Karen Marie Moning

“Deals with the devil, Ms. Lane, never go well. That‘s a given. You will not make one again. Do you understand me? If I have to chain you to a fucking wall to protect you from your own stupidity, I will!" He glared at me. I rattled my chains. "Wrists. Beam. Chained already, Barrons. Come up with a new threat." I glared back.”

“Barrons Books and Baubles had been ransacked! Tables were overturned, books torn from shelves and strewn everywhere, baubles broken. Even my little TV behind the counter had been destroyed. "Barrons?" I called warily. It was night and the lights were on. My illusory Alina had told me more than an hour had passed. Was it the same night, nearly dawn? Or was it the night following our theft attempt? Had Barrons come back from Wales yet? Or was he still there, searching for me? When I‘d been so rudely ripped from reality, who or what had come through those basement doors? I heard footsteps, boots on hardwood, and turned expectantly toward the connecting doors. Barrons was framed in the doorway. His eyes were black ice. He stared at me a moment, raking me from head to toe. "Nice tan, Ms. Lane. So, where the fuck have you been for the past month?”

“Gwen smiled and asked hopefully, "Is there coffee again this morning?"Silvan put his book down and glanced absently at Gwen. His gaze dropped to her cleavage, and a single white brow shot up. He blinked several times."There certainly is," Nell said, circling the table. She stopped behind Gwen and draped a linen cloth over her shoulders, so it tumbled from her neck like a bib."Peel yer eyes off the lass's breasts," Nell said sweetly to Silvan.Gwen turned twenty shades of red, sneaked a hand beneath the bib, and tugged at her bodice, trying to jiggle them back down a little. Mortified, she devoted her attention to eyeing the medieval dining ware-plates and goblets made of heavy silver, a fat spoon and broad knife, and heavy blue bowls."She's the one who fluffed them up," Silvan protested indignantly. "I didn't mean to look, but they were ... so ... there. Like trying not to see the sun in the sky."Nell arched a brow and circled round the table again."I hardly think 'twas ye she fluffed 'em for, was it lass?" Gwen glanced up and gave an embarrassed shake of her head.”

“Then you will simply have to see for yourself. Touch me, lass. Feel my ...sock." His silver gaze sizzled with challenge, as he unzipped his zipper.Uh-uh." She shook her head for added emphasis.Then find me a pair of trews that doona threaten to sever my manparts.”

“Walk out of this with your parents, the stones, and Darroc dead, Ms. Lane, and I‘ll give you the bloody thing.”

“Barrons." I hastily shoved the phone between the cushions. Ms. Lane." He inclined his dark head. You tattooed me, you bastard." I got right to the point.”

“She understood now why her friend Elizabeth, with her near-genius, analytical mind gave wide berth to murder mysteries, psychological thrillers, and horror stories, and read only romance novels. Because, by God, when a woman picked up one of those steamy books, she had a firm guarantee that there would be a Happily-Ever-After. That though the world outside those covers could bring such sorrow and disappointment and loneliness, between those covers, the world was a splendid place to be.”

“I was in Cancun, Mexico, sitting in a disappearing-edge swimming pool, on a bar stool that was actually under the water, watching palm trees sway in a sultry breeze against the unmistakable aqua splendor of the Caribbean Sea; drinking coconut, lime, and tequila from a scooped-out pineapple, with salt spray of breaking surf and sun kissing my skin.Translation: I'd died and gone to heaven.”

“There are really only two positions one can take toward anything in life: hope or fear. Hope strengthens, fear kills.”

“He shakes me."Say my name.""No.""Damn it,would you just cooperate?""I do not know that word,'cooperate.'""Obviously,"he growls."I think you make up words.""I do not make up words.""Do,too.""Do not.""Too.""Not."I laugh"Woman you make me crazed,"he mutters.We do this often.Get into childish arguments.He is stubborn,my beast.”

“Hard. Fast. Deep. When I'm done you'll know you're mine.”

