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Στη Σκιά της Προδοσίας
Ο Τζέικ Μακέιμπ είχε εγκαταλείψει την Ίζομπελ, πιστεύοντας ότι το παιδί που είχε φέρει στον κόσμο η γυναίκα του δεν ήταν δικό του. Όσο κι αν εκείνη επέμενε πως η Έμιλι ήταν δική του κόρη και πως δεν τον είχε απατήσει ποτέ, δεν είχε καταφέρει να του αλλάξει γνώμη.
Μετά από τόσο καιρό, ωστόσο, ο Τζέικ επιστρέφει και πάλι στη ζωή της για λόγους που ούτε και ο ίδιος μπορεί να κατανοήσει. Και δεν θ' αργήσει να κυριευθεί ξανά από εκείνο το παράφορο πάθος που τους ένωνε τα πρώτα χρόνια του γάμου τους -το ίδιο πάθος που κατέληξε να τον παγιδεύσει σ' ένα τέλμα από ψέματα και απογοήτευση.
Ο Τζέικ ξέρει ότι είναι δύσκολο ν' αντισταθεί, όπως ξέρει ότι είναι λάθος να παρασυρθεί από αυτή την έλξη. Γιατί τίποτα και κανένας δεν μπορεί να σβήσει την προδοσία της ...
Μετά από τόσο καιρό, ωστόσο, ο Τζέικ επιστρέφει και πάλι στη ζωή της για λόγους που ούτε και ο ίδιος μπορεί να κατανοήσει. Και δεν θ' αργήσει να κυριευθεί ξανά από εκείνο το παράφορο πάθος που τους ένωνε τα πρώτα χρόνια του γάμου τους -το ίδιο πάθος που κατέληξε να τον παγιδεύσει σ' ένα τέλμα από ψέματα και απογοήτευση.
Ο Τζέικ ξέρει ότι είναι δύσκολο ν' αντισταθεί, όπως ξέρει ότι είναι λάθος να παρασυρθεί από αυτή την έλξη. Γιατί τίποτα και κανένας δεν μπορεί να σβήσει την προδοσία της ...
160 pages, Paperback
First published September 1, 2003
14 people are currently reading
181 people want to read
About the author
Anne Mather
798 books357 followersAnne Mather is the pseudonym used by Mildred Grieveson, a popular British author of over 160 romance novels. She also signed novels as Caroline Fleming and Cardine Fleming.
Mildred Grieveson began to write down stories in her childhood years. The first novel that she actually finished, Caroline (1965), was also her first book to be published. Her novel, Leopard in the Snow (1974), was developed into a 1978 film.
Mildred Grieveson began to write down stories in her childhood years. The first novel that she actually finished, Caroline (1965), was also her first book to be published. Her novel, Leopard in the Snow (1974), was developed into a 1978 film.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 51 reviews
April 22, 2017
Update 22/4/17
Also, let me add more, he calls his 10 year old daughter a bitch and while his wife whom he couldn't be bothered divorcing while screwing around has no child support has to work hard to make ends meet, he wasted his money on his whores. So no. It was rather straightforward to me. Not complicated at all. He was a cheater. A bastard. An adulterer asshole. Also a shit dad, and indecent human being! To me there is no redemption. My motto is f**k cheaters, and I really stand by that! And she should have sued him for adultery. Because while he had no proof of her cheating, the whole world had proof of his cheating.
************************************************
The SOB couldn't be bothered getting a divorce for 12 years while he kept screwing the OW.
Ironic that he left his pregnant wife for adultery yet that's exactly what he did for 12 years.
Then no redemption, nothing.
Once he saw his wife, and I strongly suspect grew tired of the OW, he dumped her for the wife.
The wife was TSTL for forgiving her mother and her cheating dirtbag husband so no compassion there.
The real victim here was the OW.
He was engaged to her ffs and discarded her like trash. I failed to see her fault apart from being engaged to a douche. By the sound of it, he didn't tell her he was still hitched until that was the most effective way to discard her. He USED and basically abused her!
It was HIS fault that she had expectations yet he made it sound like she was the one who was at fault and wasn't even sorry or remorseful.
When she was mad was threatening him, which was only fair, he was like "I'm married, so there birch, you have no claim on me". Buddy that makes you the cheater. Doesn't do anything to her!
He basically conned TWO women and he's the hero of the story?
The heroine should boot him for his callous treatment of the OW alone, if not for cheating on her and the other shits!
Also, let me add more, he calls his 10 year old daughter a bitch and while his wife whom he couldn't be bothered divorcing while screwing around has no child support has to work hard to make ends meet, he wasted his money on his whores. So no. It was rather straightforward to me. Not complicated at all. He was a cheater. A bastard. An adulterer asshole. Also a shit dad, and indecent human being! To me there is no redemption. My motto is f**k cheaters, and I really stand by that! And she should have sued him for adultery. Because while he had no proof of her cheating, the whole world had proof of his cheating.
************************************************
The SOB couldn't be bothered getting a divorce for 12 years while he kept screwing the OW.
Ironic that he left his pregnant wife for adultery yet that's exactly what he did for 12 years.
Then no redemption, nothing.
Once he saw his wife, and I strongly suspect grew tired of the OW, he dumped her for the wife.
The wife was TSTL for forgiving her mother and her cheating dirtbag husband so no compassion there.
The real victim here was the OW.
He was engaged to her ffs and discarded her like trash. I failed to see her fault apart from being engaged to a douche. By the sound of it, he didn't tell her he was still hitched until that was the most effective way to discard her. He USED and basically abused her!
It was HIS fault that she had expectations yet he made it sound like she was the one who was at fault and wasn't even sorry or remorseful.
When she was mad was threatening him, which was only fair, he was like "I'm married, so there birch, you have no claim on me". Buddy that makes you the cheater. Doesn't do anything to her!
He basically conned TWO women and he's the hero of the story?
The heroine should boot him for his callous treatment of the OW alone, if not for cheating on her and the other shits!
December 5, 2024
SPOILERS
Isobel was the only child of her aristocratic parents. She was beautiful, graceful and elegant.
Jake was a university graduate who grew up in the foster care system.
When these two met, it was love at first sight.
They got married to Lady Hannah's chagrin. Jake was just not good enough for her daughter.
Three years later Jake was summoned by Lady Hannah to the family estate in Yorkshire.
Arriving there he'd found Isobel in bed with his best friend Piers.
Isobel was too drunk to even care.
Later Isobel pleated her innocence. In time, Jake hoped he might find it in his heart to forgive her, but then Isobel said she was pregnant.
Jake knew the baby was Piers and nothing Isobel could say could convince him otherwise.
The situation was too much for him to bear and he'd moved out.
Eleven years later :
Isobel and Jake have seen separated for over a decade and very rarely met.
Isobel had a 10 year old daughter, Emily.
Jake was now a computer millionaire, having his own electronics company.
He'd had affairs over the years and Isobel had suffered through every one of them, but his latest relationship with Marcie was something different.
It had gone on for so long and she heard that Marcie was telling everyone that he was going to marry her. Except he was still married to Isobel.
Jake never accepted Emily as his daughter.
Isobel knew she was fighting a losing battle. Nothing she said or did was going to change Jake's mind.
One day Jake went to Isobel's place to ask for a divorce, but he got sidetracked by ten year old Emily, who had an outburst,
"Don't you tell me what to do, you womaniser "
"You little bitch! How dare you call me a womaniser "
"Because it's what you are. I heard it at school. They laugh about it and say you've had loads of girlfriends and you don't care about mummy and me. Why can't we be a proper family? Why can't you live with us, like any proper father would?"
"Because l'm not your father "
"You are...you are..."
Jake hadn't meant to hurt the kid, but it wasn't his fault he thought, that Isobel had never told Emily the truth about her parentage.
Isobel who betrayed their marriage by having an affair.
Isobel's mother was very ill, she had limited time to live, and wanted to go back to the family seat in Yorkshire to die.
Marcie was pressuring Jake to ask Isobel for a divorce, but how could he expect Isobel to cope with a divorce on top of everything else?
He didn't want to hurt her in that way, but it was Marcie he loved.
Marcie he was going to marry as s0on as he could get a divorce.
Jake offered to drive the trio all the way to Yorkshire.
On that trip he planned to tell Isobel about the divorce.
Isobel was not his responsibility but he was concerned for her.
Her presence disturbed his equilibrium and instead of asking for a divorce, Jake's control snapped and he had kissed her. In fact he couldn't keep his hands off her.
He told himself it was just sex. And he could get that from Marcie.
