Obligation (Undergroud Kings Series) By: Aurora Rose Reynolds

Obligation is the second book in the Underground King series each book is a standalone that ends in a H.E.A. You do not need to read the first book in the series but I suggest you do because this is a very good series unlike anything we have seen from this author. This book deals with themes such as sexual abuse, and rape. This is not to detour readers but as a forewarning about this subject matter. Although the author does not dig very deep into these issues its still one of the themes/storylines in the book.

Yelling, Fighting, and a promise to be better. A mother’s plea to save her daughter. That was Myla’s last memories of her biological parents. This dark moment changed her life forever. Brought into a good loving home with parents who loved her as their own. Unfortunately things aren’t always as they seem. One day everything changed, her world as she knew it went up in smoke. Until Kai.

He has loved her since they were kids. Even as a child he always promised to protect her. Days, months, years has passed by, until one day she needs him and he is the only means of protection she has. In order to save her he must marry her. Give her the family name and everything that goes along with being his wife. Except for Kai it’s much deeper than protection. A past that binds them and a dark sordid past. Can these two face their demons together or will the past be too much to bear?

One of the things that I loved about this book is the underlying dark tone the author took in the beginning but as the book progressed it was as if the author was afraid to explore the boundaries. The themes in this book are heavy but felt watered down. Mila’s issues weren’t really addressed and when the truth finally came out it was glossed over and Kai left. Granted he left for reason and I won’t reveal too much. But it was such a heavy intimate moment between the two and could have been explored more. I did find Mila to be a walking contradiction when it came to Kai she had all the sass in the world but when it came to facing her past she reverted back to being a shell of a woman. For instance she has all these self-defense skills and took down Pika but didn’t put up much of a fight when certain names were mentioned.

Where is the time line? One minute she's reliving a horrible past in a flashback scene the next in a bikini relaxing and coming to terms with what happened. (From context clues you can tell that time has lapsed) With this book you can see that the author has a great range in her writing and at times I found some elements of the book to be reminiscent of a K.A. book.  I think this book could have been better if the author would just dig a little deeper her work just searches the surface. Good material just needs a proper time line of events and more depth. It was scenes of day to day living but so much to be explored in the story. At times the scenes jumped around and I wondered how we got to a certain point. It was a slow build up to events. I thought the author did a good job with this story but as reader I thought some issues would have added another layer of depth to the story if explored and was fully flushed out. I found very few grammatical issues with this story and loved that the author stepped outside of the box and did a story different then what we are used to. I give this book 3.5 stars. I look forward to reading the next book in this series.

***ARC Provided In Exchange For An Honest Review***