Quotes from Mary Balogh

I wanted to be able to give her all of myself. I tried.

His hand shot up to grasp her wrist as her hand flashed toward his face. 'No, not this time,' he said, eyes narrowing. 'That last time you had the advantage of surprise, my love, but I learn by experience. Hit me again, Elizabeth, and I may reply in kind. You would not escape with a kiss this time.' He released her wrist.

A very disappointing encounter. It had had strong romantic possibilities. Not that he was much given to romance, it was true.

You are, after all, a marquess. I sometimes forget that I am such an exalted personage, he said. I suppose that is the reason you are marrying me, Diana, is it? So that you may be a marchioness? Yes, she said. You mean you thought there might be some other reason?

Of course it must be the aim of any young lady of breeding to find herself a suitable husband. What else is there?

Labels helped identify a person, perhaps, but they did not define him. Or her.

Do you not know me well enough, he asked, to know that I would have come to you as fast as horse could gallop at any time I had received such a letter from you in the last six years?

Rebecca was conscious of a dull ache inside, which she could not disguise.

No one could have convinced her six years before that the day would come when she and Robert would sleep under the same roof, in separate bedrooms, not only strangers to each other, but bitter strangers.

Is it really possible that you can love me enough to forgive me?

was, licking

Some people look forward to going to heaven after they die," he said. "For years after I purchased it, Rose Cottage was the earthly heaven to which I aspired.

I fear the rain has stopped and it is time to squelch our way back through the grass to the house. If you were a gentleman, she said, you would carry me.

Why do you hate yourself so much? He laughed harshly. You ask me that? he said. You know what I am, Diana. You know that I have nothing of any goodness or worth to offer you. And you don't even know the worst about me. I think I know the best about you, though, she said. You have a strong sense of decency and honor. Otherwise you would not be protecting me more than I am protecting myself.

There is a terrible pain,' she said softly, 'about being abandoned by someone who loves someone else more than you. A pain and an emptiness and a determination never again to give anyone that power.

I wonder where he can have gone and why. And I wonder if he plans to return soon. If I had only had an inkling of his going, Mr. Rowe returned, I should have backed him into the nearest corner, my love, and forced answers from him. As it is, I am afraid I cannot enlighten you.

Please, darling, give me that much consolation at least.

His usual air of boredom and cynicism discouraged anyone from trying too hard to engage his attention.

She would find it very difficult to say an outright no if she did not have a ready-made excuse.

It seems to me that the two of you have had your marriage blighted by misunderstandings and suspicions and missed opportunities.

Will you have regrets later, love? I do not think I could bear that.

If we can only face our worst fears and move forward into them and through them instead of cowering or turning tail and running as far from them as we can, then we will never have to fear anything ever again.

I cannot imagine anyone having such a criminal lack of sense.

crowded about the four sides of the green to watch and cheer. Viola had set out from home early in the morning looking ladylike and elegant in a muslin dress and shawl and straw bonnet, her hair in a neatly braided coronet about her head beneath it. She had even been wearing gloves. But she had long ago discarded all the accessories. Even her hair, slipping stubbornly out of its pins during the busy morning of rushing hither and yon, had been allowed finally to hang loose in a long braid down