He returned back to London, but a week later he'd returned back.
He had to decide why he still felt such responsibility for a woman that cheated on him and had a child by another man.
This time Jake and Isobel did succumbed to their passion and he'd realised that Isobel was the only woman he had ever loved.
Piers came to the house that day and an ugly scene unfolded between him, Isobel, Jake and Lady Hannah. Unfortunately Emily had witnessed it.
It was revealed that eleven years ago, as Lady Hannah confessed, she got Isobel drunk, found an excuse to summon Jake from London and as Jake's car pulled in the driveway, she told Piers, who was in love with Isobel, to get in bed with her and that's how Jake had found them.
Lady Hannah never wanted Isobel to marry Jake, thought him low in status and did not have any money.
Hearing all these, Isobel was incredulous and furious.
Jake came to the realisation that Emily was his daughter.
He'd tried to touch Isobel but "Don't touch me. You are all as bad as each other. You did not believe me Jake. Do you think I'll forgive you for what you've done?"
Isobel got in the car and left.
Three weeks passed since that day and Isobel was not back.
Emily had been inconsolable and Jake knew it had to be an indication of Isobel's state of mind that she'd abandoned her daughter like that.
He had alerted the police to her disappearance. He had the fear that something happened to her.
There is a believable HEA.
This is a story that every one of the characters are flawed.
Anne Mather is special to me as the very first Harlequin l read was one of her's!
Isobel was the only child of her aristocratic parents. She was beautiful, graceful and elegant.
Jake was a university graduate who grew up in the foster care system.
When these two met, it was love at first sight.
They got married to Lady Hannah's chagrin. Jake was just not good enough for her daughter.
Three years later Jake was summoned by Lady Hannah to the family estate in Yorkshire.
Arriving there he'd found Isobel in bed with his best friend Piers.
Isobel was too drunk to even care.
Later Isobel pleated her innocence. In time, Jake hoped he might find it in his heart to forgive her, but then Isobel said she was pregnant.
Jake knew the baby was Piers and nothing Isobel could say could convince him otherwise.
The situation was too much for him to bear and he'd moved out.
Eleven years later :
Isobel and Jake have seen separated for over a decade and very rarely met.
Isobel had a 10 year old daughter, Emily.
Jake was now a computer millionaire, having his own electronics company.
He'd had affairs over the years and Isobel had suffered through every one of them, but his latest relationship with Marcie was something different.
It had gone on for so long and she heard that Marcie was telling everyone that he was going to marry her. Except he was still married to Isobel.
Jake never accepted Emily as his daughter.
Isobel knew she was fighting a losing battle. Nothing she said or did was going to change Jake's mind.
One day Jake went to Isobel's place to ask for a divorce, but he got sidetracked by ten year old Emily, who had an outburst,
"Don't you tell me what to do, you womaniser "
"You little bitch! How dare you call me a womaniser "
"Because it's what you are. I heard it at school. They laugh about it and say you've had loads of girlfriends and you don't care about mummy and me. Why can't we be a proper family? Why can't you live with us, like any proper father would?"
"Because l'm not your father "
"You are...you are..."
Jake hadn't meant to hurt the kid, but it wasn't his fault he thought, that Isobel had never told Emily the truth about her parentage.
Isobel who betrayed their marriage by having an affair.
Isobel's mother was very ill, she had limited time to live, and wanted to go back to the family seat in Yorkshire to die.
Marcie was pressuring Jake to ask Isobel for a divorce, but how could he expect Isobel to cope with a divorce on top of everything else?
He didn't want to hurt her in that way, but it was Marcie he loved.
Marcie he was going to marry as s0on as he could get a divorce.
Jake offered to drive the trio all the way to Yorkshire.
On that trip he planned to tell Isobel about the divorce.
Isobel was not his responsibility but he was concerned for her.
Her presence disturbed his equilibrium and instead of asking for a divorce, Jake's control snapped and he had kissed her. In fact he couldn't keep his hands off her.
He told himself it was just sex. And he could get that from Marcie.
He returned back to London, but a week later he'd returned back.
He had to decide why he still felt such responsibility for a woman that cheated on him and had a child by another man.
This time Jake and Isobel did succumbed to their passion and he'd realised that Isobel was the only woman he had ever loved.
Piers came to the house that day and an ugly scene unfolded between him, Isobel, Jake and Lady Hannah. Unfortunately Emily had witnessed it.
It was revealed that eleven years ago, as Lady Hannah confessed, she got Isobel drunk, found an excuse to summon Jake from London and as Jake's car pulled in the driveway, she told Piers, who was in love with Isobel, to get in bed with her and that's how Jake had found them.
Lady Hannah never wanted Isobel to marry Jake, thought him low in status and did not have any money.
Hearing all these, Isobel was incredulous and furious.
Jake came to the realisation that Emily was his daughter.
He'd tried to touch Isobel but "Don't touch me. You are all as bad as each other. You did not believe me Jake. Do you think I'll forgive you for what you've done?"
Isobel got in the car and left.
Three weeks passed since that day and Isobel was not back.
Emily had been inconsolable and Jake knew it had to be an indication of Isobel's state of mind that she'd abandoned her daughter like that.
He had alerted the police to her disappearance. He had the fear that something happened to her.
There is a believable HEA.
This is a story that every one of the characters are flawed.
Anne Mather is special to me as the very first Harlequin l read was one of her's!
May 17, 2011
This has to be one of the stupidest Harlequin Presents plots I've ever read, which is really saying something. Husband caught his wife in bed with another man, she becomes pregnant, he believes it's not his and leaves her. Twelve years later, they're still fighting about it. Can you say paternity test? The hero has some lamebrained excuse not to get one, but the heroine is apparently too busy feeling aggrieved and sniping at him about it to even think of getting one herself. Can you say martyr?
May 17, 2017
How Sinful Truths came to be published in 2003.
Editor on the phone: Anne, I’m in trouble. We need a story for the September slot ASAP.
Anne: Well, I don’t know . . . . I'm writing a story with her (possible)half-brother/stepsister/guardian-who-looks-like her father love triangle but -
Editor: No! I’ve already got step sibs and I’ve got a blackmailed mistress and a billionaire with mommy issues.
Anne: I was going through my files the other day and I found one I wrote in the 70’s
Editor: Wonderful! Send it over.
Anne: It’s a little dated.
Editor: So turn those records into CDs and let the hero have a mobile phone. We did it with Betty Neels and they’re selling like hot cakes.
Anne: It is good. The hero is a real man. He though his wife cheated on him with his best friend. And he wouldn’t believe his daughter was his. They’ve never divorced – but he’s had all kinds of girlfriends and mistresses. He’s been sending money to his wife every month –
Editor: Does she have a job?
Anne: No. She’s a married woman. Very old school as is her evil conniving mother.
Editor: Give her a job. I don’t know real estate or something. That way she looks a little independent.
Anne: Right. Although she was absolutely devastated when the hero didn’t believe her and she’s been living half a life since. She devotes herself to her daughter and her evil conniving mother. The hero was poor when they were first married. But he invented a computer you can carry in your pocket –
Editor: Computer games – make it computer games.
Anne: Oh! He can play computer games with his daughter instead of Scrabble. Brilliant! (That’s before he calls her a bitch).
Editor: Did you say he calls his ten year-old daughter a bitch?
Anne: He didn’t know her then.
Editor: So how do they work it out?
Anne: They go to the old manor house in Yorkshire so the evil conniving mother can die among the fading grandeur. The house is the reason the old lady set her daughter up to break up the marriage. She thought the friend was a better catch than the poor hero. She finally confesses.
Editor: Wow. That is evil and conniving. How does the hero take it?
Anne: Like a man. He doesn’t grovel or anything. He just waits for the heroine to forgive him. I make him wait three weeks.
Editor: That’s – er – oh, hell. I’ve got a deadline.
Anne: Right. Okay – I’ll make those minor changes.
Editor: Anne, wait. What about DNA tests? Crap. She hung up. Oh, hell. I ‘ve got a deadline and this scenario will never work if that technology is available.
Editor on the phone: Anne, I’m in trouble. We need a story for the September slot ASAP.
Anne: Well, I don’t know . . . . I'm writing a story with her (possible)half-brother/stepsister/guardian-who-looks-like her father love triangle but -
Editor: No! I’ve already got step sibs and I’ve got a blackmailed mistress and a billionaire with mommy issues.
Anne: I was going through my files the other day and I found one I wrote in the 70’s
Editor: Wonderful! Send it over.
