Courtney Milan Quotes & Sayings

He'd never treated her like a lady. He'd treated her like an equal instead, and that had seemed far more precious. — Courtney Milan

For himself ... He could rarely think of how to respond when immersed in that heady back-and-forth. Sometimes he thought of clever things to say ... hours later. Usually, he committed the worst sin possible: He said what he was really thinking. That was why he came out with gems like, I like your tits. Not one of his finest moments, that. — Courtney Milan

Do Chinese dragons even eat people?" "She lives in the Bay Area," I say severely. "She eats a Westernized diet. — Courtney Milan

Edward shook his head. "I'm going to do the same thing with Miss Marshall that I do to everyone I love. I'm going to leave before I can do her harm."
Patrick looked at him, his mouth quirking skeptically.
"I will," Edward said. "Just as soon as I can get everyone else to leave her alone. — Courtney Milan

Odd, what a strange thing trust was. A week or so ago, she'd never have trusted Mr. Clark, not for the slightest instant. In that time, little had changed. He was still a blackmailer, still a forger. He was likely even still a liar.
But he'd saved her last night, and now they knew things of each other - things that seemed more important than such details as the name he'd been born with, or the nature of his revenge. He knew she had nightmares about the lock hospital; she knew he'd been in a fire brigade in Strasbourg. — Courtney Milan

She had always thought that she wanted someone to love her beyond all reason. Someone who would slay a regiment of knights to save her the slightest inconvenience.
She'd been wrong. That sort of fool left nothing but a swath of bloody knights in his wake. — Courtney Milan

Minnie stood. I didn't refuse Gardley because I wanted too much. It wasn't that I thought I could do better. It was simply that I couldn't do worse. — Courtney Milan

In fact, if the conversation had been animate, the merciful thing to do would have been to take it out behind the barn and shoot it. — Courtney Milan

His past followed him around as faithfully as his shadow. — Courtney Milan

Oh, thank God. It wasn't the pens talk. — Courtney Milan

Defiance was only amusing when the stakes were low. — Courtney Milan

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. — Courtney Milan

Libraries are the future of reading. When the economy is down, we need to make it easier for people to buy and read books for free, not harder. It is stupid to sacrifice tomorrow's book buyers for today's dollars, especially when it's obvious that the source in question doesn't have any more dollars to give you. — Courtney Milan

Is it a thorny question of ethics? Or is it the sort of ethical question where the right choice is easy, but the unethical answer is too tempting? — Courtney Milan

If eyes were windows to the soul, hers had been bricked up to avoid taxation. — Courtney Milan

I do believe you would have cut the rope. — Courtney Milan

If that door opens now, of course," he murmured in her ear, "I can step away and only the flush in your cheeks will raise suspicion." His hands continued to chart a dangerous course over her body. He stroked her, caressed her, until she strained against him. He kissed the back of her neck. "So I think we should remove any doubt as to what is happening. — Courtney Milan

Edward had the odd notion that after years of drab motionlessness, his entire world had suddenly begun to spin about him. He'd had that feeling ever since he'd been pulled into her orbit on the bank of the Thames.
She gave him the most astonishing vertigo. He should have hated it.
But he didn't - not one bit. — Courtney Milan

Family isn't a matter of history. Or biology," he said softly. "It's a matter of choice. — Courtney Milan

If a man ever lets you know that he sees marriage as a trap, and women as nothing but scheming connivers, you are by no means to marry him. Any man that sees your entire sex in so harsh a light has nothing to offer you. — Courtney Milan

His voice dropped to a low murmur, and he leaned down so that he was almost whispering in her ear. "You see, there's this woman."
She wasn't going to look at him. She wasn't.
"Normally, one might say that there was a beautiful woman - but I don't think she qualifies as a classical beauty. Still, I find that when she's around, I'd rather look at her than anyone else."
He set two fingers against her cheek, and Minnie sucked in a breath. She was not going to look at him. He'd see the longing in her eyes, and then ...
"There's something about her that draws my eye. Something that defies words. Maybe it's her hair, but I tried to tell her that, and she told me I was being ridiculous. I suppose I was. Maybe it's her lips. Maybe it's her eyes, although she so rarely looks at me. — Courtney Milan

