“Ari stood up to greet them, and Crawford went back to his grumpy bastard therapy, which some people confused with spinning.”

“I'm still not a god," he said apologetically. Crick stood behind him and pulled his shoulders back against that wide, strong chest. "Better than a god," Crick murmured. "You're the reason to have faith.”

“You’re my friend,” Chris whispered back, and his other hand came up so he could rub Xander’s lower lip with his thumb. “That makes you beautiful.”

“You nervous about doing this on camera?”Chance tilted his head a little, considering. “Well, yeah, of course. You don’t know what you look like when you come—for all I know, I’m hella ugly or something. But at the same time....” He trailed off and shuddered, and his eyes got half-lidded. One hand went unconsciously to his stomach, then slid up to his nipples, which were still pointy and puckered. “It’s sort of cool. It’s making my stomach all jumpy, and....” His other hand slid down under the waistband of his shorts, as he made obvious kneading motions on his groin.“It’s turning you on?”“Mmmm....”“Take the shorts off, Chance, and show us.”

“Malcolm chuckled wickedly. "You, my American friend, are like a hidden landmine of sex appeal. I'm going to have to look out for you.""Too late." Owen raised his face to the unfamiliar smells, breezes, sounds of the city, enjoying them even more now that he knew something of it and it had become personal to him. "I've already exploded. You're caught."He tilted his head back and laughed, inviting Malcolm to share the joke, but Malcolm was unusually quiet.....”

“You don't love people at their best, sweetheart. You just love them because you can't help it.”

“Oh gods... oh gods... I had hurt him... so many times, I had hurt him. By trying to hurt myself, I had hurt him. By trying to push him away, I had hurt him. Every time I opened my mouth and belittled myself with my "turns of rough poetry", I had sliced his heart as fine as my wrists. I did not know why he loved me as he did. I might never know. But as I stood there and held him, my back nagging at me and my leg screaming in protest, I realized that the least I could do was welcome his love with an open heart. And part of doing that was loving myself enough to want to live.”