Anne: It’s a little dated.
Editor: So turn those records into CDs and let the hero have a mobile phone. We did it with Betty Neels and they’re selling like hot cakes.
Anne: It is good. The hero is a real man. He though his wife cheated on him with his best friend. And he wouldn’t believe his daughter was his. They’ve never divorced – but he’s had all kinds of girlfriends and mistresses. He’s been sending money to his wife every month –
Editor: Does she have a job?
Anne: No. She’s a married woman. Very old school as is her evil conniving mother.
Editor: Give her a job. I don’t know real estate or something. That way she looks a little independent.
Anne: Right. Although she was absolutely devastated when the hero didn’t believe her and she’s been living half a life since. She devotes herself to her daughter and her evil conniving mother. The hero was poor when they were first married. But he invented a computer you can carry in your pocket –
Editor: Computer games – make it computer games.
Anne: Oh! He can play computer games with his daughter instead of Scrabble. Brilliant! (That’s before he calls her a bitch).
Editor: Did you say he calls his ten year-old daughter a bitch?
Anne: He didn’t know her then.
Editor: So how do they work it out?
Anne: They go to the old manor house in Yorkshire so the evil conniving mother can die among the fading grandeur. The house is the reason the old lady set her daughter up to break up the marriage. She thought the friend was a better catch than the poor hero. She finally confesses.
Editor: Wow. That is evil and conniving. How does the hero take it?
Anne: Like a man. He doesn’t grovel or anything. He just waits for the heroine to forgive him. I make him wait three weeks.
Editor: That’s – er – oh, hell. I’ve got a deadline.
Anne: Right. Okay – I’ll make those minor changes.
Editor: Anne, wait. What about DNA tests? Crap. She hung up. Oh, hell. I ‘ve got a deadline and this scenario will never work if that technology is available.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
May 3, 2011
The hero walks in on his wife in bed with another man. She claims she was drunk and has no clue how the OM even got in her bed. He leaves her but doesn't divorce her. She's pregnant and despite the fact that they were married and having sex the whole time, he's sure it's not his because they hadn't had a baby before this point and she's only pregnant when she stepped out on him. No DNA test, he just ignores the kid for 12 years. Actually, ignoring the kid would be a good thing. Instead he makes the girl well aware of the fact that he's not her daddy, and he doesn't particularly like her. Also, her mother shoves it down her throat that he's her dad and pretty much forces her to live with the fact that he doesn't think she's his kid and he doesn't accept her.
The girl goes to school and everyone makes fun of her because her dad wants nothing to do with her and is out whoring around with any woman that will have him.
The heroine's mother set her up with the other man and let him into the house and told him to go get in her bed while she was passed out, knowing the hero would walk in on them. All because she wanted her house to be fixed up and didn't like the hero.
I don't blame her for not liking him, since he's a very weak person. Sure he thinks his wife cheated on him, and it was her job at that point to divorce him when he left her and started sleeping with anything and everything, but when he denied and treated like crap a little girl just because he was so weak he didn't want her to be his kid, I can't forgive that.
And I can't forgive the heroine who was too busy martyring herself and her innocence to the hero to separate herself and most importantly her daughter from the situation. The girl grew up for 11 years forced to face a man who is her father and hates her guts, who treats her like crap and makes fun of her and calls her a little bitch to her face.
And I'm supposed to want these two to get back together?
The girl goes to school and everyone makes fun of her because her dad wants nothing to do with her and is out whoring around with any woman that will have him.
The heroine's mother set her up with the other man and let him into the house and told him to go get in her bed while she was passed out, knowing the hero would walk in on them. All because she wanted her house to be fixed up and didn't like the hero.
I don't blame her for not liking him, since he's a very weak person. Sure he thinks his wife cheated on him, and it was her job at that point to divorce him when he left her and started sleeping with anything and everything, but when he denied and treated like crap a little girl just because he was so weak he didn't want her to be his kid, I can't forgive that.
And I can't forgive the heroine who was too busy martyring herself and her innocence to the hero to separate herself and most importantly her daughter from the situation. The girl grew up for 11 years forced to face a man who is her father and hates her guts, who treats her like crap and makes fun of her and calls her a little bitch to her face.
And I'm supposed to want these two to get back together?
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 25, 2017
Worst f-ing book I've ever f-ing read. Piece of trash I hate Jake Are you freaking kidding me with this garbage fgridoagjiasefdsaf
I shouldn't write reviews right after reading, I should have time to cool off but this is the most enraging "romance" story I've ever read. Never read this, unless you want to be left full of hatred!!
Set up was soooooo angsty but I was already so turned off by Jake having so MANY girlfriends during the 10-year separation of their MARRIAGE I knew he would never really be redeemed in my eyes but I hung in there just for a good grovel, even if he'll never get back in my good books at least it'll be fun to watch him be desperate, but it never even freaking happened. Like WHAT??? All those awful things he did, all the pain Isobel suffered, she's a beaten-down pathetic shell of a woman now and she never deserved it and he waltzes back in and THAT'S supposed to be a happily ever after? This book can die in a fire.
I shouldn't write reviews right after reading, I should have time to cool off but this is the most enraging "romance" story I've ever read. Never read this, unless you want to be left full of hatred!!
Set up was soooooo angsty but I was already so turned off by Jake having so MANY girlfriends during the 10-year separation of their MARRIAGE I knew he would never really be redeemed in my eyes but I hung in there just for a good grovel, even if he'll never get back in my good books at least it'll be fun to watch him be desperate, but it never even freaking happened. Like WHAT??? All those awful things he did, all the pain Isobel suffered, she's a beaten-down pathetic shell of a woman now and she never deserved it and he waltzes back in and THAT'S supposed to be a happily ever after? This book can die in a fire.
March 10, 2022
This book if done right, could have been a good read. The hero separated from his wife when he caught her in bed with his best friend. He didn't believe the baby she carried was his; although he never divorced her. Ten years later, he wants to marry a shallow model, but somehow can't ask for a divorce because he suddenly realizes he's still in lust with his wife. The hero is an asshat who never heard of DNA testing. The stupid heroine never took any initiative in her life. The poor, miserable daughter just wants a daddy. The selfish grandmother just cares about her money and family manor. Jerky characters all around. But oddly, I didn't hate it. Maybe lately I've been reading too many boring books that make me feel absolutely nothing. For all it's stupid premise, Sinful Truths kept me involved in the story. (C- or 2.5 stars/out of 5)
May 17, 2017
Read this last month and did not review and forgot about it. Not a good sign.
I concur with the gang. The hero is not just an idiot about his potential daughter, he is cruel. In a land as ridiculous as Harley, there are certain rules you do not stray from. One is heroes feel bad when they find out the heroine is a virgin; the second is do not hurt the child. The hero is a pig to what is an innocent child. He calls her a bitch. She. Is. Ten.
A ten year old is in either 4th or 5th grade! This is what one looks like.
You're going to call her a bitch?
And the heroine is a crappy mother for not ensuring that her daughter at least as the legal and economic protection of her father if not the emotional support.
Don't get me started on the witch on the broom mother of the h.
NO. BUENO!
I concur with the gang. The hero is not just an idiot about his potential daughter, he is cruel. In a land as ridiculous as Harley, there are certain rules you do not stray from. One is heroes feel bad when they find out the heroine is a virgin; the second is do not hurt the child. The hero is a pig to what is an innocent child. He calls her a bitch. She. Is. Ten.
A ten year old is in either 4th or 5th grade! This is what one looks like.
You're going to call her a bitch?
And the heroine is a crappy mother for not ensuring that her daughter at least as the legal and economic protection of her father if not the emotional support.
Don't get me started on the witch on the broom mother of the h.
NO. BUENO!
not-interested
April 21, 2017Bad enough hero is a cheater, but he's also a total dick to his 10-year-old daughter.
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February 17, 2015
Bucket loads of cheating in this one. This book would have made more sense back in the 70s when DNA tests weren't available. It was just stupid now that for 10 years neither of these 2 idiots insisted on a paternity test. I could have bought it if it had only been a year or two since maybe you could be an idiot for that long. But the rest of the book was silly too. The hero didn't divorce his supposedly cheating wife for 10 years but just put her up in an apartment and proceeded to cheat on her for that amount of time. Plus the infamous calling a 10 year old girl a bitch. I must have been bored to stick with it. Or maybe I was just watching a train wreck.
February 7, 2017
I hated Jake the H in this book. Really hated him.
Believing that his wife cheated on him with his best friend, he leaves her when she tells him that she's pregnant then all but ignores his daughter.
