Title: Ruin
Author:  Laurelin Paige
Publisher/Year:  Paige Press 10/29/19
Length:  299 Pages
Series:  Slay Quartet #2

Overview

With her heart literally in his hands, Celia will have to try and bargain with a devil.

Edward Fasbender is my captor.

Trapped on this island he owns everything on–including, it seems, me.

He told me he would break me, but I thought he meant in the bedroom. It turns out Edward is playing a completely different game.

And he won’t stop until he’s ruined me.

My Thoughts

This is quite the diabolical story that we’ve got here – everyone is playing a game, most of it as a form of revenge against someone or something, and it’s really anyone’s guess on how it will net out.

We left the first installment with a marriage, chemistry and pure hate. Celia’s plan to take Edward down was figured out since she didn’t realize how much he dug into her and her actions, and what that means is that she’s really at his complete and utter mercy. As though she wasn’t already…..

Edward on the other hand has even more motivation to take Celia and her family down outside of the games that were being played, yet it takes the bulk of this story to learn exactly what that motivation is. What we do see though is that his plan is going off track since his impression of Celia prior to keeping her hostage and trying to break her was way off base. He thought that she was spoiled and surface when in fact there are layers and layers to her that no one had expected.

Throughout this second book we watch torture at it’s finest. Celia is captive on the island, a place where all the people owe Edward everything, and his word is bible. She’s not able to convince anyone that he’s keeping her against her will, he even goes so far as to weave a story as to why she’s there and the staff is quick to support his word. As a result, we spend the first quarter/third of the story watching Celia try to escape any way that she can. It’s a valiant effort for sure, but one that we all know will end up with no success. Instead, we watch her break a bit, bend to what he wants of her and when she does that, she gets rewarded with ‘things’ and the opportunity to design parts of the house etc. Little scraps to make her hate him just a bit less.

The other bit of this is that no matter how much they hate each other, they have such a connection, such heat and chemistry that there’s really no chance in fighting it. He tries, and fails. She tries….but then again doesn’t really. So when we see those scenes, i’ll tell you that they are some of the hottest that i’ve read lately.

We learn that Edward’s kink is psychological pain of sorts – he wants to break her down not through physical submission, although that’s massively attractive to him, but instead to get inside her head and her soul and find out who she is and why. What pain in her past made her into what she is today. In doing this, we see their relationship change and we see unexpected revelations come out.

Where we are left at the end of this second book is a completely different place than we were at the end of the first book, and it’s a moment in time that give us hope, but at the same time, there are so many other factors that will make that hope fall aside quickly. I can’t wait to see how this relationship and story plays out since revenge is still quite important and death is a possibility. Off to find book 3 now – Enjoy!