Title: Dark Reign
Author: Amelia Wilde
Publisher/Year: Dangerous Press 11/9/21
Length: 328 pages
Series: The Collector Trilogy #1
Overview
Wealthy. Reclusive. Dangerous. Emerson LeBlanc doesn’t enter society much. He only ventures out in pursuit of new art for his collection. It starts with a haunting painting. Then he meets the artist…
Innocent Daphne Morelli is more exquisite than anything he’s ever seen. He becomes obsessed with her. It doesn’t matter that she’s a living, breathing person with her own hopes and dreams.
She’ll be the perfect addition to his collection.
My Thoughts
The summary here led me to believe that it was going to be slightly different than the story turned out to be, and frankly it took me a long time to get through it. I don’t know if it’s me, or the story – so I guess we’ll see if i pick up the next one.
Just like the synopsis says, we start our story with Emerson, he’s The Collector. and he’s known for being able to make or break an artists’ career. He finds himself in Motif, a gallery that he doesn’t usually go to and discovers art by DM, someone that he didn’t know before, but becomes obsessed with.
what we learn of DM, Daphne is that she comes from a family that is ‘connected’. They have been in a business that isn’t necessarily on the up and up, and they have a family rivalry with the Constantines, another family that’s in a similar position. What we know is that because of a tenuous relationship between the families, Daphne is beyond protected by her brother and his bodyguards. She wants to live her own life, and while he allows it, he also buys out a building across from where she lives and works so that Daphne can be protected.
What he doens’t know, is that he can’t protect her from everything.
Emerson is obsessed and we don’t get the true backstory on why he gets like this. We know that he’s a recluse and we know that he’s got a very bad relationship with his own family and the outside world, but we dont know the causes. What we do know is that he’ll venture out to find Daphne, to endear himself to her, and then hope to make her his.
What happens throughout this story is a bit of a wild ride. We see horrible things happen to Daphne’s family and we watch how that impacts the choices that Daphne makes. She is intrigued and that puts herself at risk, but the attraction that she has to Emerson makes her throw caution to the wind.
We’re left at the end of something that sounds like the demise of the freedom that Daphne has known. Will it be at the hands of Leo her brother, or at Emerson the Collector? we don’t know yet, but i’m sure more will come to light in the next book. Enjoy!