In the twelve years that he abandoned his wife and child, Jake has become a millionaire computer whiz and video game creator. He has humiliated his wife by publicly screwing around.
What I hated most about this @$$hole - he called a ten year old child a bitch! That did it for me. There is no coming back from that! I really liked Isobel until she took that @$$wipe back! Seriously?! There isn't that much forgiveness in the world!
It was a good read even though I despised the H. Yes, he provided some monetary assistance to his wife and child, but not enough for her to be able to live comfortably. She still had to scrimp and save to get by while he spent money of his whores! I have never hated a H as much as I did this one.
Ugh! So angry still!!
Believing that his wife cheated on him with his best friend, he leaves her when she tells him that she's pregnant then all but ignores his daughter.
In the twelve years that he abandoned his wife and child, Jake has become a millionaire computer whiz and video game creator. He has humiliated his wife by publicly screwing around.
What I hated most about this @$$hole - he called a ten year old child a bitch! That did it for me. There is no coming back from that! I really liked Isobel until she took that @$$wipe back! Seriously?! There isn't that much forgiveness in the world!
It was a good read even though I despised the H. Yes, he provided some monetary assistance to his wife and child, but not enough for her to be able to live comfortably. She still had to scrimp and save to get by while he spent money of his whores! I have never hated a H as much as I did this one.
Ugh! So angry still!!
August 13, 2012
The hero thought the heroines daughter wasn't his. He had some ridiculous notion that she cheated on him, so the heroine was left to be a single mother. Eventually the hero pulls his head from his ass and we get our happily ever after.
August 29, 2012
2.5 stars
Eh, this was ok. It's value was in that it was extremely angsty and extremely anger provoking.
This story centers around the hero's belief that the heroine's daughter belongs to another man with whom he believes she cheated. The big albatross in the room is that instead of getting a DNA test (because isn't it a little suspicious that the heroine has stood steadfast in her claim that the little girl belonged to the H for TEN YEARS), the supposedly wronged H responds by becoming a hypocritical ubber manwhore who has been out and screwing anything that moved (over 30 women in their ten years separated). And instead of making a break and getting a divorce, he kept the h hanging on by staying married but all the while dissing the daughter. When he finally was going to make a break and get a divorce, he choses a skankwhore as the h's replacement. Um, okaaay.
I can understand the h having a problem with the whole situation maybe. Here you love a guy who believes this awful thing about you. But while she's living at the foot of the cross, he's out there being STD man. More importantly though, here's her daughter who's being wrongfully neglected. It's the daughter who is the real victim. I think the h did her best to not affect the daughter (other than letting her know that the guy who's denying her is her father) but, it would have to be hard recognizing what could have been if the ahole just had a little more sense.
This story get's even worse but it's a quick read, really. So, yeah, if you want a straight injection of ragey angst that is perpeuated in totally unnecessary circumstances by the people who should love you most, then you've found your story.
Eh, this was ok. It's value was in that it was extremely angsty and extremely anger provoking.
This story centers around the hero's belief that the heroine's daughter belongs to another man with whom he believes she cheated. The big albatross in the room is that instead of getting a DNA test (because isn't it a little suspicious that the heroine has stood steadfast in her claim that the little girl belonged to the H for TEN YEARS), the supposedly wronged H responds by becoming a hypocritical ubber manwhore who has been out and screwing anything that moved (over 30 women in their ten years separated). And instead of making a break and getting a divorce, he kept the h hanging on by staying married but all the while dissing the daughter. When he finally was going to make a break and get a divorce, he choses a skankwhore as the h's replacement. Um, okaaay.
I can understand the h having a problem with the whole situation maybe. Here you love a guy who believes this awful thing about you. But while she's living at the foot of the cross, he's out there being STD man. More importantly though, here's her daughter who's being wrongfully neglected. It's the daughter who is the real victim. I think the h did her best to not affect the daughter (other than letting her know that the guy who's denying her is her father) but, it would have to be hard recognizing what could have been if the ahole just had a little more sense.
This story get's even worse but it's a quick read, really. So, yeah, if you want a straight injection of ragey angst that is perpeuated in totally unnecessary circumstances by the people who should love you most, then you've found your story.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
November 27, 2014
I can not even begin to say how this book was just unbelievable. The H, if we can call him that, is one of the worst Hero's I have had the misfortune of reading. He was mean, abusive, a cheater, cruel and I swear I wished the daughter had used a baseball bat on his head. He was not a hero and I wished the h had just divorced his sorry, good for nothing bum. Washed her hands clean of him cause, even though he was a sperm donor he was not a father!!!!! Wished the h had a stronger back bone. will not be reading this one again.
May 22, 2021
Conceptionally this should have hit lots of my HP buttons.
These two have been circling each since their marriage fell apart. She’s supposedly the cheater, he won’t accept that her daughter is his, he simply walked away and now he’s semi-engaged to someone else, but huh, he’s still married.
She, of course has not moved on, too busy holding her life together and keeping her dragon lady mother somewhat happy.
What I can’t get past is his treatment of his daughter... 1. He doesn’t accept that she’s his and 2. He has no issue making sure she knows this and 3. Isn’t remotely nice about it. He’s a nasty asshat to a child, to his child.
Turns out the dragon lady set up her own daughter to be found cheating with the husband’s best friend. Hubby wasn’t rich enough to keep them in their estate, even after she knows her daughter is pregnant, she waits 10+ years to admit what she did. Now, he’s rich enough to preserve the estate and she’s dying.
Truth comes out, HEA and a new baby in the mini epilogue.
These two have been circling each since their marriage fell apart. She’s supposedly the cheater, he won’t accept that her daughter is his, he simply walked away and now he’s semi-engaged to someone else, but huh, he’s still married.
She, of course has not moved on, too busy holding her life together and keeping her dragon lady mother somewhat happy.
What I can’t get past is his treatment of his daughter... 1. He doesn’t accept that she’s his and 2. He has no issue making sure she knows this and 3. Isn’t remotely nice about it. He’s a nasty asshat to a child, to his child.
Turns out the dragon lady set up her own daughter to be found cheating with the husband’s best friend. Hubby wasn’t rich enough to keep them in their estate, even after she knows her daughter is pregnant, she waits 10+ years to admit what she did. Now, he’s rich enough to preserve the estate and she’s dying.
Truth comes out, HEA and a new baby in the mini epilogue.
November 22, 2015
Horrible book! Hero was NOT a hero ! Ugh waste of a good book
June 30, 2024
I liked the idea of this story and all in all it was an okay book but there are a few things that I found hard to swallow:
1. A ten year plus separation! That seems excessive to just say I’m sorry and I love you and off they go into the rainbow for their HEA!
2. How the main female lead just rolled over and played dead instead of fighting to prove her daughter’s parentage. Make them take a DNA test etc.
3. In the ten years they were a part, he became a manwhore but never went for divorce, shows real love for his wife! Not!!
This is not a book I will read again.
1. A ten year plus separation! That seems excessive to just say I’m sorry and I love you and off they go into the rainbow for their HEA!
2. How the main female lead just rolled over and played dead instead of fighting to prove her daughter’s parentage. Make them take a DNA test etc.
3. In the ten years they were a part, he became a manwhore but never went for divorce, shows real love for his wife! Not!!
This is not a book I will read again.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 3, 2015
Hero caught his wife in bed with another man, she gets pregnant, he believes it's not his and leaves her. Twelve years later hero who is about to marry another woman realizes he never stopped loving our heroine but he can't get over her betrayal. But he finds out that it is not his wife who was guilty of a web of lies and deceit after all but his best friend and heroine's mother.
Very angsty read with lots of jerky characters but at least it was entertaining and never boring!
Very angsty read with lots of jerky characters but at least it was entertaining and never boring!
October 6, 2021
I kinda love these mistaken paternity books, where the H assumes his wife/fiancé cheated on him. 😅 So much drama. This even included an OW that was fun to dislike, and a despicable OM and a meddling selfish mother. I mean, it’s a good plot. 🤷🏼♀️
Why wasn’t this a homerun?
- 10 years of being separated but not divorced is a long time. Why? That length of time is ridiculous for a separation, and it doesn’t make much sense. Apparently he’s been acting single the whole time and the wife was celibate. I could accept this for a year or 2, but a DECADE??
- the OW was just so unlikable that it was difficult to understand why the H would be ready to marry her. Is he really that stupid?? He even thinks about how he loves her. That was difficult to swallow. (Although later he’s says he’s only ever loved the h … still. 👀)
- the h runs off and leaves her 10 yr old daughter for over 3 weeks. Doesn’t contact her at all. I know absolutely no mother who would do that. I don’t care how upset she was. Not without a word.
