“But in that moment she realized how false most smiles were and what a tremendous waste of time.”

“How she wished she had Elizabeth to herself for a little so they could discuss what Henry's real intentions were and also how high and mighty Penelope had acted at lunch and what a tremendous insult it was that she'd come at all and did anyone really think she was beautiful with those oversize features anyway.”

“So this is how life was, she thought with a faint smile: It wore you down until you emerged at its wildest, most unexpected ends.”

“It had been an awful thing to lose Henry the first time, to matrimony, but to discover what a false front he was capable of was another kind of blow, and it had left her almost speechless. Then there was the fury with herself—for she had known what Henry’s love was, and still she had gone back to suffer a little more at his hands.”

“She had believed him to be hers, time and again, but still she could not stay the feeling that he might at any moment slip through her fingers.”

“Among her other talents were forgetting what she did not like and ignoring what she preferred not to see.”

“Love is all right, as things go, but lovers can be a terrible waste of a girl's time.”