Before We Met Quotes
"The rain was beating down, and out here, where the carriageway was exposed, the wind buffeted Hannah’s old VW as if it were trying to push it off the road."
"Though they were married now, the trip to the airport was still exciting."
"The arrivals hall was busy, even for a Friday night."
"From the bench she watched the mechanised doors emit an irregular dribble of people."
"Hannah felt another buzz in the pit of her stomach. Come on, Mark."
"She’d never wanted to miss the moment when Mark first caught sight of her and the smile spread across his face."
"After twenty-five minutes, she knew there must be some sort of hold-up."
"Wind was swirling around the courtyard, driving the rain in bursts like shoals of tiny fish."
"Everything was big – everything; if it hadn’t been done so stylishly, it would have looked ostentatious."
"Feeling a burst of longing for him, she went back to her laptop and searched again for any news relating to flights from New York."
"Hannah’s breath came faster as she approached Eel Brook Common and picked up her pace."
"She’d been lucky after university – ‘Luck had nothing to do with it,’ Mark always said – and got one of the few graduate places at J. Walter Thompson."
"She spent hours every day reading the trade press, looking at other people’s new campaigns online."
"She was being ridiculous, as hysterical as her mother at her most outrageous."
"Following our recent meeting, I am pleased to be able to confirm an extension to your mortgage of £130,000, as requested."
"She felt hurt. Didn’t Mark want to involve her in the business of their life?"
"She took a deep breath and felt the anger burn in her chest."
"‘Flat but comfortable,’ was what Mark had said."
"What the hell was going on? What was he doing? Why was he marshalling all this money?"
"Stop it – just stop it! This was insane – she was thinking like some sort of madwoman."
"Mark was someone who took risks; she’d always known that."
"The current was strong all along the beach there; even very confident swimmers came unstuck against it."
"You could open these accounts with an online broker, she’d read about them, where you started without depositing any money and just ran your account until they asked you to settle up."
"She’d watched it slowly accumulate, feeling proud and in control."
"Her eyes ran down the transactions but nothing jumped out: no big transfers, no bookmakers, no La Perla or hotels."
"The glass panels shook as the front door slammed behind her."
"He is the embodiment of a sense of entitlement, a man who views life as a series of opportunities for him to take what he wants, putting his own pleasure above all other considerations, no matter what the cost to those around him."
"What kind of society have we created, when young women like Patty Hendrick will willingly sleep with a pair of brothers and indulge in protracted binges of drug-taking and extreme sexual activity?"
"It speaks of a generation without a moral compass, one that worships at the altar of the false god of consumption – of fast cars and foreign holidays, drink and drugs, and, ultimately, of each other."
"You can’t imagine why I didn’t tell you? The whole truth was worse than that. He wasn’t just badly behaved or spoiled or manipulative. Even before... it was evident there was something... wrong with him."
"I started thinking, what about me? Who cares about me? Do I exist only to be responsible for Nick?"
"It's like I've been tottering around with a jar of acid in my hands, full up to the brim, no lid, just waiting for it to slop out."
"I felt like I’d sold you shoddy merchandise, and every time I almost managed to get up the guts to tell you, I bottled it."
"It's going to be intense – I’ll be doing horrible hours."
"Everything I’ve ever done or tried to do, he’s been there mocking or stealing my thunder, undermining me, fucking things up."
"The longer she watched him, the more sure Hannah was: this was Mark’s father, and Mark had lied again – he was still lying, now, when he’d sworn he’d finally told her the truth."
"‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I just couldn’t – not tonight.’"
"Hannah’s heart gave a single great thump. Dead. The word fell like a drumbeat, the reverberations fanning out after it, vibrating in the air."
"Mark’s hands squeezed into fists on his knees. ‘Where was she? Who found her?’"
"‘I should have done something.’ Mark’s voice shook."
"I won’t let you. For God’s sake, Nick’s a killer."
"‘My brother and I have a difficult relationship,’ he said, ‘we always have had, and Nick’s angry about his time in prison. He blames me for that as well as Hermione.'"
"‘That’s enough,’ snapped Mr. Reilly. ‘The woman hasn’t come here to sit and maunder over old photographs.’"
"Doesn’t he think we’d like to forget, too?"