I beg your pardon for questioning your judgement," she said. "It is nothing to me, after all, if it proves faulty. I am not the one responsible for the Marquess of Atherton's heir and sole offspring. I am not the one who will be toppled from my pedestal if the world learns I have not only permitted but encouraged my nephew to associate with the most shocking persons. I am not the one who-" "I wish you were the one who had heard of the rule Silence is Golden," he said.

The bigger they are, the harder they fall. And the better the world liked seeing them fall.

I love these pet names," she said, gazing soulfully up into his eyes, "Nitwit. Sap skull. Termagant. How they make my heart flutter!

We've been wed more than a month. Since it appears you mean to stay, I might as well give you leave to call me by my christian name. It is preferable, at any rate, to 'clodpole.

Clara will break him to bridle,” Longmore said. “And if she can’t cure his wild ways, who knows? Maybe he’ll ride into a ditch or get run over by a post chaise, and she’ll be a young widow. Do try to look on the bright side.

"Miss you," he said. It was the barest murmur, scarcely a sound.

Jessica, I know I've been...difficult," he said. "All the same—" "Difficult?" She looked up, her grey eyes wide, "You have been impossible. I begin to think you are not right in the upper storey. I knew you wanted me. The only thing I've never doubted was that. But getting you into bed— you, the greatest whoremonger in Christendom— gad, it was worse than the time I had to drag Bertie to the tooth-drawer. And if you think I mean to be doing that the rest of our days, you had better think again. The next time, my lord, you will do the seducing— or there won't be any, I vow.