“After all, it's not every day a woman is given a kingdom of dreams.”

“It was a kingdom of dreams — a place where things would be just the way I wanted them to be.”

“If I had a hundred kingdoms, I would trade them all for you, my dearest love. Iwas nothing until you.”

“(...)Did she really tell Roddy Carstairs she could outshoot him with his own pistol?""No," Jason said dryly. "She told him that if he made one more improper advance to her, she would shoot him- and if she missed, she would turn Wolf loose on him. And if Wolf didn't finish the job, she had every faith I would." Jason chuckled and shook his head. "It's the first time I've been nominated for the role of hero. I was a little crushed, however, to be second choice after the dog.”

“Nor is he man enough to make a woman of you.”

“It's Christ­mas," he whis­pered.His wife smiled up at him, and her an­swer made his throat tighten. "No," she said softly, lay­ing her fin­gers against his jaw. "Christ­mas came three days ago.”

“I'm thinking that it will be autumn soon," she said, lifting her gaze to his. "Autumn is my absolute favorite season. Spring is overrated. It's soggy and the trees are still bare from winter. Winter drags on and on, and summer is nice, but it's all the same. Autumn is different. I mean, is there any perfume in the world that can compare with the smell of burning leaves?" she asked with an engaging smile. Matt thought she smelled a hell of a lot better than burning leaves, but he let her continue. "Autumn —is thexincgitsinagrechanging. It's like dusk." "Dusk?""Dusk is my favorite time of day, for the same reason. When I was young, I used to walk down our driveway at dusk in the summer and stand at the fence, watching all the cars going by with their headlights on. Everyone had a place to go, something to do. The night was just beginning ..." She trailed off in embarrassment. "That must sound incredibly silly.""It sounds incredibly lonely.”