The Alpha's Gamble

Mismatched Mates Series, Book 10

De: Eliot Grayson

Narrado por: Chris Chambers

Cut off from his family—and more importantly, the family fortune—Blake Castelli stakes his future on one last throw of the dice: he'll go to Las Vegas and use his line of credit at the Morrigan casino to replenish his bank account.

But the Morrigan's under new ownership. And while Blake doesn't remember handsome, arrogant Declan MacKenna from their ill-fated encounter ten years ago, Declan remembers him. And he wants payback.

Declan offers Blake a humiliating, degrading deal he has no choice but to take even though it's all kinds of wrong. While Blake may be an alpha werewolf, so is Declan—and he out-alphas Blake at every turn. Blake shouldn't enjoy what Declan does to him. He shouldn't crave things no alpha should ever accept. Declan's turned him into someone he doesn't recognize helpless, needy, and out of control.

Declan wants to keep hating Blake, but he can't. Blake wants to trust Declan, but that's impossible. When magical and mundane attacks threaten them both, Blake has nowhere to turn. If Declan doesn't realize his feelings run deeper than desire in time to save them both, they could lose everything . . . even their lives.

Contains mature themes.

©2023 Eliot Grayson (P)2023 Tantor

the best

I love love love this book so much i has to buy it and read it every week

LOVED the Irish Accent!

This is a really well-written enemies-to-lovers story with a believable reason for them to be enemies (or at least for Declan to feel justified in the offer he makes to Blake) and then Blake's redemption felt very believable too. And the alpha-on-alpha sex, sometimes hate sex and sometimes not-hate sex, was so hot! Please, let's find an Irish friend of Declan's and make him an MC for the next book!

OMG I really enjoyed Blake and Declan!

Chris Chambers has really grown on me, after experiencing his Irish accent I am all aglow with him now. The heat between Blake and Declan set me ablaze and although there were no mention of the first several couples in this series it didn't matter...."The Alpha's Gamble" definitely stands on it's own. Blake may have started out as an @.s.s.hole but his experience with Declan helped him to do some much needed soul searching...he's not completely useless, there is hope for him yet!

5 starz - I would listen again

Perfect combo

I cannot get enough of the combination of Eliot Grayson's characters and stories, and Chris Chambers' velvet voice. Declan's accent is the cherry on top.

Hard Read but still good

I have to agree that there were parts of this book that was hard for me to keep going with it but I wanted to see the hopefully good end which it was a good end but an odd one. if you don't want to read about technically extrortion that plays a fine line to sexual assault this isn't a book for you. its not ideal for me either but I did hope things would get better for them which it did. out of the whole series I think this was the hardest for me as SA is something I don't agree with but it was technically consensual as the one being extorted for sex did agree cause he didn't want to go to prison for fraud but he also was very messed up from family issues so it's hard for me to think he had really been okay with it at first. I did stick around cause I think all the books had hard to read parts but all really were great reads and made me keep going with the series. this one was definitely the hardest for me but I do still think it was worth it.

Is this a book about S/A turned to love??? Huh, What

This was a hate listen. Blake was an inconsiderate,neglected person. All the interaction from the previous book he is terrible but he’s a product of his family. Declan seemed to have been an honorable man except for his hate for Blake. I didn’t feel like Blake’s offense was equal to his punishment. Declan went to far.He could have made him work as a Bell boy. Yes, Blake agreed to the terms but underlying family issues is why he accepted being assaulted regularly. I hate that Blake’s mindset was bad attention is better than none, but at that point he didn’t have anyone to turn to. I don’t understand at all how Declan came to love Blake. He mistreated Blake for the entire book and this story doesn’t really give his pov. When he felt a little guilty he did small things , to make himself feel better. Even the ending he disrespects Blake and they both eat it up. The rings,the knotting. Bottom line. I hated this story and continued listening hoping Blake who grew as a person would have walked away from Declan and made up with his brother Brooke.

Two Alphas, Explosive Chemistry!

Blake Castelli and Declan MacKenna are both stubborn alphas, and watching them clash and slowly fall for each other was pure perfection. High‑stakes danger, family drama, and incredible chemistry made this impossible to stop listening to. Eliot Grayson delivers heat, heart, and humor every time—this might be my favorite yet!

the first part is so unbelievably fucked

First off, I love this series.

I’m only part way through but wanted to leave this review before getting onto the (hopefully) better part of the story

so the main character is illegally extorted into prostitution under the false premise that offender can just call the cops to ensure the main character’s supposed “consent” to said prostitution. also the main character is held against his will, which is the literal definition of kidnapping.

I can promise you human trafficking is a way way way worse charge than a supposed fraud charge. Bouncing a check isn’t a crime, it’s only a privately enforceable policy associated with a penalty or similar measure, not punishable by police.

also, debt owed is protected and the person who owes it is required to be given an amount of time to come up with the required funds, with legally appropriate penalties that are spaced out over time, with the final measures also being able to be dealt with by bankruptcy restructure. also I can guarantee you his family would have bailed him out and punished him some other, hopefully legal, way. I mean his brother is a good person and smart and could have worked something out that still allows for romance and personal growth

none of these come even close to the crime of extortion (on its own), extorting for sex, and kidnapping. that’s decades to life in prison level of incarceration, and it can be prosecuted after the fact by the person harmed. so even if the main character develops some stockholm syndrome type of relationship with the offender and even convinces himself that he is choosing what he is forced to do over time, that still does not legally qualifiable as consent.

so the main character can basically sue the offender after the fact for all he’s worth and then some, with a probable decades long prison sentence. this is the stupidest, most self destructive form of serving revenge i’ve ever seen.

now yes I know this is fiction, and I know that the story will move toward some form of happily ever after with character development, but the start of the path there is so so so unbelievably fucked and could easily could have set up the sexual encounters in a more co sensual, non-extorted manner. anyways I needed to get my chest. going to resume listening to the book and filter out just the parts that are so beyond fucked up and focus on the sex and overall plot

Blake hurts my heart in the worst and best of ways.

