Watching Linda is the 13th and final episode of the first season of the softcore TV series Passion Cove, which debuted in March 2000. Written Leland Zaitz and directed by John Quinn, the episode stars Gina-Raye Carter (back when she was Gina-Raye Swensson) as the title character Linda.

Linda is the girlfriend or mistress (it’s not clear) of Dominic (Daniel Anderson), who is some kind of rich businessman. I think I always assumed that he was some kind of mob boss, which I see a user review of this episode on IMDB refers to him as, but as I rewatched this now I notice that’s never explicitly stated. Linda makes references to Dominic “scaring away” all of her exes and later refers to him as “dangerous” but he could just be a ruthless tough rich guy. so who knows? He’s going away to Europe for a weekend and rents the Passion Cove house for Linda to stay at until he gets back. Darren Wayne plays Tim, a bodyguard hired by Dominic who will be staying at the house with Linda to watch over her.

At first, Linda is resentful of Tim’s presence and acts cold towards him, but Tim doesn’t seem bothered as he’s just there to do his job. Late that first night, Linda sneaks to the guest house on the property where she has her secret lover Joey (Todd Swenson as Todd Swensson) meet her and they have sex. But then Tim catches them and throws Joey out. Linda begs Tim not to tell Dominic about Joey and he agrees to keep his mouth shut. The next day while on the beach Tim meets a woman named Sandy, played by Lea Marr, and invites her to join him for dinner at the Passion Cove house. Linda acts a bit jealous about this but agrees to give Tim some privacy. That night Sandy comes over and she and Tim have dinner, then play some pool and then end up having sex on the pool table. Just as they finish Linda shows up and spoils the evening and Sandy leaves.

Linda and Tim argue, and Tim ends up revealing a secret about Dominic that Linda didn’t know, which changes the way she viewed her relationship. Then Linda and Tim have sex and decide that they want to be together, but aren’t sure how they can do that without angering Dominic, and they don’t know what he’ll do to them when he finds out.

I won’t spoil it, but the episode ends with a plot-twist, which became a common trope in this series.

This was another great one, resting largely on the shoulders (and breasts and other body parts) of Gina-Raye Carter. She’s a good actress, is sexy, and her two sex scenes were incredible. She and Darren Wayne (who only has this one acting credit to his name) had good chemistry together which helped the episode move forward. Her sex scene with Todd Swenson was also good, and I’m assuming that they were married at the time since they were using the same last name with that specific spelling of Swensson, which is unique. I don’t know that for sure, but it seems logical. Unfortunately, while looking up his credits, I see that he died in October 2011 at age 36, which is a shame. Gina-Raye continued acting, but didn’t do much softcore work, where I feel she could have really made a mark if given the chance. Lea Marr was also impressive in this episode, both for her acting and her sex scene. Daniel Anderson is a softcore veteran but didn’t have much to do in this episode.

Watching Linda was a fine episode to close out this first season of what was one of the better softcore TV shows of this era. Chacebook rating: FIVE STARS

Jason Majercik is selling Passion Cove: Season 1 as an UNRATED 2-DVD  set for $39.99 Email him at quinn_nash@hotmail.com for his softcore inventory list