“And she was not beautiful asleep. Her expression slack and not angelic. The very ordinariness of it so beautiful he felt a yearning to be something more than he was or could be. And as good a player as he was, he knew as he turned on the reel to reel and hugged the Fender once again that nothing he composed would ever be as beautiful as her ordinary sleep.Watching her he played the music of her sleeping. And by surrendering made something beautiful.”

“You are so beautiful,” he breathed. Standing over her, rampant in the moonlight, he gazed down at her body. “You are as lovely and as perfect as I imagined you would be.”Afraid to believe, afraid to trust, she dared a look at him and felt her heart wrench when she read his expression and understood that she truly was whole and beautiful in his eyes. She was a magnificent to him as he was to her.”

“Father looked at her and she was beautiful in the way she had been as a girl. He did not realize the pleasure he felt in having made her cry.”

“It was over. He knew, but she did not. He could tell by the way she nuzzled him, how her body relaxed in his embrace, how she sighed when he kissed the top of her head. She was still hopeful, he thought, and that made her beautiful. Suddenly he could not bear to imagine a life without her.”

“You're beautiful, Delaney, and you could have anyone you want. Why me?" She knew she wasn't beautiful, not like her mother. But the way he looked at her and touched her, and the tone of his voice when he said it made her almost believe him. He made her believe anything was possible. "Because you make me not want to say no.”

“He kissed her temple, nuzzling her skin, and murmured again that she was the most beautiful lass in the world. They weren't just words he offered. Platitudes he didn't mean. He cared not about the scar that marred her face. In his eyes, she was the most beautiful lass he'd ever known and nothing would change that. Not a scar. Not circumstances. She was his, and he didn't give one damn what others thought.”