“You've been doing something bad since the moment you met me, lass.”

“You have splendid breasts, lass," he purred, cupping the plump mounds. "Splendid," he repeated stupidly, and she almost laughed. Men loved breasts any shape or form, they just loved them.-Drustan to Gwen”

“It's a strange new world out there and the rules have changed: It's every princess for herself.”

“You, Ms. Lane, are a menace to others! A walking, talking catastrophe in pink!”

“I didn’t hear him behind me. I felt him. Electric. Wild. One foot in the swamp. Never going to crawl all the way out.And I wanted to have sex with whatever he was. Where was I supposed to put that in my head?”

“I moistened my lips. His gaze fixed on them. I think I stopped breathing.He jerked so sharply away that his long dark coat sliced air, and turned his back to me. “Was that an invitation, Ms.Lane?”“If it was?” I asked, astonishing myself. What did I think I was doing?“I don’t do hypotheticals. Little girl.”

“As I moved deeper into the room, his gaze dropped to my feet, and worked its way back to my face. I was wearing faded jeans, boots, and a snug pink Juicy T-shirt I got on sale at TJ Maxx last summer that said I’m a Juicy girl.“I bet you are,” he murmured.”

“I was about to look away when he reached across the seat, touched my jaw with his long, strong, beautiful fingers, and caressed my face.Being touched by Jericho Barrons with kindness makes you feel like you must be the most special person in the world. It’s like walking up to the biggest, most savage lion in the jungle, lying down, placing your head it its mouth and, rather than taking your life, it licks you and purrs.”

“Time heals. No, it doesn't. At best, time is the great leveler, sweeping us all into coffins. We find ways to distract ourselves from the pain. Time is neither scalpel nor bandage. It is indifferent. Scar tissue is not a good thing. It is merely the wound's other face.”

“Four: If you try to force yourself into my head, I will force myself into your pants.”

“What are you" -Mac "I don't follow" -Jericho "You dropped 30 feet in that warehouse. You should have broken something. What are you?" -Mac "A man with a rope." -Jericho”

“Flirtation doesn't have to go somewhere; it certainly doesn't need to end up in bed. I like to think of it as a little friendlier than a handshake, a little less intimate than a kiss. It's a way of saying hi, you look great, have a wonderful day. A tasteful flirtation, played out people who understand the rules, leave everyone feeling good and can perk up the bluest mood.”

“All my life, up until that moment, I'd had a warm, protective blanket wrapped around me, knitted of aunts and uncles, purled of first and second and third cousins, knot-tied with grandmas and grandpas and greats. That blanket had just dropped from my shoulders. I felt cold, lost and alone.”

“I'm a bartender. I like recipes. They're concretes. Was the drink recipe for seduction one shot charm and two shots self-deception, shaken, not stirred?”

“Distinguish yourself [...] in an age where girls often make themselves too available to boys, by making him work a little for your attention. He'll think he's won a prize when he gets it, and he'll work that much harder to keep it. Boys turn into men and men put a premium on what's hard to get.”

“Jericho Barrons was my poison now.”

“Good night, Lisa. Sleep with the angels."Her eyes stung from quick tears. It had been her mother's nightly benediction: Sleep with the angels. But then he added words her mother never had: "Then come back to earth and sleep with your devil, who would burn in hell for one night in your arms.”

“Resonably neat and clean?" Adrienne said incredulously. "that man is flawless from head to toe! He makes David and the Greek gods and Pan seem all out of proportion. He is raw sex in a bottle, uncorked. And somebody should cork it! He's -accck! Bah!" Adrienne spluttered and stuttered as she belatedly realised her words. Lydia was laughing so hard tears misted her eyes.”

“How does it feel, MacKayla? You have a piece of me in your mouth. Would you like another?”

“Assume' makes an 'ass' out of 'u' and 'me'.”

