Nola Blues (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9780997528817)

Calina grew up in small-town Louisiana, bouncing through foster homes and clinging to one belief: that getting into a top university would finally give her the life she has always dreamed of. But the moment she arrives, she is swept into a world of privilege, parties, and people who have no idea what it cost her to get there. When the late nights catch up to her and her grades crash, Calina loses her scholarship and is forced to leave school.

With nowhere to go, she accepts help from an older student who promises she can make "bank" fast. Calina takes a job at a Bourbon Street nightclub, expecting quick cash, but instead steps straight into a hidden world pulsing beneath the music and Mardi Gras lights. What starts as a paycheck spirals into drug runs, laundered money, and dangerous people who blend into the blur of Mardi Gras faces, where nothing is ever what it appears. Even those closest to her, her roommates, her Coast Guard boyfriend, and the club itself, are not who they claim to be.

When a DEA agent approaches her with an ultimatum, Calina's life detonates. To save herself, she must go undercover inside the very network that is pulling her under. One wrong move could cost her everything. But surviving may require betraying the only people who ever made her feel like she belonged.