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Past Passion
At eighteen, Nicola had made a terrible mistake and eight years later is still punishing herself for her folly. But her shameful secret comes full circle when Matt Hunt walks back into her life — as her new boss. Not that Matt recognizes the assured, controlled businesswoman as the girl who had shared his bed for one brief night.Her dread of discovery attacks her frail self-control. But so does Nicola's consuming need for the man who has haunted her dreams for so long. What will she do when Matt, inevitably, recognizes her...?
288 pages, Hardcover
First published February 14, 1992
21 people are currently reading
93 people want to read
About the author
Penny Jordan
1,125 books666 followersPenelope Jones Halsall
aka Caroline Courtney, Annie Groves, Lydia Hitchcock, Melinda Wright
Penelope "Penny" Jones was born on November 24, 1946 at about seven pounds in a nursing home in Preston, Lancashire, England. She was the first child of Anthony Winn Jones, an engineer, who died at 85, and his wife Margaret Louise Groves Jones. She has a brother, Anthony, and a sister, Prudence "Pru".
She had been a keen reader from the childhood - her mother used to leave her in the children's section of their local library whilst she changed her father's library books. She was a storyteller long before she began to write romantic fiction. At the age of eight, she was creating serialized bedtime stories, featuring make-believe adventures, for her younger sister Prue, who was always the heroine. At eleven, she fell in love with Mills & Boon, and with their heroes. In those days the books could only be obtained via private lending libraries, and she quickly became a devoted fan; she was thrilled to bits when the books went on full sale in shops and she could have them for keeps.
Penny left grammar school in Rochdale with O-Levels in English Language, English Literature and Geography. She first discovered Mills & Boon books, via a girl she worked with. She married Steve Halsall, an accountant and a "lovely man", who smoked and drank too heavily, and suffered oral cancer with bravery and dignity. Her husband bought her the small electric typewriter on which she typed her first novels, at a time when he could ill afford it. He died at the beginning of 21st century.
She earned a living as a writer since the 1970s when, as a shorthand typist, she entered a competition run by the Romantic Novelists' Association. Although she didn't win, Penny found an agent who was looking for a new Georgette Heyer. She published four regency novels as Caroline Courtney, before changing her nom de plume to Melinda Wright for three air-hostess romps and then she wrote two thrillers as Lydia Hitchcock. Soon after that, Mills and Boon accepted her first novel for them, Falcon's Prey as Penny Jordan. However, for her more historical romance novels, she adopted her mother's maiden-name to become Annie Groves. Almost 70 of her 167 Mills and Boon novels have been sold worldwide.
Penny Halsall lived in a neo-Georgian house in Nantwich, Cheshire, with her Alsatian Sheba and cat Posh. She worked from home, in her kitchen, surrounded by her pets, and welcomed interruptions from her friends and family.
aka Caroline Courtney, Annie Groves, Lydia Hitchcock, Melinda Wright
Penelope "Penny" Jones was born on November 24, 1946 at about seven pounds in a nursing home in Preston, Lancashire, England. She was the first child of Anthony Winn Jones, an engineer, who died at 85, and his wife Margaret Louise Groves Jones. She has a brother, Anthony, and a sister, Prudence "Pru".
She had been a keen reader from the childhood - her mother used to leave her in the children's section of their local library whilst she changed her father's library books. She was a storyteller long before she began to write romantic fiction. At the age of eight, she was creating serialized bedtime stories, featuring make-believe adventures, for her younger sister Prue, who was always the heroine. At eleven, she fell in love with Mills & Boon, and with their heroes. In those days the books could only be obtained via private lending libraries, and she quickly became a devoted fan; she was thrilled to bits when the books went on full sale in shops and she could have them for keeps.
Penny left grammar school in Rochdale with O-Levels in English Language, English Literature and Geography. She first discovered Mills & Boon books, via a girl she worked with. She married Steve Halsall, an accountant and a "lovely man", who smoked and drank too heavily, and suffered oral cancer with bravery and dignity. Her husband bought her the small electric typewriter on which she typed her first novels, at a time when he could ill afford it. He died at the beginning of 21st century.
She earned a living as a writer since the 1970s when, as a shorthand typist, she entered a competition run by the Romantic Novelists' Association. Although she didn't win, Penny found an agent who was looking for a new Georgette Heyer. She published four regency novels as Caroline Courtney, before changing her nom de plume to Melinda Wright for three air-hostess romps and then she wrote two thrillers as Lydia Hitchcock. Soon after that, Mills and Boon accepted her first novel for them, Falcon's Prey as Penny Jordan. However, for her more historical romance novels, she adopted her mother's maiden-name to become Annie Groves. Almost 70 of her 167 Mills and Boon novels have been sold worldwide.
Penny Halsall lived in a neo-Georgian house in Nantwich, Cheshire, with her Alsatian Sheba and cat Posh. She worked from home, in her kitchen, surrounded by her pets, and welcomed interruptions from her friends and family.
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Displaying 1 - 23 of 23 reviews
April 21, 2018
Re Past Passion - It is now June of 1994 in HPlandia and we get PJ HP Plus with extra PJness!
Grab extra hankies and some Tim Tams, PJ is doing what she does best, super duper inner h wrecki angst with big side of PJcolada emo drama.
It all starts with Nikki, our 26 yr old h who currently lives at home with her parents in the English Midlands. Nikki is a very nice, quiet and quite emotionally fraught girl who is practically running her boss's construction company in the wake of his beloved son's death and disinterestedly dating Mommy Boy Gordon.
Gordon is a true boringist jelly blobule at the very heights of insipidy. But Nikki dates him and his staid, orderly, anxious-to-help-his-controlling-mommy self to feel safe. Nikki's main worry is that she has a dark, hidden streak of moral laxity and she thinks she needs to surround her self in boringist beige innocuousness to keep a handle on her really horrible, deep dark pit of moral dilapidation.
In fact, poor darling Nikki spends a lot of pages in this book torturing herself and the angst she feels is absolutely exquisite, if you are a connoisseur of that. And it all started eight years earlier when Nikki made a break from the home village and took herself off to the bright lights of London.
