I wasn't sure I should waste my $2 on this thing and kind of wished I hadn't, but I read it so I'm going to review this story, though there really isn't much story here worth talking about.

Ms. Ricci never bothers to give any of these characters interior lives (like, y'know, thoughts, dreams, ideas - the stuff that's constant background noise for most people) much less exterior lives. We're given the perspectives of both Frank, the "disgraced" omega and David, the alpha, who takes the older man into his little pack.

Frank has been misused and abused for most of his life and is very unsure of himself. We're told he has two bachelors degrees, though never what those degrees are in or how they would benefit a pack. And though there is some attempt to get him speak up, no one really makes an effort to actually get to know him, who he is and what he might like to do with the rest of his life.

David split off from his father's strict pack rules to form a looser, more accepting, logical family style pack, but we don't get much more than that out of his character. In his own way, he's not a very good alpha to Frank either. His signals are very messed up, saying he does not want Frank in a real physical way, but then he'll lean in and place kisses on Franks shoulders, the side of his head, the back of his neck ... I found all this confusing to be honest. Frank just accepts it, since he's been conditioned to accept this sort of intimacy without reservation - and this after David tells him affection is a voluntary thing!

All in all, I never felt like these characters would walk off the page and have lives after the end of the story - they only move when and if someone's actually reading the story. It needs more development and the characters need more character. ( )