V.S. Carnes Quotes
V.S. Carnes Quotes
I've crossed a world of sand and tears in search of you.
4766 Kas was right: a woman could destroy a man. This one could do so, simply by knowing his name. She could do so, simply with her eyes.
2035 It was a question of insurmountable proportions. A single word that held every fear he had ever had-and every wish he had ever made on those cursed stars. She needn't say more. In a single syllable, she had said more than he wanted to hear in an entire lifetime.
4108 He smelled the salt on his own lips and the orange blossoms in her hair. Real ones, he could see now, tucked into the curls with cheap, native combs. The sight of them gave him hope.
3800 Because you have my heart, Virgilia Wessex.” Softly, almost achingly. “Every black ounce of it. Scars and all.
4633 She wondered how a man could look into a woman’s eyes and lie so completely, so convincingly. She wondered how he could have looked and not seen the love that had glowed there, the blind faith, the unconditional devotion. She wondered how he would sleep at night, knowing he had betrayed her so effortlessly.
3864 No fairy tale, this. This was by no stretch of the imagination a polished fantasy. This was a searing, living force, rough around the edges, unfamiliar and bittersweet.
And precious.
3663 He wanted to die. He prayed for it. Through the roar in his ears, he begged for it.
4256 Caine usually woke from the recurring dream mid-air, having yet to be dashed upon the rocks, whimpering and panting like a child crying for his mother. Now he lifted his eyes to a dark, empty room in Jizan and the unusual, lingering scent of roses, and wept in his hands for his Father.
2031 She was a little thing, too, inciting that basic compulsion in him as a man to protect her in so hectic a place as post-war Israel. Even so, his actions were borne out of an entirely different instinct, altogether: to fool her and anyone within a dart's range... to protect himself.
3333 Looking back at him was a man who was battered and broken.
And alive, for the first time in his life.
3757 Caine was a murderer. A liar. A cad. A skulker in shadows and a heartless wretch. What sort of woman or God would love someone like him?
2559 He heard the voice that had called to him in dreams, had saved him from the sands and from following his brother into the river.
4749 Better this way, what remained of his battered sensibilities told him. He was no good for her, anyway. She didn’t understand him. She didn’t understand that he was cursed. And, selfish as he was, he’d rather she hate him than he hate himself any more than he was already going to. Any more than he already did.
4932 I remember every good thing about you. Every sweet and perfect thing. And nothing else.” He touched her chin, tipped it up to look into her wet brown eyes. Even smudged, they were gorgeous. The dawning light in them filled his heart, and healed it. “Nothing else.
3018 Caine might have smiled at her, had his heart not been breaking to smithereens inside of him.
3966 He’d thought it would be the right thing to say, but she scoffed a little… and that, more than anything - more than the prospect of having his ribs crushed in or his face pulled off or his neck stretched on a rope - scared him out of his wits.
2845 Care for her. He was unworthy of such a gift. Unworthy of her blind trust and her sparkling, slightly crooked smiles, let alone her heart. But he wanted her, selfish fool he was and had always been. Care for her? Ah, God, she consumed him.
1016 A hand stole around her mouth, silencing her, then his lips parting her tumbled hair: “The walls have ears.”
She blinked, and for the first time, looked around. A thin beam of light beneath what may have been a door. That was all. When he released her, she endeavored to match his own, barely audible tone. “Do the walls understand English?
4743 In a land that knew only dark beauty, she was something of a hybrid no one dared touch. But the tall Arab did not appear in the least daunted by her abnormality. No, she saw his eyes. He was not daunted in the least.
4149 Oh, Lord, why was she doomed to adore a man steeped in blindness and utter stupidity?
3969 He didn’t deserve compassion. Sympathy. Not even understanding. He deserved worse, far worse than he had ever been given.
3550 By now, she was far from the scorch of these sands. After the ransom deal, she would be safely married in England. To Ashton. And Caine, who had hurt her far more than anything Abdullah had planned for her with that long, curved dagger, deserved no better than this torment of knowing it.
1639 Somehow, I did not finger you for a treasure-hunter.”
“Oh, but I am,” without shame. “Her name is Titianni Aziz.
4580 He felt, rather than saw, her chin lift toward him. But instead of pulling her hand from his grip and turning away, she tightened her own fingers and unceremoniously, unexpectedly, threw herself down the incline, dragging him with her.
Dragging him with her!
3690 Southern gentleman,” he said aside to him in Arabic. “Do you wish for me to continue this for you?”
Caine’s temper shifted to a low simmer in his chest. “Your way takes too long.”
“Ma’aleyk, and your way hurts my ears,” he argued.
4024 Kent had begun sleeping with his good eye open, for he knew the mark of sedition when he saw it. Even partway blinded, who could see it better?
2326 They were literally inches from being buried alive in this place, millions of miles from home or any sort of civilization, where they would never be found or mourned... and Caine continued to smile.
Sweet heavens, he was completely out of his mind!
1458 The horizon was indistinguishable from the inky black, which fell upon the desert like a sorcerer’s mantle shot through with diamonds. The stars were so tiny, so far away, and yet, at the moment, with her fingers curled around his, he almost felt as though he could reach up and snag one by the tail.
1494 She’d said she loved him. She'd put that impossible, unimaginably beautiful gift in his hands and he’d thrown it back at her. To save her. To save himself.
1471 Are you in the habit of taking tea with anyone who approaches you in a foreign port?” He went on and snorted carelessly. “No wonder you were abducted so easily.
2963 I will not marry Ashton. However bound by honor to do so, I will not marry Ashton. I will not marry, ever!”
“Why not?”
“Because I love you, you idiot!
4447 Fate had a cruel sense of humor. It had been all his fault, anyway, whatever Mick or Gillia told him. Careless preoccupation and utter stupidity. Boyhood ignorance and negligence. He was only getting what he deserved, over and over again, for the rest of his life. If only in his dreams.
4934 Remind me to thank God I don’t have a sister.”
Caine eyed him critically. He was a filthy heap of blood and soot and sand stuck to the gun oil on his face. “Yeah,” without much enthusiasm. “I’ll thank Him for ya.
2729 I stole you, among others, from the streets of God’s birthplace. I forced you to work as a slave. Imprisoned, mistreated and starved you and your companion. To top it off, I am in the process of selling your life to the highest bidder. Why would you trust me?
1452