“Beckett smiled at his past and future customers with both his dimples. No need to feel alarmed, his smile told them. The devil always had the biggest welcome mat at his door.”

“Cole reached into his pocket and handed Beckett the bag with the rings. He held them gently in a cupped hand for a moment and smiled down at them. Then he put them in his pocket and held his head high.”

“I had a cousin, Randall, killed on Iwo Jima. Have I told you?Have I told you his was a beautiful smile? Not the smile of a cynic, nor the easy, hungry smile of boys his age, whose smiles that aim to get them somewhere, are a commodity in exchange for God knows what. No. His was completely without intent; an accident of a smile. The kind of smile that would have surprised him if he could have seen it for himself. But he was too young to know his own extraordinariness.”

“If i opened the door would he be there? would he smile at me and show his dimples? Would his cheeks be scruffy because he needed a shave? Would he hug me? all i've wanted all these monthes was for him to be alive.But i'd seen him on the floor. i'd seen him in the coffin. And you can feel it when someone has died, you can feel that his soul is gone, just gone, the emptiness of his body.”

“It's a bitch on this ship, isn't it?' That got an unexpected smile out of the symp. Musey had two dimples on his cheeks that made him look about half his chronological age.”

“A residual smile lingered on his face, making the dimple in his cheek sink in. The more he smiled, the more I wanted to hate him, and yet it was the very thing that made hating him impossible.”