“
You're living your days at the moment how a sheep grazes, meandering, not engaged with anything much.
”
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Nikki Gemmell (The Bride Stripped Bare (Bride Trilogy, #1))
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There were the endless birthday nights and New Year's Eves of just you in your bed and no one else. There was the welling up at weddings, the glittery eye-prick, when all the couples would get up to dance. Sometimes it felt like your heart was crazed with cracks like your grandmother's old saucers. Sometimes the sight of a Saturday afternoon couple laughing in a park would splinter it completely.
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Nikki Gemmell (The Bride Stripped Bare (Bride Trilogy, #1))
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No one except your husband knows of the cautiousness at the heart of your life. Your adulthood has been a progressive retreat from curiosity and wonder, an endless series of delays and procrastinations. You wanted to be so much, once, but life kept on getting in the way... You settled. Shunned creativity, flight, risk, never had the courage to give a dream, any dream, a go.
”
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Nikki Gemmell (The Bride Stripped Bare (Bride Trilogy, #1))
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An emptiness rules at its core, a rottenness, a silence when one of you retires to bed without saying good night, when you eat together without conversation, when the phone's passed wordlessly to the other. An emptiness when every night you lie in the double bed, restlessly awake, astounded at how closely hate can nudge against love, can wind around it sinuously like a cat. An emptiness when you realize that the loneliest you've ever been is within a marriage, as a wife.
”
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Nikki Gemmell (The Bride Stripped Bare (Bride Trilogy, #1))
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Alone you're refinding a glittering, a clarity, you're finding your distilled self. ...You think of the two types of aloneness you've known recently: this wonderful, sparkly, soul-refreshing type, and the despairing loneliness that sucks the breath from your life.
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Nikki Gemmell (The Bride Stripped Bare (Bride Trilogy, #1))
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You don't dare to think ahead too much, for you don't want this melted under the heat of your attention, don't want it gone from your life.
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Nikki Gemmell (The Bride Stripped Bare (Bride Trilogy, #1))
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Duchamp had taken art to its logical conclusion.
Every act of perception is art.
So everything that perceives is an artist.
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Chris F. Westbury (The Bride Stripped Bare By Her Bachelors, Even)
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...no matter how much Theo achieves and acquires and out-dazzles everyone else, she never seems content. She's taught you that people who shine more lavishly that everyone else seem to be penalized by discontent, as if they're being punished for craving a brighter life. I've been knocked down so many times I can't remember the number plates, she said once.
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Nikki Gemmell (The Bride Stripped Bare (Bride Trilogy, #1))
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So, he feels now, that he doesn't have to try. And you want him more than you ever have before.
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Nikki Gemmell (The Bride Stripped Bare (Bride Trilogy, #1))
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Striding, finally, into the solitude. You feel as if part of your body has been ripped from you, as if flesh has been torn from flesh. But you feel powerful too, for you're free, after so long; the great burden of uncertainty, and guilt, has gone.
But then the anger comes.
At all the times in the past you've said I love you and felt stripped. All the times they never rang back. All the love affairs that evaporated, bleakly, into one-night stands. All the times they've drowned you out. Drained your energy. Your confidence. Stood you up. Walked out. Wanted a Chinese girl next.
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Nikki Gemmell (The Bride Stripped Bare (Bride Trilogy, #1))
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You feel you're learning everything about love as you watch him, from the other side. He imagines you leaving your cozy London world for a man in his thirties who has no real job, who still travels on buses, who's never found a firm footing with his life. The poet, the dreamer, and you would have fallen for it once. But you're too old, now. You just want to fuck.
”
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Nikki Gemmell (The Bride Stripped Bare (Bride Trilogy, #1))
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You know in this moment that Gabriel is at your mercy, you can do what you want, he is completely yours and with the knowledge of that something goes,you can feel it slip from you like a fish through the net.
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Nikki Gemmell (The Bride Stripped Bare (Bride Trilogy, #1))
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You feel something you haven't for years: it's to do with university parties with bathtubs of alcohol and the smell of hamburgers on fingers and beer in a kiss. You should have been disgusted by all that but you weren't. You'd be wet so quick; to get their clothes off, to have their weight upon you, to be rammed against a wall with your leg curled up.
