I DO understand why so many people love this book, I do. However, I just never found myself enjoying this book. 
 I adore Linda Howard's writing very much, and the strength of her writing was evident here. But where I usually find myself caring about her characters, and especially her talent for beautiful romance, I never truly got into the story. The pace was great, and the suspenseful story line was well thought out, and more interesting to me than some of her others. 
 I think the story as a whole was just too dark and emotional for me. It was all handled in a very real way, and I was very impressed with Milla, but I didn't enjoy the constant sadness and anger and pain. It was too tough for me. 
 Where I normally would turn to the romantic portion of the story for more enjoyment, I found this to be my least favorite LH romance so far. I never could get over the fact that Milla was totally okay with her attraction to a man that SHE THOUGHT WAS AN ASSASSIN. Seriously, that bugged me the whole story. And I never found Diaz to be that appealing; I found him unrelatable and uninteresting. Their chemistry was strange to me, as well as their sexual encounters. 
 If you enjoy LH and are okay with darker, sadder stories, clearly there are plenty of people out there who love this book, and you might, too.