Dominated (The Enforcers, #2) by Maya Banks
Series: The Enforcers #2
Published by Berkley on May 3rd 2016
Genres: Contemporary
Pages: 352
Goodreads

“Evangeline. His angel. He’d found her. Finally.”

FINAL DECISION:  I loved the first book in this series and had high hopes for this second book.  Unfortunately, I didn’t feel that the relationship between Evangeline and Drake developed at all and Drake’s poor treatment of Evangeline never really gets better.

THE STORY: Beginning right where the events of MASTERED ended, DOMINATED tells the story of Drake and Evangeline. Drake has devastated Evangeline with his treatment of her.  Trying to protect her, Drake savaged her emotionally in front of his business rivals. Evangeline has left Drake and now Drake is determined to find her and get her to forgive him.

OPINION: I had high hopes for this book.  I really loved the first book in the series and couldn’t wait until this book came out to complete Drake and Evangeline’s story.  Unfortunately, I was deeply disappointed.  The problem for me was that Drake and Evangeline’s emotional story didn’t progress at all.  It has seemed at the end of MASTERED that Drake had reached a crisis point.  After his treatment of Evangeline, it seemed like once they were back together that he would change, that she would change, that their relationship would be different.  Instead, Evangeline forgave Drake too easy and once again in this book he treated her abominably.

I don’t mind alpha dominate jerks as heroes as long as they end up treating the heroine with love and respect. Drake never learned this lesson.  While the two reconcile at the end of DOMINATED, I had no confidence that he wouldn’t go off the rails and treat Evangeline terribly again. I never felt that his characters made any changes that would justify a belief in an ultimate HEA. I ended up liking his “brothers” more than him because they believed in Evangeline while he immediately distrusted her without much reason.

For me, this book felt like an afterthought that was no necessary.  I don’t think that this story needed two books to tell and probably would have been better as one book.  Too much of this book felt repetitive of MASTERED both in the story and also emotionally. The characters relationship seemed to stagnate and I lost interest.

After enjoying MASTERED, I was highly disappointed because not only was this book not what I had hoped it would be, but also it lessened my enjoyment with MASTERED because that book needs a conclusion.  Sadly, that conclusion is not worthy of the first book in the series.

WORTH MENTIONING:  There is a MMF menage scene in this book but no emotional menage relationship.

CONNECTED BOOKS:  DOMINATED is the second book in The Enforcers series.  This book is the second part of the romance between Drake and Evangeline and should be read after MASTERED.

STAR RATING:  I give this book 2 stars.