julia-quinn

My mother is convinced that yellow is a happy color and that a happy girl would get a husband.-Penelope Featherington

And if you say that's because you lot barged into her home like a herd of mentally deficient sheep, I'm disowning all three of you.

Anthony looked down at his evil clutches -- hands, he reminded himself, hands -- and grinned anew.

James - "Are you paying attention or just trying to make me look like an idoit?"Elizabeth - "Oh, I'm definately paying attention. If you look like an idiot it has nothing to do with me.

Colin decided then and there that the female mind was a strange and incomprehensible organ - one which no man should even attempt to understand. There wasn't a woman alive who could go from point A to B without stopping at C, D, X, and 12 along the way.

Just curious,she mouthed."What? I didn't catch that."Jjuussttccuurriioouuss.She drew it out this time, hoping he'd be able to read her lips."If you spoke out loud," he drawled, "I might understand what you're saying."Caroline stamped her foot in frustration, but when it landed, it landed on something considerablyless'flat than the floor."Owww!" he yelled.Oh! His foot!Sorrysorrysorrysorrysorrysorry , she mouthed.I didn't mean it."If you think I can understand that," he growled, "you're crazier than I'd originally thought.

Caroline stamped her foot in frustration, but when it landed, it landed on something considerablyless flat than the floor."Owww!" he yelled.Oh! His foot!Sorrysorrysorrysorrysorrysorry , she mouthed.I didn't mean it."If you think I can understand that," he growled, "you're crazier than I'd originally thought.

Oh, God, Francesca,Now there__ a good one.Why?Why? Why?_ He gave each one a different tenor, as if he were testing out the word, asking it todifferent people.__hy?_ he asked again, this time with increased volumeas he turned around to face her.__hy? It__because I love you, damn me to hell. Because I__e always loved you. Because I loved you when youwere with John, and I loved you when I was in India, and God only knows I don__ deserve you, but Ilove you, anyway.__rancesca sagged against the door.__ow__ that for a witty little joke?_ he mocked. __ loveyou. I loveyou, my cousin__ wife. I loveyou, theone woman I can never have. I loveyou, Francesca Bridger-ton Stirling.

He smiled, and suddenly she knew that his words were true. Everything would be all right. Maybe not today and maybe not tomorrow, but soon. Tragedy couldn't coexist in a world with one of Colin's smiles.

You should do that more often,_ he said. __augh, I mean.___ know._ But that sounded sad, and she didn__ want to be sad, so she added, __ don__ often get to torture grown men, though.___eally?_ he murmured. __ would think you do it all the time.__he looked at him.__hen you walk into a room,_ he said softly, __he air changes.

Maybe she was a wallflower. There was no shame in that. Especially not if one enjoyed being a wallflower.

No one said we had to spend every waking moment together," he said, "but at the end of the day"-he leaned and kissed each of her eyebrows, in turn-"an most of the time during, there is no one I would rather see, no one whose voice I would rather hear, and no one whose mind I would rather explore.

It was heaven. Forget angels, forget St. Peter and glittering harpsichords. Heaven was a dance in the arms of one's true love.

Michael nodded tersely, eyeing a table across the room. It was empty. So empty. So joyfully, blessedly empty.He could picture himself a very happy man at that table."Not feeling very conversational this evening, are we?" Colin asked, breaking into his (admittedly tame) fantasies.

He smacked the heel of his hand against his forhead, as if that could knock the mental picture out of his head. Hell, he though irritably, he didn't want to knock the image just out of his head. He wanted to send it clear across the room and out the window.

This has to be the most self-centered thing I've ever said, but no, I think you just wanted to vex me.

Blake took a small roll from the tray on the table, then put it back in favor of a larger one. And maybe a little butter. It certainly couldn't hurt. And jam...no, he drew the line at jam. She was a spy, after all.

Sometimes Hen...I think I would give my life just for one of your smiles.