Mistress Quotes

The women always get blamed. Have you noticed that? The wives are nags. The mistress is a bitch for betraying the sisterhood. And the men just fall through the cracks in between. We expect so little from our boys, don't we, Grace? ~ Louise O'Neill

For Mersault, nothing mattered in those days. And the first time Marthe went limp in his arms and her features blurred as they came closer - the lips that had been as motionless as painted flowers now quivering and extended - Mersault saw in her not the future but all the force of his desire focused upon her and and satisfied by this appearance, this image. The lips she offered him seemed a message from a world without passion and swollen with desire, where his heart would find satisfaction. And this seemed a miracle to him. His heard pounded with an emotion he almost took for love. And when he felt the ripe and resilient flesh under his teeth, it was as though he bit into a kind of fierce liberty, after caressing her a long time with his own lips. She became his mistress that same day. ~ Albert Camus

The lover never sees personal resemblances in his mistress to her kindred or to others. His friends find in her a likeness to hermother, or her sisters, or to persons not of her blood. The lover sees no resemblance except to summer evenings and diamond mornings, to rainbows and the song of birds. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

Is that it?" he demanded, in sudden rage. "Is that all that matters? Not that I am in love and tumbled like a fool into sin. Not that I can never be happy, married to a snake and in love with a heartbreaker, but only, only, that Mistress Anne Boleyn's reputation must be without blemish." At once she flew at him, her hands spread like claws, and he caught her wrists before she could rake his face. "Look at me!" she hissed. "Didn't I give up my only love, didn't I break my heart? Didn't you tell me then that it was worth the price?" He held her away but she was unstoppable. "Look at Mary! Didn't we take her from her husband and me from mine? And now you have to give up someone too. You have to lose the great love of your life, as I have lost mine, as Mary lost hers. Don't whimper to me about heartbreak, you murdered my love and we buried it together and now it is gone." George ~ Philippa Gregory

I was sole keeper and mistress of the impossible. I possessed the keys to pain. ~ Cesar Aira

The truth is, every son raised by a single mom is pretty much born married. I don't know, but until your mom dies it seems like all the other women in your life can never be more than just your mistress. ~ Chuck Palahniuk

Sazed shook his head, walking over to stand beside her. "Belief isn't simply a thing for fair times and bright days, I think. What is belief - what is faith - if you don't continue in it after failure?" Vin frowned. "Anyone can believe in someone, or something, that always succeeds, Mistress. But failure ... ah, now, that is hard to believe in, certainly and truly. Difficult enough to have value, I think. ~ Brandon Sanderson

Since I am a man, my heart is three or four times less sensitive, because I have three or four times as much power of reason and experience of the world
a thing which you women call hard-heartedness. As a man, I can take refuge in having mistresses. The more of them I have, and the greater the scandal, the more I acquire reputation and brilliance in society. ~ Bill Vaughan

You will not find the warrior, the poet, the philosopher or the Christian by staring into his eyes as if he were your mistress: better fight beside him, read with him, argue with him, pray with him. ~ C.S. Lewis

Don't say 'wife.' I'm your mistress. Wife's such an ugly word. Your 'permanent mistress' is so much more tangible and desirable ... . ~ F Scott Fitzgerald

You went up a girl and came down a woman. ~ Patrick Ness

I am fully conscious that, not being a literary man , certain presumptuous persons will think that they may reasonably blame me; alleging that I am not a man of letters. Foolish folks! do they not know that I might retort as Marius did to the Roman Patricians by saying: That they, who deck themselves out in the labours of others will not allow me my own. They will say that I, having no literary skill, cannot properly express that which I desire to treat of, but they do not know that my subjects are to be dealt with by experience rather than by words; and experience has been the mistress of those who wrote well. And so, as mistress, I will cite her in all cases. ~ Leonardo Da Vinci

I feel more confident and more satisfied when I reflect that I have two professions and not one. Medicine is my lawful wife and literature is my mistress. When I get tired of one I spend the night with the other. Though it's disorderly it's not so dull, and besides, neither really loses anything, through my infidelity. ~ Anton Chekhov

