I moistened my lips. His gaze fixed on them. I think I stopped breathing. He jerked so sharply away that his long dark coat sliced air, and turned his back to me. “Was that an invitation, Ms.Lane?” “If it was?” I asked, astonishing myself. What did I think I was doing? “I don’t do hypotheticals. Little girl.

As she lifted the glittering strand of diamonds from the box, a small slip of paper fell out. She caught it as it wafted toward the floor. Four words in ancient script, an arrogantly slanted scrawl. Accept these, accept me. Well, she thought, blinking, that was certainly direct and to the point. -Adam's note to Gabrielle

I didn’t ask. Some things are better left unsaid. He looked at me and I shivered. I never get enough of him. Never will. He lives. I breathe. I want. Him. Always. Fire to my ice. Ice to my fever. Later we would go to bed, and when he rose over me, dark and vast and eternal, I’d know joy.

The battle had been invisible to the naked eye, but the hardest ones are.

I lay my head on his chest and listen to his heart beating, solid and sure.....he reads me so well. He's known about my emotional empathy since we were children. Nothing disturbs him...Few can lie to me... I don't know the truth, only that there is a lie. It takes a scrupulously honest man to love me. That's my Sean. We learned to trust each other completely before we were old enough to have learned suspicion.

My breathing was shallow and my hands were fists. 'Oh, yes, I'm going to have to kill you Barrons.' I said coolly, Partly because, for the most miniscule sliver of an instant, while looking at those handcuffs, I'd imagined myself climbing back into bed and pretending I wasn't cured yet.

A comfort zone can be a mental state:Belief in God is a lot of peoples's comfort zone. Dont get me wrong, I'm not knocking faith; I just dont think you should have it because it makes you feel safe. I think you should have it because you do. Because somewhere deep inside you, you know beyond equivocating that something greater, wiser and infinitely more loving than we're capable of understanding has a vested interested in the universe, in the way things turn out. Because you can feel that, as much as the forces of darkness might try to gain the upper hand, there is an Upper Hand.