(So you can imagine my trepidation as I approached the reveal of Nikki's Big Seekrit. I was expecting something along the lines of a roofied Nikki waking up to doing lascivious acts with the entire English Rugby Team in a Prince video destined for 24 hourly broadcast.)
Fortunately PJ never watches MTV or Prince, so that did not happen. But what did happen is that Nikki liked a guy at the place she worked and he seemed to like her back. But then she heard him putting the moves on another, more accommodating woman and Nikki's homespun country girl image was firmly desparaged in distaste.
So Nikki invested some time and got herself some video vamp big hair, a lot of neon striped eye shadow and a hot, clingy, let's go clubbing outfit. She took herself to a party where the unworthy snot snarker was flaunting his OW and she was going to show him just what he was giving up. But she never got a look in on the snot snarker Jonathan, cause adorable, manly, handsome hunk Matt was there and it was instant magnetic attraction.
Unfortunately being a nice girl, Nikki never had the opportunity to go practice keggers while doing her leaving certificate and she had never heard of a Captain consult. Nikki was pounding the G&T's like there was gonna be a ban on them and Matt became worried, cause darling Nikki was completely plastered.
So Matt took her home to keep her safe, cause he can see under the neon shaded black cut eye liner makeup that Nikki is just an innocent baby really. Matt only had one bed tho and he had to go on a big business trip the next day. So in a facsimile of PJ's legendary sponging episodes, Matt tucked Nikki up in his bed and when she groggily woke up, Matt strongly implied that they had a major lurve club event and sweet little Nikki is HORRIFIED.
She wakes the next morning to the Hangover from Hell and Matt feeling her up, cause darling Nikki is just too tempting to even try to resist. Nikki is even more horrified when she touches HIS MANLY THING! And tho Matt plans to give her a little big brother Safety in the City lecture and explain nothing happened, he gets a distracting phone call and Nikki takes her chance to escape and runs out.
When she gets to work Snot Snarker Jonathan gets mad cause she will have a one night stand with Matt and won't even look at his sub-sewer gulping self. So Snot Snarker spreads it all around the office that Nikki is a tarty trampy Harlot of the Midlands and with more club sandwich take out options than a 24 hour deli, to the other worker's supposed fascinated titillation.
Well Nikki is horrified, mortified and a lot of other fied words and can't stand the notoriety. She hightails it back to the family nest, tortures herself for eight years over her Tarty Mc Tartiness and decides that she can never marry or have a real relationship, cause how can she possibly explain to her future spouse that she is a closet Harlot Nympho just waiting to leap out. Mommy Boy Gordon is exhibited for show only, mainly cause Gordon is too busy serving his mommy to expect Nikki to put out.
Then Nikki's boss sells the company and three guesses as to who the new owner is? Yep, Nikki and Matt are together again, but Nikki found Marc Jacobs and Donna Karan and doesn't look anything like the baby video vamp he spent the night with eight years earlier.
So Matt doesn't recognize Nikki and poor darling Nikki is torn between mortification that her big promiscuous past is about to revealed and utter chagrin that the man doesn't even remember her.
Nikki and Matt have to work together and Matt is really kind and considerate and very comforting when Nikki cries a lot from the all tension working with Matt generates in her rapidly weakening knees. Mommy Boy Gordon is dumped when he cancels picking Nikki up from work to get her car from the mechanic shop and then he blows off Nikki's friend's dinner party invitation to help his mommy pouf her bouffant hairstyle.
It is okay tho, cause Matt is right there to help Nikki out and soon Nikki is massively in love with Matt. This only increases the angst tho, cause how can Nikki bear to share who she really is when Matt will probably berate her and discard her for being a promiscuous, trampy Harlot? Why Matt might be so disgusted he denounces her in Public Service Announcements to the entire Midlands and she will have to leave her home and her parents will despise her and things will just be horrible.
But PJ likes to pile on the frustrated waiting angst, so we get some more of Matt and Nikki doing office things instead and then Matt gets jealous when his new manager looks like he is going to start making goo-goo eyes at Nikki. Nikki can only see Matt of course, but for some reason she is totally missing that Matt is making big, huge, gigantic I love you heart goo-goo eyes back. (I think Nikki needed to get her vision checked.)
PJ finally gets Nikki and Matt off alone together when Tim injures himself on a job site and Nikki has to be his stand-in at a non-local conference. Nikki and Matt travel together and the conference starts out okay in a really posh hotel. Then Snob Snarker Jonathan makes his guest re-appearance at dinner.
He immediately recognizes both Nikki and Matt and lets loose with a nasty mouthed spew of Nikki's tarty tartiness and how Matt must be getting a through lurve clubbing in with such an shameless, but stuck up piece of totty. Matt is shocked and Nikki runs out crying.
Matt tells Snob Snarker Jonathan a few home truths and Jonathan looks scared as he fades into the HPlandia mists. Then Matt goes to find Nikki. Matt finds Nikki packing and he takes her to a nice, even posher, but cozy little boutique hotel and we finally get to sort things out. Matt explains that he did try to find Nikki all those years ago, but she had left London with no forwarding address and he figured she figured out nothing happened and that she learned a valuable lesson in drunken pick ups.
Nikki has to explain that she has been living in a mental nunnery most of the last decade, cause she can't be trusted not to turn into a ravening nymphomaniac at the drop of hat. Matt is overwhelmed with rueful affection as Nikki finally realizes there is a reason all those unicorns have been following her around and asking for pettings for all these years, she thought they just felt sorry for her.
Nikki's need for manly comfort soon leads to manly Matt and blissful Nikki passions and Nikki is fully on board with the big lurve mojo purple pink bliss moment when we finally get there. Nikki is embarrassed the next morning, but Matt is ready to beg for the love of Nikki so she will stay with him always, cause he loves her madly.
Nikki is overjoyed, cause she loves Matt just as madly back and we leave darling Nikki and Matt kissing in the room above the hotel lobby for the lead up to their own private Prince video and another pink sparkly rainbow unicorn studded PJ patented HPlandia HEA.
