Tessa Dare Quotes

At some point, while you were roaming the globe, making treaties and dividing the spoils of war, I quietly declared my own independence. I am the sovereign nation of Clio now. And there will be no terms of surrender.
Tessa Dare
This was her body. She had learned to take pleasure in it, even if no man had ever done the same. It was curved and generous and womanly and strong, and it was formed to do more than decorate a drawing room, or transfer wealth from one gentleman to another.She was made to tempt, labor, inspire, create, sustain.Despite the way Rafe held her bound in his grasp, a sense of power moved through her. For once, she could revel in her femininity and feel it as something other than a disadvantage to be overcome. A quality to be respected, worshiped. Even feared.
Tessa Dare
Have you been kissed before?” “I don’t know whether to say yes or no. Which answer will make you do it again?” “Oh, I’m going to do it again.” His thumb stroked her cheek. “Just wanted to know how slow to take things.” “A little faster would be fine.
Tessa Dare
At least you've brought gifts. What's in the basket?"She rummaged through the contents. "A few sweetmeats and lozenges. Packets of raisins. But mostly it's Aunt Thea's surplus cosmetics and remedies. She sends away for every product advertised in every ladies' magazine. I like to see them put to some use."He blinked at her. "These are your gifts?""Your men have depleted our stores of food, and I didn't have time to prepare anything else.""What are they supposed to do with-" he held up a brown bottle and peered at the label- "Dr. Jacobs' Miracle Elixir?" He plucked a small jar out next. "Excelsior Blemish Cream?""Women are women, Logan. Every girl needs a bit of luxury and a chance to feel pretty now and then.
Tessa Dare
Kate realized she had a grave problem. She was infatuated. Or mildly insane. Possibly both.
Tessa Dare
I never thought Greek philosophy could make a damn bit of sense to me. And most of it didn't, but those words just seemed right. 'Love is composed of a single soul, inhabiting two bodies.'" He took her by the shoulders drawing her close. "It rang true for me, in a way nothing else did. Whatever soul I had, Katie, I think I placed it in your keeping twenty years ago. And now, it's as if...every time we kiss, you give a little piece of it back.
Tessa Dare
Then she sighed. Just the faintest, softest release of breath. The sound swept through his chest like a hurricane, with the force to topple trees.
Tessa Dare
It started to rain. Fat, heavy drops of summer rain - the kind that always struck her as vaguely lewd and debauched. Little potbellied drunkards, those summer raindrops, chortling on their way to earth and crashing open with glee.
Tessa Dare
Madeline stood before him in a gown of rich, emerald-green silk. The low-cut bodice did miraculous things for her bosom, and the vibrant color made a striking contrast with her pale skin and dark hair. And her lips... something about the green brought out their richness. They looked like two lush slices of a ripened plum.His mouth watered.
Tessa Dare
A man might engage in flirtation with distinterest, even disdain. But he never teases without affection.
Tessa Dare
Ransom?” She struggled to sit up. “What are you do—?” He laid his tongue to her core. “Oh.” She flopped back against the bed. “Oh.” God, she was sweet. Sweet and pink and musky and Izzy.
Tessa Dare
I slept well last night. But when I woke this morning, I missed you so intensely. I don't even know how to describe the sensation. I looked at the other pillow, and it just seemed wrong that you weren't there. As though I'd woken up missing my own arm or half of my heart. I felt incomplete. So I rose, and dressed, and I just started walking toward you--because I couldn't move in any there direction.
Tessa Dare
She'd been mad for him as a girl, but she'd chalked that up to youthful infatuation. She'd tracked the events of his life religiously for a decade, but she'd told herself that was idle curiosity. And now... now she desired him so much she could scarcely stand, but surely that was only lust. Wasn't it?
Tessa Dare
Why did men have to ruin everything? The answer was simple, she supposed—because foolish women gave them the chance
Tessa Dare
Mr. Sand, do you think it's possible to fall in love in the space of a single day?"He smiled. "I wouldn't know. I only fall in love at night. Never lasts beyond breakfast, though.
Tessa Dare
Don’t. Don’t play that game.” His brow pressed to hers. “When I heard you cry out . . . it was like a saber to the gut. I wanted to die.
Tessa Dare
This was now officially the most inane conversation in which Griff had ever been a participant—and that included a drunken debate with Del over ostrich racing.“The color isn’t too awful?” She twisted a fold of the skirt. “The draper called it ‘dewy petal,’ but your mother said the shade was more of a ‘frosted berry.’ What do you say?”“I’m a man, Simms. Unless we’re discussing nipples, I don’t see the value in these distinctions.
Tessa Dare
Perhaps... Perhaps he could make her happy. Not with the Granville money or his social cachet, but just by being the man he was, at his core. Sometimes, when he looked deep into those blue eyes, it felt like anything was possible.
Tessa Dare
What to make of this man? He was proper. He was passionate. He had the public demeanor of an iceberg, but he kissed her as if she were his oasis in a vast, arid d
Tessa Dare
There was a moment of tenderness between them, and for a moment he experienced the most rare, ridiculous emotion- hope.
