Evangeline Kingston Quotes

“As he lifted his head, he saw a painting on the wall, in a carved and gilded frame. It was a luminous portrait of the Duchess with her children when they were still young. The group was arranged on the settee, with Ivo, still an infant, on his mother's lap. Gabriel, Raphael, and Seraphina were seated on either side of her, while Phoebe leaned over the back of the settee. Her face was close to her mother's, her expression tender and slightly mischievous, as if she were about to tell her a secret or make her laugh.”
― Lisa Kleypas, Devil's Daughter

“After a day filled with talking, laughing, reminiscing and making future plans, Evie had returned to Eversby Priory in high spirits. She was full of news to share with her husband... including the fact that the protagonist of Daisy's current novel in progress had been partly inspired by him.
"I had the idea when the subject of your husband came up at a dinner party a few months ago, Evie," Daisy had explained, dabbing at a tiny stain left by a strawberry that had fallen onto her bodice. "Someone remarked that Kingston was still the handsomest man in England, and how unfair it was that he never ages. And Lillian said he must be a vampire, and everyone laughed. It started me thinking about that old novel The Vampyre, published about fifty years ago. I decided to write something similar, only a romantic version."
Lillian had shaken her head at the notion. "I told Daisy no one would want to read about a vampire lover. Blood... teeth..." She grimaced and shivered.
"He enslaves women with his charismatic power," Daisy protested. "He's also a rich, handsome duke- just like Evie's husband."
Annabelle spoke then, her blue eyes twinkling. "In light of all that, one could forgive a bad habit or two."
Lillian gave her a skeptical glance. "Annabelle, could you really overlook a husband who went around sucking the life out of people?"
After pondering the question, Annabelle asked Daisy, "How rich is he?" She ducked with a smothered laugh as Lillian pelted her with a biscuit.
Laughing at her friends' antics, Evie had asked Daisy, "What's the title?"
"The Duke's Deadly Embrace."
"I suggested The Duke Was a Pain in the Neck," Lillian had said, "but Daisy thought it lacked romance.”
― Lisa Kleypas, Devil's Daughter

“I wasn't in a moment's danger. Ravenel was the one who held off a belligerent bull while I fetched the boy."
Evie closed her eyes briefly at the thought of it and reached for the crystal glass in his hand. She downed what little was left and set the glass on the floor. "You suffered no injuries?"
Two long, wet fingers hooked the top of her neckline and tugged her closer to the side of the bathtub. Sebastian's eyes were pale, lucent blue, sparkling like winter starlight. "I may have enough of a sprain to require your services."
A smile curved her lips. "What services?"
"I need a bath maid." Catching one of her hands, he drew it down into the water. "For my hard-to-reach places."
Evie resisted with a throaty chuckle, tugging at her imprisoned wrist. "You can reach that by yourself."
"My sweet," he said, nuzzling into her neck, "I married you so I wouldn't have to do it myself. Now... tell me where you think my sprain is."
"Sebastian," she said, trying to sound severe as his wet hands roved over her bodice, "you're going to r-ruin my dress."
"Unless you remove it." He gave her an expectant glance.”
― Lisa Kleypas, Devil's Daughter

“Family is everything to him. When he was a young boy, he lost his mother and four sisters to scarlet fever, and was sent away to boarding school. He grew up very much alone. So he would do anything to protect or help the people he cares about."
She hefted the album into Keir's lap, and watched as he began to leaf through it dutifully.
Keir's gaze fell to a photograph of the Challons relaxing on the beach. There was Phoebe at a young age, sprawling in the lap of a slender, laughing mother with curly hair. Two blond boys sat beside her, holding small shovels with the ruins of a sandcastle between them. A grinning fair-haired toddler was sitting squarely on top of the sandcastle, having just squashed it. They'd all dressed up in matching bathing costumes, like a crew of little sailors.
Coming to perch on the arm of the chair, Phoebe reached down to turn the pages and point out photographs of her siblings at various stages of their childhood. Gabriel, the responsible oldest son... followed by Raphael, carefree and rebellious... Seraphina, the sweet and imaginative younger sister... and the baby of the family, Ivo, a red-haired boy who'd come as a surprise after the duchess had assumed childbearing years were past her.
Phoebe paused at a tintype likeness of the duke and duchess seated together. Below it, the words "Lord and Lady St. Vincent" had been written. "This was taken before my father inherited the dukedom," she said.
Kingston- Lord St. Vincent back then- sat with an arm draped along the back of the sofa, his face turned toward his wife. She was a lovely woman, with an endearing spray of freckles across her face and a smile as vulnerable as the heartbeat in an exposed wrist.”
― Lisa Kleypas, Devil in Disguise

