Ronan and Seth’s story was even more angsty than Absolution was. As much as I hurt for Ronan, I wanted to strangle him every freaking time he hurt Seth. The emotional blows he landed were borderline unforgivable. I say borderline only because Ronan had convinced himself that he wasn’t good enough for Seth, not understanding that that wasn’t his decision to make. What is it with The Protectors thinking that the person who loves them won’t understand why they do what they do? In Ronan’s defense, there was an emotional wound or two that he inflicted because he didn’t know as much about Seth’s past as he thought he did. And when he learned what Trace had never told him, it made him question – if only for a moment – how much Trace had really loved him. This helped him realize exactly how badly he was hurting Seth and opened his eyes to what he could have with Seth. I loved that we got to catch up with Jonas, Mace, and Cole – especially when Ronan was able to take some advice from Jonas that helped him to realize that a future with Seth was possible.
The mystery and suspense portion of the storyline, again, kept me on the edge of my seat. I will admit that I had my suspicions about who was behind the attempts on Seth’s life and I was right. Well, I was half right. Or maybe I should say a quarter right because I wasn’t expecting the past and the present to collide so violently. And it’s not that the primary suspect is obvious, so much as it was that there were a very limited number of people it could be and as someone who’s enjoyed her fair share of romantic suspense novels, it wasn’t hard to jump to at least one correct conclusion.
Once again, Joel Leslie does an amazing job narrating Salvation. As expected, I laughed, I cried, I held my breath, and I had a strangle hold on my Kindle waiting to see how everything turned out. I cannot adequately express how much I enjoy Leslie’s narrative talents and I’m so excited that he’s also narrating book #3, Retribution, which I will be downloading shortly. Just like Absolution was, Salvation has also been added to my re-listen list.