SIMPLE FAITH (The Pagano Brothers Book #1) by SUSAN FANETTI

His head dropped to hers, and he held her. “I’ve got you,” he soothed. “It’s okay. You’re okay.”

We just popped our Susan Fanetti cherry and it was everything we hoped it would be, and we’ve now found another ‘go to’ Mafia Romance author! Simple Faith is a gripping raw story with a beautifully aching love story, which despite being a Mafia romance, had an innocent sweetness about it, due mostly to sweet and broken Lara Dumas. This character was written brilliantly by Susan Fanetti. It would’ve been so easy for Lara’s character to have come across a little cold and detached, but not so the way this author developed this vulnerable yet strong woman. Lara broke us and inspired us, she fascinated us and enamoured us with her childlike qualities.

“Don’t surprise me, Trey Pagano. If you want me to be okay, don’t surprise me.”

Simple Faith is a spin-off from the Pagano Family series and whilst we read it as a standalone and followed it perfectly, we would love to read that series at some point because this family has a lot of stories we’re desperate to hear! Susan Fanetti is one gifted and entertaining storyteller, that’s for sure!

“It’s faith, Trey. Simple faith.”

Twenty Five-year-old Trey Pagano is the nephew of Nick Pagano, the revered, feared and respected don of the Pagano Brothers, a powerful underworld Mafioso family and the central seat of the New England Council of Five families. Trey has jumped the ranks to the ‘liaison’ at his uncles’ request, being the first contact for those seeking counsel with don Pagano, and it’s a  position that rankles the men on the lower rungs of the business.

Thirty-three-year-old, Lara Dumas, is a cryptologist for the Pagano Brothers. She’s loved and respected by Nick Pagano, entrusted with encrypting the family’s data and deciphering encryptions from rival companies. Sending a message to Nick and Lara’s father, the Bondaruks, a Ukranian organisation kidnap and horrifically attack Lara in a move that sends the Pagano family into revenge mode.

‘He was a Mafioso who carried a gun, and she was afraid to leave the block she lived on.’

For her protection, Nick asks Trey accompany Lara to a cabin in West Virginia to keep watch over her whilst they exact revenge on the Bondaruks. Trey hesitantly agrees and is pre-warned of Lara’s ‘oddities’ which are in fact coping mechanisms she has acquired after her painful and harrowing childhood. What this poor girl had endured in her lifetime broke our hearts. There was an almost ethereal goodness to Lara and her pain was our pain, she endeared us to her immediately. Lara was such a sad character yet she was every bit the fighter, a true warrior who deserved nothing but happiness and boy did we will that for her!

‘If this was what love was, she understood why people said they fell into it. That was the feeling she had – of having gone over a cliff into a chasm with no floor.’

All Lara wanted was to feel safe, to feel some form of normalcy in her chaotic head, and in a little cabin in West Virginia with Trey Pagano, whose sweetness towards Lara was so heart-warming,  she found her little bit of safety as she convalesced after her sickening ordeal at the hands of the Ukrainians.

‘He was younger but more experienced. She was older but more broken. Maybe they met in the middle somewhere.’

We felt every moment as Lara and Trey’s feelings for one another grew. Much ensued during their time in the cabin and after they return home where Lara is forced to face her demons, and Trey has to prove himself worthy to his uncle. The love between Trey and Lara was beautiful, sweet, honest and heartfelt, and only time would tell if Lara can assimilate into Trey’s world. In doing so, Lara would have to go against every instinct she possesses to instill herself into Treys large, gregarious and demonstrative family. Can Lara overcome her demons, and evade the danger you feel is lurking menacingly in the background? We urge you to 1Click and find out, you won’t be sorry!

‘Damn. When she was really into something, all her demons calm and quiet, and she was simply happy, damn, she was so fucking beautiful.’

**Simple Faith releases tomorrow 14th July