When I said that this lady was known to me, I meant that I esteem her more than anyone else on this earth. If I can do my duty and walk away from my best beloved, you can all do yours and listen to what she has to say. — Courtney Milan

Well, perhaps it was more than her spirit. He admired her intelligence. The way that she'd walk into a room and immediately determine who was in charge and how best to alienate him. He wanted a wife just like that - except, — Courtney Milan

It was not lust itself he felt, but the premonition of desire, as if the wind that whipped around his cravat were whispering in his ears. /Her. Choose her./ — Courtney Milan

Took Amanda's hand. "Sisters," she repeated. "I walked away from you years ago. I'll be damned if I let you stand alone today. — Courtney Milan

Men touch their horses to calm them," she said distantly. "They caress their falcons to remind them that they are bound. Touch smacks of ownership, and I am weary of being a possession. — Courtney Milan

Love is never safe," Tina repeats. "It's weird. It's magical. It's the moment when you break through the dark shell that protects your heart and say, this, this person. I'm going to let this person in, let him come so close that he can hurt me more than I can possibly imagine. I'm going to let him hurt me." She inhales. "Love is never safe." "And yet," I say, "we do it anyway." "We do it anyway." Her voice is a quiet echo of mine, but her hands close on mine. — Courtney Milan

I knew the instant Margaret spoke that she intended to use me as a weapon. What you fail to understand is this: I am her weapon to use. — Courtney Milan

You said that I didn't notice people like you." His voice lowers. His eyes are relentlessly blue, and they cut into me. "That's completely false. You've never been invisible to me. I saw you the first day we crossed paths, and I've been seeing you ever since. — Courtney Milan

Nothing was what she was; nothing was what she gave to those foolish enough to care for her. Nothing was what she deserved, and so nothing had been what she got. It didn't matter how hard she tried or what she did. — Courtney Milan

Men wouldn't ask any such thing. They'd already know what caught my eye. He whispered in a conspiratorial fashion. "It's your tits." "They're magnificent." He wasn't even looking at them, but Minnie's hand itched to cover herself - not to block out his sight, but to explore her own curves. To see if, perhaps, her bosom was magnificent, if it had been magnificent all these years, and she had simply never noticed. — Courtney Milan

Three quarters of respectable England hates you."
"Half," Sebastian replied with a smile. "It's really only half. Judging by my correspondence, it may be as little as forty-eight percent. And of those, only a small number want to cause me bodily harm. The rest just wish to have me gagged or thrown in prison. — Courtney Milan

He was talking, politely, with those around him. But even as he conversed, he scanned the crowd. When his eyes rested on her, he stopped. He'd been smiling before, in a friendly fashion. But what lit his face when he saw her was more than a smile, more than a grin. It was as if someone had thrown aside the curtains of a sickroom on a glorious morning, to let sunlight spill into every darkened corner. What was he doing? Everyone would know how he felt. He simply made no effort to hide it. She could feel the heat of his expression, even from halfway across the room. — Courtney Milan

My heart isn't breaking because I can't have you."
"Don't say that. I saw the way you were looking at me just now. We can quibble over the precise words to use. But don't tell me I haven't hurt you."
"My heart's not breaking because I can't have you," he insisted. "It's breaking because you think you're a hard thing, because you imagine that what I see in you is an illusion. It isn't. — Courtney Milan

I like good books and clever conversation and being left alone much of the time. — Courtney Milan

He'd been lying to himself all these months.
He WAS in love with her. And he had no idea what to do about it. — Courtney Milan