- the H doesn’t grovel enough. Once the truth comes out, She forgives him and they just move on.
Bottom Line? What saves this for me is that he decides (finally) that he wants the h regardless of the child’s paternity. And at the end of the day, I was very entertained despite my annoyances. 🤷🏼♀️ 3.5 ⭐️s
⚠️SAFETY SQUAD SPOILERS⚠️
- cheating? The H sleeps with other people during the 10’years they are officially separated but not divorced. So, it will depend on your definition. Once the book starts, he does not sleep with OW
- no sharing
- OW drama - the H is in a relationship with a woman he plans to marry
- OM drama - the H believes the h slept with his best friend and got pregnant by him - he makes an appearance
- no dubcon
- h is celibate during the decade they are officially separated but still married
Why wasn’t this a homerun?
- 10 years of being separated but not divorced is a long time. Why? That length of time is ridiculous for a separation, and it doesn’t make much sense. Apparently he’s been acting single the whole time and the wife was celibate. I could accept this for a year or 2, but a DECADE??
- the OW was just so unlikable that it was difficult to understand why the H would be ready to marry her. Is he really that stupid?? He even thinks about how he loves her. That was difficult to swallow. (Although later he’s says he’s only ever loved the h … still. 👀)
- the h runs off and leaves her 10 yr old daughter for over 3 weeks. Doesn’t contact her at all. I know absolutely no mother who would do that. I don’t care how upset she was. Not without a word.
- the H doesn’t grovel enough. Once the truth comes out, She forgives him and they just move on.
Bottom Line? What saves this for me is that he decides (finally) that he wants the h regardless of the child’s paternity. And at the end of the day, I was very entertained despite my annoyances. 🤷🏼♀️ 3.5 ⭐️s
⚠️SAFETY SQUAD SPOILERS⚠️
- cheating? The H sleeps with other people during the 10’years they are officially separated but not divorced. So, it will depend on your definition. Once the book starts, he does not sleep with OW
- no sharing
- OW drama - the H is in a relationship with a woman he plans to marry
- OM drama - the H believes the h slept with his best friend and got pregnant by him - he makes an appearance
- no dubcon
- h is celibate during the decade they are officially separated but still married
December 16, 2016
good one though a little odd dat it took Jake 10 years to realise he still loved Isobel !? he did not give her the benefit of the doubt and indulged into womanizing over the years. and she forgave him in just one month !? for not believing her!? not listening to her!? he thought he caught her cheating and then spent the next decade denying he was the father of Emily while all the time whoring himself, hurting both the child and Isobel tremendously. this was unforgivable according to me and Isobel deserved much beta than dat/than him!
February 25, 2020
In a world with DNA testing, I did not get how it took 11 years for her to prove her daughter was her husband's child. The book was well written and the characters were interesting, but I had trouble understanding the whole confusion about the daughter. Okay, she cheated, maybe? But that doesn't mean you aren't the father. That is not how biology works. I kept thinking this all could be solved with a trip to the local clinic.
June 4, 2017
All the main characters were utterly detestable. And whiny.
And the so called hero called his daughter a bitch. Yes. A bitch. Because in Anne Mather's world, that's how normal dad's express their love? That's abuse Ms Mather. Annoying book.
And the so called hero called his daughter a bitch. Yes. A bitch. Because in Anne Mather's world, that's how normal dad's express their love? That's abuse Ms Mather. Annoying book.
November 12, 2019
I’ve read some silly HP plots in my time, but this one truly takes the cake, eats it whole, and shits it out for the world to enjoy. I read the whole thing in ninety minutes with my mouth half-hanging open, muttering to myself, “What the hell is this rubbish and why am I still reading it?” Talk about a wall-banger. If I could have reached in and strangled everyone in this book, I would have and probably would have been convicted of capital murder of five people and I wouldn’t have been sorry at all. They’d flip the switch on the electric chair and I’d yell “Worth it!” just before they fried my gleeful ass.
Let’s say you’re Jake McCabe and you’re a millionaire who runs on your own company and you bang hot models on the side and you’re famous enough that British rags write about it. Ten years ago, you found your beloved wife drunk and in bed with the guy you thought was your best friend and you loved her enough that you might have found it deep in yourself to forgive her, but then she tells you she’s pregnant and you refuse to believe it’s your baby because you’ve been married for three years and she’s just getting pregnant now?!? Never mind that she was on the Pill the whole time you were together because you both decided you weren’t ready to have kids, but maybe she’d missed a couple of time times because of the stress of you building up your business and your mother-in-law non-stop ragging on the both of you all the time. Let’s just say that she was already pregnant by the time you found her in bed with your supposed best friend, completely and uncharacteristically drunk, with no idea how she got in bed with him, nor could she logically retrace how she got into that situation. Do you give her a chance to explain or do you just walk out? Do you demand a paternity test or do you keep paying her spousal support, even though you think she is a liar and a cheater and doesn’t deserve jack-shit from you? That is the whole conceit of this book. The hero begrudges his estranged wife the pittance he sends her monthly, denying for eleven years that her daughter is biologically his, and doesn’t have the ballsack to tell her he’s getting ready to marry someone else, so he wants a divorce.
Which would be easier said than done if Isobelle’s situation weren’t completely pathetic. Jake McCabe thinks Isobelle and her daughter Emily should be quite comfortable with the money he gives them monthly, but he doesn’t know that Isobelle’s mother is dying, so she’s saddled with medical bills on top of the mortgage and the tuition fees for Emily’s school. Isobelle is running herself ragged just trying to keep food on the table and a roof over their heads, but now she has to worry about her daughter asking too many questions about what went wrong in her marriage and why Daddy doesn’t live with them. As if that’s not enough, her aristocrat mother is demanding to be taken back to the ramshackle estate where Isobelle grew up because that’s where she wants to die.
When Jake goes to Isobelle’s house to see her, he meets his daughter Emily, who calls him Daddy even though Jake denies he is the father and he tells her not to call him Daddy. When she dares to call him on his dating habits, he calls this ten-year-old girl a “little bitch” and says, “How dare you call me a womanizer!” But that’s exactly what Jake has been doing for the last decade, never mind that Isobelle was OBVIOUSLY framed and never cheated on him. Now he’s got demanding girlfriend named Marcie who hates that he’s still involved with his ex-wife and the ten-year-old daughter that Jake keeps denying is his. His friend Shane tells him to get a paternity test, so he can end this bullshit with Isobelle and just marry Marcie, if that’s what he really wants, but it doesn’t even occur to him. Not once in this entire book does he ask Isobelle for a paternity test to settle this Emily thing once and for all so he can move with his life.
It’s because he doesn’t want to. He says he loves Marcie and wants to marry her, but he still thinks about Isobelle all the time and worries about what’s going on with her. Mind you, he didn’t even know that Isobelle’s mother was in a bad way, so it’s obvious that at the beginning of the novel that there is very little communication going on between him and Isobelle, except for arguing about money and probably Isobelle harping on him to face up to his responsibilities as a father. He doesn’t even really encounter Emily until he goes over to Isobelle’s house with the express intention of telling her he’s marrying Marcie, so he wants a divorce, but instead he ends up spending a couple of hours playing video games with a girl he insists is not his daughter, because Isobelle was at the hospital with her dying mother. All of a sudden, Emily is showing up at his office, announcing to one and all that she is his daughter and though he initially suspects Isobelle of putting her daughter up to it in order to manipulate him, he decides that Isobelle didn’t know that Emily was going to show up at his office, having taken the bus there from her school. Jake admits to himself that Isobelle is going through a lot and she really could use the help, so he starts showing up and lending a hand here and there. After all, he couldn’t exactly allow her to move up to Yorkshire with her young daughter and ailing mother to live in a ramshackle estate, without lifting a hand to help them, right? What kind of bastard would he be, otherwise?
What about the kind of bastard who wouldn’t just sit down and listen to his soon-to-be ex-wife’s explanations that she never slept with anyone else and she never cheated on him and has suffered the last eleven years on her own, raising his daughter without any help from him? Seriously, this guy is in charge of a multi-million dollar company? I really couldn’t understand the logic of Jake McCabe. If he hated Isobelle so much because she supposedly betrayed him and he’d spent the last ten years drinking and banging models, why was he bothering to hang around her? Why has he been giving his mother-in-law money in order to sustain her estate, even though he knew she hated his guts and didn’t want him to marry Isobelle in the first place?
