“That would have been the end of it, book Z in the series, nothing left to do but mourn, or curse her into the afterlife.”

“If my heart had feet, it would have been up the staircase before the rest of me.”

“I love you, Nora. I will think you beautiful when I have no eyes left to see. I will remember your voice when my ears go. You can’t hold on to me forever, but I will hold on to you until I am nothing but dirt.”

“Seriously,let me talk to her when she wakes up. Girl-to-girl.""No offense, Chas, but you'd scare the crap out of her.""Want to say that to my face, Coalhouse?""What's left of it.”

“I’m here for every bit of your life. The bad parts, the scary parts. And I vow to do all you ask of me that is fair … even at the end.” I knew I didn’t have to elaborate; I could see that he’d gotten it, and that it moved him. "I do.”

“All the while I rattled off a long list of curses in the soundproofed room of my mind.”

“And now, because of everything you were involved in, I will spend the rest of my life hiding in the outback, mourning the death of a man who was dead when I meant him!”