What am I supposed to think, when you imagine me pure as the driven snow? I am not a child. If you strip me of the responsibility for my decisions, you strip me of the capacity to make them, as well. I am not a kitten, to be rescued from the jaws of a wolf. I'm a grown woman. And it is not your place to solve my problems without asking me for my opinion. — Courtney Milan

The beautiful thing about marriage is the right it gives me to monogamy. One man intent on dictating my whereabouts is enough, wouldn't you think? — Courtney Milan

You see so many surprising things and you think they're obvious. — Courtney Milan

There was no point in feeling hurt simply because a man she refused to want didn't want her back. — Courtney Milan

Richard is my son now," her father was saying.
Margaret leaned over him. "No," she said, her voice harsh. "No, he is not."
"He will be, when - "
"By your definition, I am the only son you will ever have." He blinked at her. "I beg your pardon?"
She hadn't known she was going to say it, but the words seemed right coming out of her mouth. "...A continuation through the female line is not traditional, but the excuse will suffice. So understand this: I will choose the next Duke of Parford. I will inherit the estate. I will have the entailed property. — Courtney Milan

If I've learned anything, it's that we know next to nothing. Disease is a mystery. Health is inscrutable. The body itself is scarcely understood; we can only examine the secrets of the dead. And in all that dark ignorance, we're sometimes granted a rare moment of illumination. The truth is a gift. — Courtney Milan

He'd wanted to make her into nothing because that's what he'd done to himself. — Courtney Milan

Do you suppose I would learn you the way a scholar learns a book? That you are nothing to me but a collection of suppositions, to be stored in my memory and written down for verification? No, Margaret. I know you. — Courtney Milan

You see, I'm not really left-handed."

"No!" Robert and Oliver spike together in joint outrage.

Sebastian's eyes widened. "An infidel! Stone him!" He looked wildly around, found a scrap of paper on the floor, and hurled it ineffectually at him. "Die, fiend, die! — Courtney Milan

Huzzah." Free met his gaze with a flat stare. "Crime! Right now that crime is blackmail, but it won't be blackmail much longer."
"No? How do you figure?"
"With luck and a good amount of arsenic ... ?" She gave him a smile of her own. "Soon it will be: 'Huzzah! Murder!' Now there's a cause that deserves my exclamation point. — Courtney Milan

I'm tired of having to remind myself that the women who are after me wish only an experience or a reputation and not a lifetime. I'm tired of holding myself back. I'm tired of having to flatten all but the barest hint of affection."
Her breath caught.
"I'm tired," he said, "Of not letting myself fall in love. — Courtney Milan

Will I see you at all?
He shook his head. But he couldn't yet make himself move away. He was unwilling to relinquish his hold on her, unwilling to say that final good-bye. He held her for a minute, then two, then three, simply holding her and committing to memory what he could not have in life. There was a sweet, comforting scent to her.
His memory was very, very good, but she was better.
He only loosened his grip when he feared he might not be able to let go of her at all. — Courtney Milan

He couldn't bring himself to look directly at her. Her gown was the color of daylight just before sunset; if he looked at her too long, he feared he might be left blind once she was gone. — Courtney Milan

Marshall was watching her again, and Jane's skin prickled under his perusal. That was when Jane realized she'd made a mistake. Those freckles, his background - they'd all misled her into thinking that he was a quiet little rabbit. He wasn't. He was the wolf that looked as if he were lounging about on the outskirts of the pack, a lone hanger-on, when in truth he had adopted that position simply so that he could see everything that transpired in the fields below. He wasn't solitary; he was waiting for someone to make a mistake. He looked willing to wait a very long time. — Courtney Milan

Thank you for everything. I'd never have been able to rid myself of Delacey without you." She leaned up and kissed his cheek. "You're my favorite brother."
"I'm your only brother," he said in dark amusement.
"You see?" Free spread her arms. "I can't count on any of the others to even exist when I need them. — Courtney Milan

Friendship was a concept men bandied about to save face when they were rejected. — Courtney Milan

Damn you, knowledge! Ruining everything good, once again. Learning things is most inconvenient. — Courtney Milan