The answer of course, is DUH, he loves her and couldn’t cut off communications with her, but let’s think about this: EMILY IS ALMOST ELEVEN and Jake has been away from her and Isobelle for that long, thinking all this time that Isobelle was a cheating whore who ruined their marriage. But he could have just settled that with a paternity test. That was why I laughed out loud when Jake finally discovered the truth and Isobelle just… up and dumped him. She took his Porsche and zoomed off, leaving him with Emily, his mother-in-law, and the ramshackle estate. FOR THREE WEEKS. Hilarious!!
Isobelle, for her sins, has the patience of a saint. With a domineering mother, an all-too-precocious child, and her ex-husband hounding her left and right, she managed to keep it together without snapping and going Lizzie Borden on the whole lot of them. Talk about a martyr. Seriously, LADY, why would you take Jake McCabe back? Sure, he’s handsome, wealthy, the father of your child, the love of your life, and all of that… but THIS GUY ABANDONED YOU WHEN YOU WERE PREGNANT AND WAS BASICALLY BANGING HOT CHICKS FOR A DECADE while you barely scraped by with your daughter, who is his biological responsibility, by the way! I don’t think I could have forgiven the guy. But that’s Reason #426 that I’m not a Harlequin Presents Romance heroine and Isobelle, at the end of the day, is still married to Jake McCabe and not behind bars for murdering his stubborn, hard-headed ass.
Let’s say you’re Jake McCabe and you’re a millionaire who runs on your own company and you bang hot models on the side and you’re famous enough that British rags write about it. Ten years ago, you found your beloved wife drunk and in bed with the guy you thought was your best friend and you loved her enough that you might have found it deep in yourself to forgive her, but then she tells you she’s pregnant and you refuse to believe it’s your baby because you’ve been married for three years and she’s just getting pregnant now?!? Never mind that she was on the Pill the whole time you were together because you both decided you weren’t ready to have kids, but maybe she’d missed a couple of time times because of the stress of you building up your business and your mother-in-law non-stop ragging on the both of you all the time. Let’s just say that she was already pregnant by the time you found her in bed with your supposed best friend, completely and uncharacteristically drunk, with no idea how she got in bed with him, nor could she logically retrace how she got into that situation. Do you give her a chance to explain or do you just walk out? Do you demand a paternity test or do you keep paying her spousal support, even though you think she is a liar and a cheater and doesn’t deserve jack-shit from you? That is the whole conceit of this book. The hero begrudges his estranged wife the pittance he sends her monthly, denying for eleven years that her daughter is biologically his, and doesn’t have the ballsack to tell her he’s getting ready to marry someone else, so he wants a divorce.
Which would be easier said than done if Isobelle’s situation weren’t completely pathetic. Jake McCabe thinks Isobelle and her daughter Emily should be quite comfortable with the money he gives them monthly, but he doesn’t know that Isobelle’s mother is dying, so she’s saddled with medical bills on top of the mortgage and the tuition fees for Emily’s school. Isobelle is running herself ragged just trying to keep food on the table and a roof over their heads, but now she has to worry about her daughter asking too many questions about what went wrong in her marriage and why Daddy doesn’t live with them. As if that’s not enough, her aristocrat mother is demanding to be taken back to the ramshackle estate where Isobelle grew up because that’s where she wants to die.
When Jake goes to Isobelle’s house to see her, he meets his daughter Emily, who calls him Daddy even though Jake denies he is the father and he tells her not to call him Daddy. When she dares to call him on his dating habits, he calls this ten-year-old girl a “little bitch” and says, “How dare you call me a womanizer!” But that’s exactly what Jake has been doing for the last decade, never mind that Isobelle was OBVIOUSLY framed and never cheated on him. Now he’s got demanding girlfriend named Marcie who hates that he’s still involved with his ex-wife and the ten-year-old daughter that Jake keeps denying is his. His friend Shane tells him to get a paternity test, so he can end this bullshit with Isobelle and just marry Marcie, if that’s what he really wants, but it doesn’t even occur to him. Not once in this entire book does he ask Isobelle for a paternity test to settle this Emily thing once and for all so he can move with his life.
It’s because he doesn’t want to. He says he loves Marcie and wants to marry her, but he still thinks about Isobelle all the time and worries about what’s going on with her. Mind you, he didn’t even know that Isobelle’s mother was in a bad way, so it’s obvious that at the beginning of the novel that there is very little communication going on between him and Isobelle, except for arguing about money and probably Isobelle harping on him to face up to his responsibilities as a father. He doesn’t even really encounter Emily until he goes over to Isobelle’s house with the express intention of telling her he’s marrying Marcie, so he wants a divorce, but instead he ends up spending a couple of hours playing video games with a girl he insists is not his daughter, because Isobelle was at the hospital with her dying mother. All of a sudden, Emily is showing up at his office, announcing to one and all that she is his daughter and though he initially suspects Isobelle of putting her daughter up to it in order to manipulate him, he decides that Isobelle didn’t know that Emily was going to show up at his office, having taken the bus there from her school. Jake admits to himself that Isobelle is going through a lot and she really could use the help, so he starts showing up and lending a hand here and there. After all, he couldn’t exactly allow her to move up to Yorkshire with her young daughter and ailing mother to live in a ramshackle estate, without lifting a hand to help them, right? What kind of bastard would he be, otherwise?
What about the kind of bastard who wouldn’t just sit down and listen to his soon-to-be ex-wife’s explanations that she never slept with anyone else and she never cheated on him and has suffered the last eleven years on her own, raising his daughter without any help from him? Seriously, this guy is in charge of a multi-million dollar company? I really couldn’t understand the logic of Jake McCabe. If he hated Isobelle so much because she supposedly betrayed him and he’d spent the last ten years drinking and banging models, why was he bothering to hang around her? Why has he been giving his mother-in-law money in order to sustain her estate, even though he knew she hated his guts and didn’t want him to marry Isobelle in the first place?
The answer of course, is DUH, he loves her and couldn’t cut off communications with her, but let’s think about this: EMILY IS ALMOST ELEVEN and Jake has been away from her and Isobelle for that long, thinking all this time that Isobelle was a cheating whore who ruined their marriage. But he could have just settled that with a paternity test. That was why I laughed out loud when Jake finally discovered the truth and Isobelle just… up and dumped him. She took his Porsche and zoomed off, leaving him with Emily, his mother-in-law, and the ramshackle estate. FOR THREE WEEKS. Hilarious!!
Isobelle, for her sins, has the patience of a saint. With a domineering mother, an all-too-precocious child, and her ex-husband hounding her left and right, she managed to keep it together without snapping and going Lizzie Borden on the whole lot of them. Talk about a martyr. Seriously, LADY, why would you take Jake McCabe back? Sure, he’s handsome, wealthy, the father of your child, the love of your life, and all of that… but THIS GUY ABANDONED YOU WHEN YOU WERE PREGNANT AND WAS BASICALLY BANGING HOT CHICKS FOR A DECADE while you barely scraped by with your daughter, who is his biological responsibility, by the way! I don’t think I could have forgiven the guy. But that’s Reason #426 that I’m not a Harlequin Presents Romance heroine and Isobelle, at the end of the day, is still married to Jake McCabe and not behind bars for murdering his stubborn, hard-headed ass.
November 12, 2019
I’ve read some silly HP plots in my time, but this one truly takes the cake, eats it whole, and shits it out for the world to enjoy. I read the whole thing in ninety minutes with my mouth half-hanging open, muttering to myself, “What the hell is this rubbish and why am I still reading it?” Talk about a wall-banger. If I could have reached in and strangled everyone in this book, I would have and probably would have been convicted of capital murder of five people and I wouldn’t have been sorry at all. They’d flip the switch on the electric chair and I’d yell “Worth it!” just before they fried my gleeful ass.
Let’s say you’re Jake McCabe and you’re a millionaire who runs on your own company and you bang hot models on the side and you’re famous enough that British rags write about it. Ten years ago, you found your beloved wife drunk and in bed with the guy you thought was your best friend and you loved her enough that you might have found it deep in yourself to forgive her, but then she tells you she’s pregnant and you refuse to believe it’s your baby because you’ve been married for three years and she’s just getting pregnant now?!? Never mind that she was on the Pill the whole time you were together because you both decided you weren’t ready to have kids, but maybe she’d missed a couple of time times because of the stress of you building up your business and your mother-in-law non-stop ragging on the both of you all the time. Let’s just say that she was already pregnant by the time you found her in bed with your supposed best friend, completely and uncharacteristically drunk, with no idea how she got in bed with him, nor could she logically retrace how she got into that situation. Do you give her a chance to explain or do you just walk out? Do you demand a paternity test or do you keep paying her spousal support, even though you think she is a liar and a cheater and doesn’t deserve jack-shit from you? That is the whole conceit of this book. The hero begrudges his estranged wife the pittance he sends her monthly, denying for eleven years that her daughter is biologically his, and doesn’t have the ballsack to tell her he’s getting ready to marry someone else, so he wants a divorce.