I’ll be honest and tell you guys that this is actually a really, really depressing read—which you’d be led to believe it should be anyway with the blurb; it’s considered a HEA but, really, it’s just heartbreaking.

I’m not understanding the insane jump from “you threw me a major setback in my career” to “so you’re going to be my knot-slave for the foreseeable future or I’ll toss you to the police because you did something much less revolting than the sexual coercion I’m currently involved in committing,” but I was willing to overlook it because it’s rare to find an Alpha/Alpha relationship that doesn’t make me roll my eyes with all the posturing from the Alpha that sees himself as less of an Alpha for bottoming, but Eliot Grayson did really well with not overdoing Blake’s Alpha attitude or underplaying it. I’m still super confused about why Blake did what he did when he’d never had a history of retaliation like that before, and I feel like Grayson had an easy opportunity to put Walter somewhere in the background that night to affect Blake, but they didn’t take the out.

Now, that said: This book is centered around rape, even though neither MC ever classifies it as such, I believe. The first instance of coercion was uncomfortable, but Blake’s first penetrative sexual experience being rape was something that really got driven home by Blake’s thoughts and the conversation afterward.

*

Would this have been comforting if he’d been someone I liked and trusted? Maybe. But as he’d told me, I’d never find out, so it didn’t matter.

*

“I didn’t think you noticed anything past your own knot.” He went even tenser, and I added, “Bodies respond to physical stimulus. That doesn’t mean I liked it.”

“Do you want me to prove you wrong, or do you want to admit you’re wrong right now and save us both the trouble?” Heat rushed to my cheeks and I went stiff in his arms. Admit I was— But he cut off my gathering tirade by saying, “You know what, never mind. I don’t care if you liked it or not. I didn’t injure you, and you agreed to do this. Beyond that, I don’t give a fuck about your feelings or your virginity or anything else about you.”

*

I stared at the wall, keeping my eyes wide open and unblinking. If I closed them, if I gave them a chance to, they’d start leaking, I knew it. I could feel the moisture right there, all ready to gather and fall.


*

Jesus Christ, just cleave my chest open and take my heart, Blake. He’s turned basically into a prisoner/sex slave overnight, unable to leave the hotel/casino/room at different intervals, and he’s left alone with his thoughts more often than not. He’s fed lines of “you deserve this because you’re a terrible person and a weak Alpha” from Declan, bookended by the man being kind to others and not him, so he must deserve this… right? Fuck me up, Eliot Grayson, I hate it. (I love it.)

…well, maybe I could convince Declan to give me a chance. A real chance, not the fucked-up blackmail-and-sex-and-occasional-spreadsheets limbo we’d been existing in. Or even just convince him to keep me around as his sex toy. I’d take it. Not too likely that it’d work, but if I held on to that faint idea of a future, it could keep me going.

Excuse me? Excuse me? Ouch. Ohmygod. Ow. And then my boy throws me this heartbreaking garbage:

“I do love you,” I choked out. “Whether or not you can love me, I do. Love you.” The shower hammered down, nearly drowning out the words if he hadn’t had a shifter’s enhanced hearing. I was so glad he was behind me and couldn’t see my face; if I’d had to meet his eyes to say this, I’d never have been able to get it out. I knew I was stumbling over my words anyway, repeating myself, unable to convey the clarity I felt inside. “Maybe I deserved what you did. And— I’ve seen you the way you really are. And I love you. So if you can’t love me, that’s all ri—”

WHAT? WHAT?! So we’re to our supposed HEA, except:

*

Gods, Declan had wanted to mate me.

Fuck. And he’d changed his mind.

By the time the door of the suite thumped shut behind us, I’d started to hyperventilate so badly my vision blurred.

*

And:

*

I’d been so confident, so determined to give Declan a piece of my mind, tell him what I wanted from him. But even if he hadn’t rethought his desire to mate me for any particular reason, knowing that he’d been waffling about this decision for such a long time made me feel so small, so insignificant. So unworthy.

*

Christ, God, Jesus, Joseph, Mary and the little lamb. It’s just so painful, even when it’s supposed to be the happily ever after, because Blake’s thoughts about himself never change, and Declan never really apologizes or grovels on-page for Blake’s forgiveness, but Blake loves Declan and wants anything Declan will offer to him. It hurts so much, and I love it.

At first, I was a little annoyed by this novel not having alternating POVs just because I’ve grown used to seeing nothing except those in MM romances, but I definitely feel that this would have suffered like a lot of others I’ve read, if it had been done that way. I’d absolutely be down for an entire book in Declan’s POV, if Eliot Grayson ever had the wild desire to fulfill my dreams.

I read the book first to break my heart in print form, then bought the audiobook to let Chris Chambers soothe the pain with his voice. 5/5, 10/10, all the stars.

Should have been a stand alone book

Chris Chambers' drunk narration was perfect and his accent was fun to listen to. The story does not connect to the original ones from the series. Can say it's in the same world but it doesn't interact with our OG guys.