Secret of the Outside World

by Cassie Corbin

Guardian Ruth Taylor has just graduated guardian school as a certified pararescue jumper. Having grown up in a secret community with limited technology and strict military training, Ruth enters the outside world with eyes wide open and is assigned to a CIA first-response team, called Condor. Ruth is desperate to earn her place on this outsider team and mark herself as a legendary guardian. Jumping into raging seas, rescuing soldiers from firefights, and mending wounds in a foreign jungle are all part of the job. But when the return of a prominent cartel leader threatens team Condor, Ruth begins to wonder who she can trust. After a rescue mission goes wrong, Ruth finds herself trapped in the Amazonian rainforest - not only fighting for her life, but for the life of her injured teammate as well. With monsoons pouring in, every breathing creature in the jungle trying to eat them, and a reckless pilot unknowingly stealing her heart, Ruth is forced to apply every ounce of her training to get out of that jungle and avoid being captured by the cartel pursuing them. She must now ask what does it mean to be a guardian, and does she truly have the courage to call herself one?

367 pages, Kindle Edition

Published June 16, 2026