MOM - Mistress Of Miracles ~ Richelle E. Goodrich

A bard's down-to-earth love: My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun; Coral is far more red and when she walks, treads on the ground ... ~ John Geddes

Her tongue flailed around all the questions stammering to get out, and she finally landed on: "When did you have time to take a mistress?"
His smile faltered. "Don't talk about Cress like that."
"What?"
"Oh - wait! You mean Darla. I won her in a hand of cards."
Cinder gawked.
"I thought she'd make a nice gift for Iko."
"You ... what?"
"For her replacement body?"
"Um."
"Because Darla's an escort-droid? ~ Marissa Meyer

I've always found it much more dangerous to fool with a man's mistress than his wife. ~ Harold Robbins

People are valuable, Mistress Vin, and so - therefore - are their beliefs. ~ Brandon Sanderson

I cannot be your mistress," I say simply. "I would rather die than dishonor my name. I cannot bring that shame on my family." I pause. I am anxious not to be too discouraging. "Whatever I might wish in my heart," I say very softly. ~ Philippa Gregory

Sovereign," like "love," means anything you want it to mean; it's a word in dictionary between "sober" and "sozzled. ~ Robert A. Heinlein

I added, that whoever the woman was that had an estate, and would give it up to be the slave of a great man, that woman was a fool, and must be fit for nothing but a beggar; that it was my opinion a woman was as fit to govern and enjoy her own estate without a man as a man was without a woman; and that, if she had a mind to gratify herself as to sexes, she might entertain a man as a man does a mistress; that while she was thus single she was her own, and if she gave away that power she merited to be as miserable as it was possible that any creature could be. ~ Daniel Defoe

You know, mistress, that I love you, and shall love you always ~ Thomas Hardy

The human face is the organic seat of beauty. It is the register of value in development, a record of Experience, whose legitimate office is to perfect the life, a legible language to those who will study it, of the majestic mistress, the soul. ~ Eliza Farnham

While Mr Loveday aired my lady's sheets, I set to scratching up a supper. With not even time to change from my own damp clothes I had in one-half hour some welcoming tea steaming and hot brandy to mix a punch. Our bill of fare was the remnants of Mrs Garland's Yorkshire Pie, still sound and savory, fried bacon, and a hillock of roasted rabbits that disappeared as quickly as I made them. The last of the seed cake was eaten too, with a douse of brandy sprinkled over it to warm us.
'She will not eat those beggarly scraps,' said Jesmire, the spiteful old cat, when I took a tray of food to my lady's door. Yet I did see a slice of brandied cake disappear. I knew my mistress well enough by then, and she was a slave to her sugar tooth. ~ Martine Bailey

Song


When I am dead, my dearest,
Sing no sad songs for me;
Plant thou no roses at my head,
Nor shady cypress tree:
Be the green grass above me
With showers and dewdrops wet;
And if thou wilt, remember,
And if thou wilt, forget.

I shall not see the shadows,
I shall not feel the rain;
I shall not hear the nightingale
Sing on, as if in pain:
And dreaming through the twilight
That doth not rise nor set,
Haply I may remember,
And haply may forget.

Sir Thomas Wyatt has been credited with introducing the Petrarchan sonnet into the English language. Wyatt's father had been one of Henry VII's Privy Councilors and remained a trusted adviser when Henry VIII came to the throne in 1509. Wyatt followed his father to court, but it seems the young poet may have fallen in love with the king's mistress, Anne Boleyn. Their acquaintance is certain, although whether or not the two actually shared a romantic relationship remains unknown. But in his poetry, Wyatt called his mistress Anna and there do seem to be correspondences. For instance, this poem might well have been written about the King's claim on Anne Boleyn: ~ Christina Rossetti

Your Queen I cannot be. Your mistress I will not be. ~ Maxwell Anderson

They destroy lives with work. What for? They rob men of their lives. What for, I ask? My master - I lost my life in the textile mill of Nefidov - my master presented one prima donna with a golden wash basin. Every one of her toilet articles was gold. That basin holds my life-blood, my very life. That's for what my life went! A man killed me with work in order to comfort his mistress with my blood. He bought her a gold wash basin with my blood. ~ Maxim Gorky

