“Most animals can be tamed, I suppose," Cork replied. "The question is, do you really want to? Make them tame and they become easy prey for people not as kindly disposed toward them as you are.”

“I thought if you loved someone you were supposed to, like, forgive them. I thought that was what love was supposed to be all about."Cork shook his head: "Easy to say, harder to do.”

“I need some-" Cork thought a moment. "I was going to say advice, but the truth is, I need some guidance, Tom.""We all do sometimes. It's not always easy to admit.”

“They fell quiet. Cork wanted to say he loved her. He wanted to ask her to forgive him. He wanted to lay his head against her breast and weep into her warm flesh and feel as connected to someone as he'd felt the night the grief passed through him when he unted the big bear with Sam Winter Moon.[.............]"You've always made me laugh, Cork. That's not what I want now.""What do you want?""To feel needed. To feel that you need me as much as you need air to breathe. I'm worth that.”

“I won't try to argue you out of this pit you've climbed into, Cork.”

“She [Jo] recalled them holding one another and feeling a terrible numbness where caring should have been. She'd blamed it on the circumstances, the weight of what each of them carried that night, the responsibilities. But it wasn't that. They were holding something dying, maybe already dead, but they were too scared to admit it.She wondered why the tragedy at Burke's Landing hadn't brought them together. Adversity was supposed to do that, wasn't it? Instead, everything got worse. Cork wasn't just distant. Something in him seemed to have died along with the other deaths that drizzly morning. Nothing mattered.”

“Do you believe in God?"St. Kawasaki looked amused. "Hell of a question to ask a priest."[...] "I'm asking because I've been a cop most of my life, but I don't believe in justice anymore. I just wondered if the same was true in your work.""Why wouldn't it be? Priests are only human. We wuestion, doubt, even grow a little despondent at times because what the world shoves at us doesn't seem to bear much mark of the divine." [...] "But in the end I always come back to believing.""Why? Why believe in something that continues to let you down?""Like justice, eh?" The priest drank and made a satified sound. "Sure hits the spot, Cork." He looked down where Cork sat on the folding canvas chair. "Everything disappoints us sometimes. Everybody disappoints us. Men let women down, women let men down, ideals don't hold water. And God doesn't seem to give a damn. I can't speak for God, Cork, but I'll tell you what I think. I think we expect too much. Simple as that. And the only thing that lets us down is our own expectaton. I used to pray God for an easy life. Now I pray to be a strong person.”