After having read this, I can only come to one conclusion. Gemma James hates her characters and lives to torture them. Maybe at some point in her life, a couple of people named Rafe and Alex done Gemma wrong, and this is her revenge. If so, remind me never to piss her off, because I'd hate to see what she did to me. That being said, I'm pretty sure that there is something wrong with me because I liked reading everything that Gemma James did to her poor characters. Maybe I subconsciously hate them? Whatever the reason for it is, I devoured the book and need to read more.
It's important to note that this is a boxset of the first 4 books, and that there are more that come after. It's a serialized book, so each section isn't overly long.
When Alex was 15, she sent the man she loved to jail. He testified that he raped her, even if he didn't. She had a very good reason to do so, she was forced by her family. Her step-brother, Zach, had raped her and told her that he would kill Rafe if she told anyone that he hadn't hurt her and that Zach had really done it. She's spent the last 8 years in her own living hell. Zach sees her as his own personal playground and has continued to rape her. Her body has been conditioned to like what he does to her, but her mind won't let it go.
After 8 years in prison for a crime he didn't commit, Rafe is finally free. But he has plans for little Miss Alex. Plans that she's not going to like. He's going to get his own back and find out why she lied about him all those years ago. He has dark, deviant plans that involve a cage in his cellar of a secluded cabin in the woods on an island in a river. Since Alex has a serious phobia about water, he knows that she's not going to try to escape.
Rafe comes to Alex's house to find that she's getting ready to leave. She's finally decided that she can't be around Zach anymore. It's finally gotten enough to her that she just can't do it anymore. She's engaged to be married to a man that she doesn't love, her crazy, possessive step-brother keeps raping her and he's trying to keep her from marrying the man that her father wants her to. She just can't be there anymore. So, Rafe shows up at just the right time. He drugs her, stages her death, and takes her away.
I can't go much further into the later books because anything I say about them will ruin the first part and then all the books after. But, it's important to know that this is the basis of everything that happens in the book.
Every time things look like they will be getting better, something terrible happens. They never really seem to have more than a moment of happiness before some shadowy figure is willing to beat them, torture them, rape them, or kill them. Or all of the above. Rafe and Alex never really know who to trust because all sorts of things happen and it seems like everyone else wants to lie to them. I'm not joking when I say that Gemma hates them.
But, I loved reading the books and watching how Rafe and Alex start to work together and start to heal. They are both profoundly broken people who have had terrible things happen to them. It's interesting watching how they heal themselves and how they manage to heal each other and how each one of them works on gaining control over what they can. Rafe is very much a Dom and sadist and Alex is very much a sub and masochistic pain slut, so the level of control that each has varies, depending on their dynamic. But, it works for them.
I am looking forward to reading the next one ASAP.
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Unwell Hydration from Alex Cooper
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- Reviewed in the United States on March 20, 2018
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