Jillian Smith and Vittorio d'Severano were together for two weeks when Jill found out Vitt was part of a mob family. Coming from a mob family herself, she didn't want to be involved with anyone connected to organized crime, so she fled, found out she was pregnant, had his baby and changed her identity until twenty months later when Vitt showed up again. That was only the back story.

I had a hard time getting into this book because Jill came off as an idiot. We learnt early on that Jill and Vitt's separation was due to a misunderstand (ugh) on Jill's part. When she found out the d'Severano name was connected with the mafia, she did an internet search only on the family name and ran off with that. Jill makes a poor researcher if that was all the evidence she was going with. >_>

I also didn't understand Jill's thinking. In the first chapter, Vitt confronted Jill as she was standing by a cliff. Jill, for some reason, thought if she had to choose between tumbling off the cliff or going to Vitt, she'd choose the cliff because she'd be saving her child from the life of a mob. (Jill had made arrangements for a friend in Washington to adopt Joe in the event something happened to her.) Wait--wut? As Joe's father, wouldn't Vitt have a better case gaining custody of Joe???

Yea, this books was pretty flawed. The title and back cover talked about the hero's secret (which wasn't a secret at all because we learnt early on that he and his father had cut themselves from the family business), but I felt the story was more about the heroine's secret. The title and back cover would have made more sense if the reader only knew as much about Vitt as Jill did. But alas, that was not so~

So...these few details and the very pat ending annoyed and distracted me from this otherwise satisfying Presents, but don't let that stop you from reading it if these things don't bother you. It's been a while since I read a book with enough emotional punch to have my throat tighten and my eyes watering. ( )

I usually am not a big fan of mob/mafia related books, but that connection didn't bother me with A Dark Sicilian Secret. Jill and Vitt's families had mafia ties, but the story wasn't about the mafia, it was about Jill and Vitt, which made me happy. Vitt seemed really dangerous and evil when we first met him because all the reader got was Jill's point of view. But when the point of view changed to Vitt and we got to learn their whole past, I really started to like him. He is such a sweet and caring guy that I don't even know how Jill could have though he would have hurt her. Their baby Joe (I know, kind of a weird name for a baby) was so cute!! I thought that sometimes Jill acted a little bit stupid when it came to Vitt. No matter how hard Jill tried, she just couldn't seem to resist Vitt when he was near yet she kept on running away. When Vitt easily figured out Jill's past ties to the mafia, I thought that was a bit too easy for him to do, but hey, maybe someone really can have that many connections. I wish that we could have read about their past relationship instead of only being recapped on it, since this book wasn't all that long anyways, but it was still a cute, shorter read. I really enjoyed Jane Porter's writing and can't wait to find some more of her books to read! ( )