“(...) then went into his room in the middle of the night after a long, heavy day of footwork and drinking; a coward's fight. She'd trussed him up and cut off his cock. She considered the act her formal resignation.”

“Oh, for pity’s sake,” she muttered, but stopped fighting him. After a moment of enduring the indignity ofhaving his hands on her, she snapped, “My pistol is in my reticule, which is sitting in Lord Draker’sdrawing room. All right?”The woman was a walking arsenal. “All right.” He released her, not because of what she’d said, butbecause running his hands over her petite but surprisingly womanly figure had perversely aroused him. Hedidn’t want her to know it, however—the female was liable to shoot off his cock for its impertinence.”

“A boy got a splinter in his eye, and his heart turned cold. Only two people noticed. One was a witch, and she took him for her own. The other was his best friend. And she went after him in ill-considered shoes, brave and completely unprepared.”

“As they began to mount the stairs, he looked up at his mother. "Just how many of those wine coolers did she drink?" "She had three," Suzy replied. Three! Bobby Tom couldn't believe it. After only three drinks, she'd stripped off her clothes and demanded that he have sex with her. "Mom?" He shoved on his hat. "Yes dear." "Whatever you do, don't let her anywhere near a six-pack.”

“With the passing of time, she would slowly tire of this exercise. She would find it increasingly exhausting to conjure up, to dust off, to resuscitate once again what was long dead. There would come a day, in fact, years later, when [she] would no longer bewail his loss. Or not as relentlessly; not nearly. There would come a day when the details of his face would begin to slip from memory's grip, when overhearing a mother on the street call after her child by [his] name would no longer cut her adrift. She would not miss him as she did now, when the ache of his absence was her unremitting companion--like the phantom pain of an amputee.”

“Special. Cute. Friends. He wished she'd just cut his testicles off and be done with it already. Depending on the next adjective she chose for him, he would either qualify as a card-carrying member of Emasculated Men's Club or a Muppet. No wonder he avoided love for as long as he had. When it went unrequited, it truly sucked.”