Tessa Dare
He had years of experience and training. She'd unraveled them in a week, and he was left at loose ends. This distraction, this madness of desire and yearning- it was everything a man in his position needed to avoid. On second thought, perhaps his senses hadn't been muddled. After all, they had been meticulously attuned to detect the slightest hint of peril.This woman- this beautiful, unbiddable, all-too-perceptive woman- was his personal embodiment of danger. She could ruin him. Destroy everything he'd worked to become.And she would do it all with a smile.
Tessa Dare
Her,” he said. “I’ll take her.
Tessa Dare
We have to get out of here, Bram. Before they take our bollocks and use them for pincushions.
Tessa Dare
Your breasts are alabaster orbs.' "What?" Rufus objected. "That's stupid. I'm not saying that." "Do you have some better suggestion?" "Why can't you just say she's got a fair set of titties?
Tessa Dare
Because I can only love you entirely. With everything I am, and everything I ever will be. Body, mind, heart, soul.” - Victor Bramwell, Earl of Rycliff.
Tessa Dare
I don't care who he is. He needs to disappear." Ransom turned and called out the window. "For the love of G-d man. I have England's sweetheart bent over the desk and panting for me. Go away and come back tomorrow.
Tessa Dare
I'm not going to accept your challenge. There will be no duel.""Why not? Because I'm a woman?""No, because I've seen the way you spinsters handle a pistol. You'd shoot me dead where I stood.
Tessa Dare
This explains so much," she said, clucking her tongue in mother-hen fashion. "You're compensating for this withered appendage."Withered appendage? What the devil was she talking about? He shook his head, trying to clear it. Colin's dire predictions of shriveled twigs and dried currants rattled in his skull. Wide awake now, he fought to sit up, wrestling the sheets."Listen, you. I don't know what sort of liberties you've taken while I was insensible, or just what your spinster imagination prepared you to see. But I'll have you know, that water was damned cold."She blinked at him. "I'm referring to your leg.""Oh." His leg. That withered appendage
Tessa Dare
He kissed her. Without warning, without permission. Without even deciding to do it, but simply because he couldn't have done anything else. He needed that breath she was holding. It belonged to him, and he wanted it back.
Tessa Dare
He couldn't escape it. She'd begun re-calibrating his senses the moment she came through that library door. His peripheral vision was now trained for flashes of golden hair: his ears, trained for her melodic laugh. He found himself following the drifting scent of her soap and dusting powder, like a dog panting after the butcher's wife.
Tessa Dare
This wasn't her first kiss. He could tell that much, though he doubted any of the young men who'd kissed her had known what the hell they were doing. He felt a vague, stupid sort of rage toward them. It made him all the more resolved to make this kiss sublime. Sufficiently long and slow and sweet and deep to obliterate those embraces from her memory.From this day forward-when she thought of kisses, she would think only of him.
Tessa Dare
What if I told you I know the risks, and I'm willing to take my chances?""It wouldn't change a thing. Those walls, as you call them. . . They're apart of me now, and they are iron strong." He lifted a hand to her face, skimming his thumb over her lower lip. "Even if I wished to, I wouldn't know how to dismantle them.""I know," she said quietly. "I know." She wreathed her arms around his neck. "That's why you need me. I'm going to burn them to the ground.
Tessa Dare
No man deserves a woman like that. He mortgages his very soul to win her and spends his life paying off the debt.
Tessa Dare
Forgive me, Your Grace. Are you suggesting a woman is some sort of … piece of fruit to you? One squeeze, and you know if she’s ripe?
Tessa Dare
Oh no. Oh God. I couldn't possibly be so stupid.""Don't limit yourself. You can be anything you wish.
Tessa Dare
Cleverness is like rouge - liberal application makes a woman look common and desperate. Wit is knowing how to apply it.
Tessa Dare
You're so young, you can't know the meaning of true regret. It's never what you've done, love, it's what you've left undone.
Tessa Dare
You're an intensely attractive woman. You do know that, don't you?" To her silence, he replied, "You'd believe me if you could see your
Tessa Dare
These kisses... they were confessions. Tastes of everything she had stored inside her. Everything she could give a man if he was brave enough to accept. Kiss by kiss, she was baring herself to the soul.
Tessa Dare
Of course one kiss changes things. If it's done right, a kiss changes everything.
Tessa Dare
It seemed any young woman at odds with her place in life--be she a genteel lady or a serving girl--might find a happier home within the pages of a book.
Tessa Dare
Damn, she just kept on surprising him. First with her beauty. Then with the illustrations. He'd been forced to accept that there was more to her character than he'd gleaned from her letters, but none of it fell too far outside the borders of his carefully mapped mental territory labeled "Madeline." She was privileged, sheltered, intelligent, curious, and far too crafty.But this...This was different. As he watched her with the tenants' children, his conception of her pushed against its established boundaries. He was forced to add new descriptors to his list. Ones like "generous" and "responsible" and "protective.
