The Retired SS Ranked Adventurer 2
(2026)(The second book in the Retired SS Ranked Adventurer series)
A novel by C L Dempsey
The Gloam is back. This time he has to win a cooking contest without killing anyone.
Joren Cairn just wants a quiet summer. His daughter is off at cookery camp, the Hearth is finally his again, and his three partners are learning how to be a family without a crisis to hold them together.
Then a brick comes through his window, tied to a golden invitation.
The Gilded Fork is the most exclusive cooking competition in the realm, and it’s a lie. Behind the laurel stars and wine toasts, its rich patrons pay to watch retired killers cook for their lives. Forged papers say Joren never retired, and if he refuses to compete, the guardianship wardens come for his daughter.
So he walks in with a knife roll, a lucky spoon, and three dangerous women: Liora on his line, Ksenia working the room, and Carys picking the house’s ledgers apart from the inside. Waiting for them are a poison basket in the first round, a master of disguise who copies Joren’s every move, and a crimson-haired sommelier with a golden mark at her throat who can taste a lie before you tell it.
The prize is a five-year contract with a death clause at the end. If Joren refuses to sign, three hundred people die at the final supper.
Book 2 of The Retired SS Ranked Adventurer, a found-family harem LitRPG about a retired dad with a dangerous past and the women who choose to stay. Expect deadly cook-offs, heist plotting, plenty of heat, and one very angry cook.
Genre: Thriller
Joren Cairn just wants a quiet summer. His daughter is off at cookery camp, the Hearth is finally his again, and his three partners are learning how to be a family without a crisis to hold them together.
Then a brick comes through his window, tied to a golden invitation.
The Gilded Fork is the most exclusive cooking competition in the realm, and it’s a lie. Behind the laurel stars and wine toasts, its rich patrons pay to watch retired killers cook for their lives. Forged papers say Joren never retired, and if he refuses to compete, the guardianship wardens come for his daughter.
So he walks in with a knife roll, a lucky spoon, and three dangerous women: Liora on his line, Ksenia working the room, and Carys picking the house’s ledgers apart from the inside. Waiting for them are a poison basket in the first round, a master of disguise who copies Joren’s every move, and a crimson-haired sommelier with a golden mark at her throat who can taste a lie before you tell it.
The prize is a five-year contract with a death clause at the end. If Joren refuses to sign, three hundred people die at the final supper.
Book 2 of The Retired SS Ranked Adventurer, a found-family harem LitRPG about a retired dad with a dangerous past and the women who choose to stay. Expect deadly cook-offs, heist plotting, plenty of heat, and one very angry cook.
Genre: Thriller
Used availability for C L Dempsey's The Retired SS Ranked Adventurer 2