“Even when she’d fantasized, what she’d come up with hadn’t ever matched this reality. She’d never envisioned a sexy, borderline grouchy guy with a glint in his eye and an erection this tempting.”

“She’d really made the fuckup that kept on fucking up, hadn’t she?”

“She would never tell him and was ashamed to admit it, even to herself, but she’d fallen in love with him the instant she’d seen him. She’d been taken at gunpoint to the alleyway outside a gallery showing her paintings and had seen a powerful man, not tall but immensely broad. He was facing three armed thugs and he hadn’t looked frightened at all.He’d looked dangerous.And she’d fallen.”

“The aura of his soul. She’d seen them before when she’d guided the dead. But she’d never seen one quite like this, darkness and light blending to a color and texture that was both frightening and beautiful.”

“She’d always wondered what it would feel like to stand on one end of a ballroom and watch a handsome, powerful man make his way to her. This was as close as she’d ever come to it, she supposed. Standing at Diana’s side. Imagining.”

“Even the way he was the only man she’d ever met who both could and dared to hold up his side of a conversation with her.”