Nora Roberts

“Sometimes it’s all you can do,” he murmured. “Fight back; run wild, until you get it all out.”“Sometimes there is nothing to fight and nowhere to run.”

“We are so miserably shallow Josh, how do we stand ourselves?”

“You are wise as well as short.""I can also break bricks with my bare hands.""That's a handy skill if you ever find yourself walled up in the basement of an abandoned house by a psychopath.”

“That has not yet been put to the test. I got my fourth-degree black belt this winter. When I make martial arts noises, thousands flee in terror. Don't test me.""Can you hear that? It's my knees knocking.""They're wise to fear me.”

“I want lots and lots of sex.""You really are the woman of my dreams.""First round, wet shower sex, after we scrape off a few layers of the Alaskan tundra, then a short and satisfying lunch break. Then a second round of make-the-mattress-sing sex.""I feel a tear of gratitude and awe forming in the corner of my eyes. Don't think less of me.”

“I have to get used to it—to her, but she's put a light in him so I think I'm going to be a fan.""You're a stand-up gal, Swede.""If she screws him up, I'll peel the skin off her ass with a dull razor blade.”

“I had to get by the flower beds he's planted, the flowers in vases, candles, the potpourri in the powder room—""Mother of God! Potpourri in the powder room. We need to get a posse together ASAP, go get him. He can be deprogrammed. Don't lose hope.”

“I'm damned if I'm going to be eaten by a bear when I'm naked.""I'm sure it's a more pleasant experience dressed.”

“It's called male bonding. You'll never get it. I believe women are as capable as men, deserve equal pay—and that one day, should be sooner than later, in my opinion, the right woman can and should be leader of the free world. But you can't understand the male bonding rituals any more than men can understand why the vast majority of women are obsessed with shoes and other footwear.”

“Let's go have lotsa drunk sex before it hits.""'Kay. Drunk sex for everybody!”

“Getting a room's not always enough. Sometimes you gotta close the door.”

“When the going gets tough, the tough eat ribs.”

“Matt's brother and the blond cook spent a good portion of last season tangling the sheets. Historically, said cook tangled many other sheets with dexterity and aplomb.""Aplomb""It's a polite way to say she banged often, well and without too much discrimination.""That also sounded polite.""I was raised well.”

“Being dead didn't make Jack Mercy any less of a son of a bitch”

“He looked around when he heard a window-rattling roar. "Earthquake? Volcano? Nuclear war?""Beaver," Peter told him."I don't care if it is Alaska, you don't have beavers big enough to sound like that.”

“What was that technique you were using on those bastards?""An ancient form called kicking ass.”

“In my world, the self-righteous are often the ones sneaking around getting blow jobs before they go home to the wives and kiddies.”

“Roz to Amelia (the house ghost): How considerate of you, after trying to kill me, to see that I don't catch a cold.”

“Dinner's in one hour. If you're not back, sitting at the table, I'll beat you all unconscious with a spatula.”

“Look, if some guy dressed in his mother's clothes breaks in, fight him off until I get my pants back on.”

“- Spune-mi ce-ţi doreşti. El o prinse de încheieturi, apoi îşi trecu degetele printre ale ei.- Vreau o viaţă alături de tine, şi-o să împrumut cuvintele lui Jack şi Del acum - într-un fel. Vreau să încep acea viaţă, fiindcă tu eşti Parker. Tu eşti acea viaţă, eşti totul. Vreau ca povestea noastră să devină adevărată. Vreau - şi de data asta cuvintele îmi aparţin în întregime -, vreau să-ţi fac promisiuni şi vreau să le indeplinesc. Te iubesc şi vreau să-ţi promit că o să te iubesc tot restul vieţii mele.”

“- Când găseşti o femeie pe care o iubeşti cu tot sufletul şi te iubeşte şi ea - chiar şi cu slăbiciunile şi defectele tale, totul începe să se potrivească. Şi dacă poţi să vorbeşti cu ea, iar ea te ascultă, dacă te face să râzi şi te face să te gândeşti, te face să vrei, te face să veyi cine eşti cu adevărat, iar acel cineva e un om mai bun, pur şi simplu mai bun alături de ea, atunci ai fi un nebun să nu-ţi doreşti să-ţi petreci restul vieţii cu ea.”

“Dacă relaţia lor ar fi rămas una superficială, acea reticenţă nu ar fi contat. Dar nu rămăsese, credea Parker, aşa că era importantă. Conta, fiindcă trecuse de faza de interes, se abandonase atracţiei, explodase în dorinţă, se împiedicase în afecţiune, iar acum derapa necontrolat spre iubire.”

