The Expats Quotes

“The best hiding spots are not the most hidden; they're merely the least searched.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“It was impossible to understand how brief it is. It seemed like youth would last so long; it would last forever. But it's just a blink.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“And everyone's in the same situation, basically: we're all finding our separate ways, together.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“People who were too outgoing made her suspicious. She couldn't help but presume that all the loud noise was created to hide quiet lies.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“But she was still operating on lonely-person principles, still worried that her happiness could be wrenched away at any moment, for reasons out of her control.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“Travel wasn't fun if you didn't get to see or do what you wanted; it was merely a different type of work, in a different place.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“This is the expat life: you never know when someone you see every day is going to disappear forever, instantly transmogrifying into a phantom. Before long you won’t be able to remember her last name, the color of her eyes, the grades that her children were in. You can’t imagine not seeing her tomorrow. You can’t imagine you yourself being one of those people, someone who one day just vanishes. But you are.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“But all people have secrets. Part of being human is having secrets, and being curious about other people's secrets. Dirty fetishes and debilitating fascinations and shameful defeats and ill-begotten triumphs, humiliating selfishness and repulsive inhumanity. The horrible things that people have thought and done, the lowest points in their lives.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“She understood that he had to work, and he had to travel. But what he didn't have to do was be absent even when he was present.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“Once you see some things, you can never forget them. If you don't want to have to see them for the rest of your life, it's better not to look in the first place.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“So my sister, she slipped through the cracks of the disaster of our family. She became her own disaster.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“It's impossible to know which parts of the woman, if any, were real.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“But Kate was wide awake, chased by the same demon that haunted her regularly, especially when she was trying to forget it.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“A waiter visited to find out if everything was okay. A preposterous question.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“Each of those photos proves a different thing. All those things add up to the truth.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“After all, she herself had done the very worst thing imaginable. And she was a good person. Wasn’t she?”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“They are permanent tourists, in Paris. Their life is a certain type of dream come true.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“But quitting didn't change what she'd already done. The piece of her past that she'd never be able to outrun.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“You talking about computer weaknesses?"
"Yes. But also human weaknesses."
"Meaning what?"
"Meaning the types of weaknesses that make humans let down their guard. Trust people they shouldn't trust."
"You're talking about manipulating people."
"Yes." Dexter and Lester were staring at each other. "I guess I am.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“So she forgave him. And instead she berated herself for her suspicion, for her snooping. For the things she promised herself she wouldn't do, the feelings she wouldn't have.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“Plus she had to admit that a small part of her secrecy was that she was holding something back, for herself. If she never told Dexter the truth, she was still reserving the right to return to her old life. To one day be a covert operative again. To be a person who could keep the largest secrets from everyone, including her husband, forever.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“She began to sacrifice that old identity to live in her new one. It was the new life, after all, that everyone wanted.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“She was not in a position to complain about this life, not yet. Probably not ever.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“She needed friends, and a life, and this is how you acquired those things: by talking to strangers. Everyone was a stranger, all on equal footing in strangerhood.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“Because when people are transferring millions of dollars, they don’t simply hit the Send button on their computer. They’re also on the phone with a bank officer, confirming the transaction. The customer creates the transaction detail, then the bank officer executes the transfer. This is how banks prevent fraud.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“Royalty. Very different from merely rich.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“You can’t have the money.” Kate says. The dark red wine has already spread through the cloth, tendrils reaching out through the fibers from the pool. That same pattern, again. “But if you move fast, you can have your freedom.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“But there’s this giant deception at the foundation of their relationship, their happiness. This impure motive. There was that small mistake that the woman made, uttering the wrong number. And then the man reconstructed an entire intrigue, a big thick plot— a seduction and affair and relationship and marriage proposal, a whole life— around her error and his notice of it. Taking advantage of her lie.

But does that make their relationship less real? Does that make it impossible that they genuinely love each other?”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“She knows that one of the most dangerous, self-destructive indulgences is to go around proving how smart you are. It’s the type of thing that gets people shot.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats

“Dexter was too legit,” Julia continued. “His life was too verifiable, too aboveboard. He was nobody’s spy, nobody’s mole, nobody’s rat. He was who he is. And he didn’t know that you weren’t.”
― Chris Pavone, The Expats