But the Duke of Clermont was smiling and cheerful, and he’d thrown it out there as if it were merely one more fact to be recounted. The weather is lovely. The streets are paved with cobblestone. Your tits are magnificent.
A man must claim responsibility for his own temptation, and not pin it on the woman who arouses him. It’s a gown, Sir Mark. Not even one of my more daring ones.
What can I say? I have a thing for women who carry heavy books and know how to use them.
Distressed sighs!” Robert protested. “Not once did I stoop to distressed sighs! I might have emitted a manly huff of oppression.
My nerves are neither over- nor underwrought. They are wrought to the precise degree demanded by this situation.
If I had married, there is much I would not have learned of myself. This has been hard and painful and horrible. But I’ve learned that I’m stronger than hard, better than pain, and that with enough luck, horrible can go away.
For years, every conversation she had with a man had been colored by calculation. Would she put him off is she spoke her mind? What did he want her to say? When a man took a mistress, he purchased not just the rights to her body, but the content of her thoughts. Sir Mark wanted her as she was, not as he wished her to be. The thought made her head hurt.
I adhere to the law of chastity because I don’t believe in pushing women. That’s what it means to be a man. I don’t hurt others simply to make myself feel superior. Gossip can ruin a woman as surely as unchaste behavior. True men don’t indulge in either. We don’t need to.
If you’re going to throw the girl to the wolves, it’s only appropriate to outfit her with a red cloak.
So,” he said, “you think that I’m charming. You didn’t list that among my assets before.” “Of course you’re charming.” She didn’t look up. “I’m charmed. I’m charmed to my teeth.” There was a note in her voice that sounded so bitter that it almost tasted sweet. “You’re a force of nature, Your Grace,” she said. “But so am I. So am I.
I believe that women are human beings. That belief is not diametrically opposed to thinking that men are human beings, and that if one human being has the opportunity to be kind to another, she should do so.
But here’s the thing about having been in love that first time: I always knew, every time after, that what I was faced with was a pale imitation. I never found someone else I could trust with my soul. After that first time, nothing else was acceptable.
When someone falls,” Mark said, “you don’t throw her back down in the dirt. You offer her a hand up. It’s the Christian thing to do.
Damn you, knowledge! Ruining everything good, once again. Learning things is most inconvenient.
Anjan was Batty because Bhattacharya had too many syllables. He’d told one man his first name; the fellow had blinked, and then had immediately dubbed him John. That’s who they thought he was: John Batty. These well-meaning English boys had taken his name as easily, and with as much jovial friendship, as their fathers had taken his country.
If he were another person entirely, he might burst into flowery speech. If he did, she’d probably laugh at him. Besides, he didn’t believe in pretending to be anyone other than who he was. Even if she swooned at whatever poetic nonsense he managed to spout, she would only be disappointed once they grew comfortable with each other and he went back to making jokes about death and gonorrhea.
Defiance. He swallowed. It wasn’t enough for him – not anymore. He wanted to be more than her defiance. He wanted to be her strength, her amusement. He wanted to be her lover. He wanted to be her every wicked desire and her safe haven, all at once.
And your mom?” Blake clears his throat. “She’s not with us.” I remember the conversation Blake and I had on the way down and tense. I can only imagine what my mother will say. But my mother just smiles brilliantly. “That’s good! Too many boys your age get spoiled by their mothers. They don’t know how to cook, how to do laundry. Tina is going to be a busy doctor. She’ll need someone to do all that for her. Better if you’re not used to having someone else take care of you.
I knew perfectly well what you meant,” Sebastian said. “But I’ve always found that the quickest way to make someone relent in his foolish edicts is to take every command literally and to perform it with flagrant obedience.
And I know, despite all the constellations placed in the sky as warning, why all those Greek maidens gave it up in the end. It’s because all the pain is worth it for this one moment.