Book Review: It Ruins Me

Title: It Ruins Me
Author: Penelope Sky
Genre: Romance, Fiction, Crime

What It’s About: Axel and Scarlett continue to live together, and Scarlett does not allow herself to fall back in love with him fully. He has said I love you to her, and continues saying it to her, but she does not want to say it back to him. Axel goes to Dante asking him to come clean, and Dante in turn tells him that he won’t do it because he doesn’t want to lose his relationship with his daughter. At the same time, Dante reminds him what Axel revealing this information to Scarlett do to his own parents. So Axel gives him an ultimatum. Axel convinces Scarlett to open up a restaurant, and then they start looking around for a place—she wants to open up a hole-in-the wall, and he recommends that she open up a much larger space, which Theo backs up when she gets his opinion on her food.

Axel and Scarlett attend the birthday party of a Mayor that has known Axel since he was a young child, and they are having a good time, but suddenly Scarlett closes herself off, and that night, Axel finally tells her that he’s had enough. He reveals to her that he married her because he loved her and it was the only way to get her back after all the stuff that his father put him through. He asks her to promise him not to say anything or reveal anything to her father, and when she does, he goes on to tell her everything—that Dante had told him off, and that the night of the party, he looked at Scarlett for too long,and then Dante threatened his father to make him stay away from her, ultimately shooting his dad in the arm, and ending the potential for reconciliation between them. Scarlett doesn’t believe it and moves away from him, rejecting him. He tells her that she has to pick—either she believes him and stays, or she needs to leave, because he’s not going to do this.

Scarlett moves out that same night after he kicks her out and moves back into her old apartment, where she spends the next few days wallowing. Her dad comes by and tells her that if she truly loves Axel to go back to him and work it out, that it’s worth fighting for. Axel in the meantime is miserable and gets mad when his butler has Theo visit after not seeing Axel for three days because his butler, Aldo was worried about him. When Aldo lets him know that Scarlett is in the house, he goes to see her. She’s sad, but she doesn’t rush to him like he had hoped, with a passionate kiss. Instead she starts talking about how her dad advised her, to which Axel tells her to get the hell out of his house because he wants a relationship with her, not one that includes her dad making decisions on her part. He adds that she’s a mistake exactly like his first wife. She goes home and cries more, to the point that Dante ends up coming by to Axel’s house to try to convince him, but he does not budge on this, asking once again if he would tell Scarlett the truth. Dante denies his request, after asking if Axel would take her back if he did, to which Axel says no, and says that Scarlett deserves this truth.

Scarlett meets with her dad and asks him if he would give her a loan for her restaurant—having made it abundantly clear to him that she is not interested in running the family business. He does ask again, and she pushes it away, saying that she’s not interested. He says that he will think about it and get back to her. So Scarlett goes to the bank and gets a loan for the restaurant, which is enough for her to get the hole-in-the-wall that she had looked at. Her father comes by while she’s cooking in her apartment and tells her that he will lend her the money, to which she tells him that she already has gotten it. He doesn’t even finish the food that she made, and they get into an argument as to her working for him for cheap while he was running the drug business, hesitating to give her the money for her restaurant even though she’s made it explicitly clear that she has no intention of going back into it. He’s stunned by he words as she wonders whether he truly loves or is just in it for himself, and then tells him to leave and not come back. Then she wallows in her misery.

Axel in the meantime starts to put things in motion, and has his lawyer put together a divorce agreement. He goes out and meets with Theo instead, and they hang out talking about this, though Theo tries to reason with him about letting Scarlett go. Scarlett is home alone when she is served with the papers, and cries for a while in her house, before she heads over to her father’s. While there, her father’s butler stops her from going in too far, and then lets her father know. Dante comes out and holds her while she explains that she got served divorce papers, and he even reads the line of it, before just holding her and telling her that they will figure something out. Unfortunately, he tells her that he has a guest that has come a very far distance to see him, so he’s unable to drop it, and Scarlett leaves the house to her car, where she continues to cry really hard. She tries to drive away and then realizes that unfortunately, she does not have her keys as she left her bag and the papers inside her father’s house. So she goes back in to grab her stuff, and overhears her father talking to his friend, who mentions French wine and speaks with a slight French accent, that they paid the Colombians more money, and that now this guy has to kill both Axel and Theo and they can be business partners. She grabs the stuff, quietly leaves the house and goes straight to Axel.