How may paintings have preserved the image of a divine beauty which in its natural manifestation has been rapidly overtaken by time or death. Thus, the work of the painter is nobler than that of nature, its mistress. ~ Leonardo Da Vinci

If the theater is the refuge of the conversationalist whose friend is mute and whose mistress is insipid, then conversation, even the most exquisite, is the pleasure of men without imagination. ~ Marcel Proust

There is a difference between him who claspeth his mistress in his arms, and him whose eyes are fixed on the door expecting her. ~ Saadi

Dogs are quick to show their affection. They never pout, they never bear a grudge. They never run away from home when mistreated. They never complain about their food. They never gripe about the way the house is kept. They are chivalrous and courageous, ready to protect their mistress at the risk of their lives. They love children, and no matter how noisy and boisterous they are, the dog loves every minute of it. In fact, a dog is still competition for a husband. Perhaps if we husbands imitated a few of our dog's virtues, life with our family might be more amiable. ~ Billy Graham

When you were six you thought mistress meant to put your shoes on the wrong feet," she writes. "Now you are older and know it can mean many things, but essentially it means to put your shoes on the wrong feet. ~ Lorrie Moore

Many are the stories I have heard about myself. I have mistresses I have never met. When I hear that I am a sodomist and a zoophalist then I shall know that I have reached the high point of fame, but I suppose I can hardly expect such exaltation for many years. ~ John Steinbeck

She's as light as any fairy; she's as pretty as a peach; She's mistress of the witchcraft to beguile; There's sunshine in her manner, there is music in her speech, And there's concentrated honey in her smile. ~ Robert W. Service

Christmas, 1492….

Unfortunately, on Christmas morning 1492 Columbus' ship, the Santa María, ran aground on the northern coast of what is now Haiti. Not having any way to refloat her, the crew off-loaded the provisions and equipment from the ship before she broke up. For protection they then built a flimsy fortification on the beach, calling it "La Navidad." With the consent of the local Indian Chief, Columbus left behind 39 men with orders to establish a settlement, and appointed Diego de Arana, a cousin of his mistress Beatriz, as the Governor. ~ Hank Bracker

But the most obvious fact about praise
whether of God or anything
strangely escaped me. I thought of it in terms of compliment, approval, or the giving of honor. I had never noticed that all enjoyment spontaneously overflows into praise ... The world rings with praise
lovers praising their mistresses, readers their favorite poet, walkers praising the countryside, players praising their favorite game ... I think we delight to praise what we enjoy because the praise not merely expresses but completes the enjoyment; it is its appointed consummation. ~ C.S. Lewis

Yes, she might have managed to lift the portcullis - with concentration, an unprecedented bout of luck, and the absence of a hangover. Oh, and if she were in mortal danger.
Unfortunately, her power was adrenaline-based, making it as infinite as it was uncontrollable.
"You think I use magick like mine to open a tomb?" Mari asked in a scoffing tone. Mistress of bluffing, working it here. ~ Kresley Cole

Oh wondrous,' murmured Lin Chung. 'Oh, water, mistress of earth, valley spirit, eternal feminine!'
'Taoism again?' Phryne leaned close to hear what he was whispering.
'From the "Tao Te Ching." The old Master should have seen this. All made by water, the female, cold, moon principle.'
'Yin,' said Phryne. 'This is the womb of the earth.'
'Indeed.' He took her hand. 'Completely foreign to all male, hot, sun creatures.'
'Like you?'
'Like me. Yang can only admire and tremble.'
'Come along.' She led him into the centre of the huge space. 'We don't want to get lost in the earthmother's insides. ~ Kerry Greenwood

