“A couple of inches up and right and he would have been a soprano.”

“He inched his way up the corridor as if he would rather be yarding his way down it, which was true.”

“They will wake up one morning and realize their civilization has been pulled out from under them, inch by inch, dollar by dollar, just as ours was. They will know what it is to have been asleep for the most important century of their history.”

“Inch by tantalizing inch, he brought the shirt up exposing his six pack abs. Kim’s mouth went dry as more and more of his chest was revealed to her view. Her tongue ran over her parched lips. All she could think about was licking something off those abs. It could have been poison and she would have gladly licked it and begged for more.”

“Maybe there would be a bad outcome for some of the others, but no one was going to shoot a soprano.”

“Chaol had been right. She'd missed the target by six inches to the left,”