MARGARET HAD SEEN ASH cheerfully powerful, as talkative as a jaybird. She'd seen him silently powerful while he was listening to those around her. She didn't like seeing him vulnerable. It made her feel odd inside - hotly angry on his behalf, and enraged that someone had made him feel that way. — Courtney Milan

He'd fallen a little bit in love with her the moment she'd said his name as if it had value. — Courtney Milan

All soldiers dreamed of armistice, after all. — Courtney Milan

He was 'susceptible' to her. If he wasn't careful, he might end up nursing a full-blown interest. — Courtney Milan

She made her shoulder blades into steel, willing them to stay rigid against his onslaught. She was a thing of gears and metal, strong like clockwork, and she wouldn't melt down into tears. — Courtney Milan

He knew taht many of his compatriots avoided marriage at all costs. They saw matrimony as an annoyance, a wife as another person who would nag and prod. But when he repeated his vows, he heard "as long as we both shall life" and he hoped. — Courtney Milan

I assumed I would be better off telling you about this, rather than waiting for the entire thing to blow up in my face. — Courtney Milan

There was only a language of families, a tongue woven from a lifetime of shared experiences. Its vocabulary consisted of gestures and curt sentences, incomprehensible to all outsiders. Inside, it wasn't difficult to translate at all. — Courtney Milan

I think you're very brave," he whispered. "You're a fire that should burn itself out in five seconds of brilliant combustion. I know what it's like to put forth that much energy, and yet you do it night after night. And nobody - not marquesses nor guardians nor physicians, not the whole weight of society's expectations - can make you stop." She let out a sigh, a trembling sigh that had her lips brushing against his thumb. So much like a kiss. "If people want you to stop talking, or to stop dressing the way you do, or to change who you are, it's because you hurt their eyes. We've all been trained not to stare into the sun. — Courtney Milan

It's called basic human decency, and I deserve no credit for doing what every man should. — Courtney Milan

You've always been your own knight, riding to your rescue. I'm just the man who came along and saw how brightly your armor shone. — Courtney Milan

Don't hide it on my account," he growled. "You have the most damnably beautiful punctuation that I have ever seen. You make a man feel greedy. — Courtney Milan

You anchor me without holding me down. You frighten me without threatening my future. You're unflinchingly devoted. I love you. — Courtney Milan

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. — Courtney Milan

There were no knights, no castles, no magic. But there was laughter, and there was love, and while Judith still had breath in her body, she would make sure they had enough. Her life was already its own once upon a time. There was enough joy in the story, enough sorrow mixed in. It might not be the sort of tale that mothers told their children but it was still a good one. Not everything hurt. It would all turn out. — Courtney Milan

Sir Mark Turner," he said. "I speak with the tongues of a thousand angels. Butterflies follow me wherever I go. Birds sing when I take a breath. — Courtney Milan

You need to control your wife."
"Haven't you figured it out?" Edward said quietly. "I married her to unleash her on the world, not to keep her under wraps."
James blinked, as if trying to understand that.
"I married her because she made me believe in her," Edward said. "Because I wished her beyond your power, not under mine. You have no idea of the debt I owe her. For her I'd do the unthinkable."
He glanced back at Free.
"If she asked me to do it," he told James, "I'd even forgive you. — Courtney Milan

She shouldn't have been beautiful - she was too forward, too freckled, too thin. Still ... Oh, to hell with it all. He wasn't hungry, anyway. He reached out and took her hand, drawing her to him. She drifted near, until she was close enough to kiss. Close enough for him to see the green of her eyes, widening as he turned her hand over, palm up.
"There's something I've wanted to do since the first moment I saw you," he said. It came out close to a whisper.
"Oh?" He could feel the puff of breath from that word against his nose.
"Don't even think of arguing."
She shook her head. Her lips opened, an impossible, inviting fraction.
He set the fork in the palm of her hand and closed his fingers tightly around hers. "I want you to eat," he said. — Courtney Milan