Which would be easier said than done if Isobelle’s situation weren’t completely pathetic. Jake McCabe thinks Isobelle and her daughter Emily should be quite comfortable with the money he gives them monthly, but he doesn’t know that Isobelle’s mother is dying, so she’s saddled with medical bills on top of the mortgage and the tuition fees for Emily’s school. Isobelle is running herself ragged just trying to keep food on the table and a roof over their heads, but now she has to worry about her daughter asking too many questions about what went wrong in her marriage and why Daddy doesn’t live with them. As if that’s not enough, her aristocrat mother is demanding to be taken back to the ramshackle estate where Isobelle grew up because that’s where she wants to die.
When Jake goes to Isobelle’s house to see her, he meets his daughter Emily, who calls him Daddy even though Jake denies he is the father and he tells her not to call him Daddy. When she dares to call him on his dating habits, he calls this ten-year-old girl a “little bitch” and says, “How dare you call me a womanizer!” But that’s exactly what Jake has been doing for the last decade, never mind that Isobelle was OBVIOUSLY framed and never cheated on him. Now he’s got demanding girlfriend named Marcie who hates that he’s still involved with his ex-wife and the ten-year-old daughter that Jake keeps denying is his. His friend Shane tells him to get a paternity test, so he can end this bullshit with Isobelle and just marry Marcie, if that’s what he really wants, but it doesn’t even occur to him. Not once in this entire book does he ask Isobelle for a paternity test to settle this Emily thing once and for all so he can move with his life.
It’s because he doesn’t want to. He says he loves Marcie and wants to marry her, but he still thinks about Isobelle all the time and worries about what’s going on with her. Mind you, he didn’t even know that Isobelle’s mother was in a bad way, so it’s obvious that at the beginning of the novel that there is very little communication going on between him and Isobelle, except for arguing about money and probably Isobelle harping on him to face up to his responsibilities as a father. He doesn’t even really encounter Emily until he goes over to Isobelle’s house with the express intention of telling her he’s marrying Marcie, so he wants a divorce, but instead he ends up spending a couple of hours playing video games with a girl he insists is not his daughter, because Isobelle was at the hospital with her dying mother. All of a sudden, Emily is showing up at his office, announcing to one and all that she is his daughter and though he initially suspects Isobelle of putting her daughter up to it in order to manipulate him, he decides that Isobelle didn’t know that Emily was going to show up at his office, having taken the bus there from her school. Jake admits to himself that Isobelle is going through a lot and she really could use the help, so he starts showing up and lending a hand here and there. After all, he couldn’t exactly allow her to move up to Yorkshire with her young daughter and ailing mother to live in a ramshackle estate, without lifting a hand to help them, right? What kind of bastard would he be, otherwise?
What about the kind of bastard who wouldn’t just sit down and listen to his soon-to-be ex-wife’s explanations that she never slept with anyone else and she never cheated on him and has suffered the last eleven years on her own, raising his daughter without any help from him? Seriously, this guy is in charge of a multi-million dollar company? I really couldn’t understand the logic of Jake McCabe. If he hated Isobelle so much because she supposedly betrayed him and he’d spent the last ten years drinking and banging models, why was he bothering to hang around her? Why has he been giving his mother-in-law money in order to sustain her estate, even though he knew she hated his guts and didn’t want him to marry Isobelle in the first place?
The answer of course, is DUH, he loves her and couldn’t cut off communications with her, but let’s think about this: EMILY IS ALMOST ELEVEN and Jake has been away from her and Isobelle for that long, thinking all this time that Isobelle was a cheating whore who ruined their marriage. But he could have just settled that with a paternity test. That was why I laughed out loud when Jake finally discovered the truth and Isobelle just… up and dumped him. She took his Porsche and zoomed off, leaving him with Emily, his mother-in-law, and the ramshackle estate. FOR THREE WEEKS. Hilarious!!
Isobelle, for her sins, has the patience of a saint. With a domineering mother, an all-too-precocious child, and her ex-husband hounding her left and right, she managed to keep it together without snapping and going Lizzie Borden on the whole lot of them. Talk about a martyr. Seriously, LADY, why would you take Jake McCabe back? Sure, he’s handsome, wealthy, the father of your child, the love of your life, and all of that… but THIS GUY ABANDONED YOU WHEN YOU WERE PREGNANT AND WAS BASICALLY BANGING HOT CHICKS FOR A DECADE while you barely scraped by with your daughter, who is his biological responsibility, by the way! I don’t think I could have forgiven the guy. But that’s Reason #426 that I’m not a Harlequin Presents Romance heroine and Isobelle, at the end of the day, is still married to Jake McCabe and not behind bars for murdering his stubborn, hard-headed ass.
Let’s say you’re Jake McCabe and you’re a millionaire who runs on your own company and you bang hot models on the side and you’re famous enough that British rags write about it. Ten years ago, you found your beloved wife drunk and in bed with the guy you thought was your best friend and you loved her enough that you might have found it deep in yourself to forgive her, but then she tells you she’s pregnant and you refuse to believe it’s your baby because you’ve been married for three years and she’s just getting pregnant now?!? Never mind that she was on the Pill the whole time you were together because you both decided you weren’t ready to have kids, but maybe she’d missed a couple of time times because of the stress of you building up your business and your mother-in-law non-stop ragging on the both of you all the time. Let’s just say that she was already pregnant by the time you found her in bed with your supposed best friend, completely and uncharacteristically drunk, with no idea how she got in bed with him, nor could she logically retrace how she got into that situation. Do you give her a chance to explain or do you just walk out? Do you demand a paternity test or do you keep paying her spousal support, even though you think she is a liar and a cheater and doesn’t deserve jack-shit from you? That is the whole conceit of this book. The hero begrudges his estranged wife the pittance he sends her monthly, denying for eleven years that her daughter is biologically his, and doesn’t have the ballsack to tell her he’s getting ready to marry someone else, so he wants a divorce.
Which would be easier said than done if Isobelle’s situation weren’t completely pathetic. Jake McCabe thinks Isobelle and her daughter Emily should be quite comfortable with the money he gives them monthly, but he doesn’t know that Isobelle’s mother is dying, so she’s saddled with medical bills on top of the mortgage and the tuition fees for Emily’s school. Isobelle is running herself ragged just trying to keep food on the table and a roof over their heads, but now she has to worry about her daughter asking too many questions about what went wrong in her marriage and why Daddy doesn’t live with them. As if that’s not enough, her aristocrat mother is demanding to be taken back to the ramshackle estate where Isobelle grew up because that’s where she wants to die.
When Jake goes to Isobelle’s house to see her, he meets his daughter Emily, who calls him Daddy even though Jake denies he is the father and he tells her not to call him Daddy. When she dares to call him on his dating habits, he calls this ten-year-old girl a “little bitch” and says, “How dare you call me a womanizer!” But that’s exactly what Jake has been doing for the last decade, never mind that Isobelle was OBVIOUSLY framed and never cheated on him. Now he’s got demanding girlfriend named Marcie who hates that he’s still involved with his ex-wife and the ten-year-old daughter that Jake keeps denying is his. His friend Shane tells him to get a paternity test, so he can end this bullshit with Isobelle and just marry Marcie, if that’s what he really wants, but it doesn’t even occur to him. Not once in this entire book does he ask Isobelle for a paternity test to settle this Emily thing once and for all so he can move with his life.
It’s because he doesn’t want to. He says he loves Marcie and wants to marry her, but he still thinks about Isobelle all the time and worries about what’s going on with her. Mind you, he didn’t even know that Isobelle’s mother was in a bad way, so it’s obvious that at the beginning of the novel that there is very little communication going on between him and Isobelle, except for arguing about money and probably Isobelle harping on him to face up to his responsibilities as a father. He doesn’t even really encounter Emily until he goes over to Isobelle’s house with the express intention of telling her he’s marrying Marcie, so he wants a divorce, but instead he ends up spending a couple of hours playing video games with a girl he insists is not his daughter, because Isobelle was at the hospital with her dying mother. All of a sudden, Emily is showing up at his office, announcing to one and all that she is his daughter and though he initially suspects Isobelle of putting her daughter up to it in order to manipulate him, he decides that Isobelle didn’t know that Emily was going to show up at his office, having taken the bus there from her school. Jake admits to himself that Isobelle is going through a lot and she really could use the help, so he starts showing up and lending a hand here and there. After all, he couldn’t exactly allow her to move up to Yorkshire with her young daughter and ailing mother to live in a ramshackle estate, without lifting a hand to help them, right? What kind of bastard would he be, otherwise?
