“Wonderful, a death match on my first day behind bars. Some girls have all the luck”

“But as Luca slid into my passenger seat to accept my offer of a ride home, the most pressing question was already weighing heavy on my mind. What does a warrior princess wear for her first day on the throne?”

“Alec licked his spoon, then set it on the table and popped his drink open. "Okay, I may be breaking some kind of girl bonding rule or something, but can I offer you a guy's perspective on this?"I frowned, my spoon halfway to my mouth. "Is this gonna make me want to hit you?"He shrugged. "Maybe. But it's the truth. Here goes: kissing back is an instinct. Unless the girl smells like a sewer or has tentacles feeling you up independently, a guy's first instinct is to kiss back. That's how it works. What's important is how long that kissing back lasted. So...how long?”

“Some day soon, reaper, your mouth is going to be the source of your own destruction.""That does seem likely, doesn’t it?" Tod glanced at me and shrugged. "Until then, it remains a source of my own amusement.”

“Relief washed over me like that first air-conditioned breeze on a hot summer day.”

“I was fine with that. The very idea of Death knowing my name made my skin crawl. Even if this particular Death was only one of many, and almost too pretty to look at.”

“A field trip. You interested in doing something dangerous, and possibly illegal?"Does it involve underage girls, broken curfews and soorte4d fruit toppings?"I dropped the empty can into the recycling bin and leaned against the kitchen peninsula, grinning like an idiot. "Two of the three. And I could probably scrounge up some strawberry jam, if you're desperate.""I'm never desperate," Tod said, only his voice hadn't come from my phone. I whirled around to see the reaper standing behind me, still holding his cell. "But for the record, I prefer apricot." "Yuck. Nobody likes apricot jam.”