Rating: 3 stars
Buy Link:
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Length: Novel

 

Prepared is the 6th book in the Auctioned series and this review will naturally reveal plot points for the series.

When Gray Nolan was abducted three years ago, he thought that was it for him and he gave up all hope of ever being rescued. Now, Gray is prepared to marry the man of his dreams, Darius. Darius not only gave Gray his life back, but sent his life in a direction he never expected. Their wedding was postponed twice due to the pandemic and now the men are only one mission away from saying “I do.”

The mission seems as difficult to navigate as the multi-day bachelor party that awaits the men. Gray has put everything into planning the wedding, wanting it to be perfect for Darius. Darius only wants to spend the rest of his life with Gray and writing his own vows is tripping him up, or so he thinks. With plenty of friends and family, the men are sure to get their long awaited happy ever after on their own terms.

The Auctioned series has been a long journey for Gray and Darius, starting with Gray being abducted into a trafficking ring in the first book. Their dynamics have shifted over the course of the series as they fell in love, moved to their dream home, and adopted two boys. The final piece in their happy ever after was what was missing from the series and I thought this book would bring it all together. While it did that somewhat, some of the other aspects in this book didn’t work out as well for me.

The beginning opens with the men on an extraction mission and we’re just thrown into the action again after all of this time away from their story and it was difficult to place where in their timeline they were. There was no lead up into who they were rescuing and a lot of it came across as jumbled and unclear to me. The present day of the story is in third person and then there are flashbacks, mostly from Darius’s point of view, that are in first person and I did not care for this style.

Being that this is the conclusion to Darius and Gray’s story, there wasn’t a lot of time with the men together without a crowd around them. They are on a mission and then their friends and family come for their wedding and it was too much and too many people. There was name after name listed, not all of them were recognizable as this point in the series, and the constant references to everyone else that was there did not add anything to the story for me and it had the opposite effect of detracting from it.

When Gray and Darius have their moments in the story, there were too few of them for me in their final book. But, it has been a long road for the men and it was great to see them go off to live their lives together.