At eight-thirty that night Ian stood on the steps outside Elizabeth's uncle's town house suppressing an almost overwhelming desire to murder Elizabeth's butler, who seemed to be inexplicably fighting down the impulse to do bodily injury to Ian. "I will ask you again, in case you misunderstood me the last time," Ian enunciated in a silky, ominous tone that made ordinary men blanch. "Where is your mistress?"
Bentner didn't change color by so much as a shade. "Out!" he informed the man who'd ruined his young mistress's life and had now appeared on her doorstep, unexpected and uninvited, no doubt to try to ruin it again, when she was at this very moment attending her first ball in years and trying bravely to live down the gossip he had caused.
"She is out, but you do not know where she is?"
"I did not say so, did I?"
"Then where is she?"
"That is for me to know and you to ponder."
In the last several days Ian had been forced to do a great many unpleasant things, including riding across half of England, dealing with Christina's irate father, and finally dealing with Elizabeth's repugnant uncle, who had driven a bargain that still infuriated him. Ian had magnanimously declined her dowry as soon as the discussion began. Her uncle, however, had the finely honed bargaining instincts of a camel trader, and he immediately sensed Ian's determination to do whatever was necessary to get Julius's name on a betrothal contract. As a result, Ian was the first man ~ Judith McNaught

I have a better idea,' said she. 'Know that under a mortal name am I mistress of the Palace of Kama in Khaipur.'
'The Fornicatorium, madam?'
She frowned. 'As such is it often known to the vulgar, and do not call me 'madam' in the same breath
it smacks of ancient jest. It is a place of rest, pleasure, holiness and much of my revenue. ~ Roger Zelazny

Looking for an entirely reliable informant is like looking for a chaste mistress. ~ Cassandra Clare

Writing a book is an adventure. To begin with it is a toy and an amusement. Then it becomes a mistress, then it becomes a master, then it becomes a tyrant. The last phase is that just as you are about to be reconciled to your servitude, you kill the monster and fling him to the public. ~ Winston S. Churchill

No rich man is a patriot, no rich man is a friend. They have all only got one fatherland the Ritz-Carlton; and one friend the mistress they're promising to divorce their wives for. ~ Christina Stead

What do you do with the kid who can't read? ... Well, what he did with the kid who couldn't read was to make her his mistress. What Farley did was to make her his punching bag. What the Cuban did was to make her his whore, or one among them
so Coleman believed more often than not. ~ Philip Roth

Music is a proud, temperamental mistress. Give her the time and attention she deserves, and she is yours. Slight her and there will come a day when you call and she will not answer. So I began sleeping less to give her the time she needed. ~ Patrick Rothfuss

Considering how little the beginning or the ceasing to love is in our own power, it is foolish and unreasonable for the lover or his mistress to complain of one another's inconstancy. ~ Francois De La Rochefoucauld

I am not covetous, but as ambitious as ever any of my sex was, is, or can be; which makes, that though I cannot be Henry the Fifth, or Charles the Second, yet I endeavour to be Margaret the First; and although I have neither power, time, not occasion to conquer the world as Alexander and Caesar did; yet rather than not be mistress of one, since Fortune and Fates would give me none, I have made a world of my own; for which nobody, I hope, will blame me, since it is in everyone's power to do the like. ~ Margaret Cavendish

There are many ways to become mistress (or master) of one's fate after a betrayal, but they all have things in common: conscious effort and a fighting spirit, embodied in what I call 'the Affirmative No.' The Affirmative No incorporates self-enhancing outrage, independence, and courage. It is a stance through which a traumatized person actively proclaims her will by rejecting the role of victim.... Unable to change our predicaments, we actively changed their meaning and our relationship to them, and in the process, we discovered that we could exert power when we thought we had none. ~ Jeanne Safer

I am nature, the universal Mother, mistress of all the elements, primordial child of time, sovereign of all things spiritual, queen of the dead, queen of the ocean, queen also of the immortals ... ~ Kristen Callihan

Have I shocked you, mistress? Do you still believe you can heal him? A virgin who's seen nothing of the world, a man who's seen the very worst of it?" John demanded, his voice hard edged. ~ Lecia Cornwall

The trouble is that privacy is at once essential to, and in tension with, both freedom and security. A cabinet minister who keeps his mistress in satin sheets at the French taxpayer's expense cannot justly object when the press exposes his misuse of public funds. Our freedom to scrutinise the conduct of public figures trumps that minister's claim to privacy. The question is: where and how do we draw the line between a genuine public interest and that which is merely what interests the public? ~ Timothy Garton Ash

