Cruel Seduction

Aphrodite has never minded getting her hands dirty. Her marriage to Olympus's new Hephaestus, a man the whole city fears, is one more move in a game she intends to win.

She plans to rattle her husband by seducing Pandora, his closest friend. Hephaestus is playing a game of his own, though, and the two plans run straight into each other.

What starts as an enemies-to-lovers marriage of convenience soon slips out of both spouses' control. Pandora is drawn into the middle of it, and Adonis is part of the tangle too.

The story is told in alternating points of view, moving between Hephaestus, Aphrodite, Pandora and Adonis. Loyalty, jealousy and old wounds pull the four together and apart. The romance is why-choose and polyamorous.

The setting is a modern city ruled by its gods, a contemporary retelling of Greek mythology, and political unrest is building across Olympus. This is the fifth book in the Dark Olympus series, published in 2023. The question is whether a scheme built on seduction can survive feelings none of them planned.