A bolt of warmth, fierce with joy and pride and gratitude, flashed through me like sudden lightning. I don't care about whose DNA has recombined with whose. When everything goes to hell, the people who stand by you without flinching-they are your family. And they were my heroes.

No rest for the wicked, Bob, and that means that we can't slack off either, or they'll outwork us.

My brother the vampire, whose kiss was a slow death sentence, had a stable and loving relationship with a girl who was crazy about him. By contrast, I could barely talk to a woman, at least about anything pertaining to a relationship. Given that my only long-term girlfriends had faked their own death, died, and broken free of enslaving enchantments to end the relationship, the empirical evidence seemed to indicate that he knew something I didn't. Keep your life tonight, Harry. Complicate it tomorrow.

No story that juicy was going to stay secret for long.

I just stood there staring, because while I've seen a lot of weird things, I hadn't ever seen that.

We're all so damned fragile.

Pansy," Murphy sneered. Thomas leered at her. "You make my stamen tingle when you talk like that, Sergeant.