“There was nothing like an extra helping of guilt to cool a man's blood.And it was guilt as much as the hot food and the glass of good wine that got Brian through the evening in the Grant kitchen. The size of it left little room for lust, considering.There was Adelia Grant giving him a warm greeting as if he was welcome to swing in for dinner anytime he had the whim, and Travis getting out an extra plate himself-as if he waited on employees five days a week-and saying that there was plenty to go around as Brendon had other plans for dinner.Before he knew it, he was sitting down, having food heaped in front of him and being asked how his day had been.And not in a way that expected a report.He didn't know what to do about it. He liked these people, genuinely liked them. And there he was lusting after their daughter. An alley mutt after a registered purebred.”

“No matter how much he talked, she never answered him, but he knew she was still there. He knew it was like the soldiers he had read about. They would have an arm or a leg blown off, and for days, even weeks after it happened, they could still feel the arm itching, the leg itching, the mother calling.”

“A man came up to me the other day and said he hadn't had a bite in weeks. So you know what I did? I walked by him like he didn't even exist.”

“Sometimes Sarah would be up and about and when she saw Pete she would let something slip.He would walk into the kitchen to say hello and she would say, ‘Do you think whoever has him knows that he likes to read about space? Do you think they know he loves pasta but hates corn?’They were random questions. Pete tried to answer at first but then he realised that Sarah wasn’t really talking to him. She was simply voicing out loud the questions that went through her head every day, all day, tormenting her. 'Do they know he likes Vegemite toast for breakfast?’‘Do they know how he likes his scrambled eggs?’‘Are they making sure he has his milk every day?’‘Are they keeping him warm?’‘Are they being kind to him?’‘Is he going to school?’‘Do they know he hates to be tickled?’‘Are they hurting him? Are they hurting my little boy?’What could he say to that? Pete said nothing. He hung his head and waited for her to stop asking questions.”

“I waited for him to come out. He didn't. I considered going in after him, but knew the fact that I had readied myself to kill him did not mean that he had readied himself to die.”

“Nothing had worked out the way he’d hoped. He should’ve expected it by now, maybe. After all, things never had before. And yet he kept on pissing into the wind. He was like a man whose door’s too low, but instead of working out how to duck, keeps on smacking his head into the lintel every day of his miserable life. He wanted to feel sorry for himself, but he knew he deserved no better. A man can’t do the things he’d done, and hope for happy endings.”