“It rested flat on a surface. A cushion or a mattress. The toes curled up. Then another foot appeared, suspended in air until a leg extended. He started backward, repelled by whatever could twist and turn so freakishly.”

“She turned. ‘I’m quite serious, you know. I plan to murder him tonight.’ She touched my leg again; my muscles tensed. ‘I’ve got it all worked out. It’s a simply delightful plan.’ She cocked her head. ‘No, let me rephrase that. Really, it’s more delightfully simple.”

“She could work any situation to her advantage, instantly turning herself into the life of the party, whether it was some soirée for an oil tycoon or a rally for the homeless.”

“I always believed that for every good thing that happens in life, two tragedies rush in to kick your ass to keep you from getting all saccharine and deluded. It was as if just before you turned left into paradise, Ethel Merman popped up in your backseat and shouted, ‘Turn right, you idiot!”

“Somehow I can live in that awful building‟s shadows,” she said, “but I don‟t think I have the strength left to ever set foot in there again.”

“He lunged for me, but stopped short of hitting me, instead taking hold of my arm and pulling me toward him. ‘If I ever see you again,’ he whispered, ‘I’ll finish what I started in there.’ He squeezed my arm harder, digging into me. ‘Maybe, for fun, I’ll just snap your neck in half.’ His pressed his lips to my ear. ‘And I’d better not find out you tried to contact Helena again, got it?”

“You’re a bastard,’ she whispered, her hands beginning to tremble as she scooped up one of the figurines. I could tell by the costume it was Pulcinella, his body split in half. The head completely shattered. ‘You’re a selfish bastard.”