...just a little touches her and there. He puts his hands on your arms or back, he stands close to you, getting you used to him... it's a mating ritual. Like March of the Penguins.

Hardy's either done the wrong thing for the wrong reason . . . " Another big swallow. "Or the wrong thing for the right reason.

I thought I would spend the rest of my life searching for little reminders of you.

I feel like I've been shut in a closet, and he's on the other side, and he doesn't have the key to unlock the door.

I’ve never heard of a man being so eager to confess to the parent of a girl he’s just ruined

I swear on St. Francis, the patron saint of all animals.” Seeing Poppy’s hesitation, Beatrix added enthusiastically, “If a band of pirates kidnapped me and took me to their ship and threatened to make me walk the plank over a shiver of starving sharks unless I told them your secret, I still wouldn’t tell it. If I were tied by a villain and thrown before a herd of stampeding horses all shod in iron, and the only way to keep from being trampled was to tell the villain your secret, I—

The Travises who had survived were the most purely stubborn people on earth, the kind who relied on their backbones when their wishbones were broken.