“- N-aş putea să dorm aici? Jack se ridică şi o ridică şi pe ea. Ea zâmbi adormită, petrecându-şi braţele pe după gâtul lui.- Ador când faci asta.- Ţi-ai câştigat dreptul să fii purtată pe sus. Noapte bună tuturor.”

“- De ce ne batem atâta capul? întrebă Parker. Bărbaţii oricum nu observă.- Fiindcă ceea ce purtăm afectează felul în care ne simţim, cum ne comportăm, cum ne mişcăm. Iar astea sunt lucruri pe care le observă. În special mişcarea. Îmbracă-te, machiază-ţi ochii. Vei şti că arăţi bine, aşa că te vei simţi bine. Ai să te distrez mai tare.”

“Se răsuci şi se aflau acum faţă în faţă.- Poate, pânâ la sfârşit, o să-mi dau seama de ce am în faţa ochilor.Ea se dădu înapoi.- Nu e chiar atât de complicat.- Nu tu eşti cea care priveşte. Eşti gata?”

“- Ai un minut? întrebă Mac.- Întâmplător am chiar mai multe. Poţi să-ţi iei şi tu unul.”

“Durerea o lovea în valuri, tari şi învolburate, biciuind-o şi sfâşiindu-i inima. În alte zile, valurile erau lente şi persistente, ameninţând să-i înece sufletul.”

“O amor, qualquer que seja o tempo, quaisquer que sejam os obstáculos, dura sempre.”

“It's not right," he repeated, grabbing her again and turning her to face him. "I'm not having it.""So you said, in clear terms.""I don't mean that.""Oh, well, if you've decided you'd like to have sex with me after all, I've changed my mind.""I haven't decided--" He broke off, staggered. "Changed your mind?""I have. Kissing you wasn't altogether what I thought it would be. So you were right and I was wrong." She gave him a deliberately insulting pat on the cheek." And that's the end of it.""The hell it is." He trapped her against the truck, quickly and firmly enough to have both excitement and annoyance rising inside her. "If I want you, I'll have you, and that's the end of it.”

“I want you more than I should," she heard herself say. "I have you less than I want.”

“Do you want to fix it?""I just said I was in love with her. Why wouldn't I want to fix it?""You want to know how?""Goddamn it, Del." He drank again. "Yes, since you're so fucking smart. How do I fix it?""Crawl."Jack blew out a breath. "I can do that".”

“People [are] as much a source of entertainment as they [are] a source of irritation. it keep[s] things balanced.”

“There was nothing like a Saturday - unless it was the Saturday leading up to the last week of school and into summer vacation. That of course was all the Saturdays of your life rolled into one big shiny ball.”

“You can't write well what you don't read for pleasure. If it doesn't entertain you, it's not going to entertain anyone else.”

“I promised myself that no matter where I went, what I did, I'd never take anything for granted again.”

“It was best not to think, not to analyze. It was best to accept and act.”

“The old goes into making us what we are, or what we're hell-bent on not being.”

“He pulled himself out of hard times, dealt with the scars from it, pushed himself to make a mark. A little bit of the wild side there, always. I told myself, oh no, I won't get tangled up with this one. And I said it again, even when I was tangled up.”

“I think things happen between people for a reason.”

“It doesn't matter, that's the point. It doesn't matter that things don't always work exactly the way you thought they should. Moments matter. People matter, how they feel, how they connect. Who they are alone and together. All that matters, no matter how quickly the moment passes. Maybe because it passes.”

“Some things in life are just out of our control. It's what we do about them that counts.”

“Why couldn't she have this, just enjoy this, without creating obstacles, digging up problems, worrying about mistakes, about tomorrow's? Why let the maybe's, the what if's, the probabilities spoil something so lovely?”

“It takes a lot of spine and stomach to make yourself into something when no one gives you a foundation.”

“Potholes and bumps? Welcome to the world. Every road gas them. They're there to be navigated, avoided, driven over, or through to the other side. Don't keep driving into the pothole.”

“Some people refuse to take the next step. You could refuse to take what you wanted most, because you're afraid someday you might lost it.”

“She's the light. Before, you can fumble around in the dark or manage in the dim. You don't even know it's dim because that's the way it's always been. But then, she's the light. Everything changes. If the light shuts off, or worse, you're stupid enough to shut it off yourself, it's a hell of a lot darker than before.”

“You bring the color and the life. It's a lucky man who is offered that color and life, and a wise one who values it.”

“And tis' my faith that every flower enjoys the air it breathes.”

“It's life, and it's messy, and it breaks down.”