“And on a personal level,my boyfriend and I love eachother enough,and we have enough respect for each other, that we're bigger than that."I laughed."Nick and I are not bigger than that.We are very,very small." Daisy nodded. "And then,of course, there's the fact that I'm prettier than my boyfriend. He may fly higher,but I look better doing it." She turned around backward. "I mean, even in these snow pants,check out my ass.”

“Listen.” The voice is extremely loud, and I am forced to hold the telephone away from my ear. “I don’t know who you are, or why you have Jack’s phone, but he is my boyfriend, and—”Boyfriend? What is a boyfriend? Perhaps it is something like a beau. “Is he engaged to you, then?” I hope not.“What? No. Of course not.”“Oh, what a relief. He is my true love, and you do not sound very nice.”“What? Listen, you . . .”And then, strangely enough, she calls me a female dog.”

“Dylan looked at me and matter-of-factly said, "My Dad's smart. Boyfriends are way better than girlfriends." I laughed. "Oh really? And why is that?" The kid wrinkled his nose. "Because girls are gross.”

“Why, if you were not interested in me as anything more than a"-she stumbled, trying to find the right terminology-"momentary plaything, you might at least have just told me outright afterward." She crossed her arms and sneered at him. "Why didn't you? You think I was not strong enough to take it without causing a scene? I assure you, no one is better used to rejection than I, my lord. I think it very churlish of you not to inform me to my face that your breach in manners was an unfortunate impulse of the moment. I deserve some respect. We have known each other long enough for that at the very least.”

“To my surprise, I recognized Dimitri Belikov-Rose's boyfriend-among those doing crowd control. He was easy to spot since he was almost always taller than everyone around him. Dhampirs look very human, and even I could admit that he was pretty good-looking. There was a rugged handsomeness to him, and even in a still photograph, I could see a fierceness as he watched the crowd.”

“I didn't know I had it in me. There's more to all of us than we realize. Life is so much bigger, grander, higher, and wider than we allow ourselves to think. We're capable of so much more than we allow ourselves to believe.”