Grab extra hankies and some Tim Tams, PJ is doing what she does best, super duper inner h wrecki angst with big side of PJcolada emo drama.
It all starts with Nikki, our 26 yr old h who currently lives at home with her parents in the English Midlands. Nikki is a very nice, quiet and quite emotionally fraught girl who is practically running her boss's construction company in the wake of his beloved son's death and disinterestedly dating Mommy Boy Gordon.
Gordon is a true boringist jelly blobule at the very heights of insipidy. But Nikki dates him and his staid, orderly, anxious-to-help-his-controlling-mommy self to feel safe. Nikki's main worry is that she has a dark, hidden streak of moral laxity and she thinks she needs to surround her self in boringist beige innocuousness to keep a handle on her really horrible, deep dark pit of moral dilapidation.
In fact, poor darling Nikki spends a lot of pages in this book torturing herself and the angst she feels is absolutely exquisite, if you are a connoisseur of that. And it all started eight years earlier when Nikki made a break from the home village and took herself off to the bright lights of London.
(So you can imagine my trepidation as I approached the reveal of Nikki's Big Seekrit. I was expecting something along the lines of a roofied Nikki waking up to doing lascivious acts with the entire English Rugby Team in a Prince video destined for 24 hourly broadcast.)
Fortunately PJ never watches MTV or Prince, so that did not happen. But what did happen is that Nikki liked a guy at the place she worked and he seemed to like her back. But then she heard him putting the moves on another, more accommodating woman and Nikki's homespun country girl image was firmly desparaged in distaste.
So Nikki invested some time and got herself some video vamp big hair, a lot of neon striped eye shadow and a hot, clingy, let's go clubbing outfit. She took herself to a party where the unworthy snot snarker was flaunting his OW and she was going to show him just what he was giving up. But she never got a look in on the snot snarker Jonathan, cause adorable, manly, handsome hunk Matt was there and it was instant magnetic attraction.
Unfortunately being a nice girl, Nikki never had the opportunity to go practice keggers while doing her leaving certificate and she had never heard of a Captain consult. Nikki was pounding the G&T's like there was gonna be a ban on them and Matt became worried, cause darling Nikki was completely plastered.
So Matt took her home to keep her safe, cause he can see under the neon shaded black cut eye liner makeup that Nikki is just an innocent baby really. Matt only had one bed tho and he had to go on a big business trip the next day. So in a facsimile of PJ's legendary sponging episodes, Matt tucked Nikki up in his bed and when she groggily woke up, Matt strongly implied that they had a major lurve club event and sweet little Nikki is HORRIFIED.
She wakes the next morning to the Hangover from Hell and Matt feeling her up, cause darling Nikki is just too tempting to even try to resist. Nikki is even more horrified when she touches HIS MANLY THING! And tho Matt plans to give her a little big brother Safety in the City lecture and explain nothing happened, he gets a distracting phone call and Nikki takes her chance to escape and runs out.
When she gets to work Snot Snarker Jonathan gets mad cause she will have a one night stand with Matt and won't even look at his sub-sewer gulping self. So Snot Snarker spreads it all around the office that Nikki is a tarty trampy Harlot of the Midlands and with more club sandwich take out options than a 24 hour deli, to the other worker's supposed fascinated titillation.
Well Nikki is horrified, mortified and a lot of other fied words and can't stand the notoriety. She hightails it back to the family nest, tortures herself for eight years over her Tarty Mc Tartiness and decides that she can never marry or have a real relationship, cause how can she possibly explain to her future spouse that she is a closet Harlot Nympho just waiting to leap out. Mommy Boy Gordon is exhibited for show only, mainly cause Gordon is too busy serving his mommy to expect Nikki to put out.
Then Nikki's boss sells the company and three guesses as to who the new owner is? Yep, Nikki and Matt are together again, but Nikki found Marc Jacobs and Donna Karan and doesn't look anything like the baby video vamp he spent the night with eight years earlier.
So Matt doesn't recognize Nikki and poor darling Nikki is torn between mortification that her big promiscuous past is about to revealed and utter chagrin that the man doesn't even remember her.
Nikki and Matt have to work together and Matt is really kind and considerate and very comforting when Nikki cries a lot from the all tension working with Matt generates in her rapidly weakening knees. Mommy Boy Gordon is dumped when he cancels picking Nikki up from work to get her car from the mechanic shop and then he blows off Nikki's friend's dinner party invitation to help his mommy pouf her bouffant hairstyle.
It is okay tho, cause Matt is right there to help Nikki out and soon Nikki is massively in love with Matt. This only increases the angst tho, cause how can Nikki bear to share who she really is when Matt will probably berate her and discard her for being a promiscuous, trampy Harlot? Why Matt might be so disgusted he denounces her in Public Service Announcements to the entire Midlands and she will have to leave her home and her parents will despise her and things will just be horrible.
But PJ likes to pile on the frustrated waiting angst, so we get some more of Matt and Nikki doing office things instead and then Matt gets jealous when his new manager looks like he is going to start making goo-goo eyes at Nikki. Nikki can only see Matt of course, but for some reason she is totally missing that Matt is making big, huge, gigantic I love you heart goo-goo eyes back. (I think Nikki needed to get her vision checked.)
PJ finally gets Nikki and Matt off alone together when Tim injures himself on a job site and Nikki has to be his stand-in at a non-local conference. Nikki and Matt travel together and the conference starts out okay in a really posh hotel. Then Snob Snarker Jonathan makes his guest re-appearance at dinner.
He immediately recognizes both Nikki and Matt and lets loose with a nasty mouthed spew of Nikki's tarty tartiness and how Matt must be getting a through lurve clubbing in with such an shameless, but stuck up piece of totty. Matt is shocked and Nikki runs out crying.
