“So what now?" he said. "What do you mean?""What do we do now? We can't just be roommates.""You said you didn't like me.""I don't like you. I don't like how your hair smells, and how I can't stop thinking about waking up and seeing your face. I hate how my bed felt empty when you left. I don't like how good you were with my family, especially Harper, and how I wanted to see you with then again, but not just as a guest. As a member. You're right. I don't like you at all.""When did you change your mind?""My mind never changed. I've wanted you since the moment you opened the door and had that stunned look on your face. It just took me a while to admit it. Why deny it now? It is what it is and it's not going to change.""Oh.""This doesn't mean I'm going to be nice. I'm still going to be an ass. I'll just be an ass who apologizes and brings you flowers to say he's been a dick.""Chocolate," I said. "What?""I'd rather have chocolate when you apologize.""Chocolate it is." He smiled. "So does that mean what I think it means?""No. It just means that you get to bring me chocolate when you've been an ass. I'm going to weigh three hundred pounds." I focused my attention back on the peppers. I couldn't think about Hunter's declaration of... whatever it was. Footsteps didn't make me look up. "Taylor, look at me. Please." Damn. If only he didn't say please. "I can't promise to not make you mad. I can't promise that I won't hurt you. All I can promise is that I want you in my life, and I'll do anything to keep you there.”

“I don't like you. I don't like how your hair smells, and how I can't stop thinking about waking up and seeing your face. I hate how my bed felt empty when you left. I don't like how good you were with my family, especially Harper, and how I wanted ot see you with them again, but not just as a guest. As a member. You're right. I don't like you at all.”

“Just what the hell did you mean, you bastard, when you said we couldn't punish you?" said the corporal who could take shorthand reading from his steno pad."All right," said the colonel. "Just what the hell did you mean?""I didn't say you couldn't punish me, sir.""When," asked the colonel."When what, sir?""Now you're asking me questions again.""I'm sorry, sir. I'm afraid I don't understand your question.""When didn't you say we couldn't punish you? Don't you understand my question?""No, sir, I don't understand.""You've just told us that. Now suppose you answer my question.""But how can I answer it?""That's another question you're asking me.""I'm sorry, sir. But I don't know how to answer it. I never said you couldn't punish me.""Now you're telling us what you did say. I'm asking you to tell us when you didn't say it."Clevinger took a deep breath. "I always didn't say you couldn't punish me, sir.”

“Do you know what it was like kissing Holly and looking up to see you?""What?""You said to begin anywhere."But I hadn't expected that as a beginning, middle or end. I felt my cheeks getting warm. "I guess it was pretty embarrassing for both of us," I said, and walked ahead of him so he wouldn't see my face. "I know, I just kept staring at you.""What were you thinking?""I don't remember.""Don't you start using that line," he chided."Then don't ask me, Nick." Did he suspect how I felt.He caught me and turned me around to face him. I focused on his shirt. "Okay," he said quietly, "I'll tell you what I was thinking. I couldn't believe that I, who was never going to get hooked, had fallen in love with a girl who didn't want to date, and she was watching me kiss somebody else."I glanced up."Your turn, brave girl. What were you thinking?""That Holly looked beautiful in your arms and that you didn't pull away from her the way you had pulled away from me when I kissed you."He drew me to him. "I'm not pulling away again," he said holding me close.”

“When you got captured, I didn't know..." He trailed off, had to chug whiskey before he could continue. "If it'd be like...""What?""Like it was with Clotile.""Oh, Jackson, no. I was okay. I'm unharmed.""Didn't know if I'd get there too late," he said with a shudder. Then he crossed over to me, until we stood toe-to-toe. "Evie, if you ever get taken from me again, you better know that I'll be coming for you." He cupped my face with a bloodstained hand. "So you stay the hell alive! You don't do like Clotile, you doan take that way out. You and me can get through anything, just give me a chance."--his voice broke lower "just give me a chance to get to you." He buried his face in my hair, inhaling deeply. "There is nothing that can happen to you that we can't get past."..."When you say we...?"He pulled back, gazing down at me, his eyes blazing. "I'm goan to lay it all out there for you. Laugh in my face--I don't care. But I'm goan to get this off my chest.""I won't laugh. I'm listening.""Evie, I've wanted you from the first time I saw you. Even when I hated you, I wanted you." He raked his fingers through his hair. "I got it bad, me." My heart felt like it'd stopped--so that I could hear him better."For as long as you've been looking down your nose at me, I've been craving you, an envie like I've never known.""I don't look down at you! I'm too busy looking up to you."..."The corners of his lips curled for an instant before he grew serious again. "You asked me if I had that phone with your pictures, if I'd looked at it. Damn right, I did! I saw you playing with a dog at the beach, and doing a crazy-ass flip off a high dive, and making faces for the camera. I learned about you"- his voice grew hoarse -"and I wanted more of you. To see you every day." With a humourless laugh, he admitted, "After the Flash, I was constantly sourcing ways to charge a goddamned phone--that would never make a call."I murmured, "I didn't know...I couldn't be sure.""It's you for me, peekon.”

“I said, "Jesse, don't flatter yourself that I did this for you. I mean, it has been nothing but one giant pain in the neck, having you for a roommate. Do you think I like having to come home from school or from work or whatever and having to explain stuff like the Bay of Pigs to you? Believe me, life with you is no picnic."He didn't say anything. He just kept pulling me along."Or what about Tad?" I said, bringing up what I knew was a sore subject. "I mean, you think I like having you tag along on my dates? Having you out of my life is going to make things a lot simpler, so don't think, you know, I did this for you. I only did it because that stupid cat of yours has been crying its head off. And also because anything I can do to make your stupid girlfriend mad, I will.""Nombre de Dios, Susannah," Jesse muttered. "Maria's not my girlfriend.""Well, she certainly used to be," I said. "And what about that, anyway? That girl is a full-on skank, Jesse. I can't believe you ever agreed to marry her. I mean, what were you thinking, anyway? Couldn't you see what she was like underneath all that lace?”