He rode on the horse, but he kept the woman walking ahead of him, always in sight. The dark, hand-braided rope that bound the entirety of her upper body was anchored at the other end of its length around his waist.

He knew she was too weak to get away, but not too weak to cause real trouble if he gave her the chance. She’d already tried spooking the horse once, but the horse had seen a lot and wasn’t spookable and the man had climbed down from the saddle and backhanded her across the face with all of his…

Violet’s mother was dead so she was free now. The weeks since the funeral had been a trial, but now it was time.

Violet began her last day by exchanging her stiff black silk mourning dress and bonnet for a white cotton dress that would have well-suited a bride with simple tastes. When the maid finished dressing her, she’d examined her image in the mirror. She admitted that she was not what she had been, that she was no longer a rose in full bloom. But she allowed that she wore her maturity well and her figure was unaltered. Fine. This was the face and the form that she would have for eternity.

All of the family affairs were now in order and…

Yup. It's the daily little things that tell the story far better than grand gestures ever could. Important to recognize your blessings, especially when they are low-key and do not announce themselves :)

In the midst of this pandemic and all the fallout, there has been a lot of personal tragedy and relationship meltdowns that had nothing to do with finances etc.. People basically discovered they didn't like who they were locked in with. No matter how big the house was.

Like you, I become conscious of how lucky I was to be stranded with exactly the right person.

Cheers!

The sound that repeats itself, again and again, is stone striking sharply against stone. And a single drum beats a plaintive beat.

Lona peers down at her son’s beautiful face. The wind ruffles the rabbit fur collar of his coat, the whiteness of it stark against the rich brown of his skin. He looks as if he lightly sleeps and will at any moment quicken to wakefulness, with a mischievous smile for her. But he will not. He is not sleeping. He lies atop a dense pile of carefully-arranged, dry wood. And the sound of the stone striking stone is…

Nicholas watched the young woman in the tight white jeans and bright red crop top as she sauntered toward his car. The high heels she wore made her legs look endless and the curve of her bare waist where it met her hips was a study in primal seduction. He watched as she drew closer, much of her face hidden behind oversized designer sunglasses, but the high cheekbones and lovely mouth set in an alluring pout were on full display.

It didn’t matter that he’d seen her, had studied her, thousands of times. Each time, every day, her beauty struck…

Robots always lie.

Lync repeated this to himself silently, his lips exaggerating every syllable of each word. If he said it enough times, it just might work. He could make it all the way back home to Haven City without asking the question.

He cut his eyes toward the immobile figure occupying the seat next to his. Then looked away again.

Robots always lie.

So there was absolutely no point in asking the damned thing was there?

But like everyone else, he wanted to know.

The car skimmed through the desert at a speed that made it impossible to pick…

After 2 hours on the jet, a handful of men and one woman walked across a tarmac to this helicopter. The entire shift of personnel and cargo from one to the other took exactly one minute. They were now 53 minutes into this second stage of the journey. She could tell by the slowing of the engines and the more frequent direction changes of the helicopter that they were nearly back at their launch base. There had been no scent of saltwater for at least 20 minutes, which was further confirmation. So yet another mission would soon be over.

She…

“He’s just a friend.”

“Oh, don’t. Don’t even. I know all about this friend scam. I used to be your friend, remember? Back then it was that Per guy listening to you say, ‘Oh, Anders? He’s just a friend´.”

They stood on the balcony side by side, looking out across a narrow strip of water toward Bygdøy. Smoking Marlboros. Astrid leaning against the iron railing. Both wore sunglasses, so neither could read the other’s eyes. Astrid focused on his voice. How much of it was joking and how much of it was real hostility? …