Two broken hearts…one perfect fit.Alpha Morris Danvers likes his quiet life as a paralegal and as the uncle to his beta brother Morgan’s infant son Aeron. Raised by an abusive sire, Morris and Morgan have relied on each other for years, and Morris doesn’t trust himself to do right by an omega mate. When a tragic accident leaves Morris alone to raise a baby, he reaches out to his boss Ronin Cross … Ronin Cross for help—and gets more help than he ever imagined from Ronin’s mate and their friends. But Morris can’t take bereavement leave forever and Aeron needs a caregiver.
After surviving an abduction and months of torture, all omega Jaysan Rowe wanted was to give away the baby he never asked for and move on. But after months of acting out, Jaysan finally hits rock bottom on the one-year anniversary of his child’s birth. Desperate to get his act together, he meets with an alpha who needs full-time daycare for his infant nephew. But the instant Jaysan sets his sights on little Aeron he knows: Aeron is his biological child. Even Morris’s nose can tell the pair belongs to each other. His nose also tells him something even more shocking: Jaysan is his bondmate.
Both men feel the bond, but neither is ready to mate, period, so they come to a business arrangement. Jaysan wants a relationship with Aeron, and Morris needs a sitter. It should have been perfect, except for that pesky mating bond. A bond that draws them together, over and over, no matter how hard each man fights it. Jaysan swore long ago he’d never mate or let another alpha touch him during heat—except everything about Morris makes him feel safe. Wanted. Whole. But Morris deserves an unsoiled mate, not someone as dirty and used as Jaysan, and Jaysan will do anything to prove it to the stubborn alpha…even if it means giving up his son a second time.
NOTE: This is a non-shifter Omegaverse story with alpha/omega/beta dynamics, heats, knotting, and mpreg. In this world, omegas are second-class citizens with few civil rights and almost no protections under the law. Trigger warnings for physical, emotional, and sexual abuse. This series is best read in numerical order.
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Jaysan gets his HEA!
The Breaking Free series is one best read in order, but, if you don’t have time to read them all, I think that Whole could be read as a stand-alone. We met Jaysan in book 4, Found, where he gave up his baby for adoption – a decision that he is now regretting deeply. We know from the book blurb that Jaysan unexpectedly finds his son when he goes to interview for a governor (governess) position with an alpha who needs help caring for the nephew has custody of.
Whole is such an emotional book. Morris Danvers is beside himself with grief when his brother Morgan and his mate, Brody, are killed in a car accident and he is left as guardian to their infant son, Aeron. Morris and Morgan were very close and now Morris has no family left to help share his grief. When Jaysan interviews for the job to care for Morris’s nephew he meets Aeron and immediately recognizes that he is the son he gave up for adoption one year earlier.
There is so much to this story. Morris has dark things in his past he doesn’t share with people and Jaysan doesn’t want to talk about what happened to him when he was forced to fight other pregnant omegas in an illegal fighting club. I really don’t know how to say much without going into too much detail about the book.
My emotions were all over the place. The things that both Morris and Jaysan endured were horrible. The emotional scars left on both men has deeply affected their feelings about taking a mate. Whole is really an emotionally gritty story, one that the author could have easily stopped after Jaysan and Morris finally acknowledge their feelings for each other. I’m so glad she didn’t stop at that point, though, because the events that happen afterward give her an opportunity to tell more of their story and also introduce another character that I hope she plans to write about next.
A.M. Arthur does an excellent job of breaking this reader’s heart and putting it back together again; I hope she plans to continue this series.
An advanced copy of this book was provided to me but my review was voluntary and not influenced by the author.
***Reviewed for Xtreme-Delusions dot com***
*verified Amazon purchase Jan 2019*
This is book 5 in the Breaking Free series, and it would help you GREATLY to have read the other books first. I mean you SHOULD read them, because they are so bloody good, but for the full enjoyment of this one, it’s probably best you do. You need to know how Jaysan got to this point in his life, and what happened to him, cos it ain’t pretty. I’m not sure is Morris popped up along the way, he may have, and I just didn’t register him.
A year ago, Jaysan made the biggest mistake of his short life, and gave up his newborn baby for adoption. He didn’t even see the child. Now, on the child’s 1st birthday, Jaysan does something to feel, to feel WHOLE again. Of course, that doesn’t work so well, and his foster parent takes him to the emergency room where Jaysan catches the wiff of the most delicious basil scent he ever smelt. On the worst night of his life, Morris catches the scent of roses on the emergency room and his protective alpha instincts kick in. He has no idea who this young man is, but he is hurt and he is Morris’. But both Morris and Jaysan have sworn off mating, both men feel they are not good enough for another. However, Morris needs a carer for his newly orphaned nephew, and Jaysan needs a job. Then Jaysan meets Aeron and Jayson knows that this is HIS baby, the one he gave away. Morris knows it too, judging by the mixed scents and seeing aeron with jayson. Can Jaysan look after Aeron and keep his distance from Morris? Can Morris finally let go of his past?
Jaysan is, in his own words, soiled. He knows he is on a path of self destruction, even with the help of the omega/beta support group and his amazing foster parents. He does something entirely voluntary but incredibly stupid on the 1st birthday of his baby. He knows it is stupid, and dangerous, but he can’t stop himself. Kell finds him a job looking after Morris’ nephew. Morris works for Kell’s husband, Ronin,. No one had any idea that Aeron could be Jaysan’s. the province is huge and the chance of them meeting is slim. But meet they do, and Jaysan knows it the second he sees Aeron. Morris can see it, and smell it too, picking up that delicious rose scent from Aeron as well as Jaysan.
Morris doesn’t want a mate. His own sire was a nasty piece of work, abusive to Mossis and his brothers and to their omegin. Morris doesn’t want to be like that so has decided against taking a mate. Meeting Jaysan, though, and that rose scent, and Morris knows he will have to fight hard against the mating bond. So much so, he takes the suppressor that hides his own sweet basil scent from Jaysan.
But neither man can fight it, and after a heart to heart that made me cry (I cry a LOT with these books!) they decide to get to know each other, and maybe, just maybe, they can make it work.
Then Jaysan has what i can only call a brain fart, and it scares him and he runs. Runs into a situation of his own doing, but almost immediately he knows it is wrong, the other person s WRONG. He manages to get himself out of the situation and calls Morris, not even sure if Morris will come to help him. But Morris DOES come, and they finally decide they belong together!
The coming together of Morris and Jaysan is truly beautiful, for used as Jaysan feels, Morris is untouched. And Morris feels that this will affect his ability to please Jaysan. It’s really great reading, watching the younger Jaysan bring the older Morris out of himself, it really is.
Time is moving in the world, and attitudes are changing positively towards the omegas. The children rescued from the fight ring are beginning to heal and bloom into wonderful young men, who meet their partners who help that healing all the more. Babies (lots of babies!) are being born to these couples and I find myself pairing them together, mix of alphas, omegas and betas that they are.
I also find myself wondering about the group of young omegas that were spirited off into the night in book one The ones Braun rescued from the group home that was feeding the fight ring. I’d love to catch up with what’s happened to them, as they have grown into young men, and how they are fairing in the place they went to.
I’m trying not to read these book too fast, because I’m running out of books in the series, I only have two more left! I’m loving these so much. I bought the first three books in the Us series by Arthur, so i can still get my fix. Won’t be this world, but still. I am in love with this author!
Book 5 of 8 and so far, they are ALL
5 star reads!
**same worded review will appear elsewhere**