Julia Quinn

“It means that love isn‟t about being afraid that it will all be snatched away. Love‟s about finding the one person who makes your heart complete, who makes you a better person than you ever dreamed you could be. It‟s about looking in the eyes of your wife and knowing, all the way to your bones, that she‟s simply the best person you‟ve ever known.”

Was it possible to fall in love with the same man over and over again, every single day?

The bane of his existence.
And the object of his desires.

He could probably seduce an iceberg.”

“Kate!” Mary exclaimed.

Kate grimaced. She’d forgotten her stepmother was listening. “Well, it’s true,” she added. “I’ve heard he’s had more mistresses than I’ve had birthdays.”

“Miss Sheffield,” he murmured unthinkingly, “you are as lovely as your sister.”

If she had seemed uncomfortable before, her bearing now turned downright hostile. And Anthony realized with a mental slap that he’d said exactly the wrong thing. Of course he should not have compared her to her sister. It was the one compliment she could never have believed.

“And you, Lord Bridgerton,” she replied in a tone that could have frozen champagne, “are almost as handsome as your brother.”

And then there was Kate Sheffield.

The bane of his existence.

And the object of his desires.

All at once

And it was stunning how much he wanted to be the one to make her feel better

He might have been a rake and a rogue—he might still be a rake and a rogue—but clearly his behavior to those ends did not define the man. And the only objection Kate had to his marrying Edwina was…

She swallowed painfully. There was a lump the size of a cannonball in her throat.

Because deep in her heart, she wanted him for herself.

Kate closed her eyes in misery. This wasn’t how it was supposed to happen. Even as she had told him he might marry her sister, she’d secretly wished he could be hers, but not like this.

Oh, dear Lord, not like this. Not so he’d feel trapped. Not so he’d spend the rest of his life looking at her and wishing she were someone else.

Anthony held himself still for several seconds, thinking he might like to murder all those men and women who had compared her to Edwina and found her lacking. Kate truly had no idea that she might be attractive and desirable in her own right.