbuilding, and a story that treads the fine line of horror and fantasy. This is the kind of read that makes your spine shiver, and your heart beat faster.’

—Roshani Chokshi, New York Times bestselling author of The Star-Touched Queen

‘The world...is astoundingly vivid and complex, the smells, sounds and sights of the smouldering city/travelling carnival near tangible. Amanda Foody’s deliciously dark and magical whodunit has world-building so rich, the reader...is likely to leave with a hangover.’

—Shelf Awareness

‘Utterly original. Amanda Foody has a wicked imagination. If you enjoy your fantasy on the darker side, then you will love Gomorrah!’

—Stephanie Garber, New York Times bestselling author of Caraval

‘Foody’s colourful setting is vast—filled with magic, political intrigue, and the potential to grow’.

—Publishers Weekly

‘I love the vivid, sumptuous world Amanda Foody has created: Sorina’s magic, her illusionary family and the Gomorrah Festival make for a wildly inventive mystery I won’t soon forget.’

—Virginia Boecker, author of The Witch Hunter series

To Mom-Mom

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Booklist

Title Page

Copyright

Praise

Dedication

DAY ONE

ENNE

LEVI

LEVI

ENNE

ENNE

LEVI

ENNE

ENNE

DAY TWO

LEVI

ENNE

LEVI

ENNE

DAY THREE

LEVI

ENNE

DAY FOUR

LEVI

ENNE

DAY FIVE

ENNE

DAY SIX

LEVI

ENNE

LEVI

DAY SEVEN

ENNE

DAY EIGHT

ENNE

LEVI

DAY NINE

ENNE

LEVI

LEVI

ENNE

LEVI

ENNE

DAY TEN

ENNE

LEVI

ENNE

LEVI

EPILOGUE

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Extract

About the Publisher

DAY ONE

“To be frank, reader, you’d be better off not visiting the city at all.”

— The City of Sin, a Guidebook: Where To Go and Where Not To

ENNE

If I’m not home in two months, I’m dead .

Her mother’s warning haunted her as Enne Salta lugged her leather trunk down the bridge leading off the ship, filling her with an inescapable sense of dread.

If I’m not home in two months, I’m dead .

It’d been four.

For the first time in fifteen days, Enne stepped onto dry land. Her balance veered from side to side as if she expected the gray cobblestones to tilt like the sea, and she white-knuckled the pier’s railing to compose herself. If the ground weren’t so littered with cigar butts and grime, she might’ve kissed it. Two weeks battling seasickness on a floating monstrosity could do that to a lady.

A woman shoved past her, not noticing Enne’s petite frame. The force of it nearly knocked Enne over. She glared at the woman’s ostentatiously feathered hat as it disappeared into the crowds.

Hmph , she thought. A lady shouldn’t rush. Barely five seconds in the so-called City of Sin and already people were rude.

As more passengers disembarked from the ship, the crowds around the customs tables swelled with hundreds of people, hollering and waving passports and jostling each other in an effort to reach the front of the lines. Most were young men, probably visiting New Reynes to sample its famous casinos and nightlife—but the number of families present surprised her. This city was no place for children.

And, she reminded herself, staring up at the sinister, smog-stained sky, it was no place for her, either.

As Enne joined the queues, she dug through her belongings for her tourist documents. Her purse was stuffed: her passport, a handful of gingersnap cookies leftover from last night’s dinner and a copy of The City of Sin, a Guidebook: Where To Go and Where Not To . As she fished out her papers, something fell and clinked when it hit the ground. Her token.

She scooped it up and clutched it to her chest. Her mother, Lourdes, had given her this token. It was two inches long and gilded, with an old Faith symbol of an eye etched on one side and a cameo of a past queen on the other. The Mizer kings had used these tokens as party invitations. It was probably illegal to own it—any remnants from before the Revolution twenty-five years ago had been destroyed, just like the Mizers themselves. But Enne couldn’t bring herself to throw away something so rare and precious. She tucked it safely back into her pocket.