Silk Is For Seduction

- Life had a way of wrecking her careful plans, again and again. Roulette was more predictable than life. Small wonder she was so lucky at it.
Life was not a wheel going round and round. It never, ever returned to the same place. It didn't stick to simple red and black and a certain array of numbers. It laughed at logic.
Beneath its pretty overdress of man-imposed order, life was anarchy.

- She swallowed it. So bitter.
"Vile," she said. "Vile."
"I know, but it helps. Trust me. I know."
"Trust you," she said. "Hah."
"Clearly you are not dying."
"No. Devil won't take me."
The low chuckle again. "Then we're all safe."

- "No its you," she said. How far away her voice sounded, as though it had traveled to London already, ahead of her. "Your ducal self assurance. Everything will give way to you. Even Satan's own storm."
"You are definitely improving," he said. "Full mocking sentences."

- "Get off," she said. "Get off now."
Before its too late, and I decide to celebrate a narrow escape from death in the traditional manner of our species.

- Then he recalled whose daughter she was, and wondered why he wondered.
Then he recalled who it was who had a child.
A child, Noirot had a child!

- She'd read in novels of people who couldn't speak because their hearts were too full and she'd always thought, Not my black heart.
But now she couldn't speak, because it was too much, whatever it  was.

- "I have a plan," he said.
"Yes," she said.
"Let's get married," he said.
"Yes," she said.
"Let's conquer the world," he said.
"Yes," she said. No one in her family had ever been accused of dreaming small.
"Let's bring the beau monde to its knees."
"Yes."
"Let's make them beg for your creations."
"Yes," she said. "Yes, yes, yes."
"Is tomorrow too soon?" he said.
"No." she said. "We've a great deal to do, you and I, conquering the world. We must start at once. We've not a minute to lose."
"I love hearing you say that," he said.
He kissed her. It lasted a long time.
And they would last, she was sure, a lifetime. On that she'd wager anything.

- "I'm no good at being good."

- "I'm in a mood to knock someone down, and you'll do very well."
"Don't tell me," Longmore said. "The dressmaker doesn't want you, either. By gad, this isn't your day, is it? Not your week, rather."

- Hell, what was one more scandal?

- ...it was hard to hide one's emotion from one's own kind.

- "Oh, it's ridiculous. I ought to laugh. But I can't. You won't believe it."
"Of course we will," Sophye said.
"He offered you a carte blanche," Leonie said.
"No, he asked me to marry him."
There was a short stunned silence.
Then, "I reckon he's in a marrying mood," Sophy said.

- "I expected a good deal more from you," Marcelline said, "You bungled it."
"Yes," he said. "What else could I do? I was asking the wrong woman to marry me."

- "I deserve passion," she said. "I deserve to be loved- in every way. I deserve a man who'll give his whole heart, not the part he isn't using at the moment.."

- He'd forget all that, just as he would forget this night.
The memories would linger for a time, but they'd grow dull. The ache he felt now, the frustation and anger and sorrow - all those would fade too.
She'd given him a night to remember, but of course he'd forget.