One does not imagine the presence of a dog in the Garden of Eden, for had there been, no doubt he would have given adequate protection to his mistress and saved her descendants from all subsequent trouble. ~ Kate Sanborn

For a good wife contains so many persons in herself. What was H. not to me? She was my daughter and my mother, my pupil and my teacher, my subject and my sovereign; and always, holding all these in solution, my trusty comrade, friend, shipmate, fellow-soldier. My mistress; but at the same time all that any man friend (and I have good ones) has ever been to me. Perhaps more. ~ C.S. Lewis

Anything a wife should do, I'm terrible at. Anything a mistress should do, I'll try. ~ Tori Amos

The poet Rilke once reported seeing a dying dog give its mistress a look full of reproach. Later, he gave this experience to the narrator of a novel: He was convinced I could have prevented it. It was now clear that he had always overrated me. And there was no time left to explain it to him. He continued to gaze at me, surprised and solitary, until it was over. ~ Sigrid Nunez

Reality is a harsh mistress. She demands our honesty. She demands our work. She demands that we give up comforts, that we let ourselves feel pain, that we accept how small we are and how little control we have over our lives. And she demands that we make her our top priority. But she is more beautiful, and more powerful, and more surprising, and more fascinating, and more endlessly rewarding, than anything we could ever make up about her. ~ Greta Christina

What could he mean by speaking so, as if I were always thinking that he cared for me, when I know he does not; he cannot ... But I won't care for him. I surely am mistress enough of myself to control this wild, strange, miserable feeling ~ Elizabeth Gaskell

One never owns a book. It sits on your shelf in a fine edition like a piece of furniture, and you are its admiring ward until it flies off from you in a time of financial hardship. If it is a tattered paperback, she is your casual mistress you use a few times. If you have read it a hundred times then it is your wife, and a source of infinite mystery. ~ Bauvard

That, sir, depends on whether I embrace your mistress or your politics. ~ John Wilkes

That life sometimes imitates art is a mere Oscar Wilde-ish curiosity; that it should set about to do so in such unseemly haste that between notes and novel (not to mention between the drafted and the printed page) what had been fiction becomes idle fact, invention history--disconcerting! Especially to a fictionist who, like yours truly, had long since turned his professional back on literary realism in favour of the fabulous irreal, and only in this latest enterprise had projected, not without misgiving, a detente with the realistic tradition. It is as if Reality, a mistress too long ignored, must now settle scores with her errant lover. ~ John Barth

He is either a pompous ass or helplessly in love with you,' she told me, 'and, from the way you did not colour when you mentioned him, I should say the former. Oh, how disappointing. I had hoped he would have made you his mistress by now. How I could have entertained my tea-circle with that story. But do not worry, I shall anyway. ~ M. R. C. Kasasian

I will be calm. I will be mistress of myself. ~ Jane Austen

We feasted on love; every mode of it, solemn and merry, romantic and realistic, sometimes as dramatic as a thunderstorm, sometimes comfortable and unemphatic as putting on your soft slippers. She was my pupil and my teacher, my subject and my sovereign, my trusty comrade, friends, shipmate, fellow-soldier. My mistress, but at the same time all that any man friend has ever been to me. ~ C.S. Lewis

Suddenly watching her feet, so light and precise and mistress of his shuffle, I was in love again. ~ Graham Greene

Marriage is the only actual bondage known to our law. There remain no legal slaves, except the mistress of every house. ~ John Stuart Mill

...though I have neither Power, Time nor Occasion, to be a great Conqueror, like Alexander, or Cesar; yet, rather than not be Mistress of a World, since Fortune and the Fates would give me none, I have made One of my own. And thus, believing, or, at least, hoping, that no Creature can, or will, Envy me for this World of mine, I remain,

Noble Ladies, Your Humble Servant, M. Newcastle. ~ Margaret Cavendish

A member of Parliament to Disraeli: 'Sir, you will either die on the gallows or of some unspeakable disease.'
That depends, Sir,' said Disraeli, 'whether I embrace your policies or your mistress. ~ Benjamin Disraeli