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Nikki Gemmell (The Bride Stripped Bare (Bride Trilogy, #1))
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What is the shocking weakness in virtually every man you know well? The whimpering like children when they're ill. The need for women to ask directions for them. Help shop for their clothes. Book appointments for their hair to be cut because they don't care to speak for themselves. The inability to pick up a phone if they want a relationship to stop. Are the weaknesses you see again and again a symptom of men in this age, or have they always been there, and women, secretly, have always known?
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Nikki Gemmell (The Bride Stripped Bare (Bride Trilogy, #1))
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Isaac basically knew just one thing for sure: Many are born, few flourish, all die. If you didn’t die as a sacrifice for God today, you would die of an incomprehensible plague tomorrow, or of undeserved starvation the day after, or of good old-fashioned senseless human slaughter before the next harvest. Life was short in those days and people were grateful for whatever they could get. They didn’t expect wireless video game consoles, fast German cars, dental insurance, anti-depressants, and a pension.
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Chris F. Westbury (The Bride Stripped Bare By Her Bachelors, Even)
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Instead, his lips brushed over the tip of my index finger in a kiss that was feather light and yet hummed through every part of me: my throat, my chest, my inner thighs, all the way to my toes. My mouth dropped open with a small “Oh.” A flicker of a smile crossed his mouth before it landed on my next finger. His dark gaze collided with mine as he moved to the next, and heat crept across every inch of my flesh, pooling at my core. With each kiss, that thrumming in my body rose, my nipples tightened, and the dark flavour of night built on my tongue, sparked with starlight and rhubarb. If he’d asked me to strip bare, to bend over the table and let him fuck me, to marry him, to anything at that moment, I’d have agreed in an instant. But all I could do was stare at his progress, my chest heaving as I tried to contain… everything. The magic, the thrumming resonance that threatened to shatter me, the burning, burning heat that must’ve made my cheeks as red as the jewels in their glass phials. When he reached my thumb, the pad dragged across his lower lip and I couldn’t have said whether it was him pressing it against his flesh or if I did. I didn’t care. By the time he moved to my right hand, starting with the thumb, I was swaying. When he whispered, “It is so,” against the very tip of my little finger, I almost swooned as a kick of pure energy throbbed through me. Chest heaving, cheeks flushed, he caught me. “Are you all right?” He searched my face, concern in his gaze. “Yes,” I breathed. My fingertips tingled. “Just… that was…” “Sorry, I’ve never done that before, I didn’t realise it would be so”—he swallowed and wet his lips—“heady.” “That’s one word for it.” I huffed
”
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Clare Sager (Stolen Threadwitch Bride (Bound by a Fae Bargain, #1))
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My lady?” He came inside just in time to catch her as her legs collapsed. “Kat!” He looked at her anxiously. “Are you all right? I could feel your pain and distress—it worried me.” Kat smiled at him weakly. “Just the same old thing. You’d think I’d be used to it by now.” She sighed. “Where’s Deep?” Lock’s handsome features tightened. “I don’t know and I don’t care to know.” “What? So you two really are fighting?” she asked as he carried her back to the bedroom and laid her gently on the bed. “It goes beyond that.” Lock stripped off his shirt and climbed into the bed beside her. Kat sighed in relief when she felt his warm hand on her arm. She didn’t even protest when he pulled her blouse gently over her head, leaving her bare from the top up except for her bra. “We should call him, even if you are fighting,” she said as Lock pulled her close, pressing his broad chest to her back. “Don’t want to hurt you.” “The pain is nothing,” Lock assured her gently. “It’s more than worth it to be near you, my lady. Especially when…” His voice faltered for a moment. “When I’m going to lose you so soon.” “Oh, Lock…” Kat could feel his sorrow welling up, a sense of loss so great it nearly smothered her with its intensity. Still, she didn’t draw back or try to get away. Instead, she turned in his arms so she was facing him and drew him into a tight embrace. “I’m sorry,” she whispered into his shoulder. “So sorry.” “So am I.” It sounded like Lock might be crying. His large form shook against hers and Kat held him tighter, wishing she could comfort him better. “I love you, Kat,” he whispered brokenly. “And the idea of being torn apart from you tomorrow—of losing what little bond we have between us—it feels like death to me. Like the end of everything.” “I love you too,” Kat admitted. “And…I feel like I could love Deep. If only he would let me. If only he wanted me to.” Lock stiffened in her arms. “He won’t. He doesn’t. There’s no point in even considering it. No hope.” A low growl rose in his throat. “Gods, I wish I wasn’t tied to him.” “Don’t say that,” Kat said softly. “You’re brothers—twins. You ought to be close.” “How can I want to be close to him when he’s killing the only relationship that ever mattered to me?
