Counterculture Compromise
A Billionaire Redemption Romance
by Isla Wilde
Pairing: MF
Heat: 🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️ Very Hot
Tropes: Enemies to Lovers, Age Gap, Billionaire, Redemption Arc, Groveling Hero
He built an empire on compromise. She’s determined to tear it down.
Sierra Woods has a megaphone, a hand-painted sign, and a plan: stop GreenFuture Development from destroying her Brooklyn neighborhood. She expects a fight. She doesn’t expect Marcus Sterling—the ruthless, forty-six-year-old billionaire CEO—to walk across the picket line and offer her a job.
Marcus Sterling is used to buying whatever he wants, and he wants the fierce, brilliant activist who looks at him like he’s the villain of the story. He tells himself he’s hiring her to fix his company’s image. He tells himself their late nights at the office are just business. He tells himself he can control the way his pulse spikes every time she challenges him.
He’s wrong.
When professional boundaries blur into a passion neither can resist, Sierra thinks she’s finally changing the system from the inside. But a devastating discovery in the company archives proves that Marcus is exactly the man she feared he was.
Now, Marcus has to do the one thing his money can’t buy: earn a second chance. To win her back, he’ll have to burn his own empire to the ground.
You’ll love this if you enjoy:
✓ Enemies-to-lovers with real stakes and real conflict
✓ An age gap romance where both characters are equals
✓ A billionaire hero who actually grovels
✓ Scorching chemistry with emotional depth
✓ A heroine who stands her ground
✓ Second chance romance earned through genuine change
Counterculture Compromise is a billionaire redemption romance featuring enemies-to-lovers tension, a 22-year age gap, a hero who earns his grovel, and a guaranteed happily ever after.
⚠️ Content Warning
This book contains: explicit sexual content, significant age gap (22 years), power imbalance in workplace (addressed and resolved), references to childhood poverty and parental death, emotional manipulation (addressed and resolved), and environmental ethics themes.
Chapter One Preview
The morning of the protest, Sierra Woods woke up at 5 AM and couldn’t fall back asleep.
This wasn’t unusual. She’d been running on anxiety and cold brew for the better part of six years, ever since she’d traded her trust fund for a sleeping bag at Standing Rock and never looked back. Sleep was a luxury for people who didn’t lie awake calculating how many signatures they still needed, how many city council members remained unconvinced, how many days until the bulldozers arrived.
Today: forty-seven days. Not that she was counting.
She pulled on yesterday’s jeans—the ones with the paint stain from last week’s banner-making party—and made her way to the community garden three blocks from her co-op. The sun was just starting to pink the sky over Brooklyn, and the streets were quiet except for the early joggers and the night shift workers heading home.
The garden was her sanctuary. Had been since she’d arrived in New York at twenty-two, freshly disowned and completely lost. Mrs. Chen, who’d been tending these plots since before Sierra was born, had handed her a trowel and pointed at a patch of weeds without saying a word. Sierra had been coming back ever since…
🎁 Exclusive Bonus Content
Want more Marcus and Sierra? Get “The Anniversary”—an exclusive scene set one year after the wedding that’s too hot for retailers. 🔥
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Counterculture Compromise spicy?
Yes! Heat level: 🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️ (Very Hot). This book features multiple explicit scenes throughout, including office encounters, emotional makeup scenes, and the wedding night. The chemistry between Sierra and Marcus is combustible from chapter one.
What’s the age gap?
Sierra is 24 and Marcus is 46, making this a 22-year age gap romance. The age difference is explicitly addressed in the story—Sierra calls it out, they discuss it, and the power dynamics it creates are central to their conflict. Both characters are consenting adults who ultimately become true equals.
Does the hero actually grovel?
Yes. Marcus makes real, damaging mistakes—including hiding corporate malfeasance that hurt communities. His redemption arc spans months of genuine change, therapy, and public accountability. He doesn’t just apologize; he burns down parts of his empire to prove he’s changed.
Is there a happily ever after?
Always. Sierra and Marcus get their HEA after earning it through separation, individual growth, and rebuilding trust from the ground up. The book ends with a wedding in the community garden.
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