He'd fashioned himself into one hard edge. He was all blade and no handle. If she held him close, she'd risk being cut. — Courtney Milan

He wasn't good with this sort of thing - with the back-and-forth dance between man and woman. He wasn't even sure if they were dancing, or if she was merely being polite. — Courtney Milan

She made everything happen, and still she remained invisible to the people she loved the most. — Courtney Milan

I was worried that my brilliant good looks and easy manners would make me impossible to hate, thus ruining our fragile alliance. But this will be simple. Just tell me all the subjects you are an expert in, and I shall endeavor to explain them to you. — Courtney Milan

He blinked. He had the sense that he was lost in those quiet gray eyes, unable to look away from her. He was a duke. She was a - what had she called herself? A half-blind near-spinster. It shouldn't even have been a fair fight. — Courtney Milan

And that was how Jenny discovered the answer to her question. How could she remain Gareth's lover without becoming his mistress?
She couldn't.
The only question was whether this affair would end in three months or three days. — Courtney Milan

He looked over at her, at the fierce expression on her face. Her hair spilled around her shoulders in little curls, tickling his arm. And he felt a sense of unimaginable wonder. He'd thought to keep her safe, and yet here she was, insisting that she would protect him. He couldn't wrap his mind around what this could mean. — Courtney Milan

Fairfield," she said in cutting tones, 'if you had been a hunter on the plains of old, the lions would have killed you while you were wandering around the savannah saying, 'Where is everyone, and what have they done with my spears? — Courtney Milan

I hated you," she continued, "because you have done nothing more than abide by rules that every gentlewoman follows every day of her life. Yet for this prosaic feat, you are feted and cosseted as if you were a hero." She felt nothing as she spoke, but still her voice shook. Her hands were trembling, too. "I hate that if a woman missteps once, she is condemned forever, and yet the men who follow you can tie a simple ribbon to their hats after years of debauchery, and pass themselves off as upright pillars of society. — Courtney Milan

This time, his gaze fixed on her and stayed. The wind blew, whipping her skirts about her ankles, as if he'd called up a gale with the intensity of his stare. — Courtney Milan

My entire notion of friendship altered when I depended on someone for more than just the pleasant passing of time. — Courtney Milan

I've seen Emily's scars, and that's more than you can say.
Fairfield shrunk back from the anger in Anjan's voice. "I meant well," he whispered.
Anjan leaned forward across the desk until he was an inch from the other man. "Mean better. — Courtney Milan

How many lovers?" He could have given her a straight answer. Dozens. Or, more specifically: Thirty-seven. Thirty-seven, if you counted mutual versions of the conduct he'd just engaged in, and Sebastian did.But what he finally said was, "Too many. And not enough." Her face was in shadow. He couldn't tell if she was disgusted by him, or if this was just a matter of idle curiosity for her.
She exhaled. "How many would be enough?"
He smiled sadly. "One more, Violet." He looked over at her - at her arms folded around herself, at her head, turned from his, as if that would be enough to distract him from the ferocity of his want. "I've only ever wanted one more. — Courtney Milan

God, the gown was hideous. So utterly hideous. Never before had so much money been put in the service of so little taste. She batted her eyes at the mirror in glee; her reflection flirted back with her: dark-haired, dark-eyed, coquettish and mysterious. "What do you ladies think?" she asked, turning about. "Ought I have more lace?" At her feet, the beleaguered Mrs. Sandeston let out a whimper. — Courtney Milan

A lady always avoids the truth, when it happens to be gauche. — Courtney Milan

His fingers went to the buttons of his jacket, and her mouth dried. His buttons were simple cloth and metal affairs, scarcely worth a second thought. And yet as he undid them, she had second thoughts and third thoughts, none of them proper. His gloved fingers were long and graceful, and every button he undid revealed another inch of creamy linen, one that hinted at broad shoulders and strong muscles.
He'd not shown her the slightest bit of skin, but the act of unbuttoning his coat sparked indecent thoughts - memories of his arm coming around her, his mouth on hers ...
He stopped undoing buttons, and she realized he'd only wanted to reach the inside pocket. She sat back in disappointment. — Courtney Milan