Memory supplies the place of a mistress ~ Pierre Abelard

Want is the mistress of invention ~ Susanna Centlivre

Most aren't trying to kill you, unfortunately. They're trying to bed you, mistress."
"Why?"
"Probably because of the prophecy," said Nandi.
"Prophecy," I said dryly. "Wonderful. Now there's a prophecy."
"Mistress," she said hastily, "had you asked us if there was a prophecy-"
"Yeah, yeah. I know. What's this one say? That I'm a good lay? ~ Richelle Mead

In an instant, five harlequin-like clowns emerged and began to perform all kinds of acrobatic tricks, encircling us––correction...corralling us. They were graceful but a little creepy too. They were wearing black and white costumes that were form fitting and appeared to move like some psychedelic drug trip when they flipped around. That of course was odd, but not nearly as odd as the chant they were singing as they continued to perform their tricks.
See us dance.
Watch us flip.
Care to take a chance?
We'll only need a sip.
Come to see our mistress?
Or come to see our master?
She can be quite viscous.
But he is a disaster.
We love them both, and we'll let you choose.
Either way, we wouldn't want to be in your shoes. ~ Brynn Myers

In Paris, Julien's position with regard to Madame de Renal would very soon have been simplified; but in Paris love is the child of the novels. The young tutor and his timid mistress would have found in three or four novels, and even in the lyrics of the Gymnase, a clear statement of their situation. The novels would have outlined for them the part to be played, shown them the model to copy; and this model, sooner or later, albeit without the slightest pleasure, and perhaps with reluctance, vanity would have compelled Julien to follow.

In a small town of the Aveyron or the Pyrenees, the slightest incident would have been made decisive by the ardour of the climate. Beneath our more sombre skies, a penniless young man, who is ambitious only because the refinement of his nature puts him in need of some of those pleasures which money provides, is in daily contact with a woman of thirty who is sincerely virtuous, occupied with her children, and never looks to novels for examples of conduct. Everything goes slowly, everything happens by degrees in the provinces: life is more natural. ~ Stendhal

To celebrate his prosperity, fellow employees and friends urged him to take a young concubine to "serve him". Even Ye Ye's boss, the London-educated K. C. Li, jokingly volunteered to "give" him a couple of girls with his bonus. Ye Ye reported all this in a matter-of-fact way in a letter to his wife, adding touchingly that he was a "one-woman man". ~ Adeline Yen Mah

Plough not the seas, sow not the sands,Leave off your idle pain;Seek other mistress for your minds,Love's service is in vain. ~ Robert Southwell

But all he could think of was what Sabina would have said about it. Everything he did, he did for Sabina, the way Sabina would have liked to see it done. It was a perfectly innocent form of infidelity and one eminently suited to Franz, who would never have done his bespectacled student-mistress any harm. He nourished the cult of Sabina more as a religion than as love ~ Milan Kundera

Boxer, feeling that his attentions were due to the family in general, and must be impartially distributed, dashed in and out with bewildering inconstancy; now, describing a circle of short barks round the horse, where he was being rubbed down at the stable-door; now feigning to make savage rushes at his mistress, and facetiously bringing himself to sudden stops; now, eliciting a shriek from Tilly Slowboy, in the low nursing-chair near the fire, by the unexpected application of his moist nose to her countenance; now, exhibiting an obtrusive interest in the baby; now, going round and round upon the hearth, and lying down as if he had established himself for the night; now, getting up again, and taking that nothing of a fag-end of a tail of his, out into the weather, as if he had just remembered an appointment, and was off, at a round trot, to keep it. ~ Charles Dickens

Mistress Isabel ties me down and pushes my limits of pain and pleasure, and I'm the one screaming out her name. True love, power exchange, contentment and most importantly, trust – have finally graced me with their presence and my life with Isa is complete. ~ Ella Dominguez

I was fired ignominiously from the Junior School Choir for being so off tune that the choir mistress declared she couldn't even bear to have me mime. ~ Sara Sheridan

The future is religion and commerce, aphrodisiac and Benzedrine, a mother of mysterious comfort and a mistress of familiar ravishments ever on the verge of embracing or destroying us. ~ Eugene Kennedy