”
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Evangeline Anderson (Sought (Brides of the Kindred, #3))
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Why didn’t you tell us?” Despite her pain, Kat lifted her chin defiantly. “Didn’t want…your pity. And after the fight we had I didn’t…didn’t think you two would want to touch me anyway.” “You mean you didn’t think I would want to.” Deep shook his head. “Goddess damn you, Kat, for your stupid, stubborn pride. Don’t you know I’d do anything to keep you from pain?” Standing, he began stripping off his shirt. But when he reached for her, Kat had a sudden thought. “Wait,” she protested as he bent toward her. “Lock said…said it hurts you to touch too much if…if the other one isn’t there.” She gestured weakly at his bare chest. “Too much skin-to-skin contact…without Lock…will hurt you.” “You think I give a damn about that?” Deep’s voice was an angry growl but he gathered her into his arms with surprising gentleness. “Come here, damn you. Let me hold you,” he murmured, settling himself on the flat boulder with her in his lap. Kat couldn’t help it—she didn’t want to give him pain, but the immediate relief she felt when his broad, warm chest came in contact with her cheek was too wonderful to deny. His arms around her were so comforting and strong and the scent of his skin made her feel safe—protected. Suddenly, though she didn’t know why, she was crying. Stop crying, stupid! It’s bad enough that holding you hurts him, he doesn’t want you crying all over him too! But she couldn’t stop. And to her surprise, Deep didn’t say a thing. No sarcastic remarks or biting observations—he just held her closer and stroked her hair in a gentle rhythm that somehow calmed her down. “I’m
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Evangeline Anderson (Sought (Brides of the Kindred, #3))
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An angel is an empty comic book thought bubble. The content has to be filled in by the viewer.
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Chris F. Westbury (The Bride Stripped Bare By Her Bachelors, Even)
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Dar a inceput sa te plictiseasca traiul in mijlocul panzei de fantezii pe care ai tesut-o de-a lungul timpului. Caci un barbat adevarat s-a prins in ea si a inceput sa traga de firele ei de matase.
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Nikki Gemmell (The Bride Stripped Bare (Bride Trilogy, #1))
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The Devil offered Christ the ability to turn stones into bread. Then he offered him the chance to test God, or His angels actually, by throwing himself off a cliff. Which I have always thought was probably not a very tempting temptation. To see if the angels would rescue him, right? Christ says no, like any sane person would if you asked him if he would like to jump off a cliff.
“Finally, the Devil offered to make Christ the Ruler of the World. Much more tempting than jumping off a cliff, definitely.
“But Christ rejects that too.
“He rejects everything for what he cannot know. The Great Unknown. He chooses to take”– she shrugged her shoulders to underline how little it seemed– “whatever. Anything. He is saying that what is unknown is better than anything that is known. That the freedom to go through life without even ever knowing what is going to happen to you is the best possible thing that can happen, better than any miraculous gift could ever be.
”
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Chris F. Westbury (The Bride Stripped Bare By Her Bachelors, Even)
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You can get the clothes into the washing machine. You can get them out. You can arrange them over the radiators to dry. You can collect the dried clothes and put them in a heap ready for sorting. But you cannot, cannot, get the clothes back into their cupboards and drawers. Until that pile at the end of the bed becomes a volcano of frustration and accusation and despair; ever growing, ever depleting you.
”
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Nikki Gemmell (With My Body (Bride Stripped Bare, #2))