“I don’t know where dreams come from. Sometimes I wonder if they’re genetic memories, or messages from something divine. Warnings perhaps. Maybe we do come with an instruction booklet but we’re too dense to read it, because we’ve dismissed it as the irrational waste product of the ‘rational’ mind. Sometimes I think all the answers we need are buried in our slumbering subconscious, int he dreaming. The booklet right there, and ever night when we lay our heads down on the pillow it flips open. The wise read it, heed it. The rest of us try as hard as we can upon awakening to forget any disturbing revelations we might have found there.”

“You & I are here but the wind is everywhere. Cast no words upon it you don’t wish followed back to you.”

“Pretty girls don't have ugly mouths.”

“Barrons has something the rest of us don't have. I don't know what it is, but I feel it all the time, especially when we're standing close. Beneath the expensive clothes, unplaceable accent, and cultured veneer, there's something that never crawled all the way out of the swamp. It didn't want to. It likes it there.”

“He ran a hand over his face and shook his head. "Lass, I have never lied to you. I adore you and there have never been any other women from the future here. And these"- he flung a tampon in the air- "cleaning swabs, I cannot fathom why they upset you so greatly, but I assure you I have never let the maids use them."Lisa's brow furrowed. No man could be so stupid. "Cleaning Swabs?"He snatched up a gun and jerked the barrel in her direction, and an unwrapped tampon shot out. It was coated with black from the slow corrosion of the steel. She eyed it for a moment, bent, and plucked it from the floor. "You clean your guns with these?"He lowered the gun. "Is that not the purpose for which they were designed? I vow I could not conceive of another."Didn't you read the box?"There were too many words I didn't understand!”

“Because I knew the moment I saw you,” he ground out savagely, her “I hate you” still ringing in his ears, “that in another life—a life where I didn’t become a dark sorcerer—you were my wife. I cherished you. I adored you. I loved you until the end of time, Jessica MacKeltar. But I doona get to have that life. So I’ll take you any fucking way I can get you. And I’ll not apologize for one moment of it”

“Yesterday was a memory. Tomorrow was a hope. Today was another day to live and do one's best to love”

“Words can be twisted into any shape. Promises can be made to lull the heart and seduce the soul. In the final analysis, words mean nothing. They are labels we give things in an effort to wrap our puny little brains around their underlying natures, when ninety-nine percent of the time the totality of the reality is an entirely different beast. The wisest man is the silent one. Examine his actions. Judge him by them.”

“The most confused we ever get is when we're trying to convince our heads of something our heart knows is a lie.”

“I've come to hold the human spirit in the highest regard. Like the body, it struggles to repair itself. As cells fight off infection and conquer illness, the spirit, too, has remarkable resilience. It knows when it is harmed, and it knows when the harm is too much to bare. If it deems the injury too great, the spirit cocoons the wound, in the same fashion that the body forms a cyst around infection, until the time comes that it can deal with it. For some people, that time never comes. Some stay fractured, forever broken. You see them on the street, pushing carts. You see them in the faces of the regulars at the bar.”

“There are only shades of gray. Black and white are nothing more than lofty ideals in our minds, the standards by which we try to judge things, and map out our place in the world in relevance to them. Good and evil, in their purest form, are as intangible and forever beyond our ability to hold in our hand as any Fae illusion. We can only aim at them, aspire to them, and hope not to get so lost in the shadows that we can no longer aim for the light.”

“Its our actions that define us. What we choose. What we resist. What we're willing to die for.”

“No matter how people try to dispute it, perception is reality. Its what you choose to believe that makes you the person you are.”

“When insane things start to arrange themselves in sane patterns around you, you know you got problems.”

“I have your word?”“You trust my word?”“You’re an idealistic fool. Of course.”

“Fire isn’t good or bad. It just burns.”

“I said breathe. Not do a fish-out of-water imitation.”

“Yesterday is skin on snake, to be shed many times.”

“The entire time I'm burning in Hell, I'll regret each tear I made you weep. But if Hell were the price for twenty days with you, I'd condemn myself again and again. - Cian MacKeltar ”