This book made me feel all kinds of icky. Between this weird creep leering after a minor and basically waiting for her to be legal, straight up raping her, then beating her when she doesn’t do what he wanted. I can not freaking see how she fell in love with him???? I’m not seeing the romance??? I do like captive romances, and I don’t see consensual BDSM as “gross” but I think this one hit my limit with the non consent part and when she was full on crying hysterically. Not sexy my guy. And don’t get me started on Beth! Nora would (rightfully) complain about being kidnapped and Nora would be all “oTHeR pEOpLe haVe iT haRDeR yOu sHOUld bE GrEAtFuL. JuLiAn wiLL taKe cARe of YoU”. Excuse me Beth??? No?? Then Nora has the nerve to say he didn’t hurt her??? Girl the whole book has been about him hurting her??? Are we seeing the same things?? When Nora got appendicitis and did nothing to try to escape, I was very disappointed in her. When she gave up her hiding place to save Beth I was like ???? Why?? I mean good for her for being a good person but I probably wouldn’t have done that for Beth. I was sad that Beth was getting her cheeks cut off. Holy cannoli was that scene ghastly. I didn’t like her, doesn’t mean I wanted her dead. When Nora escapes with Julian’s help and thinks he’s dead I knew she would forget about all the shitty things he did and just focus on the “good”. Side note when the sketch artist told her that he was attractive, I feel like that’s grounds for firing??? Don’t tell a victim of sexual abuse that her abuser was “a handsome fellow”. YOU ARE ENABLING HER. It made me sooo mad. So many people said this like it justified what he did!! And him giving money to the parents was just confusing. What kind of guy thinks that 1 million dollars will make parents think “welp, that’s enough payment for our daughter, no questions asked. We will cease looking for her because we believe you when you send us pictures of her looking happy, because we trust you, a stranger.” I was happy to see that her parents were reasonable and looked for her and didn’t take his word. This and Noras self defense classes were the only pros of the book. When Julian comes “back to life” or whatever and is all “let’s go now” and Nora asked what would happen is she says no, and he shows her a syringe I literally died. When I came back to life, the book was done and I didn’t know what to say. Would I read this book again? No. Would I read the sequel? Perhaps.
