Until the End (Final Hour, #3)

by Juno Rushdan

Joniece Abbott-Pratt (Narrator), Kris Koscheski (Narrator), and Victor Bevine (Narrator)

• ISBN10: 1713551802
• ISBN13: 9781713551805
• Publish Date: 4 August 2020 (first published 26 May 2020)
• Publish Status: Out of Stock
• Imprint: Audible Studios on Brilliance
• Format: Audiobook (MP3)
• Duration: 12 hours
• Language: English

Reviews

[FranJessca @ A Book Lovin' Mama's Blog]

Until the End is the third book to Juno Rushdan’s Final Hour series, it was one of my ‘Most Anticipated Books of 2020,’ and I couldn’t wait to dive into it. 

Female Protagonist: Kit Westcott is a rich heiress and Founder of the Outliers, which is a hacker group. Kit is a White-Hat Hacker who is on the run after her other fellow hackers were murdered. She knows she’s in danger. She plays the damsel in distress in the book, but she knows how to handle herself. She doesn’t trust easily, which is understandable after what she witnessed. She’s seen a villain in the book and knows her team was setup. I liked her character. She was determined to prove her team and herself were setup. 

Male Protagonist: Castle Kinkade is the Gray Box operative who’s a former Navy SEAL. He’s intense, brutal, and persistent on getting his job done. He’s the one you call to get it done. I enjoyed his character. He battled his feelings in this book when he has to protect Kit. He promised he would protect her, though, even if his boss told him not to catch feelings. 

Storyline: The storyline in this book is about Kit’s hacker group getting into something that got them killed. Now Kit is on the run to find out what happened and prove herself and her team were innocent. Unfortunately, she is being tracked by several groups. One that wants her dead and the other that wants to bring her in for questioning. She ends up being detained and questioned by the Gray Box team. Castle promises he will protect Kit, even though he needs to watch his feelings for her. Unfortunately, big secrets are happening in the Gray Box and the other groups that are after Kit that will leave every reader in shock. I know I was in shock. I had a feeling, though, who was behind it all. I couldn’t believe it ended the way it did, but I’m glad there was closure.

Steaminess: Some Steam towards the end of the book with the characters.

Standalone or Series: Series. I recommend reading the books in order; otherwise, you will out on some issues that happen in the previous books.

Cliffhanger: No.

Trope: Forbidden Romance

HEA: Yes, but after so much trouble.

Would I recommend this book?  Yes, definitely. Juno Rushdan was a new-to-me author when I started reading this series, and now she has become a favorite author. I love her writing style, and I look forward to reading more from her. The Final Hour series is full of action-packed scenes with some romance in them. I love reading books that involve a thrilling storyline that leaves your heart beating at a fast-pace because you want the good guys to get the bad guys in the story.

[llamareads]

Content warnings: graphic violence (headshots, etc), depression, suicide (of character’s relative, in the past and off-page), survivor’s guilt, PTSD (military combat related), grief, medicine insecurity

I’ve enjoyed every one of Juno Rushdan’s books I’ve read, but none of them have been as much of an edge-of-your-seat roller coaster ride as this one! This is the third in a series, and while you could probably read it as a stand-alone as everything is recapped well, it won’t be quite the same experience.

Castle is a complicated character. We’ve seen a lot of him from the outside, especially from his sister Maddox’s perspective in the first book, where she worried that something that happened during his time as a SEAL broke him. Castle’s rebuilt himself around his identity at the Gray Box as Director Sanborn’s second-in-command and heir apparent, committed to the mission and the security of his country. Nothing else is important to him, as the Gray Box is his family and Sanborn, known colloquially to the team as “Dad,” is basically a surrogate dad to him. The last thing he wants is to be responsible for a mouthy POI that may hold the information they need to track down stolen biological weapons…

“Careful what you wish for. You just might get me completely unfiltered and unfettered.”
She didn’t bat an eyelash. “Is that a promise or a threat?”

It took me a while to warm up to Kit. Part of the problem is that the previous main characters in the story have all had some level of experience with field operations – Maddox and Gideon were both field operatives, Cole had experience on the civilian side, and Willow, while not a field operative, worked directly with them and had extensive knowledge of what they do. In Willow’s case, it helped that she already trusted Gideon would keep her safe, and that while he might have to do monstrous things to do that, he was not himself a monster. Kit? None of that. She’s a trust fund heiress whose life work was putting together the Outliers, a group of white hat hackers. She’s not much of a hacker herself, more of the head honcho-type, or, as Willow puts it, a Bill Gates. She’s got plenty of reason to be suspicious of the government and too many examples of hackers like her being “disappeared.” Combined with the trauma of watching her team being murdered, she’s not always in the best headspace for making rational decisions. Everyone she loves – her twin brother, her parents, her team – dies, and she’s lonely and hurting. Watching her mouth off and push back at Castle was hilarious, but there were also times when she seemed to forget the seriousness of the situation and put them both in danger.

“I’ve never believed in chemistry, besides the kind to breach a site with explosive charges. Not until you.”
“You say the most romantic things.”

This is definitely an enemies-to-lovers situation, though even at the beginning both recognize the chemistry between them. Castle loves her fiery spirit and how she pushes back against him, and Kit appreciates how honorable and trustworthy he is, even when she has every reason not to trust him. They’re more alike that they want to admit, both people who have worked hard to put together their teams and protect them, who have experienced loss and understand how it changes you.

“When I strike, it is with precision and it is with justified cause.”

Where this series has really excelled is in the plotting and pacing. This book, even more than the previous books, is absolutely non-stop. All of the action scenes are well-written and make you feel like you’re right there in the middle of them. Some of the plot lines that have run through the first two books are finally resolved. I’ve had suspicions since the first book about where some things were going, and while some panned out – to devastating effect – others haven’t, but I’m not quite willing to let go of them yet.

Overall, this is another thrilling entry in the series, and I cannot wait to see what happens next!

I received this book from NetGalley. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.