1924, Chicago. Prohibition is in full swing and gang bosses rule the city with might—and magic. When Sam Cunningham flees his small-town life to try his luck in the big city of Chicago, he quickly finds himself in over his head in a world of gangs, glitz, and glamour. Fortunately, he has his cousin Eldon to teach him the trade of hex-making. Everything changes the night Sam visits The Pride speakeasy and meets grumpy cheetah-shifter Alistair Gatti. After losing his first witch to the horrors of the World War, Alistair isn’t interested in any new entanglements, romantic or magical. Especially when said entanglement comes in the form of kind, innocent Sam. When Eldon is brutally murdered, Sam becomes drawn into the dark underworld of the Chicago gangs. Sam must find the missing hex Eldon created for one of the crime bosses—before whoever killed Eldon comes back for him. Together, Alistair and Sam begin the search for the mysterious hex, diving deep into the seedy side of Chicago’s underworld while dodging rival gangs. And as they come to rely on one another, Alistair realizes he’s falling for the one man he can’t afford to love.

Control the booze. Control the magic. Control Chicago. Sam Cunningham just wants a quiet life with his lover, the cheetah-shifter Alistair Gatti. But that hope is dashed when a member of Mickey Sullivan’s gang dies inside the Gatti family’s speakeasy. Sullivan wants Sam to work for him, deciphering long-forgotten hexes as part of his illegal hexworks operation. At the same time, a corrupt prohibition agent demands Sam and Alistair investigate the gang member’s murder. Caught between gangster and agent, they must walk a fine line just to stay alive. Because the sinister forces behind the killing are still out there, and now they have Sam in their sights…

War has come to the streets of Chicago… Sam Cunningham didn’t set out to work for a gangster, but his job as Mickey Sullivan’s hexmaster seems safe enough…until a gang war puts a target on both of their backs. Cheetah-shifter Alistair Gatti is desperate to keep his family’s speakeasy up and running. But with a brutal assassin killing off the city’s bootleggers, his options are growing slimmer with every passing day. Their one chance to remain safe and keep The Pride afloat lies in the form of an ancient hex looted from an Egyptian tomb. If Sam wants to escape Sullivan’s grasp, he needs to recreate the hex and get it to work. But in a gang war fought by magic as well as guns, the odds are in no one’s favor, and the streets of Chicago will soon run red with blood.