What about the kind of bastard who wouldn’t just sit down and listen to his soon-to-be ex-wife’s explanations that she never slept with anyone else and she never cheated on him and has suffered the last eleven years on her own, raising his daughter without any help from him? Seriously, this guy is in charge of a multi-million dollar company? I really couldn’t understand the logic of Jake McCabe. If he hated Isobelle so much because she supposedly betrayed him and he’d spent the last ten years drinking and banging models, why was he bothering to hang around her? Why has he been giving his mother-in-law money in order to sustain her estate, even though he knew she hated his guts and didn’t want him to marry Isobelle in the first place?
The answer of course, is DUH, he loves her and couldn’t cut off communications with her, but let’s think about this: EMILY IS ALMOST ELEVEN and Jake has been away from her and Isobelle for that long, thinking all this time that Isobelle was a cheating whore who ruined their marriage. But he could have just settled that with a paternity test. That was why I laughed out loud when Jake finally discovered the truth and Isobelle just… up and dumped him. She took his Porsche and zoomed off, leaving him with Emily, his mother-in-law, and the ramshackle estate. FOR THREE WEEKS. Hilarious!!
Isobelle, for her sins, has the patience of a saint. With a domineering mother, an all-too-precocious child, and her ex-husband hounding her left and right, she managed to keep it together without snapping and going Lizzie Borden on the whole lot of them. Talk about a martyr. Seriously, LADY, why would you take Jake McCabe back? Sure, he’s handsome, wealthy, the father of your child, the love of your life, and all of that… but THIS GUY ABANDONED YOU WHEN YOU WERE PREGNANT AND WAS BASICALLY BANGING HOT CHICKS FOR A DECADE while you barely scraped by with your daughter, who is his biological responsibility, by the way! I don’t think I could have forgiven the guy. But that’s Reason #426 that I’m not a Harlequin Presents Romance heroine and Isobelle, at the end of the day, is still married to Jake McCabe and not behind bars for murdering his stubborn, hard-headed ass.
October 12, 2016
This was a very hard story to read. It deals with the thought that the child born ten years before was not Jake's. That his wife Isobel had had an affair with another man. Instead of getting DNA done he rejects the child. This story was written in 2003 and I know that DNA was around even then. I thought the story was well written but the plot was too dark even for HP. I have read other stories by Mather and enjoyed them. I have reread this one when I want a story to vent my anger a the male species. Yes I have reread this one. And will keep it. I would love to see this type of story line done differently though. Not have the child so old when he finds out. I hated that he had too many affairs himself and want forgiveness when all is revealed. I would not have been so forthright after all the years.
June 18, 2019
Jake McCabe had separated from his wife Isobel, convinced that the daughter to whom she'd given birth was not his. Proud, and insistent that Emily is Jake's child, Isobel has struggled on alone as a single mother.
But now Jake finds himself in Isobel's life once more and snared again by the same heated desire for her that held him fast when they were first married...and which entangled him in a web of lies and regret. It's all Jake can do to keep control. Seducing Isobel can only add to the tally of their sins, and it won't change the truth of her betrayal...will it?
But now Jake finds himself in Isobel's life once more and snared again by the same heated desire for her that held him fast when they were first married...and which entangled him in a web of lies and regret. It's all Jake can do to keep control. Seducing Isobel can only add to the tally of their sins, and it won't change the truth of her betrayal...will it?
December 8, 2024
I won't go into an in depth review, as others here have done that and there's nothing I can add. I'll just say that this is a twist on the usual setting of the h leaving the H when she thinks he's cheated. This time it's the H who thinks the h has cheated (the OM being his best friend, or so he thought) and (like so many h's) refuses to listen to or believe her. Just like I get angry at the h's who toss true love aside, as well as trust, I'm angry with the H for doing the same thing!
He never let up on accusing her of betraying him, insisting he wasn't the bio father of their daughter, and saying a lot of crappy things.
And worse: he was planning to marry another woman (a model he'd been sleeping with) and has no problem cheating on her with the h. So it's okay for him to be a cheater??? Not that the OW was so terrific, but still!
Also, their separation went on WAY too long (I can accept a few years at most, but NOT ten) and he had multiple affairs during that time, and that just ruins the story for me. If she had actually cheated then I'd have no problem with whatever he did, but knowing it wasn't true just makes it so frustrating.
Well, I said more than enough. On a scale of 1-10, I'd rate this a 2.
He never let up on accusing her of betraying him, insisting he wasn't the bio father of their daughter, and saying a lot of crappy things.
And worse: he was planning to marry another woman (a model he'd been sleeping with) and has no problem cheating on her with the h. So it's okay for him to be a cheater??? Not that the OW was so terrific, but still!
Also, their separation went on WAY too long (I can accept a few years at most, but NOT ten) and he had multiple affairs during that time, and that just ruins the story for me. If she had actually cheated then I'd have no problem with whatever he did, but knowing it wasn't true just makes it so frustrating.
Well, I said more than enough. On a scale of 1-10, I'd rate this a 2.
January 12, 2022
Some of the books should be banned for being so immorally bad. This is one of those books.
A parent, a mother's duty is to love their child the most. Don't have children unless you're prepared to love them. Here we have a mother who is not only disgustingly controlling of the people around her but also thinks the world revolves around her and she deserves everything she could imagine.
Just imagine having a mother who loves her family's dilapidated home more than you. She drove a wedge between the H and h and held onto the ruse for more than 11 years. This poor h was failed by everyone (more by her doing, what sane person let's her mother control and rule her life at a level where she'd leave her job and have her daughter take a leave of absence indefinitely from her school at her mother's whim? The old biddy wants to live in a downtrodden home? Let her, you don't have to follow her there.)
She's still married to her POS husband after 11 years of being separated from him. He is in a relationship with someone else and she's dreading the thought of getting a divorce? I would be more than eager to be divorced from a person who doesn't want to acknowledge the existence to his daughter much less dread it.
After the truth came out, she took off for 3 weeks and was okay? All it took her 3 weeks to forgive her husband and mother?
God, I would cross the street to get away from such a man and leave that woman she calls mama to die in the house she loved so much.
Take that damn divorce with a hefty payout and go live your best life with your daughter.
Eff everyone else.
A parent, a mother's duty is to love their child the most. Don't have children unless you're prepared to love them. Here we have a mother who is not only disgustingly controlling of the people around her but also thinks the world revolves around her and she deserves everything she could imagine.
Just imagine having a mother who loves her family's dilapidated home more than you. She drove a wedge between the H and h and held onto the ruse for more than 11 years. This poor h was failed by everyone (more by her doing, what sane person let's her mother control and rule her life at a level where she'd leave her job and have her daughter take a leave of absence indefinitely from her school at her mother's whim? The old biddy wants to live in a downtrodden home? Let her, you don't have to follow her there.)
She's still married to her POS husband after 11 years of being separated from him. He is in a relationship with someone else and she's dreading the thought of getting a divorce? I would be more than eager to be divorced from a person who doesn't want to acknowledge the existence to his daughter much less dread it.
After the truth came out, she took off for 3 weeks and was okay? All it took her 3 weeks to forgive her husband and mother?
God, I would cross the street to get away from such a man and leave that woman she calls mama to die in the house she loved so much.
Take that damn divorce with a hefty payout and go live your best life with your daughter.
Eff everyone else.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
March 7, 2021
I loved the hero though he was just to hasty and the heroine was ok I guess . Money ... what people will do for money and power. The h mother thought the H was not good enough though they were married for 3 years . Seriously does marrying the right person in society makes a difference🤔. Hero certainly had ambition and became quite famous and rich lol. I thought it was grand that the h held her ground continuously saying that the daughter they had was the H’s daughter, quite gusty . I enjoyed the kindness of the hero as though he believed otherwise he still wanted the h to live comfortably. I gave this book a 4 star just because of the relationship later in the book between H and his daughter, H and his estranged wife . Altogether it worked out quite well for everyone involved including the grandmother 👵
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