Matt tells Snob Snarker Jonathan a few home truths and Jonathan looks scared as he fades into the HPlandia mists. Then Matt goes to find Nikki. Matt finds Nikki packing and he takes her to a nice, even posher, but cozy little boutique hotel and we finally get to sort things out. Matt explains that he did try to find Nikki all those years ago, but she had left London with no forwarding address and he figured she figured out nothing happened and that she learned a valuable lesson in drunken pick ups.
Nikki has to explain that she has been living in a mental nunnery most of the last decade, cause she can't be trusted not to turn into a ravening nymphomaniac at the drop of hat. Matt is overwhelmed with rueful affection as Nikki finally realizes there is a reason all those unicorns have been following her around and asking for pettings for all these years, she thought they just felt sorry for her.
Nikki's need for manly comfort soon leads to manly Matt and blissful Nikki passions and Nikki is fully on board with the big lurve mojo purple pink bliss moment when we finally get there. Nikki is embarrassed the next morning, but Matt is ready to beg for the love of Nikki so she will stay with him always, cause he loves her madly.
Nikki is overjoyed, cause she loves Matt just as madly back and we leave darling Nikki and Matt kissing in the room above the hotel lobby for the lead up to their own private Prince video and another pink sparkly rainbow unicorn studded PJ patented HPlandia HEA.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
October 20, 2021
“Past Passion” is the story of Nicola and Matt.
The heroine is a sedate woman, dating a boring man and keeping her emotions under a wrap. Many years ago, her impulsive nature had scarred her and now she’s afraid of building intimacies.
Now when her new boss turns out to be THE man from her past, she is scared that he would remember her. But he doesn’t, and slowly she finds herself falling for him. But what will happen when he does..
It was kinda silly that the hero made the heroine believe what he did, because of which she shied away from intimacies. He does realize his folly though. Their chemistry was average, minimal angst but we did get an on page lovemaking scene.
An ok read!
Swe/ safe for me
3/5
The heroine is a sedate woman, dating a boring man and keeping her emotions under a wrap. Many years ago, her impulsive nature had scarred her and now she’s afraid of building intimacies.
Now when her new boss turns out to be THE man from her past, she is scared that he would remember her. But he doesn’t, and slowly she finds herself falling for him. But what will happen when he does..
It was kinda silly that the hero made the heroine believe what he did, because of which she shied away from intimacies. He does realize his folly though. Their chemistry was average, minimal angst but we did get an on page lovemaking scene.
An ok read!
Swe/ safe for me
3/5
September 30, 2021
This is another one where the heroine acts as if she murdered a family of 10, including babies, grannies, neighbours plus their pets (that is really unforgivable).
When she was a teenager she flirted with the hero, an older and more mature man, and went with his hotel room because she was completely drunk.
When she woke up the day after, in his bed, the hero pretended they had sex, just to tech her a lesson, and then went to have a shower, thinking to tell her the truth afterwards, since he considered her as one of his younger sisters and wanted her to realize how dangerous was to drink and hook up with a complete stranger.
The heroine though left before he could explain and after suffering slut-shaming by her collegues who saw her going away with the hero, changed city and job.
Years later the hero is back and has become her boss. The heroine of course has become a frozen maiden since she's too ashamed of what she thinks she did years before with him (I know it's sound as if it's a victorian romance) and she doesn't want to have sex with anyone, because how could she ever explain why she's not a virgin (why should she ever explain it I wonder???) to a potential husband?
Meh.
The hero doesn't recognize her but she does, and while he's very attracted to her, she rejects him constantly because of what she thinks she did with him, until he's frustrated and doesn't understand what he has to make her hate him so.
When they meet the man who saw her with the hero and slut shamed her on her previous job, and he makes some nasty remarks about her, the hero understands who she is and explains to her the truth.
The man is really in love with her, and he's really a nice guy for PJ's standard, even at their first meeting he's not nasty, he's very understanding and caring, treating her as a lil sister.
The heroine is usually martyr who crucify herself for a phantomatic unforgivable sin.
So, very much useless angst but very nice book too.
When she was a teenager she flirted with the hero, an older and more mature man, and went with his hotel room because she was completely drunk.
When she woke up the day after, in his bed, the hero pretended they had sex, just to tech her a lesson, and then went to have a shower, thinking to tell her the truth afterwards, since he considered her as one of his younger sisters and wanted her to realize how dangerous was to drink and hook up with a complete stranger.
The heroine though left before he could explain and after suffering slut-shaming by her collegues who saw her going away with the hero, changed city and job.
Years later the hero is back and has become her boss. The heroine of course has become a frozen maiden since she's too ashamed of what she thinks she did years before with him (I know it's sound as if it's a victorian romance) and she doesn't want to have sex with anyone, because how could she ever explain why she's not a virgin (why should she ever explain it I wonder???) to a potential husband?
Meh.
The hero doesn't recognize her but she does, and while he's very attracted to her, she rejects him constantly because of what she thinks she did with him, until he's frustrated and doesn't understand what he has to make her hate him so.
When they meet the man who saw her with the hero and slut shamed her on her previous job, and he makes some nasty remarks about her, the hero understands who she is and explains to her the truth.
The man is really in love with her, and he's really a nice guy for PJ's standard, even at their first meeting he's not nasty, he's very understanding and caring, treating her as a lil sister.
The heroine is usually martyr who crucify herself for a phantomatic unforgivable sin.
So, very much useless angst but very nice book too.
July 6, 2020
Lukewarm, just like the hero.
Matt disappointed me with the damage he'd inflicted upon the very innocent and sensitive Nicola. Maybe I shouldn't blame Matt. Maybe Nicola should have just grown a tougher shell. At the end of the day though, it wasn't Matt's place to do what he did (see spoiler below). Nicola really suffered and it probably could have been avoided if Matt hadn't decided to play judge, jury, and executioner.
For her part, Nicola was way too hard on herself for having had casual sex with Matt when she was a very young 18.
Eight years later Nicola has never forgiven herself for her "wanton" behavior. She's constantly afraid Matt will recognize her in his role as her new boss, which he ends up doing. In Matt's favor, he's remorseful after hearing Nicola tell him how their past incident affected her so negatively that she couldn't engage in any intimate relationships because of guilt and shame. They declare their feelings in a neatly wrapped resolution and achieve their happy ending.
