Pitch Black Desires Book 1 (The League of Hearts)

To save a dying club, a stoic captain and a disgraced striker must fake a friendship for the cameras--only to discover a primitive, scorching hunger that threatens to expose their every secret.

Rio ‘The Wall’ Mendoza is a master of defense, both on the pitch and in her life. As the youngest veteran of the Seattle Sirens, she lives by rigid rituals and heavy silences, convinced that if she lets one person past her guard, the world will see her as a fraud. She wears her turf burns like armor, scanning for threats that haven’t arrived yet.

Then comes Riley Hayes.

Disgraced by a tabloid scandal and labeled ‘damaged goods,’ Riley is a destructive force with a cocky undercut and a reputation she can’t outrun. She expects the Sirens to discard her just like everyone else. But when a documentary crew arrives, Rio and Riley are forced into a fake friendship to save the team’s legacy.

Between the 5 AM fog of the training facility and the voyeuristic heat of the cameras, the performance starts to feel terrifyingly real. Rio finds herself watching Riley not as a threat, but as a woman who sees through her walls. And Riley, for the first time, finds a partner who will stand by her in the light.

As their scorching connection threatens to shatter their carefully constructed masks, they must decide: will they choose the safety of the narrative, or the radical trust of the truth?

In a world of professional hazards and public scrutiny, is their love a tactical surrender or the only thing worth fighting for?