Tessa Dare
A better man wouldn’t play this ‘sweethearts’ game with her when he knew very well it couldn’t lead to more.But he wasn’t a better man. He was Colin Sandhurst, reckless, incorrigible rogue—and damn it, he couldn’t resist. He wanted to amuse her, spoil her, feed her sweets and delicacies. Steal a kiss or two, when she wasn’t expecting it. He wanted to be a besotted young buck squiring his girl around the fair.In other words, he wanted to live honestly. Just for the day.
Tessa Dare
Izzy felt as though she’d wandered into the third act of a play. She had no idea what was going on, but it was unbearably dramatic.
Tessa Dare
I'm not going to touch her," he said "She's not mine.She never will be.""Indeed." Bruiser rolled his eyes and dusted off his hat. "Definitely no years of pent-up lusting there. Glad we have that sorted.
Tessa Dare
I know how mirrors work. They're all in league with the cosmetics trade. They tell a woman lies. Drawing her gaze from one imagined flaw to another, until all she sees is a constellation of imperfections. If you could get outside yourself, borrow my eyes for just an instant... There is only beauty.
Tessa Dare
And she was well-enough acquainted with loneliness to understand that the worst part wasn't having nobody caring for you - it was having nobody to care for.
Tessa Dare
Logan's sleep was much as it always was.Dark. Cold. Empty.Seemingly endless.Then, out of nowhere, a face appeared to him in the darkness. A pale, pretty face with dark eyes.She called to him in a sweet, husky voice. "Logan."Well, Logan thought. If he was going to develop the talent for dreaming, these were the kinds of dreams he could enjoy.
Tessa Dare
Proper handling of a horse like this is no simple matter. He was trained to race, from birth. Not only to race, but to be the best. Once a champion, he was spoiled with attention and permissive handling. Add to that, he's an ungelded male, with a strong natural mating drive. It all adds up to a horse with a mile-wide streak of arrogance, bloody bored out of his mind. Without proper exercise and opportunities to mate, all that aggressive energy festers. He becomes moody, intractable, withdrawn, destructive."Ashworth raised an eyebrow at Bellamy. "Is it just me, or is this conversation becoming uncomfortably personal?"Spencer fumed. "I'm not referring to myself, you ass.
Tessa Dare
I'm going to build that house with my own hands, from the foundation to the roof. I'm going to do it for us, and I'm going to do it right, so it lasts forever. Can't go raising walls on a shaky foundation. Can't go slapping thatch over rafters so thin, they'll topple with the first winter storm. Do you know?"She nodded. "I know."He reached for her hand. "It's the same with us. I mean to build something with you. Something that will last. Much as I want you, I don't want to rush and bollocks it up.
Tessa Dare
You’re a grown woman, and a clever one. I believe you understand the situation. And I’m going to trust that you know your own mind.
Tessa Dare
You’re hurt.”“No. No, I’m fine. It’s not blood. The militiamen were adjusting Sir Lewis’s trebuchet, and there was a mishap. You took a melon for me.” She smiled, even though her lips trembled.
Tessa Dare
I reckon we could all use an opportunity to endear ourselves to our wives." He looked to Rycliff and Thorne. "When's the last time you did something heroic for your lady?"Rycliff smirked. "Last night."Thorne drained his tankard and cracked his neck. "This morning.""I didn't mean in bed," Colin said. Under his breath he added, "Braggarts.
Tessa Dare
He had to feel those lips on him again. Had. To. This wasn’t a mild expression of preference. This was an imperative. His body was insistent. To continue hisexistence on this earth, he now needed the following: food, water, shelter, clothing, and Minerva Highwood’s lips.
Tessa Dare
There are all kinds of courage in the world, and most of it takes place far from battlefields.
Tessa Dare
There's a very generous donation in the parish's future if you make this fast. Ten minutes, at the most."Frowning, the man fumbled open his liturgy. "There's an established rite, Your Grace. Marriage must be entered into with solemnity and consideration. I don't know that I can rush--""Ten minutes. One thousand guineas."The liturgy snapped closed. "Then again, what do a few extra minutes signify to an eternal God?" He beckoned Amelia with a fluttering, papery hand. "Make haste, child. You're about to be married.
Tessa Dare
Izzy was utterly convinced. Never mind Arabian horses, African cheetahs. No creature in the world could bolt so quickly as a rake confronted with the word "marriage". They ought to shout it out at footraces rather than using starting pi
Tessa Dare
The pain of an injury is over in seconds. Everything that comes after is the pain of getting well." He gave her a heartfelt look, full of apology. "I'd forgotten that you see. Coming back to life ... It hurts.
Tessa Dare
She sketched songbirds when she was supposed to be minding her lessons, and she sketched church mice when she was meant to be at prayer. When she had time to ramble out of doors, anything in Nature was fair game- from the shoots of clover between her toes to any cloud that meandered overhead.
Tessa Dare
So odd. Most women of his acquaintance relied on physical beauty and charm to mask their less-pleasant traits. This girl did the opposite, hiding everything interesting about herself behind a prim, plain facade.What other surprises was she concealing?
Tessa Dare