There was something more than a little satisfying about ripping the heart out of someone the moment before they expected to do the same to you.

Still pleasant as a cornered hedgehog, and as well mannered as a badger, I see.

Alison’s gaze gentled. “Tell me, Samantha, have you ever been to Scotland?

Samantha imagined that in another life, she and Alison could have, indeed, been friends. Had she not been about to rob the train.

Love is quite like reading, I expect. Once you know how, you can't ever imagine not doing it.

A jewelry box? Ballerinas? She'd been such an active girl that any jewelry she'd been given would have been lost or broken right away. It was Faye Marie who'd loved-"My sister," she gasped, then louder. "My sister!" She clasped her hands together in a pleading gesture. "My lord, I beg pardon of you, but you're mistaken. I believe you gifted that treasure box to my older sister, Faye Marie. She's the one who loved ballerinas. I was obsessed with-""Pegasus." The old justice's eyes melted from cold to kindness. "It was a trick question. I'd forgotten your birthday was so close to mine, and shared my spice cake out of pure guilt." His lined face wrinkled as he smiled with a fond memory. "You were a kind little soul, unspoiled for a girl raised in such wealth. You forgave me instantly and informed me that spice cake was, indeed, your favorite present ever received.

Sometimes I feel that I could stand in the middle of the square and scream and thrash about like a wildling, and no one would notice.

Ye’re wet,” he groaned. “I’m underwater.” “I ken that, bonny. But this dampness has nothing to do with that.

Experience should have taught ye by now that denying me what I want only makes me more relentless.

The lass was no damsel. He’d prepared himself for a hard sell, one that might require a few extra knee-weakening smiles, perhaps so much as a seduction, but he’d never in a million years expected the disaster that landed his arms. The disaster named Alison Ross.

Doona fash, Sam.” Calybrid, spying her scowl, hurried to balm the wound. “Ye’re plenty fair.” “Aye,” Locryn agreed. “With eyes the color of the Alt Dubh Gorm.” “Sure, that too.” “Just… no one will write odes to yer breasts is all.” “On account of ye not having any,” Locryn supplied, rather unnecessarily, in Samantha’s opinion.

Though her muscles went rigid, her tongue sparred with his, as he might have guessed it would. Each lick and swirl, each plunge and retreat became a point counted for or against. Gavin had never enjoyed a woman’s mouth so much in his entire life.

This blood feud is a bit too Shakespearean, if ye want the truth. I’m no Montague, and ye’re no Capulet.

It occurred to Gavin that the first thought a groom had upon spying his bride shouldn’t be to wonder whether or not she wore knickers.

So does it still count if he doesna kiss the bride?

If you love no one, no one can hurt you,” she whispered.

He clutched her to him with a desperate strength that almost hurt. "I will love you for your light, if you can love me through the dark times. And that love will be like the clear night sky when the moon is full. Not like the sun....but beautiful and bright enough to find our way.

Cole stilled when his feral eyes found her, roaming every inch as though searching for a wound. The doorway framed him like a portal to purgatory, and he stood like an avenging archangel come to wreak a wrath no less than biblical. The swells of his powerful chest heaved against the white of his shirtsleeves now blotched and stained with blood. The blade on his prosthesis was extended past the motionless metal fingers, and blood dripped from it into a thick crimson puddle on the marble floor.

I think this dress will stun the nobility, and leave them stupefied with envy and lust," Madame Sandrine announced with relish."I'm just glad it's not crimson, like everything else you drape," Farah said to her husband as she glanced at her transformation in the floor-to-ceiling mirrors across from the raised podium on which she stood. The creation of blue silk evoked the midnight sky, as it wrapped her bosom and waist in bejeweled gathers before cascading from her hips in a dark waterfall. The shamelessly cut bodice was lent a hint of respectability by folds of a shimmering diaphanous silver material draping from a choker of gems about her neck and flowing down her shoulders like moonbeams. To call them sleeves would have been a mistake, for all they concealed.Madame Sandrine threw a teasing look over her shoulder at Blackwell. "How fitting that the color of blood is the one you prefer the most.""Not for her," Dorian rumbled.The seamstress lifted a winged eyebrow, but didn't comment. "Voila. I believe that is all I'll need from you today, Madame Blackwell. I can have these finished in the morning, and in the meantime I have a lovely soft gray frock hemmed with tiny pink blossoms that will bring out the color in your cheeks.

Dougan had almost completely forgotten about the food, for his entire body was suffused with the most intense and exquisite sensation he'd ever known. It was something like hunger, and something like fulfillment. It was wonder and awe and yearning and fear encapsulated in a tender bliss.