“So unfair, she thought. Her baby was going to grow up, and her husband wasn't.”

“Normal. She wasn't normal. A girl Graced with killing, a royal thug? A girl who didn't want the husbands Randa pushed on her, perfectly handsome and thoughtful men, a girl who panicked at the thought of a baby at her breast, or clinging to her ankles.”

“as she walked back to her husband, lola thought about lying on her expensive sheets and holding a baby - their baby - to her breast. to the baby, lola would smell like a mother, and the ridiculous chandelier would look like stars. ”

“Hannah expected this to make her sob even more, but instead she found her tears drying up and her tummy growing warm. How dare they? How dare they do this to little girls? She understood now why her parents go so angry when they saw the result of bombers in the white hot streets of the Middle East, why men and women wailed in anger as well as grief as they lifted the limp bodies of children from the rubble. How dare they? No, she wasn't going to die like this, wrapped up like some helpless baby.”

“It was like she was so empty there wasn't even a feeling or thought in her.”

“She was just kind and genuine. Pure, even. I hated that her good heartedness and naivety were going to cost her so dearly because I was going to bust up her marriage and take her husband if it were the last thing I did.”