He is watching and she knows it but this cat and mouse game will not end soon.
Dates read: 17/11/24 to 17/12/24
Word to describe: Unforgettable
Star rating:⭐⭐⭐⭐
Genre: Dark Romance, Stalker Romance, Smut Fiction.
Trigger Warnings: Prepare yourselves! Sexual assault, stalking, home invasion, rape, penetrative assault with objects, forced sexual acts without penetration, sexual harassment, bodily harm, graphic violence, murder, consistent mention of grief, death of family member, child pornography, child sexual assault, child sex trafficking, adult sex trafficking, kidnapping, torture. - honestly just read the list at the beginning of the book because it is brutal.
How do I even begin? I suppose I should thank my friends for introducing me to this evil and completely unforgettable duology. And then I should thank H D Carlton for making me want to simultaneously bleach my eyes and eat them and tape my eyelids open so I can keep reading.
Adeline Riley, Addie for the majority of the book, is a small town author who has just moved into her grandmothers manor house that is definitely haunted by the ghost of her great-grandmother (who conveniently left her diaries to read about their very similar situations). She is feisty and determined to prove to her mother that she is fine living in her deceased grandmothers creepy house. It's not a lie she does love the manor even when it gets tainted with the foreboding presence of her stalker. A dark man who hovers at her windows and leaves her roses with the thorns clipped. The man who watches her sleep and steals her good whisky.
Zade is a killer. Unashamed and more than willing to prove that he is going to go as far as he must to stop the skin trade. To recuse the children. To save the women and girls from the clutches of evil men and women who will abuse them and kill them for their own sick gratification. He will maim, torture and murder to protect those from harm and nothing - nothing except Addie - will distract him from project Z. Addie - his lover, his entire reason for living, the beautiful woman he watches and torments to prove his love.
These two characters equally as fucked as one another collide in battle. With knives, guns, and roses the pair of lovers (and haters) will burn the world for each other and to escape each other. Addie does not want to love Zade, how could she after he invades his home and her body without consent. Yet, she finds herself compelled to be near him and searching for his security. She ̶l̶o̶v̶e̶s̶ hates him. Addie finds herself in whirlwind of new people, riches, and danger when Zade interrupts her life and uses her to secure his next murder target. Except, it all goes wrong.
I have no words for how utterly insane this book is. You have a victim of sexual assault who falls in love with her abuser and gets off on being attacked with knives and a gun (?!) and then you have her abuser who kills rapists for a living but has no issue blurring the lines and raping his lover (?!). There is a lot that goes on in this book for sure but this is the major plot point that becomes so difficult to pass over. This is clearly a Stockholm syndrome situation but I kind of love it. H D Carlton creates characters that are messy and complicated. They have dark desires and unspoken fantasies and she brings them into light and shows her readers how sick they all are. Even the victims have just as much darkness to them as the abusers.
I found myself unable to stop reading no matter how fucked up the story got because these characters were so compelling. I want to recommend this to all but at the same time the trauma of reading this book is enough to make me want to hoard it in the darkest place in my mind. I can't unread this mess but I also don't want to. H D Carlton you broke me. Thank you.
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