Matt disappointed me with the damage he'd inflicted upon the very innocent and sensitive Nicola. Maybe I shouldn't blame Matt. Maybe Nicola should have just grown a tougher shell. At the end of the day though, it wasn't Matt's place to do what he did (see spoiler below). Nicola really suffered and it probably could have been avoided if Matt hadn't decided to play judge, jury, and executioner.
For her part, Nicola was way too hard on herself for having had casual sex with Matt when she was a very young 18.
Eight years later Nicola has never forgiven herself for her "wanton" behavior. She's constantly afraid Matt will recognize her in his role as her new boss, which he ends up doing. In Matt's favor, he's remorseful after hearing Nicola tell him how their past incident affected her so negatively that she couldn't engage in any intimate relationships because of guilt and shame. They declare their feelings in a neatly wrapped resolution and achieve their happy ending.
January 27, 2016
some parts were boring not much interaction between H and h :(
October 28, 2025
2.5 ⭐️
I’d never be one to rate anything from Penny Jordan so low but there wasn’t any other option here.
Nicola is a nice girl and minds her own business at work. She also lives in severe self purgation for almost 10 years now of denying herself love or pleasure in any way at all. Her work bf is more invested in serving his mother and seems to cancel out on their dates all the time, preferring to spend time with his mother.
All’s well until the h’s boss announces that he’s sold out to some other man. Not many jobs are available in their small village so the h has to adapt to a new work relationship with the new boss. The new boss is no one other than the H from the h’s past. The man who ruined her (not) and let her believe that she’d had a ONS with him and left her to office gossip.
Ten years ago the h was interested in someone from her work place but he was playing her so she attends an office party and to save face from being rejected by him, she flirts with another man (the H) and goes home with him. Next morning the H lets on to the h that they slept together. She makes a runner and back at work gives in her notice. All because the co-worker she was interested in makes a jibe at her how she’s cheap and readily available for sleeping around but acts like a prude.
Tbh it wasn’t much that the man had said but the h lives like it was the biggest crime she had committed. If anything, the h’s parents were easy going and encouraged her to date and get married to a man who deserved her but the h preferred to live in misery and self atonement for a non-crime that hadn’t happened.
This martyr life was like a black cloud in this work place romance and so the romance ceased to exist. The h would over think any possible scenario of a possible relationship with her current boss (the H) and be terrified that he would recall who she was from 10 years ago.
The current boss is the same man who said they had a ONS but they didn’t. The H is tender and caring but the h jumps off in fright every time he even looks at her fearing that he might recognize her. Like even if he does, SO FREAKING WHAT??!!?
The h was a sociopath and to me she’d always be jumping or shrieking or having a panic attack anytime anyone wanted to love her or make out with her. Eventually the H recognizes her and fixes her misunderstanding and tells her he loves her and also proposes to her, all in the same breath.
I’d never be one to rate anything from Penny Jordan so low but there wasn’t any other option here.
Nicola is a nice girl and minds her own business at work. She also lives in severe self purgation for almost 10 years now of denying herself love or pleasure in any way at all. Her work bf is more invested in serving his mother and seems to cancel out on their dates all the time, preferring to spend time with his mother.
All’s well until the h’s boss announces that he’s sold out to some other man. Not many jobs are available in their small village so the h has to adapt to a new work relationship with the new boss. The new boss is no one other than the H from the h’s past. The man who ruined her (not) and let her believe that she’d had a ONS with him and left her to office gossip.
Ten years ago the h was interested in someone from her work place but he was playing her so she attends an office party and to save face from being rejected by him, she flirts with another man (the H) and goes home with him. Next morning the H lets on to the h that they slept together. She makes a runner and back at work gives in her notice. All because the co-worker she was interested in makes a jibe at her how she’s cheap and readily available for sleeping around but acts like a prude.
Tbh it wasn’t much that the man had said but the h lives like it was the biggest crime she had committed. If anything, the h’s parents were easy going and encouraged her to date and get married to a man who deserved her but the h preferred to live in misery and self atonement for a non-crime that hadn’t happened.
This martyr life was like a black cloud in this work place romance and so the romance ceased to exist. The h would over think any possible scenario of a possible relationship with her current boss (the H) and be terrified that he would recall who she was from 10 years ago.
The current boss is the same man who said they had a ONS but they didn’t. The H is tender and caring but the h jumps off in fright every time he even looks at her fearing that he might recognize her. Like even if he does, SO FREAKING WHAT??!!?
The h was a sociopath and to me she’d always be jumping or shrieking or having a panic attack anytime anyone wanted to love her or make out with her. Eventually the H recognizes her and fixes her misunderstanding and tells her he loves her and also proposes to her, all in the same breath.
November 28, 2011
Overhearing her boyfriend, Jonathan, with another woman, eighteen year old Nicola decides to make him see her in a different light. So she set out to get him to notice her by changing her hair, clothes and make-up. Only instead of getting Jonathan to notice her she grabbed the attention of Matthew Hunt. Matthew saw the little girl behind the mask and sought to save her from herself. Only he inadvertently hurts her when he lets her believe that they had a one night stand together. Nicola was devastated by her actions and the repercussions she suffered from fellow co-workers the next day that she instead ran back to the country and sought refuge behind a staid, calm existence - living with her parents. Eight years later Matthew Hunt walks back into her life when he takes over the company that she has been working for. Nicola is scared that he will remember her and continues to hide from her feelings for him.
