Penance

A Dark Forbidden Romance

By: Dana Velle

Narrated by: Virtual Voice

She thought silence was protection. Then it became the price.

For six years and seven months, Caroline Bancroft has wired $22,000 a month to Reilly Consulting LLC on the first business day of the month. The math has not missed a minute. Her ex-FBI fixer keeps her safe. Her ex-FBI fixer keeps her quiet. Her ex-FBI fixer has, until nine days ago, kept his phone on.

Then the federal investigation she was told was closed reopens under a new agent and a new case number. The Monsignor mentions it at the parish gala the way a man mentions weather. Caroline registers the temperature drop and walks home.

She has been running a Ponzi inside her parish's laundering operation for seven years. Three tiers offshore. Forty-seven million working, one hundred twenty-six million in holding, a third tier in her name only that no Whitcomb signature can reach. The donors think they are buying the parish's blessing. She has been pre-cultivating them.

Tom Reilly has been keeping a second set of books on her for three years. Not for the Bureau. For himself. He cannot tell himself why.

When he shows up at her apartment after ten days dark, neither of them asks the question that matters. He decides she stays. She decides she does not leave. The federal agent who built the case that forced him out of the FBI in 2017 is now the agent who can take everything from him in exchange for handing over Caroline. He has not committed.

She has six weeks before the cooperation deadline. She has the man who has been her silence for almost seven years. She has the choice she has been engineering since 2020: be the one expelled, or be the one who walks.

The only question left is which version of Tom Reilly takes her with him.

Heat 4 baseline. Heat 5 peaks. Heat 6 HEA. Captor dynamics. Power exchange. Morally gray FMC. Federal investigation. Financial crime. HEA delivered.

For readers of Sierra Simone, Sara Cate, and Tarryn Fisher.

Tropes: morally gray FMC, captor romance, age-gap-adjacent, second-chance, found-family, federal investigation, financial thriller, forbidden, slow-burn ignition, dark possessive MMC, ecclesiastical setting, HEA.

Holy Orders is a five-book dark romance series. Each book stands alone. Reading order matters for the spine.