I wrote 'Mistress of Spices' at an unusual time when I had a near-death experience after the birth of my second son. ~ Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

The Mistress of the Manor (Hoyt calls her MOM) has no idea he shoots the skunks and raccoons he traps on her property. She has asked him please to release the creatures in some other vicinity, a "humane" act that only makes them somebody's else's problem. Typical: MOM sees nothing contradictory in driving twenty miles in a gas-guzzling atmosphere-choking SUV to buy organic vegetables. ~ Sarah Kernochan

It is a delightful thing to write, to cease to be oneself, to flow through the whole creation of which one speaks. Today, for example, man and woman at the same time, lover and mistress at once, I rode horseback through a forest on an autumn afternoon under the yellow leaves, and I was the horses, the leaves, the wind, the words they said to each other and the red sun that beat down on their eyelids, heavy with love, and made them droop. Is this pride or piety? Is it the inane outpouring of egotism, or a vague and noble religious instinct? When I think it over, after experiencing these delights, I would be tempted to offer a prayer of gratitude to God, if I were sure he could hear me. ~ Gustave Flaubert

With little effort, he rolled his late lover off the edge of the cliff and watched, grimacing, when her dainty body bounced off a rocky outcropping. True, he planned on packing her back to France, or to another of his associates. And true, he didn't see her death as a great loss, but he wouldn't have wished her bashed on the rocks, even in death. However, this was the most expedient way to rid himself of an inconveniently dead mistress. ~ Chris Karlsen

So your theory is that Nancy plans to marry Samuel, pass off as her own the child he fathered on her maid, and then raise it, assuming it's a boy, to be heir to the title. That doesn't gain Nancy much, does it? It's not her son, and she's not Samuel's only lover. He and his mistress and the son get everything; she gets only the privilege of knowing she's married to a seducer."
Dom ignored the fact that some of what she said made sense. "She gains an exalted rank as mother to the new viscount. She gains a husband she's always coveted. And she might not even care if Samuel was having an affair with her maid--you said yourself that Nancy wasn't fond of the intimate side of marriage."
The moment Jane paled, he realized what he'd said. Something highly inappropriate. Something that revealed just how frank he and Jane had been in their conversations. God only knew what Blakeborough would make of that.
Bloody hell. Whatever it was, it wouldn't help Dom's situation with Jane any. Not that any of this would. Damn Nancy for coming between them yet again.
Jane's gaze turned stormy as she poked him in the chest. "You've got it all figured out, don't you? But as usual, you ignore all the ways that your theory doesn't fit."
He stared her down. "Such as what?"
Again she poked him in the chest. "Why did Samuel mention coming to London to see a doctor if they were sure that Nancy had lost the baby?" Another poke. "Why did she leave York in such strange circumstan ~ Sabrina Jeffries

Slave. Minion. Fiend. The others who have come before me have been called such things, but I prefer to think of myself as a disciple; a devout follower of my voluptuous mistress. ~ Charlotte Featherstone

Aubade THE lark now leaves his wat'ry nest, And climbing shakes his dewy wings. He takes this window for the East, And to implore your light he sings- Awake, awake! the morn will never rise Till she can dress her beauty at your eyes. The merchant bows unto the seaman's star, The ploughman from the sun his season takes, But still the lover wonders what they are Who look for day before his mistress wakes. Awake, awake! break thro' your veils of lawn! Then draw your curtains, and begin the dawn! ~ William Davenant

A lover, when he is admitted to cards, ought to be solemnly silent, and observe the motions of his mistress. He must laugh when she laughs, sigh when she sighs. In short, he should be the shadow of her mind. A lady, in the presence of her lover, should never want a looking-glass; as a beau, in the presence of his looking-glass, never wants a mistress. ~ Henry Fielding

Okay," I said, "so what does all that have to do with his dead mistress, her dead ex-boyfriend with the dirty pictures or the entire Rossetti crime family?" Trixie shrugged. "I dunno, let's go ask him." "Ask who?" I said, a little lost. "Roger Mayfield," she said simply. "Isn't that what I wanted to do at nine o'clock in the morning?" I asked, annoyed. "Nine thirty-seven," she reminded. "And there's a difference." "Which is?" I asked. "When you wanted to do it, it was a stupid idea," she said with a smile. ~ Gregg Taylor