“Damn it, he thought wearily, I miss Evie.
When she was away, which thankfully was seldom, the world stopped spinning, the sun went dark, and life devolved to a grim exercise in endurance until she returned.
At the outset of their marriage, Sebastian had never dreamed a shy, awkward wallflower, who'd spoken with a stammer since childhood, would turn out to have such fearsome power over him. But Evie had immediately gained the upper hand by making it clear he would have nothing from her- not her affection, her body, or even her thoughts- unless he'd earned it. No woman had ever challenged him to be worthy of her. That had fascinated and excited him. It had made him love her.
Now he was left counting the remaining nights- four, to be precise- of waking in the middle of the night blindly searching the empty space beside him. And the hours- ninety-six, approximately- until Evie was in his arms again.”
― Lisa Kleypas, Devil in Disguise

“Evie, Duchess of Kingston, had spent a perfectly wonderful afternoon with her three closest friends at Lord Westcliff's estate. Long ago, she had met Annabelle, Lillian, and Daisy during her first London Season, when they had been a group of wallflowers sitting in chairs at the side of the ballroom. While becoming acquainted, it had occurred to them that instead of competing for gentlemen's attentions, they would do better to help each other, and so a lifelong friendship had blossomed.”
― Lisa Kleypas, Devil's Daughter

“Too often in the past, I made a public spectacle of myself on the worst possible occasions, in front of the worst possible people. I was an absolute swine. Brawling at parties. Pissing in fountains and vomiting in potted plants. I've slept with other men's wives, I've ruined marriages. It takes years of dedicated effort to discredit one's own name as thoroughly as I did, but by God, I set the bar. There will always be rumors and ugly gossip, and I can't contradict most of it because I was always too drunk to know whether it happened or not. Someday your sons will hear some of it, and any affection they feel for me will turn to ashes. I won't let my shame become their shame."
Phoebe knew if she tried to argue with him point by point, it would only lead to frustration on her part and wallowing on his. She certainly couldn't deny that upper-class society was monstrously judgmental. Some people would perch ostentatiously on their moral pedestals, loudly accusing West while ignoring their own sins. Some people might overlook his blemished reputation if there was any advantage to them in doing so. None of that could be changed. But she would teach Justin and Stephen not to be influenced by hypocritical braying. Kindness and humanity- the values her mother had imparted- would guide them.
"Trust us," she said quietly. "Trust me and my sons to love you.”
― Lisa Kleypas, Devil's Daughter

“... was Aunt Evie very upset when you told her about the letter?"
"No. Only concerned for the boy's sake, and mine as well."
"Many women in her position would consider him as... well, an embarrassment."
That drew a real smile from him, the first she'd seen from him in a while. "You know Evie. She already thinks of him as someone else to love.”
― Lisa Kleypas, Devil in Disguise

