Hey! My name is Nicole Underwood, but you can call me Nikki. I’m the babysitter of . . . Sorry. Let me try that again. I’m the executive assistant of Xander Chambers, CEO of Altruist Corporation.

A quick scan of my Outlook calendar shows a packed schedule today. I’ve only got about 20 minutes until Xander’s first meeting. That is, if he even shows up for this one. It’s always a coin toss whether he makes appointments that are scheduled before 10 a.m. Which reminds me, I should probably send a text to his driver telling him to make sure Xander gets home before 2 o’clock tomorrow morning because Xander has an early TV interview with MSNBC. I’ve warned Xander to keep the late-night partying to a minimum, but he does not listen.

Wait, you don’t want to hear me complain about my boss. I’m supposed to tell you about myself. But work is my life. For years, I haven’t had much room for anything else.

I always knew I wanted to be in the corporate world—but as an entrepreneur like my former boss, Bridget Chambers. I met Bridget, the CEO and founder of Altruist Corporation, at a college event my senior year. She recruited me as her executive assistant. For four years, I worked for Bridget. She was practically my idol. Bridget was the exact opposite of Xander as a boss: tireless, punctual, and reliable. But nearly three months ago, Bridget died tragically in a car crash on her estate in Hudson Valley, New York. You may have seen the rumors on social media that say the car crash wasn’t an accident, but that’s all they are—rumors. And no one is allowed to say any differently at Altruist or when they’re within earshot of Xander—or talk about the crash at all, for that matter.

After Bridget’s death, I agreed to stay on as Xander’s assistant to help him transition as the company’s new CEO. However, my time working for Xander ends soon. Thank God! That man and his antics have given me more gray hairs in the past three months than I’ll probably get in the next forty years. But with less than a week left in my official capacity as Xander’s assistant, he announced that he has one last big project for me, which is to plan a huge three-day celebration for his 32nd birthday on the same Hudson Valley estate where his mother died. So, in addition to editing his speeches, planning his schedule, picking up his drycleaning, and other sundry tasks, I’m now up to my eyeballs in party planning.

Yesterday, Xander gave me his guest list. It included the usual suspects of friends, family, and hangers-on, but he doesn’t know I’ve got a list of my own. Xander wants it to be a bash to remember. He has no idea what I have in store.

In Deadly Company
Genre: Psychological Suspense
Release: September 2025
Format: Print, Digital, Audio
Purchase Link

An incisive workplace satire and twisty murder mystery featuring a young executive assistant who realizes the peril in being diligently attentive to her boss’s whims.

As the assistant of the CEO of a Fortune 500 company, Nicole Underwood has plenty of tasks on her to-do list—one of which is the blowout birthday celebration for her nightmare, one-percenter boss, Xander Chambers. But when the party ends in chaos and murder and Nicole is one of the survivors, suspicion—from the investigators to the media—lands on her. Was she the reason for all the bloodshed?

A year after those deadly events, Nicole tries to set the public record straight by agreeing to consult on a feature film based on her story. However, on the set in LA, she’s sidelined by inappropriate casting and persistent, bizarre script changes, while also haunted by the events of that party weekend with visions of her now-deceased boss. It seems clearing her name isn’t so simple when the question of guilt or innocence is…complicated.

Meet the author
L.S. Stratton is a NAACP Image Award-nominated author and former crime newspaper reporter who has written more than a dozen books under different pen names in just about every genre from thrillers to romance to historical fiction. Her thrillers have been chosen as Barnes & Noble Mystery/Thriller of the Month pick, Amazon’s Mystery/Thriller Editor’s Picks, and Gold Standard Selection by the Junior Library Guild. Her most recent thriller, In Deadly Company, will be released September 2, 2025.