Don’t tell me your name. It’s likely to awaken my conscience, and that’s the last thing we want.

The biggest challenge of my career, which is something that authors of genre fiction face all the time, is writing something fresh and new and at the same time meeting reader expectations.

Michael nodded tersely, eyeing a table across the room. It was empty. So empty. So joyfully, blessedly empty. He could picture himself a very happy man at that table. "Not feeling very conversational this evening, are we?" Colin asked, breaking into his (admittedly tame) fantasies.

And so Harry became proficient in the task of cleaning up vomit.

And for the rest of the night, he couldn’t quite forget the smell of her perfume. Or maybe it was the soft sound of her chuckle. Or maybe it was neither of those things. Maybe it was just her.

Just be quiet and accept the praise.

He ought to buy her a new dress. She would never accept it, of course, but maybe if her current garments were accidentally burned... ...But how could he manage to burn her dress? She'd have to not be wearing it, and that posed a certain challenge in and of itself.