“It was like trying to think about what he’d be thinking if he never existed. He wouldn’t be thinking about what he was thinking. He just wouldn’t exist. It wouldn’t hurt.”

“If you think God’s there, He is. If you don’t, He isn’t. And if that’s what God’s like, I wouldn’t worry about it.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t say that. Work, my dear Blushweaver, is like fertilizer.”“It smells?”He smiled. “No, I was thinking that work is like fertilizer in that I’m glad it exists; I just don’t ever want to get stuck in it.”

“He also thinks there’s something in the Carpathian woman’s chemistry that makes it impossible for the female chromosome to beat out the male.”“Wouldn’t you know he’d think it was the woman,” Shea sniffed contemptuously.”

“I think it was the ChapStick that did it; he tasted like ChapStick and Jack Daniels. That reminder of human vulnerability got to me in a way that polished experience wouldn’t have. Not that he had lied about the experience.”

“If you think your boss is stupid, remember: you wouldn’t have a job if he was any smarter.”