“So much for keeping things business when it came to Jenna Darrow. If this had been a test, he figured he’d just failed it with flying colors.”

“Damn, amigo. Just how much Oprah have you been watching since I’ve been gone?”

“As a girl, Mira had held his hand and led him out of a dark place. As a woman, she’d held his heart, despite his efforts to prove himself from caring for someone he could never bear to lose. Now he only hoped he’d find the strength to push Mira away, when all he wanted was to pull her close and never let her go.”

“Jenna.” Brock stroked the underside of her chin very gently, lifting her face up toward his. “Would it be all right if I kissed you?”

“Maybe she should cut the guy a little slack, [...] Maybe Thorne had been a no-show because something bad happened to him on the job.What if he'd been injured in the line of duty and didn't come by as promised because he was incapacitated in some way? Maybe he hadn't called to apologize or to explain his absence because he physically couldn't. Right. And maybe she had checked her brain into her panties from the second she first laid eyes on the man.”

“he settled back on the bed with her and wrapped her in his protective embrace, giving her a hundred solemn promises that he was very eager to keep, and loving her with all the reverence and worship of a blood-bonded male who had stared hell in the face and now understood that he was holding heaven in his arms.”

“When he spoke, there was an odd vulnerability to his deep voice. As if he were letting her peek inside one of the dark chambers of the heart he seemed so sure he didn’t possess.”