“This man was no servant. She looked up at him in acute agitation and knew: this man was now her master.”

“Looking back at him was a man who was battered and broken.And alive, for the first time in his life.”

“Wait for me.”If his voice was just a bit hoarse, she didn’t seem to take note of it. She looked at him as though he had reached over and slapped her. “You don’t trust me? After all that talk of taking me for my word—”“This isn’t about trust.”“That is precisely what this is about.” Her fingers fisted in her skirts. “Because I’ve trusted you.”It hurt him to hear it. He didn’t know what else to do. He had no contacts left. He was walking around now like a blind man. He didn’t need the added weight of her safety on his conscience. Caine’s eyes fell away again. “Maybe you shouldn’t.”That earned him a flustered: “You told me to!”

“She wondered how a man could look into a woman’s eyes and lie so completely, so convincingly. She wondered how he could have looked and not seen the love that had glowed there, the blind faith, the unconditional devotion. She wondered how he would sleep at night, knowing he had betrayed her so effortlessly.”

“She was a little thing, too, inciting that basic compulsion in him as a man to protect her in so hectic a place as post-war Israel. Even so, his actions were borne out of an entirely different instinct, altogether: to fool her and anyone within a dart's range... to protect himself.”

“Kas was right: a woman could destroy a man. This one could do so, simply by knowing his name. She could do so, simply with her eyes.”

“…deceitful!” she decided with a little bounce of fury that briefly ballooned the silk of her trousers. “There! You deceitful …”“Gillia…”“…misleading, dishonest, insincere…”“Those are all the same words, Gill—”“Ooh! Liar!” She’d managed to get her hands on a small pillow. He ducked just as it whizzed past him. In justice, however, it did strike the mosaic vase behind him on an engraved mahogany pedestal, and it tipped and spun on its base before landing in a shattered heap on the bare floor. “Now, look what you’ve done!” she accused tearfully and bolted from the room.”