In the foyer, Aldo tells her to wait and then goes up to Axel, before returning to tell her that Axel doesn’t want to see her. She demands to see him, and claims to not leave the place until she does see him. So she starts heading upstairs, with Aldo on her heels, and he leads her to believe that Axel may be entertaining another woman. Axel steps out in the hallway, and she calls him an asshole saying that if he’s moved on so fast from her, then maybe he really didn’t care about her at all. Axel is confused, but figures out that Aldo told her that he’s with someone and tells Aldo to pack his stuff and leave his position. He then catches up with Scarlett, grabs her and then takes her back into his room, throwing her on the mattress and asks her where is this woman that she was lead to believe that he was entertaining, and reveals that he is not seeing anyone. Scarlett tells him what she overheard at her father’s and tells him that she believes him now—that it’s all about her father’s business to him, and not so much interest about what she wants and what she wants to do. She tells him that she misses him and that she loves him, and he tells her that she doesn’t get to do this right now, before telling her to leave. She does, crying.

Axel speaks with Theo and tells him that Dante is going to double cross them, including the details of what Scarlett has told him, but explains that she didn’t get much more out of that because she wanted to be quiet. Theo asks him about Scarlett and Axel tells him that he’s done with her. Theo tells him that he finds that hard to believe because he’s acting like a bitter old man, and he wasn’t even that bitter when he got out of prison after two years. When Axel claims that he’s done chasing this woman, Theo asks him if he can take her out on a date as there was chemistry between them. Axel can’t believe he’s serious, but ultimately gives his blessing.

Scarlett is in her own house, when there’s a knock, and it’s Axel. They make up and end up having sex. The next morning, she makes breakfast and they have sex again. He keeps cutting her off when she asks him if he really wasn’t with anyone, and when she finally gets a word in edgewise, she tells him that she wasn’t accusing him. He apologizes to her. Scarlett ends up moving in with him, and he helps her get a new space for her restaurant, while simultaneously taking care of her hole-in-the wall restaurant. They start working on that, and he even fixes her a chandelier that the contractors messed up.

After avoiding her father for a while, she finally meets with him in a restaurant—Axel had told her to not continue ignoring her dad or else he will know something is up, and if anything, she can bring up that she overheard the information he said to his colleague about killing Axel. Scarlett had texted with her father here and there, letting him know that she and Axel are back together. SO Scarlett goes to dinner with her dad, and he can tell that she’s pissed with him. She explodes after he asks her what is wrong, and tells him thatcher had overheard that conversation about killing Axel, and says that if she hadn’t been in the right place and the right time, he would have taken away the love of her life and left her a widow. He promises her that he has never meddled in anything before, after explaining that it wouldn’t have mattered because it looked like Axel and her were heading for divorce, which makes Scarlett upset. She lashes out that she now wonders if the whole thing with Cassandra was also his fault; that maybe her dad did something to make Axel break up with her. She leaves the dinner and her father follows her at which point she just tells him to leave her alone for good. She tells Axel that he tried to justify that he would have killed him because she and he were divorcing.

Axel goes and talks to Dante and tells him that she has seen him for what he has done to her and the lies, and urges him to come clean to her. He promises Dante that if he does, he will try to steer Scarlett to forgive him, and that he will give Dante the business back—or at least his own portion of the business, with the understanding that Scarlett is to be nowhere near that stuff. Dante does come by Axel’s house, and tries to see Scarlett, but Axel sees him first, and then convinces her to come down. Dante explains himself to her and tries to apologize to him, but Scarlett is still hurt, telling him that he has been lying this whole time, and whether her mom was even the trough or not; that she can’t believes that he would do this to her and get in between her and someone who loves her and treats her like she’s his whole universe. Then he walks away with Axel to their bedroom.

They open her restaurant, and on opening night, her father visits with Hannah, his assistant. Scarlett goes to the restroom and when she comes out, she gets upset that Axel is speaking with her father instead of being by her side. She goes to bed short and resentful with him, but ultimately she melts. Theo wants to speak with Axel and talk about what to do with Dante, but Axel tells him that he’s going to give him the part of the business.

