I really wanted to like this book, I love masked men, stalker, dark romances with a passion and I feel this has potential but just fell flat for me and I'm disappointed by that.

Off the bat, I just want to say I was so frustrated by how many times these characters "rolled their eyes" - it literally seemed like every few sentences or at least twice a chapter one or both were doing it and it was extremely repetitive. I'm genuinely surprised this wasn't caught before release?

Lillith wasn't really likable, she just seemed very bland. Kain mentioned a few times how even though he called her little flower he didn't see her as delicate or fragile and that he thought she was strong and while I don't really see her as delicate/fragile either, I didn't really feel she was "strong". She didn't really do much of anything. She finds out fairly quickly he's stalking her and she's just "oh this is okay, kinda hot" and goes with it and that's pretty much all her personality is. Even her "fighting" with him was weak and just what she thought she SHOULD do. She's supposed to be an ER Intern but, we really only get a few chapters of her doing that in the beginning and then she's literally just a sex toy for Kain. The most interesting thing about her was her taking "pet" wild animals (a mouse and pigeons).

Kain was definitely more interesting. He's second in command of a club, his father was a POS and abused him as a child so he's pretty unhinged, one side of his face/eye is burned, he has no problems unaliving people or beating them senseless, he becomes obsessed with Lillith and stalks then kindaps her to protect her. He has extreme trust issues and few friends but, those he does consider friend he'd do anything for. He comes across as cold, detached and unfeeling but, he's got lots under the surface. I enjoyed how he saw Lillith as this ray of light and even though he didn't think he deserved her, he wanted to. But even he fell flat because like what even was the point of the club? He didn't do anything though he was 2nd in command, we have no idea why he hates the rival club, why his father suddenly turned into a pyschopath after his wife died and decided to start abusing his kid caude even Kain tells Lillith before that he had a great childhood, we have no idea why Kain doesn't like the new leader of the club (other than he's 'weak') or how he even got into power when it should've been Kain. He stalks her, kidnaps her and has this voice in his head that gives him awful thoughts so he takes this strong drug to quiet it but, literally as soon as he has sex with Lillith all of that no longer matters. He's suddenly cured of the voice and addiction. And yes, I could get behind a whole "she helped cure him with her love" blah blah but that wasn't even mentioned. It just literally went away with no reason for why. He had this back story set up with potential and it went no where. And don't even get me started on his healing. This dude was shot..in the chest...at LEAST 4 times in his life and lived. But there's more about this in my spoiler.

Spoiler

My next biggest gripe is the fact every damn male Lillith came across somehow KNEW she was a virgin and wanted to either sell her for it or assault her for it. And I cannot for the life of me figure out how they all knew. It was ridiculous. When Lillith told Kain she was he said "I know" and she's like "wait, how?" and his reason was she LOOKED innocent and virgin like. What does that even mean? How does someone LOOK like a virgin? lmao. Are you telling me over 4 different men knew she was a virgin by looking at her? I get this is fictional but, that's so utterly ridiculous and unrealistic. She's a 24 year old woman - there's no reason to assume she's a virgin simply because she's nice and comes across as "innocent". She didn't have friends, she was friendly with two men she worked with and those were two who tried attacking her but, she never saw them outside of work, she rarely talked to them at work and she even said while they both seemed interested in her she'd always brush them off and she kept to herself so like there's no way she told any friends or these men she was a virgin and it got around.

Bear's betrayal would've been sooo much more impactful if we actually got to know him and their friendship better. We got a handful of scenes of them and then out of NO WHERE he turns on Kain and his reasoning is "I didn't want to be in your shadow" which made no sense. I believe it was hinted at he had become an addict to whatever street drug was in this Universe and it ~changed him but, the few scenes we did get of Kain and Bear he seemed normal, they did get into a fight but, it seemed like from what I could tell that wasn't unusual of them especially if they'd been drinking. Once he was meant to protect Lillith and while he did make a few sexual comments at her he did protect her and he kept calling Kain to tell him what their leader was doing behind Kain's back so it was just weird he then was like "yeah I hate you, I'm tired of being in your shadow". Like, huh?

I didn't like the use of Kain constantly calling Lillith his "toy". Sure, if it was in a sexual manner I could kinda understand and yes I get he's not normal and is a bit unhinged and doesn't think like a normal person but, it felt icky he referred to her as his toy and not a human being even though he actually DID treat her like a human and even after he fell in love he would still call her that but, then got so offended when others were call her similar. And no, it wasn't always in a sexual context he called her this cause that would make more sense. Also he kept saying he was going to "ruin" her, he collared her, had a cage under his bed and a whole sex dungeon and he didn't DO much of anything. They had some rough sex a few times but nothing pearl clutching.