This was a wonderful book. Matthew was a hero worthy of the name hero. He didn't take advantage of a young innocent eighteen year old girl when he could have, but instead he thought to shock her by what could have happened. Only he was unable to clear the air before she fled the next morning. We actually got to see a bit into Matthew's personality and POV. He really didn't mean for things to turn out the way they had and he apologized for his part in it. Never really laying the blame on Nicola, but owning up to what he did in the name of setting her straight, unlike the hero in The Hard Man - Penny Jordan. I of course would have liked Matthew to punch Jonathan out, but then Matthew doesn't approve of violence and perhaps the set down he gave him at the time is enough. Nicola was so sickened by her behavior that night long ago that she shunned any further attention of any man that might be interested in her. But she soon finds that she can't quite squelch the feelings that Matt seems to ignite in her and this worries her more. Matthew and Nicola were a greatly matched h/H neither one more dominant than the other. If you decide to read The Hard Man then I suggest you QUICKLY follow it up with Past Passion!!
This was a wonderful book. Matthew was a hero worthy of the name hero. He didn't take advantage of a young innocent eighteen year old girl when he could have, but instead he thought to shock her by what could have happened. Only he was unable to clear the air before she fled the next morning. We actually got to see a bit into Matthew's personality and POV. He really didn't mean for things to turn out the way they had and he apologized for his part in it. Never really laying the blame on Nicola, but owning up to what he did in the name of setting her straight, unlike the hero in The Hard Man - Penny Jordan. I of course would have liked Matthew to punch Jonathan out, but then Matthew doesn't approve of violence and perhaps the set down he gave him at the time is enough. Nicola was so sickened by her behavior that night long ago that she shunned any further attention of any man that might be interested in her. But she soon finds that she can't quite squelch the feelings that Matt seems to ignite in her and this worries her more. Matthew and Nicola were a greatly matched h/H neither one more dominant than the other. If you decide to read The Hard Man then I suggest you QUICKLY follow it up with Past Passion!!
December 30, 2022
I liked this one...
It was sweet and cute. The male character wasn't a jerk and it was a sweet romance, especially for the time it was written. A throw back for women when Security was not spoken of and where good girls just "didn't "
An engrossing read that had me read from start to finish in one go.
It was sweet and cute. The male character wasn't a jerk and it was a sweet romance, especially for the time it was written. A throw back for women when Security was not spoken of and where good girls just "didn't "
An engrossing read that had me read from start to finish in one go.
April 4, 2023
Bare 3. Another day at the PJ office, another h who is ashamed and frozen for years after sleeping with the H when she was a teen. In this case they hadn't even had sex, he'd just let her think they had to encourage her not to be so rash in future. A bit ho hum.
June 23, 2015
It’s 1991, and this is a very nostalgic Jordan romance for me. Nicola (our heroine) is employed by a local building firm in a rural location (coincidentally so was I during the early 90s). She’s got something of a troubled past, having had a nasty experience once at an office party, involving a disastrous perm, a dreadful purple bandage style dress and some awful over the top make-up (coincidentally, I also had a disastrous perm in the early 90s). After drinking too many champagne cocktails at said office party and getting very drunk, she flirts shamelessly with a nameless stranger, who ends up giving her a lift home, where she is almost (rather realistically but not very romantically) sick in his Jaguar. (Coincidentally... just kidding – never done that – never felt nauseous in a Jaguar – although I did once drop a kebab in a Ford Capri which made nearly as much mess)
She then wakes up the next morning in his bed with no recollection of what has occurred and convinced she has had sex with him and is now a “fallen woman”. The stranger does nothing to disabuse her of this notion, even flirting with her shamelessly (in spite of her hangover) and placing her hand in a very intimate place indeed. The whole episode is enough to put her off sex for good.
Eight years later, we rejoin our heroine with a very dull asexual boyfriend (with that common Jordan motif, the controlling mother) and about to get a new boss. And guess how the new boss is?? That’s right, someone she knows rather more about than she should do (in the biblical sense, that is). What then follows is our heroine agonising about whether her boss will recognise her or not from that party. There’s an awful lot of comedy in this book. Consider this scene when the heroine first sickeningly realises just who her new boss is:
“What if he recognised her? What if he...? But no. That was impossible..,. He had only seen her the once, her hair had been longer then, and she had just had that dreadful disaster of a perm which had left her looking like something out of a horror film. She closed her eyes, shuddering deeply, trying not to remember how she had looked that night... the dress she had worn, bought in a fierce, reckless mood of defiant misery.. the make-up she had put on.. the way she had behaved... No. He wouldn’t recognise her. Her own parents wouldn’t have recognised her.” (Loc 167)
Nicola spends most of the action of the book feeling sick or about to be sick – it’s really quite refreshing how unromantic and down to earth, this romantic novel is.
The hero is a totally nice chap (more along the lines of popular 90s hero Hugh Grant than the more usual darkly forbidding Jordan hero she habitually churns out) Once again, this illustrates the time that Jordan was writing from very well – it’s always easy to date her work. This is a great, funny, nostalgic, easy read – nothing too taxing and not all that romantic really, but still very enjoyable.
She then wakes up the next morning in his bed with no recollection of what has occurred and convinced she has had sex with him and is now a “fallen woman”. The stranger does nothing to disabuse her of this notion, even flirting with her shamelessly (in spite of her hangover) and placing her hand in a very intimate place indeed. The whole episode is enough to put her off sex for good.
Eight years later, we rejoin our heroine with a very dull asexual boyfriend (with that common Jordan motif, the controlling mother) and about to get a new boss. And guess how the new boss is?? That’s right, someone she knows rather more about than she should do (in the biblical sense, that is). What then follows is our heroine agonising about whether her boss will recognise her or not from that party. There’s an awful lot of comedy in this book. Consider this scene when the heroine first sickeningly realises just who her new boss is:
“What if he recognised her? What if he...? But no. That was impossible..,. He had only seen her the once, her hair had been longer then, and she had just had that dreadful disaster of a perm which had left her looking like something out of a horror film. She closed her eyes, shuddering deeply, trying not to remember how she had looked that night... the dress she had worn, bought in a fierce, reckless mood of defiant misery.. the make-up she had put on.. the way she had behaved... No. He wouldn’t recognise her. Her own parents wouldn’t have recognised her.” (Loc 167)
Nicola spends most of the action of the book feeling sick or about to be sick – it’s really quite refreshing how unromantic and down to earth, this romantic novel is.