An untutored observer would focus on the Duke of Clermont, apparently in full command, resplendent in a waistcoat so shot with gold thread that it almost hurt the eyes. This observer would dismiss Hugo Marshall, arrayed as he was in clothing spanning the spectrum from brown to browner. The comparison wouldn't stop at clothing. The duke was respectably bulky without running to fat; his patrician features were sharp and aristocratic. He had mobile, ice-blue eyes that seemed to take in everything. Compared with Hugo's own unprepossessing expression and sandy brown hair, the untutored observer would have concluded that the duke was in charge.
The untutored observer, Hugo thought, was an idiot. — Courtney Milan

You always put things at risk. If you fell out of a tree as a child, I'd clean you up and bandage your knees, and next I looked you'd be out climbing again. You never learned your lesson.
Oh, she'd learned her lesson. Climb harder. — Courtney Milan

Keep quiet. Don't panic. Never tell anyone the truth. She'd lived with their rules for twelve years, and for what? So that she might one day be so lucky as to be forgotten entirely. The memory of Minerva Lane - of who she'd been, what she'd done - felt like a hot coal covered in cold ashes. It smoldered on long after the fire had been doused. Sometimes, all that heat rose up in her until she felt the need to shriek like a teapot. Until she wanted to burn the mousy shreds of her tattered personality. It rose up in her now, that fiery rebellion. The part of her that was still Minerva - the part that hadn't been ground to smoothness - whispered temptation in her ear. You don't need to keep quiet. You need a strategy. — Courtney Milan

Love will never magically make me whole. It won't heal old wounds. But when I'm around you, I do not feel as if I must be alone. I smile when you're in the room and I laugh when you're happy. I feel as if I've come home to you." He slid his fingers up her arm, around her back. "There isn't one part of me that you've flinched from. I don't know why you'd marry me, but I know why I'm desperate for you. Nobody else on earth would bring me to myself as you have. — Courtney Milan

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. — Courtney Milan

After she left, he stood as still as he dared, listening to the sound of the cart recede into the distance. Listening, past all hope of hearing her. He wasn't even conscious of breathing, and yet his lungs ached fiercely. He had been wrong. It would have been easier if it had slain him. But he was still standing. Still cogent. And that meant he was all too aware of how badly it hurt. He clutched her hairpin until the metal cunt into the palm of his hand, unable to let even that much go. — Courtney Milan

A sign on the door proclaimed: The countess is NOT to be bothered except in the cases of death, disembowelment, the Apocalypse, or the arrival of her mother. — Courtney Milan

You matter," she whispered to him. "You are important. And you are the single most magnificent man I have ever had the honor of meeting. — Courtney Milan

He just looked at his brother and very slowly shook his head, as if to reprove him. 'Ash' was all he said.
The elder Turner reached out and ruffled his younger brother's hair. Mr. Mark Turner did not glower under that touch like a youth pretending to be an adult; neither did he preen like a child being recognized by his elder. He could not have been more than four-and-twenty, the same age as Margaret's second-eldest brother. Yet he stood and regarded his brother, unflinching under his touch, his eyes steady and ageless. — Courtney Milan

Over the years, everyone stumbles. That's why I'll be here for you - and you'll be there for me. I don't expect perfection. I want you, and you're a thousand times better. — Courtney Milan

That memory was a knife that kept on cutting. — Courtney Milan

He snorted. "Are you lying to me, Miss Marshall?"
"Of course I am." She smiled at him. "I thought it would put you at ease. — Courtney Milan

It was the first hint that she'd given that there was anything to her but an excess of shyness. He'd begun to actually doubt his own memory. Surely this woman hadn't come to his house and attempted blackmail. — Courtney Milan