“After twenty minutes of hard swimming, his muscles were burning. He hoisted himself out of the water, breathing heavily, and went to fetch a towel from a stack on a table. As he dried himself vigorously, he caught a glimpse of someone standing by the other end of the swimming bath. He went very still at the sight of rose-copper hair... pink cheeks and round blue eyes... and lavish curves contained in a fashionable striped wool dress. Every filament of his nervous system sparked with an infusion of joy.
"Evie?" he asked huskily, afraid he was imagining her.
She glanced at the water, remarking innocently, "You were swimming so hard, I thought there might be a sh-shark."
It took all Sebastian's concentration to reply casually, "You know better than that, pet." He wrapped the towel around his waist and tucked in the overlapping edge to fasten it. "I am the shark."
He went to his wife in no apparent hurry, but as he drew closer his stride quickened, and he snatched her up with an ardor that nearly lifted her feet from the floor. She gasped and clutched his shoulders, and lifted her smiling mouth to his.
Glorying in the taste and feel of her, Sebastian kissed her thoroughly, eventually finishing with a soft, provocative bite at her lower lip.”
― Lisa Kleypas, Devil in Disguise

“Although Evie was far quieter than the rest of the family, everyone paid close attention whenever she spoke. For all her gentleness, she possessed a core of inner strength that had made her the center of the Challons' world. And she was so kind that Keir couldn't help but like her. When they'd first met, the duchess had stared at him for a moment of wonder, and then had smiled and embraced him with tear-glittered eyes, as if he were her own long-lost child instead of Kingston's.”
― Lisa Kleypas, Devil in Disguise

“In her ladylike way, Merritt is a sledgehammer."
Wryly, Westcliff commented, "All three of my daughters are hellbent on making decisions for themselves. They always have been."
"Mine as well," Sebastian said. "Much to my dismay." Noticing the way Lillian and Evie glanced at each other and smiled, as if at some shared reminiscence, he asked, "What is it?"
"I was remembering the conversations we used to have with Annabelle and Daisy," Evie told him, "about the things we wanted to teach our daughters."
Lillian grinned. "The first point we all agreed upon was, 'Never let a man do your thinking for you.'"
"That explains a great deal," Sebastian said. "Evie, my sweet, don't you think you should have asked me before filling the girls' heads with subversive wallflower philosophy?"
Evie came to him, slid her arms around him, and tucked her head beneath his chin. He could hear a smile in her voice as she said, "Wallflowers never ask permission.”
― Lisa Kleypas, Devil in Disguise

“Although a stream of cheerful postcards and letters had arrived from Evie for the past three weeks, they were a poor substitute for the sound of her voice, and her good morning kisses, and the quirks only a husband would know about. The adorable way her toes would wiggle in her sleep whenever he touched her foot. And the way she would bounce a little on her heels when she was especially happy or excited about something.
God, he needed her back in his bed. He needed it soon.”
― Lisa Kleypas, Devil in Disguise

“Evie and Lillian hurried to each other and embraced warmly. The two of them, along with Lillian's sister Daisy Swift, and the vivacious Annabelle Hunt, had begun a lifelong friendship more than three decades ago. They had all been downtrodden wallflowers, consigned to sitting in a row at the side of a ballroom while everyone else danced. But instead of competing for male attention, they had made a compact to help each other. And throughout the years, they had championed and saved each other, time and again.”
― Lisa Kleypas, Devil in Disguise

“He was especially charmed by the two youngest Challons, Ivo and Seraphina, both of them engaging and warm, but also possessing their father's knack for a perfectly timed witticism- a bon mot, Merritt called it.
They asked countless questions about Islay, his friends, his dog, and the distillery, and they entertained him with stories of their own. To Keir's relief, neither of them seemed to have difficulty accepting him as a half brother, despite the vast differences in their ages. They had been brought up in an environment filled with so much abundance, it didn't occur to them to feel threatened by anyone.
The Challons were nothing like the noble families Keir had heard of, in which the children were raised mostly by servants and seldom saw their parents. These people were close and openly affectionate, with no trace of aristocratic stuffiness. Keir thought that was in no small part due to the duchess, who made no pretense about the fact that her father had made his start as a professional boxer. Evie was the anchor who kept the family from drifting too far in the dizzying altitude of their social position. It was at her insistence that the children had at least a passing acquaintance with ordinary life. For example, it was one of Ivo's chores to wash the dog, and Seraphina sometimes accompanied the cook to market to talk with local tradespeople.”
― Lisa Kleypas, Devil in Disguise