Later, while they’re relaxing in their bedroom, Aldo comes by (Axel had not fired him after all) and tells him „your father is here”. Which Scarlett takes to mean that it’s Dante, and says that she’s not interested in speaking to her father. Aldo corrects himself, and says that it’s Axel’s father that is the one who is downstairs. They’re both so confused, and Aldo does confirm it is indeed him, though it’s been a while since he saw the man. Axel goes down, and it is his dad, so they sit down. His father tells him that the man who shot him (Dante) came by and explained that Axel saved them despite them not talking and had to give up the person that he loved the most, because Dante coerced him to do that. He had told Axel’s parents taht he continued to protect them even after, which resulted in a lot of tension with his wife, the woman he loves, and that Dante even found evidence to exonerate him from the crimes that he was found guilty of. His father apologizes to him, and tells him that he would like to have a relationship with him, to which Axel tells him to just give him a hug, and they make up with his father telling him that he loves him, and Axel telling him that back. Axel explains all of this to Scarlett, and tells her that they are having dinner tomorrow night at her restaurant because they would love to meet her. That does happen, and Scarlett apologizes for her harsh words, to which her father in law says that they were deserved. Axel knows that his parents loved her.

He asks her to come with him to speak to her father—and they do, but Scarlett does not want to talk. Her father during the conversation with Axel explains how he found out about the evidence and the information and what he did to get his father to talk to him again. He also tells them that he’s given his portion of the business to Theo, and wishes him luck—he would much rather focus on family, relationships and other things in life and that Axel was right after all. Axel leaves Scarlett to speak to her dad, even after promising that she would not have to speak, and her dad speaks to her, to which she remains cold and says that she wants nothing to do with him.

That night, they go to bed, and something wakes her up. Axel realizes that they have an intruder in the house, and puts on the bulletproof vests, grabs guns, and then tells Scarlett to get into the safe room with a gun. Then he goes down the house trying, killing men with a knife while Aldo, his butler walks him through where his enemies are in the house. Scarlett in the meantime is freaking out, and calls the one person she can think of—her father. Ultimately, Axel has to surrender—there are too many people in his house, and faces Davon, the French guy who Dante had spoken to about taking out Theo and Axel. Davon wants to get Axel to call Theo over because he had tried to negotiate with Theo, but Theo had told him that he will not be giving anything over of the business. Axel is forced to call Theo, and Theo tells him that he’s coming when he realized how serious this is. In the meantime, Davon threatens Scarlett, which terrifies Axel, and then Scarlett shoots him in the shoulder. Chaos ensues as men bomb and even Dante shows up fighting with Davon, who ultimately escapes through the kitchen, with Theo on his heels. Dante embraces Scarlett and makes sure that she is fine, after which she goes back to cuddling with Axel.

Scarlett and Dante have lunch, and talk about his relationship with Hannah, his assistance. She also asks about her mother, and he says that he actually doesn’t know, but he’s sure he can use his connections to find her if Scarlett wanted to. In the end, Scarlett goes home to Axel, bringing food and he tells her that he’s booked them a honeymoon in Santorini, while the renovations happen to their house.

In the epilogue, Axel welcomes Theo into their house for a gender reveal party, and Theo brings diapers. Axel’s parents, and Dante and Hannah are there with a heavily pregnant Scarlett for the gender reveal party. Theo guesses it will be a boy, and he is s on the money, as when they cut cake, it turns out that it is blue. Scarlett and Axel talk to their guests, and while Scarlett is talking to Axels’ parents, Axel talks to Dante, who tells him that if he needs a babysitter, he can call him, and taht he did raise Scarlett on his own after all, and it turned out well, and that they are family after all.

My Thoughts: I absolutely love the ending for Axel and Scarlett! They’re one of my favorite couples in a while, but holy moly everything that they had to go through to get here, is insane—and it’s all because Scarlett’s father was greedy. What I did not expect was the fact that Dante would go and make amends with Axel’s parents, and that they would reconcile. That really melted my heart and I realized that Dante could change, so there’s definitely hope for him, and when Scarlett calls him to help with the attack, I figured that they would make things work out between themselves. Either way, this story keeps making me gush and I absolutely adore them!