While most young people are just getting their footing in life, 24-year-old Bryshon "Boogie" Tolliver is already being groomed to be a boss by his father, Barry Tolliver. At first, he's not so sure he wants to take his father's place in the family business. He has dreams of being the most prominent chef in New York. However, things change when Barry is murdered in cold blood and everything he built is left at Boogie's feet. Gone are those chef dreams, replaced with a new resolve to prove himself worthy of upholding his father's legacy. Boogie takes his rightful place at the table of the Five Families of New York and is quickly taken under the wing of Caesar, the head of the organization. Known as The Godfather's Godfather, Caesar shows Boogie what it takes to be a boss. The deeper in Boogie gets, the more obsessed he becomes with finding his father's murderer. When all signs point to the person Boogie knows is untouchable, he'll do anything to even the score, even if it costs him his seat at the table.

In the five boroughs of New York City, there are turf wars and rival gangs, but at the top are five families that run things, cooperating with their rivals whenever it means they will all make more money. Through the darkest tunnel comes the light, but for Caesar King, there is nothing but more darkness on the other side. After the failed attempt on his life, he is afraid that the Pact of the Five Families is no more. He can trust nobody. Whoever murdered Barry is now aiming for Caesar’s crown, and the only way to flush them out and figure out who’s responsible is to go to war…with everybody.

C. N. Phillips returns with the next tale in the saga of five crime families that run the streets of New York’s five boroughs. The uneasy alliance they once shared has been compromised, and now no one is truly safe from retribution. Caesar knew the peace he started had an expiration date, but he never thought the end would be so explosive. With the Pact completely dissolved and the Chinese angered beyond measure at the loss of their leader, they want Boogie’s head bloody and served on a stick. Caesar is willing to protect him at all costs, even if it puts him at odds with the allies still on his side.

In this fourth installment of the Five Families of New York, C. N. Phillips explores just how far a person will go to keep things together when their life is crumbling. With death nipping at his neck like cold in the winter, Lorenzo “Zo” Alverez is faced with the inevitable fate of stepping into his late father’s shoes. With enemies coming at him from all sides, Zo doesn’t know who he can trust. But when the light at the end of the tunnel comes in the form of family, he discovers secrets about his father that he never knew. These secrets threaten to pull him away from the other powerful families in New York and people that would risk their lives for his. When the time comes to decide where his loyalty will lie, he is unaware that the price for that choice is the heads of the people he loves the most.