“Bryn’s back was to me, auburn hair pulled up in the usual sloppy-romantic twist. Soft murmurs came from her as she gently pruned dead leaves from a strange green plant.“They’re never going to talk back. You know that, right?”She turned, suppressing her smile. “Shows how little you know about earth crafting. They always talk back.”

“Hi,' he says.'Hi,' she says back, and then to her great surprise, she begins to cry.'You know,' Nick says as he hands her a tissue from the bedside table,' for all this talk about how you don't cry, you sure are sprouting a lot of water.”

“Right back where you started, she told herself. Right back in the middle of that town. You were out, she told her heartburn. You. Were. Out. Her father once told her that when you leave a place, you should never go back, because no matter what the actual circumstances, it will always look like a retreat, a failure. That was sure how it felt.”

“Let me know when you're ready to talk." She stopped and glanced at them both over her shoulder. "Maybe then I'd be ready to discuss your sexual twists and my own little abnormal desires. You never know what we all might learn that we haven't already."With that, she turned and moved back into the house, closing the door behind her and disappearing out of sight. And Cam found his back slammed against the side of Ian's Hummer, his brother in his face.Lust and irritation flared in his brother's eyes. "You better start talking," he grated. "Because you know what she just did?""She just dared us, Cam. And I don't know about you, but the thought of 'abnormal desires' dancing through her mind is going to drive me fucking crazy. Now, fix it.”

“It’s all right,” the boy murmured as he felt her trembling. “My grandmother always told me ‘Never try to turn back on a new road—you don’t know what adventures await you.”

“I tried to go back and talk about what I did know. I told her about one girl he'd brought home from Cornell; I'd asked if she was his girlfriend, and he's said, "When you define something, you limit it.”