Book 1 in US Marshals: Task Force 9 · Dark-edged romantic suspense · Reads as a standalone · Guaranteed HEA
About the book
The silence is the first lie.
Trauma bays are never quiet. So when a boy is wheeled into Bay 4 with road rash that doesn't match a single broken bone, Dr. Iris Kincaid knows the truth before the monitor flatlines: this was no accident. It was an execution — and the men in tailored suits who stood there and watched him die just learned her name.
Iris has spent her life beating the Reaper. Saving the savable. Refusing to let death have the last word. Now she's the only witness who can prove a murder the most powerful people in the country need to stay buried — and overnight, the careful, ordered life she built becomes a target.
Enter Boyd Vance.
US Marshal. Task Force 9 — the off-books unit that doesn't officially exist. He lives by one rule that's kept him alive: never get attached to the asset. He had another, once — never fail a protectee again — and he's still bleeding for the night he broke it. Now he's been handed a stubborn doctor, a blizzard, and a glass house on the edge of a cliff, with a single order: keep her breathing.
She isn't supposed to look at him like she already knows how to take a command. He isn't supposed to want to give her one. But the safe house is small, the storm doesn't end, and the closer the danger gets, the harder it is to tell where his duty stops and the wanting starts.
When the people hunting Iris finally close in, Boyd will have to choose between the rule that's kept him hollow and alive — and the one woman who makes him want to be more than a weapon.
He swore he'd never fail to protect someone again.
He never planned to fall for the one he was sent to save.
Tropes, heat and content notes
- Tropes: US Marshal protector, witness protection, bodyguard romance, forced proximity, snowed in, off-grid safe house, alpha protector, he falls hard, touch her and die, found family
- Heat: explicit, with a consensual power-exchange dynamic
- Point of view: dual first person, present tense, Boyd and Iris
- Ending: a happily ever after for Boyd and Iris, with no cliffhanger. The case against the Consortium continues in book 2.
- Content notes: a staged murder, a trafficking conspiracy behind the crime, gun violence, explicit sex. Adults 18+.
Where it fits in the series
BOYD is book 1 of 6 in US Marshals: Task Force 9.
- Before it: nothing. This is where the series starts.
- After it: CIPHER: Lethal Algorithm (book 2). Ivy, the hacker you meet in BOYD, falls for Julian "Cipher" Rhodes.
Questions readers ask
Is BOYD the first book in US Marshals: Task Force 9?
Yes. Start here, then read the rest of the series in order.
Can I read BOYD as a standalone?
Yes. Boyd and Iris's love story is complete in this book. The hunt for the Consortium continues in the next books.
How spicy is BOYD?
It's explicit. Boyd and Iris have a consensual power-exchange dynamic.
Does BOYD end on a cliffhanger?
No. Boyd and Iris get their happily ever after.
Is BOYD in Kindle Unlimited?
Yes. Every book in US Marshals: Task Force 9 is in Kindle Unlimited.