Oh good. I love being bait for a homicidal mutilator." Stephanie Plum

Cracker Jacks don't count as junk food because they're corn and peanuts, which we know to be high in nutrition. And they have a prize inside.

That’s how you tell what a man’s really made of. It’s one thing for a man to be big and brave and kill a spider. Any man could do that. Trailin’ after a woman when she’s shopping for thongs and push-up bras is a whole other category of man. And then if you want to see how far you can go with it, you ask him to carry one of those little pink bags they give you.

We were discussing a grisly double murder and Rodriguez was telling us all this in the same sort of conversational tone a person might use to pass on a favorite lasagna recipe. And I was responding with the same enthusiasm a new cook might show. I was simultaneously horrified and impressed with myself.

Give me the gun." Ranger said. I extracted the gun from my pants and handed it over. Ranger held the gun in the pulm of his hand and smiled. "It's warm," he said. He put the gun in the glove compartment and plugged the key into the ignition. Am I fired?" No. Any women who can heat up a gun like that is worth keeping around.

When Grandma Mazur is talking about the reason for the improved play of her 91-year-old bowling teammate, she said: "She's doing better now that we got her the longer tubing to her oxygen tank.

I checked my phone messages. Three in all. The first was from Joe. “Hey, Cupcake.” That was it. That was the whole message. The second was from Ranger. “Yo.” Ranger made Joe look like a chatterbox.