The hero is a totally nice chap (more along the lines of popular 90s hero Hugh Grant than the more usual darkly forbidding Jordan hero she habitually churns out) Once again, this illustrates the time that Jordan was writing from very well – it’s always easy to date her work. This is a great, funny, nostalgic, easy read – nothing too taxing and not all that romantic really, but still very enjoyable.
November 29, 2018
A tepid PJ book.
The h was bloody annoying. I understand that she was a bit traumatized when she made a complete idiot of herself at 18, but for God’s sake woman, get over it. You’re 26 years old and you don’t know that you’ve never had sex?!
The H was not an alpha. He was an average Joe, with his own company, doing well for himself. He met the h when she was 18 and making a fool of herself over a worthless idiot. He saves her from pending doom, but in the process, unknowingly puts the fear of sex and intimacy in her.
When they meet again eight years later, he has no clue who she is but her neurotic ass recognizes him and goes into meltdown whenever he’s around. Which makes her life a mess since he’s her boss.
The story drags on and on, the h gets more and more neurotic as the story goes on. The H is confused but not to the point of confronting her. Not until a person from their past shows up at a conference and makes nasty comments about their supposed one-night stand eight years earlier.
It wasn’t a difficult read, just a bit slow. I disliked how little confidence the h had, especially after the H came back into her life. My wish for her is a stronger backbone and some good meds.
The h was bloody annoying. I understand that she was a bit traumatized when she made a complete idiot of herself at 18, but for God’s sake woman, get over it. You’re 26 years old and you don’t know that you’ve never had sex?!
The H was not an alpha. He was an average Joe, with his own company, doing well for himself. He met the h when she was 18 and making a fool of herself over a worthless idiot. He saves her from pending doom, but in the process, unknowingly puts the fear of sex and intimacy in her.
When they meet again eight years later, he has no clue who she is but her neurotic ass recognizes him and goes into meltdown whenever he’s around. Which makes her life a mess since he’s her boss.
The story drags on and on, the h gets more and more neurotic as the story goes on. The H is confused but not to the point of confronting her. Not until a person from their past shows up at a conference and makes nasty comments about their supposed one-night stand eight years earlier.
It wasn’t a difficult read, just a bit slow. I disliked how little confidence the h had, especially after the H came back into her life. My wish for her is a stronger backbone and some good meds.
May 24, 2017
Sigh. Matthew Hunt was dreamy. The angst was dripping off of every page. So was their desire for one another. Her little flinches and his frowns? Sigh, that's why I love the oldies.
Minus one star for me not understanding her nunnery behavior at all.
Minus 1/2 star (but I'll round up) for Jonathan not getting punched in the fucking face. Or kicked int he balls. Either or. Or both. I'm easy to please.
Minus one star for me not understanding her nunnery behavior at all.
Minus 1/2 star (but I'll round up) for Jonathan not getting punched in the fucking face. Or kicked int he balls. Either or. Or both. I'm easy to please.
October 7, 2010
How was this book even published? Egads, it was bad! I could kinda see where the author was going, but she did not make it a pleasurable journey.
November 19, 2022
Poor heroine never got over the slut shame she felt when she drunkenly flirted with the hero and woke up the next day in bed next to him. He let her think they slept together to "teach" her a lesson.
She learned that lesson all too well. *8* years later she is still a virgin - and still consumed with anxiety and shame. Hero is now the new boss and . . . doesn't recognize her.
Hi jinks ensue - well not really. It's a pretty tame story - spent in the heroine's neurotic head.
For Penny Jordan fans only.
She learned that lesson all too well. *8* years later she is still a virgin - and still consumed with anxiety and shame. Hero is now the new boss and . . . doesn't recognize her.
Hi jinks ensue - well not really. It's a pretty tame story - spent in the heroine's neurotic head.
For Penny Jordan fans only.
September 30, 2020
The woman thinks she had a one night stand with the man years ago and she blames herself.
The woman has too much self pity, too much inner dialogue. She comes across as a neurotic person who is afraid for everything and everyone. She becomes annoying at a certain point.
And why feel so guilty for having a one night stand? This isn’t the 18th century.
The woman has too much self pity, too much inner dialogue. She comes across as a neurotic person who is afraid for everything and everyone. She becomes annoying at a certain point.
And why feel so guilty for having a one night stand? This isn’t the 18th century.
November 11, 2024
Is the premise of this somewhat bonkers? I mean it's a category, so obviously. Definitely of its time (although surprisingly prescient) so there are things that i dont think would work for many readers, but if you want a category that is like...entirely angst and longing (my absolute kryptonite) then this is for you!
September 19, 2025
Upgrading it to four stars. From two. Why the hell did I give only two?
It’s Penny Jordan.
A twenty something young innocent girl goes to work in a company in big bad city. She develops a crush on owner’s son and is convinced he cares for her too. Then she overhears him laughing about her with another woman who he is inviting to his father’s birthday party. She goes berserk as very young women do. She goes and gets a makeover. The eighties big permed hair, red glossy lipstick and apparently a purple miniskirt. I think she must have looked cute. But apparently she looks slutty.
Then she goes to party where she sees much older hero with her crush. She asks him to dance and cosies up to him and leaves the party with him.
The hero basically saw she was drunk and felt concerned that she would fall prey to the predatory other man. He took her out of the party intending to drop her home. She went to sleep. He took her to his own home and let her sleep it off. When she woke up the next morning she saw hero in a towel and herself in her undergarments and assumed the “worst”.
The hero in his innate misguided wisdom decided to put the fear of such occurrences in her and pretended they had spent the night together.
One thing led to another and he almost went to bed with her.
She ran away while he took a phone call.
Cut to eight years later.
She is now a repressed maiden. She goes out with a very mama’s boy man who isn’t interested in furthering the relationship. All he cares for is his mother’s upset stomach which happens whenever they are going to go out. He is so disinterested that they may as well not be together. He lets her down when she counts on him.
Everybody is shocked and disgusted and tells her to break up with the self centred mama’s middle aged boy. But she just smiles it off.