Memory is a cruel mistress with whom we all must learn to dance. ~ Kate Morton

She carried herself like a queen,: gracefully, regal, and dignified. She was all woman and every inch a lady, and he had never seen her equal, not even in Paris. He was thinking she would make the perfect mistress, but at the same time, he wonder if she would accept such a role. Beautiful, arousing, and complicated meant nothing but trouble.-Alysandir ~ Elaine Coffman

Raphael pulled out a paperback and handed it to me. The cover, done back in the time when computer-aided imagine manipulation had risen to the level of art, featured an impossibly handsome man, leaning forward, one foot in a huge black boot resting on the carcass of some monstrous sea creature. His hair flowed down to his shoulders in a mane of white gold, in stark contrast to his tanned skin and the rakish black patch hiding his left eye. His white, translucent shirt hung open, revealing abs of steel and a massive, perfectly carved chest graced by erect nipples. His muscled thighs strained the fabric of his pants, which were unbuttoned and sat loosely on his narrow hips, a touch of a strategically positioned shadow hinting at the world's biggest boner.
The cover proclaimed in loud golden letters: The Privateer's Virgin Mistress, by Lorna Sterling.
"Novel number four for Andrea's collection?" I guessed.
Raphael nodded and took the book from my hands. "I've got the other one Andrea wanted, too. Can you explain something to me?"
Oh boy. "I can try."
He tapped the book on his leather-covered knee. "The pirate actually holds this chick's brother for ransom, so she'll sleep with him. These men, they aren't real men. They're pseudo-bad guys just waiting for the love of a 'good' woman."
"You actually read the books?"
He gave me a chiding glance. "Of course I read the books. It's all pirates and the women they steal, apparently so they can enjoy lo ~ Ilona Andrews

I did not throw 'The Shepherd Boy Sings in the Valley of Humiliation' at the audience. I threw it at the elocution mistress. I meant to cast it at her feet, but I missed. ~ Mary Ann Shaffer

Take love as a sober man takes wine; do not become a drunkard. If your mistress is sincere and faithful, love her for that; but if she is not, if she is merely young and beautiful, love her for that; if she is agreeable and spirituelle, love her for that; if she is none of these things but merely loves you, love her for that. Love does not come to us every day. ~ Alfred De Musset

So you put me through all this suffering just to taunt me?'

'Humans suffer because they take seriously that which we create for entertainment.'

'Oh really? Because let me tell you, I wasn't the least bit entertained!'

'That's because you were not being entertained, Mr Fantoccio, you were being enlightened,' stated the Mistress through a pair of foggy eyes. 'You want to know why painting never worked for you? Because painters are creators and you, Mr Fantoccio, are an overseer. You don't care about setting up the puppet show; you are merely interested in giving it a good ending. For you, Mr Fantoccio, creating the world was never enough; you aspire to run it. With every breath, you want to shape it. With every choice, you need to control it. ~ Louise Blackwick

My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun ~ William Shakespeare

Fate is a comfortable mistress, Wes, if you accept her demands." Fate, the mistress that four years ago had put him the hands of mercenaries who turned him over to the British to be tortured.
"Listen to the monk teaching me about mistresses." Wesley chuckled.

-Vitor & Wesley ~ Katharine Ashe

The man is always the last to know when
Cupid has struck him
-Anonymous, Memoirs of a Mistress ~ Sabrina Jeffries

her home; it just happened to be where she lived. This was the House that Jack Built, she thought, hearing the singsong rhythm of the old children's story in her head. And this was the wife who lived in the house that Jack built. And there was the mistress that screwed the husband that ignored the wife who lived in the house that Jack built.... ~ Susan Wiggs

When a man marries his mistress it creates a job opportunity. ~ James Goldsmith

Mistress Allen was only an ordinary provincial manor lady, bent on nothing more sinister than retrieving money of which she felt defrauded, and in the process either quarreling with or using people. ~ Anya Seton