Quotes from Shelby Reed

Walking away from you with a broken heart is easier to handle than selling my soul to make love with you. I'm sorry, Adrian. I might be lonely, and naive, and all the things you think about me. But I'm also true to myself, and I won't denigrate my feelings for you. They're much too precious in a world that offers so little love.

I won't cheapen it by buying what you sell to strangers. I'm not a stranger. I'm the woman who loves you

I love you, Billie. Give me the chance to make you happy. To show you who I really am – the man who can't live without you. The man who deserves your heart

Think what you want about me Billie. You're the only part of my life that hasn't been a lie.

I'm going to come," he whispered, lips against her ear. "Deep, deep inside you.

It came to him then, permeated his disjointed thoughts. Billie was teaching him—him—how to make love. With a jolt of surprise at the crashing irony, Adrian realized he hadn't known how until now. He, the consummate lover, so renown for his sexual skill, so proficient and controlled and practiced, had only played at making love, where Billie…God. Clearly, it was all she knew. Pretense just wasn't in her spectrum of capabilities.

If you're as intelligent as I think, you'll back away and give him time to examine his true desires. He's so busy fulfilling everyone else's; he has no idea what he wants." "I've been under the impression that he wanted me," Billie said coldly, "or I wouldn't be here.

He'd performed like a well-oiled automaton last night, blocking out the reality of the woman taking her pleasure beneath him, banishing images of Billie that rushed time and again through his thoughts and threatened the steely control he maintained over his own orgasm. When at last he'd let himself go, one fevered word had pounded through his brain. Billie.

In her own fumbling way, she'd reminded him he was just a man, fallible, needful, a member of the supremely imperfect human race…and shamefully undeserving of what she had to offer. Looking at Billie, touching her, tasting her, had filled him with a wanting fiercer than any he'd known. For the first time, he was faced with something he couldn't truly have, because of what he'd become.

Love is the great redeemer, the Franciscan had said. Through love, all things are possible. Gideon bit back the triumphant laughter rising in his chest. He'd beaten the monster. Just once, but if he'd restrained it once, he could do it again. Through love, all things are possible.