She had run away from London when her boss and colleagues started slut shaming her for having a one night stand. She herself was ashamed. Then her peers reinforced the shamefulness of her behaviour . She decided there and then that she would always be a good girl and never sleep with anybody. Her innocence (or black and white thinking) was such that she felt she could never explain her lack of virginity to her lover. So things were dragging along.
Then her construction company was taken over by the hero.
He had zero recollection of who she was but felt attracted and even fell in love. She was afraid he would judge her!! For what?? But she was convinced she had to not get close to any man. Her abuse by her peers had left her thinking it was bad to sleep with a man. I wonder where her mother was in all this? Parents were clueless. So also were all her friends in the village.
Anyway. Finally hero and heroine went to a conference and met the bad Casanova other man who made innuendoes about their having slept with each other and still being together.
Finally the tube light moment for hero happened. All was made clear to his eyes.
He took heroine home and talked to her. Declared his love. They lived happily ever after.
It’s Penny Jordan.
A twenty something young innocent girl goes to work in a company in big bad city. She develops a crush on owner’s son and is convinced he cares for her too. Then she overhears him laughing about her with another woman who he is inviting to his father’s birthday party. She goes berserk as very young women do. She goes and gets a makeover. The eighties big permed hair, red glossy lipstick and apparently a purple miniskirt. I think she must have looked cute. But apparently she looks slutty.
Then she goes to party where she sees much older hero with her crush. She asks him to dance and cosies up to him and leaves the party with him.
The hero basically saw she was drunk and felt concerned that she would fall prey to the predatory other man. He took her out of the party intending to drop her home. She went to sleep. He took her to his own home and let her sleep it off. When she woke up the next morning she saw hero in a towel and herself in her undergarments and assumed the “worst”.
The hero in his innate misguided wisdom decided to put the fear of such occurrences in her and pretended they had spent the night together.
One thing led to another and he almost went to bed with her.
She ran away while he took a phone call.
Cut to eight years later.
She is now a repressed maiden. She goes out with a very mama’s boy man who isn’t interested in furthering the relationship. All he cares for is his mother’s upset stomach which happens whenever they are going to go out. He is so disinterested that they may as well not be together. He lets her down when she counts on him.
Everybody is shocked and disgusted and tells her to break up with the self centred mama’s middle aged boy. But she just smiles it off.
She had run away from London when her boss and colleagues started slut shaming her for having a one night stand. She herself was ashamed. Then her peers reinforced the shamefulness of her behaviour . She decided there and then that she would always be a good girl and never sleep with anybody. Her innocence (or black and white thinking) was such that she felt she could never explain her lack of virginity to her lover. So things were dragging along.
Then her construction company was taken over by the hero.
He had zero recollection of who she was but felt attracted and even fell in love. She was afraid he would judge her!! For what?? But she was convinced she had to not get close to any man. Her abuse by her peers had left her thinking it was bad to sleep with a man. I wonder where her mother was in all this? Parents were clueless. So also were all her friends in the village.
Anyway. Finally hero and heroine went to a conference and met the bad Casanova other man who made innuendoes about their having slept with each other and still being together.
Finally the tube light moment for hero happened. All was made clear to his eyes.
He took heroine home and talked to her. Declared his love. They lived happily ever after.
hq-to-read
February 11, 2019Too close…
At eighteen, Nicola had made a terrible mistake and eight years later is still punishing herself for her folly. But her shameful secret comes full circle when Matt Hunt walks back into her life�as her new boss. Not that Matt recognizes the assured, controlled businesswoman as the girl who had shared his bed for one brief night.
Her dread of discovery attacks her frail self-control. But so does Nicola's consuming need for the man who has haunted her dreams for so long. What will she do when Matt, inevitably, recognizes her…?
At eighteen, Nicola had made a terrible mistake and eight years later is still punishing herself for her folly. But her shameful secret comes full circle when Matt Hunt walks back into her life�as her new boss. Not that Matt recognizes the assured, controlled businesswoman as the girl who had shared his bed for one brief night.
Her dread of discovery attacks her frail self-control. But so does Nicola's consuming need for the man who has haunted her dreams for so long. What will she do when Matt, inevitably, recognizes her…?
January 13, 2022
Past Passion
Because of her past she has been on a mission to never let another man into her life. We read where she had went to London as a young woman, got a great job and boyfriend. But not all is as it seems. The bf was a wanker. And after a company party she left to go back home. Now years later she ends up working for the man, not bf, who shattered her dreams. And he doesn't recognize her. The story revolves around these two people. And after finding out what really happened years ago. Will they get their own happy ending?
Because of her past she has been on a mission to never let another man into her life. We read where she had went to London as a young woman, got a great job and boyfriend. But not all is as it seems. The bf was a wanker. And after a company party she left to go back home. Now years later she ends up working for the man, not bf, who shattered her dreams. And he doesn't recognize her. The story revolves around these two people. And after finding out what really happened years ago. Will they get their own happy ending?
September 25, 2007
Didn't like this book at all! It's a small book, just over 180 pages, but it took me over a month to read it, it was so bad!
June 21, 2018
Too close...
At eighteen, Nicola had made a terrible mistake and eight years later is still punishing herself for her folly. But her shameful secret comes full circle when Matt Hunt walks back into her life -- as her new boss. Not that Matt recognizes the assured, controlled businesswoman as the girl who had shared his bed for one brief night.
Her dread of discovery attacks her frail self-control. But so does Nicola's consuming need for the man who has haunted her dreams for so long. What will she do when Matt, inevitably, recognizes her...?
At eighteen, Nicola had made a terrible mistake and eight years later is still punishing herself for her folly. But her shameful secret comes full circle when Matt Hunt walks back into her life -- as her new boss. Not that Matt recognizes the assured, controlled businesswoman as the girl who had shared his bed for one brief night.
Her dread of discovery attacks her frail self-control. But so does Nicola's consuming need for the man who has haunted her dreams for so long. What will she do when Matt, inevitably, recognizes her...?
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