Vicious Prince by Lili St. Germain Spoilers

TW: Rape (current and past) and suicide

 

SYNOPSIS:

"An arranged marriage. A brutal abduction.

And a love so forbidden, it might destroy them both.

Avery Capulet is missing.

Taken by a madman. Kept in the dark.

She might not survive.

He’ll use her body. Destroy her mind. All before he ever lays a hand on her.

Rome Montague is a drug dealer. A criminal. A thief.

And he needs the secrets Avery and her family are keeping – even if it means cutting them out of her pretty Capulet flesh.

Rome Montague is missing – but nobody will miss him.

Not that it matters; After the things he’s done to this girl, he doesn’t deserve to be found.

Vicious Prince, set in the criminal underbelly of San Francisco, follows two warring families who are ruled by blood, power and twisted desire.

Please note this book was formerly titled Verona Blood."

RECAP:

- Avery, who turned 25-years-old the start of the book, is at her father's (Augustus Capulet) office and passes Joshua Grayson, a 40-year-old man who is friends/business partners with Augustus and has been creeping on her since she was 16. She doesn't get a good feeling about him or why he came out of her dad's office. When she enters she discovers that her engagement to him is finalized and that she will need to break up with her current boyfriend of eight years, Will, who she thought was approved to marry her.

- She recounts her mother's death by childbirth to a stillborn son, and her older sister's suicide (drowning in the pool) nine years ago to escape her future arranged marriage to Joshua.

- Her Uncle Enzo walks in and Avery states to her father that she will not have Joshua's children. Enzo then reveals that they harvested her eggs when she was 16 during her appendectomy, and created 13 embryos with Joshuas sperm. Her father and uncle justify it as preserving the bloodline in case something happens to her too.

- She storms off to go to the Catholic church to confess her sins and future sins. After confessing, she visits the Capulet mausoleum "to pay visit her sister" but is really a secret place to meet Will. He finds out about the engagement because she wants to have unprotected sex and he is very upset she is marrying someone else. He is the son of an action movie star so Augustus does not deem him worthy. Will officially emancipated himself from his family and moved to San Fransisco to be with Avery. They have angry sex and he wants them to fight for them but she is resigned. He leaves.

- During this time Rome has been on drugs and and having sex with Rosaline for three days straight. Rome hates the Capulets for what they did to his family (we aren't told what exactly) and he stays in the old burned remains of the Montague mansion next door to the Capulets (his brother died in the fire. It was stated that Rome caused it but then he states later in the book that his dad caused it so who knows about that detail). He hears Rosaline rummaging in the bathroom and knows she is stealing the special pill he has created. Him and his best friend, Merc, tie her up and want to know who she's stealing for. Rome leaves her with Merc in the house while he does his business in the city.

- He heads to a sex club where he does business. He makes sure his clients take the pills in front of him and wash it down for double measure so no one can steal/recreate his formula.

- Rome was sent to prison for two years for something Avery's cousin, Ty, did. (Ty is described as a psychopath since his pregnant girlfriend was found murdered in Mexico. He has also done something to Avery that we don't know the details about, but it might be rape, when she was 16 and Rome told Augustus and almost killed Ty. He would also be next in line to marry Avery if she doesn't go through with Joshua). Avery, we find out later, was one of the people testifying against him and lied to the judge. He finds out that Ty will be at Avery's birthday/inauguration party (she is the sole heir to the Capulet business and will gain everything. They are basically Jeff Bezos but maybe even richer? and more powerful) and he plans to crash it to harm Ty.

- Her and Rome were supposed to marry one another until the Montague's betrayal.

- At the party, Avery is cornered by Will and he asks her to run away with him, but she refuses because her father would kill Will and because she can't defy her father ("daddy issues" was mentioned). He storms off again furious. Joshua overheard and was shocked and amused she refused Will.

- Her dad is shot in the chest and falls in the pool, Enzo and Nathan scramble to get him out. Joshua takes Avery to safety with six bodyguards (ex-marines) surrounding them. When they get to the loading docks two figures kill the bodyguards, tase Joshua, and drug Avery. Rome witnesses this and tries to save her but gets beat up because his focus is on Avery and not the assailants. (The whole book is a bit nonlinear, so for a few chapters in Avery's POV we think one of the masked figures is Rome).

- When Avery awakens to a windowless room, naked and tied to a chair, she is molested by one of the masked men (MM) and is almost bleeding out by the cut he gives her on her inner thigh. She believe he is the XO serial killer since he wrote XO on her chest with her blood.

- Rome is locked up with her afterwards and he gives her his clothes while she is passed out. He confesses that if she dies he will die along side her. He also patches up her injury with the med kit in the adjacent bathroom, where he find scissors. The MM, who has a voice alterer, comes in and plans to rape Avery if Rome won't, and when Rome tries to attack him he shoots Rome in the shoulder. The MM then proceeds to molest her gently (almost like a lover/admirer) and then rapes her as Rome bleeds to death. Avery is very drugged and suffering blood loss so she can't put up much of a fight.

- Once they are alone again, turns to the cameras in the room and threatens to kill herself if MM lets Rome die. MM storms in and tranquilizes her and then takes Rome to underground surgeons. While in and out of consciousness, Rome reminisces about Avery and how they stole glances at one another while she was a sophomore and he a senior at their prestigious prep school when they were supposed to hate each other. Then how they shared a cigarette behind the horse stable. He realizes that he loved her at one point and will protect her.

- When he wakes up again he is back in the windowless room with Avery who has cleaned up and changed clothes and wears a dog collar, and he also has changed clothes. The MM comes in with a butcher knife and a gun and tells Rome that he will hurt Avery with the butcher knife.

REVIEW:

3.75 stars

This was a good start to the series. I'm looking forward to her Gypsy Brother series, which I've been meaning to read so I'm a bit mad at myself that I didn't know she was the author to that and I could have read that series since it is complete. Anyway, there were a lot of inconsistencies and awkward timelines with the POV switches. But the upside, for me at least, was that this was really dark.

I'll admit that I misinterpreted the synopsis and the title so I thought Rome was the capturer not the captive. I mean it's super good that it wasn't a Stockholm syndrome storyline. But then it makes the title change and cover not make any sense. The title could be a hint and the MM is a "prince" since Avery is referred to as a "princess" and Rome isn't even described as a disgraced prince or prince at all.

The sequel's release date keeps getting pushed back to reader's utter frustration. So as of now it's supposed to come out at the end of the month (8/31/2020).