Coffee or orange juice?” “Water is fine.” His eyebrows went up. “Uh-oh,” Auriele said, but she was smiling. Darryl was not. “Are you implying that my coffee is not the best in four counties? Or my fresh-squeezed orange juice is less than perfect?

I could hear him laughing. Son of a bit*h. I would kill him. I didn't care if he was coyote or the son of Satan.He was a dead man walking.

He loved her beyond all reason and didn't expect her to love him back. He was just waiting for her to wise up.

A man who will risk nothing for love is not a man

I like that people can just look at you and know that you are taken, that you are mine.” He closed his eyes and laughed. “And yes, I know that sentiment is at the top of the Women’s Liberation Movement’s list of things not to say to a modern woman

I told them," he said in a clear, carrying voice, "that they should not give someone as old and powerful as I a daughter to love. That it would end badly.

During my last year of college I wrote the same ten pages over and over again. Those ten pages became the first few pages of my first novel. I can still recite the opening paragraph from memory - only now I cringe when I do it because they are - surprise! - a classic example of overwriting, in addition to being a more than a little pretentious.