Nikka Blanco

“You also," he said, lowering his voice, "haven't yet
thanked me for saving you from sitting in the flower bed."
She didn't even look up. "It was entirely your fault that I nearly did. If you hadn't sneaked up on me, I wouldn't have been in any danger of landing in the weeds." She glanced briefly at him, a touch of color in her cheeks. "A gentleman would have coughed or something."

Vane trapped her gaze, and smiled—a slow, Cynster smile. "Ah," he murmured, his voice very low. He shifted fractionally closer. "But, you see, I'm not a gentleman. I'm a Cynster." As if letting her into some secret, he gently informed her: "We're conquerors—not gentlemen.”
― Stephanie Laurens, A Rake's Vow

“One question I feel compelled to ask; Before they agreed to marry, did all the Cynster females behave as irrationally as Heather is?"
He glanced briefly up, but Richard didn't look up from the lure he was tying off as he unperturably replied, "Prickly at the best of times, then 'have-at-you' the instant you set a foot, nay, a toe, wrong?"
"Exactly."
"Then yes." Richard straightened, tipping his head as he examined his lure. "It seems to be a family failing, even when they're not Cynster-born."
Breckenridge humphed.
He was carefully placing the fresh hook into his clamp when Richard continued, "There seems to be this prevailing wisdom, not just over marrying for love, but what that actually equates to. They seem to all have it firmly in their heads that without some cast-iron assurance, preferably in the form of an open declaration from us, then no matter the reality of any love, that love won't be solid and strong."
Unwinding the vise to release his completed lure, Richard grimaced. "It's almost as if they think that unless we state our feelings out aloud, we won't know what they-our feelings-are." He snorted. "As if we somehow might not notice that our lives have suddenly shifted to revolve solely about them and their well-being."
Breckenridge grunted in masculine agreement.
"Sadly," Richard said, selecting another hook, "it appears futile to expect them to go against the familial grain.”
― Stephanie Laurens, Viscount Breckenridge to the Rescue

“The world takes us to a silver screen on which flickering images of passion and romance play, and as we watch, the world says, “This is love.” God takes us to the foot of a tree on which a naked and bloodied man hangs and says, “This is love.”
― Joshua Harris, I Kissed Dating Goodbye

“No matter how long you have been waiting, the man God has for you will surpass your expectations. You will meet him when god says so. Not a minute early, not a moment later.”
― Michelle McKinney-Hammond