“My insides twist in a flurry of excitement, and I stiflethe laugh welling inside.Parker Whalen knows I’m alive.”

“I know some women go in for excitement and danger. It must make them feel more alive. It's my professional judgment that you're a dangerous man.”

“I can barely get a guy in my own town to realize I'm alive. Well that’s not true, he knows I’m alive. He just doesn't t look at me the way I want him to. Like, well like the way Grant is looking at me right now. His eyes all gentle and questioning, his lips slightly parted.”

“Everything inside me twisted in pain and relief. My brothers. I was in the same room as my brothers.”

“Cal," I whisper into her sleep, "if you go, you know what? You'll break my liver." I want to pretend that it's a joke, that she will wake up and laugh with me, throwing her head back the way she did last night, bit this time the words are true . . . she will break my liver, break my heart, kill everything inside alive inside me.”

“I am alive and well and unconcerned about the rumors of my death. But if I were dead, I would be the last to know.”